A Critique of Smith's Argumentation Schemes for Commercial Society

Mandeville affirmed the positive significance of modern commercial society through the paradoxical proposition of “private vices, public benefits”. Rousseau, starting from the “state of nature”, negated the civilizational value of modern commercial society. In contrast, Smith justified commercial society by linking the “path to wealth” to the “path to virtue”. The German Historical School later misinterpreted Smith's argumentation schemes as the “Adam Smith Problem”, which in turn provoked critiques from the Austrian School of Economics and a counter-reaction under the slogan “Back to Smith”. Revisiting the theoretical background, philosophical foundations, and historical repercussions of Smith's argumentation schemes along the voluntarist path after the Nominalist revolution, we can achieve a new perspective. This re-examination allows us to transcend not only the opposition between Mandeville and Rousseau but also the divergence between the German Historical School and the Austrian School. This re-examination clarifies Smith's foundational status as the “Newton of the economic field”. The question of universality versus particularity in Smith's argumentation schemes is a basic issue for any science. It deserves serious consideration as a prerequisite question for adapting Marxism to the Chinese context and constructing China's independent knowledge system.