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Xerox University Microfilms 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, Michigan 4B106 73-18,905 HUNT, Ronald John, 1940- THE SOCIAL AND POLITICAL THOUGHT OF DAVID RICARDO. The Ohio State University- Ph.D., 1973 Political Science, general j University Microfilms,A XEROX Com pany, Ann Arbor, Michigan i . __________ ________________ Copyright by Ronald John Hunt 1973 ii THE SOCIAL AM) POLITICAL THOUGHT OF DAVID RICARDO Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University Ronald J. Hunt, B.S., M.A. a # w * * * The Ohio State University 1973 Approved by Adviser ©pt. of Political Science ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS To my parents. Special thanks are due to Professor David Kettler whose inspiration, encouragement, and careful criticism of the text made this project possible. Thanks are also due to Tony Walsh and Robert Handelman, two very committed attorneys, without whom this project could not have been successfully completed. iii VITA Oct. 25, 194-0 . B o m — Dayton, Ohio. 1962.............. B.S., Business Administration, The Ohio State University 1964 -.............. M.A., Economics, The Ohio State University 1965-1968 ........ Teaching Assistant, Department of Political Science, The Ohio State University 1968-1973 ........ Instructor, Department of Government, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio TABLE OP CONTENTS Chapter I LIBERALISM AND THE TRADITION OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 1 Introduction. Political Philosophy and Political Economy: The Case of David Ricardo. Liberalism: An Historical Appraisal. Politics and Society: The Utilitarian Tradition. Nascent Social Theory: Classical Political Economy. II DAVID RICARDO: POLICY SCIENTIST FOR A LIBERAL SOCIETY 52 Ricardo and the Movement for Reform. Property Values and Liberal Constitutionalism: The Question of Parliamentary Reform. Who Governs? Population Growth and the Poor Laws. III DAVID RICARDO AND THE BULLION CONTROVERSY: THE PRINCIPLES OF FREE TRADE ARTICULATED 106 Background to the Bullion Controversies: The Inflation and Deflation Phases. David Ricardo and the Bullion Controversies. Ricardo's Theory of Money. Summary: The Principles of Free Trade Established. IV DAVID RICARDO AND THE CORN LAW CONTROVERSY: THE DEVELOPMENT OF RICARDO'S THEORY OF VALUE 168 Background to the Corn Law Controversy. The Writing of the Principles. Capital Accumulation and Labour Costs: The Evolution of Ricardo's Theory of Value. The Labour Theory of Value and the C o m Law Controversy. V THE COSMOLOGY OF DAVID RICARDO 230 Progress and the Spector of Poverty. The Class Basis of Ricardo's Analysis. The International Division of Labour and the Doctrine of Comparative Advantage: Free Trade Imperialism. Summary. Toward a Distributive Theory of Justice! The Bourgeois Class as the Universal Class in Civil Society. v VI THE SOCIAL AMD ECONOMIC FOUNDATIONS OF POLITICAL RATIONALITY The Locus of Rationality in the Philosophy of David Ricardo. From Utopian Mentality to Ideology. Technological Rationality and the Crisis of Public Authority. Conclusion. BIBLIOGRAPHY LIST OP TABLES Table 1. British Net Public Expenditure, With Principal Headings, .1 .790-1816 2. British Public Income, With Principal Headings, 1790-1816 3. Percentage of Total British Net Income Derived (A) Prom Revenue, and (B) By Borrowing, 1790-1816 4-. Percentage of Unfunded to Total Public Borrowing, Annually, 1793-1816 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1. Monthly Average Price of Wheat and Annual Number of Enclosure Acts, 1793-1S15 viii CHAPTER I LIBERALISM AMD THE TRADITION OF POLITICAL ECONOMI ’•The science of political economy resembles more the sciences of morals and politics than the science of mathematics." (T.R. Malthus, Principles of Political Economy.) . The opposition between political economy and ethics is only a sham opposition and just as much no opposition as it is an opposition. All that happens is that political economy expresses moral laws in its own way. (K. Marx, The Economic and Philosophic Manu­ scripts of 1S4A .) . The final causes of all social changes and political revolutions are to be sought, not in men’s brains, not in men's better Insight into eternal truth and justice, but in changes in the modes of production and exchange. They are to be sought not in the philos­ ophy but in the economics of each particular epoch. The growing perception that existing social institutions are unreasonable and unjust, that reason has become unreason and right wrong, is only proof that in the modes of production and exchange changes have silently taken place with which the social order, adapted to earlier economic conditions, is no longer in keeping. (F. Engles, Socialism; Utopian and Scientific.) Introduction. Political Philosophy and Political Economy; The Case of David Ricardo It is imperative at the outset to ask in what sense the theories of David Ricardo represent a political philosophy. To ask this question, however, presupposes a preliminary answer to a logically 1 2 prior question: What is political philosophy? A convenient— yet accurate— answer is that there is neither a body of knowledge nor an approach to the understanding of human affairs that, understood by itself, could claim the exclusive mantle of political philosophy. There are only competing, oftentimes contradictory, claims. Such, ultimately, must be the case with an evaluation of the writings of David Ricardo. Any attempt to define political philosophy as the principles discoverable in the corpus of Ricardo's writings or, vice-versa, to exclude his theories because they do not conform to some preconceived notion of the underlying concerns of the "dis­ cipline" would— in all probability— involve a petitio principii. This does not mean, however, that no justification is possible. A number of different understandings of what constitutes political philosophy have been enumerated. A recent conception of the enterprise— by Michael A. Weinstein— will serve the function Q of classification as well, perhaps better, than that of any other. After reviewing Weinstein's conceptual scheme it will then be possible to speak more clearly about the place of David Ricardo in the history of political philosophy. # » According to Weinstein there are three basic issues which confront the contemporary political philosopher. The first, he identifies as the problem of "personal identity"; the second, as the problem of "organised power"; and, the third, as the problem of "political change." With respect to the first "problem," Wein­ stein feels that what is known to contemporary writers as "identity" was understood historically under the rubric of "human nature." And, as suggested by the change in the terms of reference, there have been changes in the conceptualization of the problem. The study of human nature is a challenge to explore the characteristics of man in general. When people become more interested in identity than in human nature, they begin to believe that human beings In large part create themselves through their actions. Even the nominally great disparity between the outlooks of existentialists and behaviorists narrows considerably on this issue. As much as behaviorists and existentialists differ about the. actual ways in which personalities come into being, they agree that identities are largely formed by social relations. While the existentialist would argue that human beings create their characters through choices and the behaviorist would hold that people mold each other’s characters through dispensing rewards and punishments, both theorists are certain that the socially significant aspects of human behavior cannot be explained by a concept of an invariant human nature.3 The second "problem" identified by Weinstein is the impact of "organized power" on human relationships. Just as the classical problem of human nature has been transformed into the contemporary problem of identity, the ancient problem of power has become increasingly reinterpreted as the problem of organized power struc­ tures.^ As Weinstein correctly points out, the traditional questions of power relationships are most often identified with Thomas Hobbes. Power, for Hobbes, meant basically two things: (1) the means to the attainment of a future end and, (2 ) a more personal formula, the ability of one individual to "command" another's action.