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Jeremy Bentham’s Politics of Global Commerce as a Limit-Case

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British Modern International Thought in the Making

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Abstract

In this chapter, Benjamin Bourcier argues that Bentham’s politics of global commerce evolved from enlightenment cosmopolitanism aspirations to gradually integrate several features of an economic imperialist model. Bentham’s series of writings on colonial and commercial projects share a relative similarity with the British imperial ideology of his time. Observing that Bentham’s politics of global commerce is not perfectly coherent, Bourcier interrogates how these changes reveal a close historical and conceptual relation between enlightenment cosmopolitan ideas on commerce and the burgeoning development of British imperial ideology.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    It is more relevant and accurate to talk about neo-Machiavellian ideas on commerce than to use the term “mercantilism”, because the concept of “mercantilism” is often used inaccurately by political theorists (insufficiently informed by the work of economic historians) and “neo-Machiavellian” covers more precisely the central ideas of the reason of state, bellicism and vain glory that characterised the dispositions of states. See Hont (2005).

  2. 2.

    Bentham’s opposition to neo-Machiavellian ideas were frequently articulated in the current debates of his day, which covered the likes of William Pitt’s foreign policy (1789), and debates over the cost of war (1795) and critics of Spanish colonies at the beginning of the nineteenth century.

  3. 3.

    See Muthu (2012, 213): “Smith understood, therefore, that such international companies and their corporate and governmental allies would not easily be reformed. In his view, eliminating the colonial context within which they operated would be a significant improvement”.

  4. 4.

    The “imperial turn” in the history of political thought reveals new perspectives on the analysis of Bentham’s international political theory. See Arneil (2021, 115, 4, 1147–1158).

  5. 5.

    This idea is more fully developed in Cléro (2022).

  6. 6.

    In her study, Pitts focuses on French and British philosophers such as Tocqueville and the Mills.

  7. 7.

    This chapter develops a critical discussion of analysis developed in the well-known Bentham secondary literature (Kapossy et al. 2017; Pitts 2005, 2011; Schofield 2022, 223–247).

  8. 8.

    The idea that there is a possible continuity existing between an enlightenment cosmopolitan approach to global commerce and an imperial approach to global commerce seems to be underappreciated (Coulmas 1995; Fine 2011, 153–171; Muthu 2011, 2012).

  9. 9.

    Principles of International Law is a text compiled by Bowring from Bentham’s manuscripts with the exclusion of 52 of 135 folios in French and English.

  10. 10.

    The original appears in French in Bentham’s manuscript [UC. xxv. 2].

  11. 11.

    Ibid.

  12. 12.

    The original appears in French in Bentham’s manuscript [UC. xxv. 5].

  13. 13.

    The quotation appears originally in French. “Pour les nations comme pour les individus, l’état le plus heureux n’est pas d’avoir fait fortune, mais de la faire: une prospérité croissance, voilà le bonheur. Quand on seroit au point que tous les emplois seroient pleins, que la terre auroit reçu tous ses développements, que l’industrie n’auroit plus de progrès à faire, quelle seroit alors la condition de la nature humaine ? Un homme ne pourroit faire sa fortune qu’au dépend d’un autre. (…) Un état de travail sera un état de guerre: tous contre tous, combattant comme les gladiateurs à Rome – jusqu’à la mort”.

  14. 14.

    Bentham criticised economic monopolies as a policy endorsed by mercantilist; see Bentham (2016a, 268).

  15. 15.

    The application of the term “imperial” relies on two considerations. First, the attempt to control and assure domination on a political society through legal and economic means; second, the exercise of a political power that is alien to the political society subjugated and which is devoted to serve the economic interests of the dominant one. See Bell (2016, 91–116).

  16. 16.

    See Mikko Jakonen’s chapter in this book.

  17. 17.

    The colonies could find their emancipation after a few years, maybe four.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Catholic University of Lille, Lille, France

    Benjamin Bourcier

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  1. Benjamin Bourcier
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Correspondence to Benjamin Bourcier .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Catholic University of Lille, Lille, France

    Benjamin Bourcier

  2. University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu, Finland

    Mikko Jakonen

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Bourcier, B. (2024). Jeremy Bentham’s Politics of Global Commerce as a Limit-Case. In: Bourcier, B., Jakonen, M. (eds) British Modern International Thought in the Making. International Political Theory. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-45713-5_11

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