Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Aristotle’s Difficult Relationship With Modern Economic Theory

  • Published:
Foundations of Science Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper reviews Aristotle’s problematic relationship with modern economic theory. It argues that in terms of value and income distribution theory, Aristotle should probably be seen as a precursor to neither classical nor neoclassical economic thought. Indeed, there are strong arguments to be made that Aristotle’s views are completely at odds with all modern economic theory, since, among other things, he was not necessarily concerned with flexible market prices, opposed the use of money to acquire more money, and did not think that the unintended consequences of human activity were generally beneficial. The paper argues however, that this interpretation goes too far. The Benthamite neoclassical theory of choice can be seen as a dumbing down of Aristotle’s theory, applicable to animals, not humans. Adam Smith and Karl Marx were deeply influenced by Aristotle’s work and both started their main economic works with Aristotle: Smith ultimately rejecting, and Marx ultimately developing Aristotle’s views of the use of money to acquire more money. Possibilities for the future development of a new Aristotelian Economics are explored.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Albritton R. (1986) A Japanese reconstruction of Marxist theory. Macmillan Press, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Aristotle (1984) The complete works of Aristotle: The revised Oxford translation (J. Barnes, Ed). Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey

    Google Scholar 

  • Blaug M. (1985) Economic theory in retrospect (4th ed). Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Blaug M. (Ed) (1991) Aristotle (384–322 BC). Edward Elgar, Brookfield, Vermont

    Google Scholar 

  • Blaug M. (2001) No history of ideas, please, we’re economists. Journal of Economic Perspectives 15(1): 159–160

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Claeys, G. (1987). Machinery, money and the millennium: From moral economy to socialism, 1815–1860, Princeton.

  • Crespo R.F. (2006) The ontology of ‘the economic’: An Aristotelian analysis. Cambridge Journal of Economics 30: 767–781

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Crespo, R. F. (2007). Aristotelian Perspective on Economic Thought, What Could We Learn From Him Today? Paper, “Aristotelian Encounters” Conference, Middelburg, The Netherlands.

  • Davis J.B. (2006) The turn in economics: Neoclassical dominance to mainstream pluralism?. Journal of Institutional Economics 2(1): 1–20

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dobb M. (1973) Theories of value and distribution since Adam Smith: Ideology and economic theory. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Finley, M. I. (1970). Aristotle and Economic Analysis. Past and Present, 47, May, pp. 3–25; in Blaug, 1991, pp. 150–172

  • Fleetwood S. (1997) Aristotle in the 21st century. Cambridge Journal of Economics 21: 729–744

    Google Scholar 

  • Fleischacker S. (1999) A third concept of liberty: Judgment and freedom in Kant and Adam Smith. Princeton University Press, Princeton

    Google Scholar 

  • Frank T. (2004) What’s the matter with Kansas?. Penguin Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Fusfeld D.F. (2002) The age of the economist (9th ed). Addison Wesley, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Galbraith J.K. (2004) The economics of innocent fraud: Truth for our time. Houghton Mifflin, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Gordon, B. J. (1963). Aristotle and Hesiod: The economic problem in Greek thought. Review of Social Economy, 21, September, 147–156 in Blaug, 1991, pp. 103–112.

  • Gordon, B. J. (1964). Aristotle and the development of value theory. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 78, February, 115–128, in Blaug 1991, pp. 113–126.

  • Held D.T.D. (2005) Review of ‘Aristotle and the Philosophy of Friendship. Ancient Philosophy 25: 193–197

    Google Scholar 

  • Henry, J. F. (1990). The making of neoclassical economics. Unwin Hyman.

  • Hicks J.R. (1946) Value and capital: An inquiry into some fundamental principles of economic theory, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunt E.K. (1979) History of economic thought: A critical perspective. Wadsworth Publishing Co, Belmont, California

    Google Scholar 

  • Innis H. (1950) Empire and communications. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Innis H. (1951) The bias of communication. University of Toronto Press, Toronto

    Google Scholar 

  • Kauder, E. (1953). Genesis of the Marginal Utility Theory from Aristotle to the End of the Eighteenth Century. Economic Journal, 63, September, 638–650, in Blaug 1991, pp. 42–54.

  • Langholm O. (1983) Wealth and money in the Aristotelian tradition: A study in scholastic economics sources. Universitetsforlaget, Bergen

    Google Scholar 

  • Langholm O. (1984) The Aristotelian analysis of usury. Universitetsforlaget AS, Bergen

    Google Scholar 

  • Langholm, O. (1992). Economics in the medieval schools: Wealth, exchange, value, money and usury according to the Paris theological tradition 1200–1350, New York: E. J. Brill.

  • Langholm O. (1998) The legacy of scholasticism in economic thought: Antecedents of choice and power. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Lennox J.G. (2001) Aristotle’s philosophy of biology: Studies in the origins of life science. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Levitt S.D., Dubner S.J. (2005) Freakonomics: A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything. William Morrow, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Lie, J. (1988). John Lie Replies. Monthly Review, 39 #8, p. 47.

  • Lloyd G.E.R. (1996) Aristotelian explorations. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Lowry S.T. (1987) The archaeology of economic ideas: The classical Greek tradition. Duke University Press, Durham

    Google Scholar 

  • Lowry, S. T. (1991). Understanding Ethical Individualism and the Administrative Tradition in Pre-Eighteenth Century Political Economy. In William J. Barber (Ed.), Perspectives on the history of economic thought V. Aldershot, Hants, England: Edward Elgar.

  • Lowry S.T. (1995) The ancient Greek administrative tradition and human capital. Archives of Economic History VI 1: 7–18

    Google Scholar 

  • Marx, K. [1862–1863] 1963, 1968, 1971, Theories of Surplus Value. Moscow: Progress Publishers.

  • Marx, K. [1859] 1970: A contribution to the critique of political economy. New York: International Publishers.

  • Marx, K. [1867] 1976, Capital, Volume I. New York: Penguin.

  • McCarthy, G. E. (1990). Marx and the ancients: Classical ethics, social justice, and nineteenth-century political economy. Savage, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.

  • McCarthy, G. E. (Ed.) (1992). Marx and Aristotle: nineteenth-century German social theory and classical antiquity. Savage, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.

  • Meek R. (1976) 2nd edition, Studies in the labor theory of value. Monthly Review Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Meikle, S. (1985). Essentialism in the thought of Karl Marx. La Salle, Illinois: Open Court Publishing Company.

  • Meikle S. (1989) ‘Et in Arcadia Chicago’ a review article of S.T. Lowry. The Archaeology of Economic Ideas Polis 8(1): 25–34

    Google Scholar 

  • Meikle S. (1995) Aristotle’s economic thought. Clarendon Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Meikle S. (2001) Quality and quantity in economics: The metaphysical construction of the economic realm. In: (eds) The economic world view: Studies in the ontology of economics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 32–54

    Google Scholar 

  • Mirowski P. (2002) Machine dreams: Economics becomes a cyborg science. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Mises L. von (1966) Human action: A treatise on economics. H. Regnery, Chicago

    Google Scholar 

  • Montesquieu, Charles de Secondat [1748] (1989). The spirit of the laws. New York: Cambridge University Press.

  • Mosselmans B. (2004) Time and value in the history of political economy. Foundations of Science 10: 325–345

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Murray, P. (eds) (1997) Reflections on commercial life. Routledge, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Nussbaum M.C. (2000) Women and human devolopment: The capabilities approach. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Ostwald M. (1962) Nicomachean ethics: Translated, with introduction and notes by Martin Ostwald. The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack S.J. (1985) Reconstructing Marxian economics: Marx based upon a Sraffian commodity theory of value. Praeger, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack, S, J. (1985b). Aristotle and the problem of insatiable desires. History of Political Economy, 17(3), Fall, pp. 391–3; in Blaug, (1991). pp. 271–273.

  • Pack, S. J. (1988). Do not dump on the unoites. Monthly Review, 39, #8, 45–46.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack S.J. (1991) Capitalism as a moral system: Adam Smith’s critique of the free market system. Edward Elgar, Brookfield, Vermont

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack, S. J. (1993). Adam Smith on the limits to human reason. Perspectives on the History of Economic Thought: Selected Papers from the History of Economic Thought Conference 1991, Vol. IX, pp. 53–62.

  • Pack, S. J. (1995). Theological (and hence Economic) Implications of Adam Smith’s ‘The Principles Which Lead and Direct Philosophical Enquiries’. History of Political Economy, 27, #2, 289–307.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack, S. J. (1996). Adam Smith’s Invisible/Visible Hand/Chain/Chaos. Joseph A. Schumpeter, Historian of Economics: Perspectives on the History of Economic Thought: Selected Papers from the History of Economics Society Conference, 1994, Edited by Laurence S. Moss, pp. 181–195.

  • Pack S.J. (1998) Review of Scott Meikle. Aristotle’s Economic Thought, History of Political Economy 30(2): 365–368

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack S.J. (2001) S. Todd Lowry and ancient Greek economic thought: an interpretation. In: Stephen Medema, Samuels Warren(eds) Historians of economics and economic thought: The construction of disciplinary memory. Routledge, New York, pp 166–184

    Google Scholar 

  • Pack S.J., Schliesser E. (2006) Smith’s Humean criticism of Hume’s Account of the Origin of Justice. Journal of the History of Philosophy 44(1): 47–63

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pangle L.S. (2003) Aristotle and the philosophy of friendship. Cambridge University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Pieper J. (1998) Leisure, the basis of culture. St. Augustine’s Press, South Bend, Indiana

    Google Scholar 

  • Plato (1997). In J. M. Cooper (Ed.), Plato: Complete works. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.

  • Polanyi, K. (1968). Aristotle discovers the Economy. In G. Dalton (Ed.), Primitive, archaic and modern economics. New York: 1968.

  • Ricardo, D. [1821] 1977, Principles of political economy and taxation. New York: Dutton.

  • Rich F. (2006) The greatest story ever sold: The decline and fall of truth from 9/11 to Katrina. Penguin Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Roberts, W. C. (2007). Aristotle’s social naturalism: Understanding the nature of exchange. Paper, “Aristotelian Encounters”, Conference, Middelburg, The Netherlands.

  • Rothbard M. (1995) Economic thought before Adam Smith: An Austrian perspective on the history of economic thought, Vol I. Edward Elgar, Brookfield, Vermont

    Google Scholar 

  • Rousseau, J.-J. [1755] (1992). A discourse on the origin of inequality. Translated by Donald A. Cress, Indianapolis: Hackett

  • Schumpeter J. (1954) History of economic analysis. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Sen A. (1987) Commodities and capabilities. Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Sen A. (1999) Development as freedom. Anchor Books, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Smith, A. [1776] (1976). An enquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of nations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Smith, A. [1762–3; 1766] (1978). Lectures on jurisprudence. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Smith, A. [1762–3] (1983). Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Soudek, J. (1952). Aristotle’s theory of exchange: An enquiry into the origins of economic analysis. Proceedings of the American Pilosophical Society, 96(1), 45–75 in Blaug 1991, pp. 11–41.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spengler, J. J. (1955). Aristotle on economic imputation and related Matters. Southern Economic Journal, 21(4) April, 371–89, in Blaug 1991, pp. 371–89.

    Google Scholar 

  • Staveren I. van (2001) The values of economics: An Aristotelian perspective. Routledge, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Stigler G. (1987) The theory of price, 4th ed. Macmillan Publishing Company, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Stigler, G., Boulding, K. (Eds.) (1952). A.E.A. Readings in Price Theory, Vol. VI, Chicago: Richard D. Irwin, Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Takayama A. (1974) Mathematical economics. Dryden Press, Hinsdale, Illinois

    Google Scholar 

  • Thurow L.C. (1975) Generating inequality: Mechanisms of distribution in the US economy. Basic Books, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Uno, K. (1980). Principles of political economy: Theory of a purely capitalist society. Humanities Press.

  • Veblen, T. (1948). The portable veblen. edited and with an introduction by Max Lerner, New York: Viking Press.

  • Walsh V.C., Gram H.N. (1980) Classical and neo-classical theories of general equilibrium: Historical origins and mathematical structure. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Weintraub, E. R. (2006). Economic science wars, European History of Economics Society Meetings, Porto, Portugal.

  • Wicksteed (1914). The scope and method of political economy. The Economic Journal, XXIV, pp. 1–23, in Stigler and Boulding, 1952, pp. 3–26.

  • Xenophon (1994) Oeconomics: A social and historical commentary (with a new English translation by Sarah B Pomeroy). Oxford University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Xenophon (2001). The education of Cyrus (Translated and Annotated by Wayne Ambler). Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, Connecticut College, Box #5554, 270 Mohegan Ave, New London, CT, 06320-4196, USA

    Spencer J. Pack

Authors
  1. Spencer J. Pack
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Spencer J. Pack.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Pack, S.J. Aristotle’s Difficult Relationship With Modern Economic Theory. Found Sci 13, 265–280 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-008-9135-x

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-008-9135-x

Keywords

Search

Navigation