Abstract
In this chapter, Benoît Walraevens investigates the possible “dialogue” between two eighteenth-century masterpieces on international politics and trade: Wealth of Nations (Smith 1776) and Histoire des Deux Indes (Raynal 1770). Although many differences appear in their treatment of colonies, properties, and occupation, they share a similar defense of “doux commerce” and free trade.
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Notes
- 1.
Then HDI.
- 2.
Then WN.
- 3.
Note that Biziou has mainly in mind the French sources of Smith’s moral philosophy, especially Pascal, Mabillon, Marivaux, Voltaire and Malebranche.
- 4.
Many people criticized Raynal’s work on that point, and in particular Robertson, Smith’s compatriot and Raynal’s competitor in the writing of global history (Pugliese 2015).
- 5.
The references to the HDI in the Oxford edition of WN are the following: 225 on gold/silver ratio in India, China and Japan (which could be taken from Cantillon, though); 226 on the figures of average annual imports of gold and silver into Spain, which Smith says are confirmed by other sources 227; 227, 444 and 511 still on the gold and silver trade; 575 on the question of an exclusive trading company with a colony; p. 589 on the Portuguese Jews, persecuted, exiled, who find refuge in Madeira; 626 on the discovery of America and the Cape of Good Hope as the two most important events in the history of mankind, on which I will come back later. Moreover, Bénot (2005, fn 25, 134) suggests, unconvincingly for me, that the title of chapter XV of book 19 of the HDI,”Réflexions sur le bien et le mal que la découverte du Nouveau Monde a fait à l’Europe” [“Reflections on the good and bad that the discovery of the New World has done to Europe”], added to the 1780 edition, seems to respond to the title of an analogous chapter in Smith’s WN, more precisely section 3 of Book IV, chapter 7 (WN, IV.vii.c), untitled “Of the Advantages which Europe has derived from the Discovery of America, and from that of a Passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope”.
- 6.
Then TMS.
- 7.
Note that in this article and also in the “Encyclopédie” article, Diderot seems to have developed the idea of conjectural history (Ottaviani 2001), that Smith famously applied to the history of human societies.
- 8.
- 9.
And perhaps also the article “Colonie” (‘Colony’) of Forbonnais (1753), Smith taking up the distinction between ancient and modern colonies, distinguishing in the former the Greek colonies from the Romans. But Forbonnais defends the idea that the colony is at the service of the metropolis and therefore the monopoly of colonial trade, contrary to Smith, and in opposition with the article “Population” of Damilaville, published later, which opposes any right to colonize, except uninhabited lands, as his friend Diderot will do in the HDI. For more on this point, see Bénot (2003).
- 10.
Book 19 of the HDI, the last one, added to the 2nd edition published in 1774, is generally attributed to Deleyre (Feugère 1913).
- 11.
There is one reference to Smith’s TMS though, in Diderot’s Salon de 1767 (Goggi 1999).
- 12.
- 13.
Necker was a successful Genevan banker in Paris, and a shareholder and then administrator of the French East India Company in the 1760s, during its crisis. Later, in the 1770s and at the end of the 1780s, he became a famous Minister of Finance under Louis XVI.
- 14.
- 15.
On Turgot see E. H. Lemay (2000). Turgot wrote to Morellet about the HDI in 1772 and about Raynal “who has no fixed idea and who lets himself be carried away by the enthusiasm of a young rhetorician” and admits to being “a little tired of the multiplied excursions and incoherent paradoxes that he gathers from all parts of the horizon. The work is nevertheless very popular, precisely because it has no fixed idea” (Lemay 2000, 224). On Morellet and Dupont’s criticisms of the HDI, see the letters quoted in Ohji (2011, 157–158).
- 16.
On Raynal’s critical dialogue with the économistes see Ohji (2011, 154–161).
- 17.
I agree here completely with Stephane Pujol when he maintains that “It would be futile to look in HDI for anything other than the first rudiments of an economic science in the process of being established. A space for discussion and debate, the work shows a certain number of tensions between different economic theories discussed at the end of the century and it is difficult to formally link it to one or other of the major currents of thought. contemporaries. Empiric and not very doctrinaire, Raynal remains attached to a mercantilist conception of the State but he is clearly in favor of the freedom of imports and exports; without joining them exactly, it thus seems open to certain physiocratic theses” (Pujol 2015, 21).
- 18.
Raynal’s view of philosophical history seems to be close to Voltaire’s, highlighting that it should be useful, critical and impartial (Binoche 2013, 42–45).
- 19.
On the impartiality of the “historien philosophe”, see also Voltaire in his Réflexions sur l’histoire, taking Hume as an example (Binoche 2013, 44). On Diderot’s conception of “philosophical history”, a new view of history which focuses on moral, political and economic issues, and which should fight against civil and religious tyrannies, see Ottaviani (2001).
- 20.
Diderot uses this expression to qualify China in his Fragment sur les chinois (1772), so a few years before Smith.
- 21.
But we agree with Abbatista (2018, 177) that it is difficult to imagine that Diderot might have been influenced by Smith’s WN in his revision of the chapters on China in the 3rd edition of HDI.
- 22.
For Gordon (2015), Raynal’s book is a sort of Wikipedia of the eighteenth century.
- 23.
See in particular Smith’s LJ, (337–338 and 488–489).
- 24.
Pujol (2015) notes that in the HDI “Not only does commerce participate in the different forms of social bond, but it seems to be both the origin and the end of these. In the minds of their authors, the circulation of goods and the circulation of ideas are only two subsets of the vast system of exchange to which human activity boils down”.
- 25.
Note that the announcement of the competition was made in the 1781 edition of the Révolution de l’Amérique that Smith owned.
- 26.
“There is no more memorable event among men than the Discovery of America. Going back from present times to the most remote times, there is no event that can be compared to this one […] This astonishing revolution which changed the face of the earth & the fortunes of Nations, was absolutely momentary, because by an incredible fatality, there was no balance between attack and defense. All the strength & all the injustice were on the side of the Europeans: the Americans had only weakness: they were therefore to be exterminated & exterminated in an instant” (my translation) (de Pauw 1768–1769).
- 27.
“To the natives, however, both of the East and West Indies, all the commercial benefits which can have resulted from those events have been sunk and lost in the dreadful misfortunes which they have occasioned. These misfortunes, however, seem to have arisen rather from accident than from any thing in the nature of those events themselves. At the particular time when these discoveries were made, the superiority of force happened to be so great on the side of the Europeans, that they were enabled to commit with impunity every sort of injustice in those remote countries” (WN, IV.vii.c.80, 626).
- 28.
As suggested by the end of the passage in the WN, Smith seems optimistic that the rights of indigenous peoples might be better respected in the future, if a certain “equality of force” emerges over time between them and the Europeans, sparking a “mutual fear” (ibid.).
- 29.
“The discovery of America, and that of a passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope, are the two greatest and most important events recorded in the history of mankind. Their consequences have already been very great: but, in the short period of between two and three centuries which has elapsed since these discoveries were made, it is impossible that the whole extent of their consequences can have been seen. What benefits, or what misfortunes to mankind may hereafter result from those great events no human wisdom can foresee. By uniting, in some measure, the most distant parts of the world, by enabling them to relieve one another's wants, to increase one another's enjoyments, and to encourage one another's industry, their general tendency would seem to be beneficial. To the natives, however, both of the East and West Indies, all the commercial benefits which can have resulted from those events have been sunk and lost in the dreadful misfortunes which they have occasioned” (WN, IV.vii.c.80, 626).
- 30.
Here is what Raynal wrote, which is very close to what Smith wrote: “There has never been an event so interesting for the human species in general, & for the peoples of Europe in particular, as the discovery of the New World & the passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope. Then began a revolution in commerce, in the power of nations, in the customs, industry and government of all peoples. It is at this moment that the men of the most distant countries approached by new relationships and new needs. The productions of the climates placed under the equator, are consumed in the neighboring climates of the pole; industry from the North is transported to the South; Eastern fabrics have become the luxury of Westerners; & everywhere men have made a mutual exchange of their opinions, their laws, their customs, their diseases, their remedies, their virtues and their vices. Everything is changed, & must change again. But the past revolutions and those which are to follow, have they been, will they be useful to human nature? Will man one day owe them more peace, happiness and pleasure? Will his condition be better, or will he only change?” (my translation, Livre I, Introduction).
- 31.
For Gordon (2015, 106), this expression of doubt by Smith on the benefits of colonization is a mark of respect for the Histoire des Deux Indes.
- 32.
- 33.
“Nothing seems more likely to establish this equality of force than that mutual communication of knowledge and of all sorts of improvements which an extensive commerce from all countries to all countries naturally, or rather necessarily, carries along with it”. See also the passage on the “mutual communication of knowledge and of all sorts of improvements which an extensive commerce from all countries to all countries naturally, or rather necessarily, carries along with it” (WN, IV.vii.c.80, 626).
- 34.
See Pujol (2015, 22–25) on the emphatic celebration of a first form of trade globalization in the HDI and its relationship to Montesquieu.
- 35.
“The hazards of navigation threw men into the necessity of destroying or bonding. It was with treaties of commerce between nations separated by the sea, like pacts of society between men sown & brought together by nature on the same land. All these reports started with fights & ended with associations. War and navigation have mixed societies and populations. From then on, men found themselves linked by dependence or communication. The alliance of nations fused together by the fire of battle is refined and polished by trade. In its destination trade wants all nations to see themselves as a single society, all of whose members have an equal right to participate in all the goods of each. In its object & its means trade implies the desire & the bast t e coordinated among all peoples to all exchanges that can suit their mutual satisfaction. Desire to enjoy, freedom to enjoy: there are only these two sources of activity, only these two principles of sociability among men. What can those who blame the commerce of Europe with the Indies oppose to these reasons for free & universal communication? That it involves a considerable loss of men; let him stop the progress of our industry; that it decreases the mass of our money. It is easy to destroy these weak objections” (H70, tI, book 5, p. 251). See also Introduction and Book 5, Chapter XLVIII of H74, p. 335; Chapter XXXIII of H80, p. 678.
- 36.
- 37.
“A spirit of barter and exchange is established in Europe” [which recalls the “propensity to truck, barter and exchange of Smith, and the “spirit of commerce” of Montesquieu], a spirit who is “a friend of peace and tranquillity” (Book 6).
- 38.
On the use of apostrophe in the HDI, see Terrade (2011).
- 39.
The most famous example is the praise of Eliza Draper. See Goggi (2014, 6).
- 40.
“The historian again as he is in no pain what side seems the justest, but acts as if he were an impartial narrater of the facts; so he uses none of these means to affect his readers, he never dwells on any circumstance, nor has he any use for insisting on arguments as he does not take part with either side, and for the same reason he never uses any exclamations in his own person” (LRBL, i.82–83, 35).
- 41.
In his Lettre apologétique de l’abbé Raynal contre Mr Grimm, dated March 25, 1781, Diderot underlines that Raynal is a new kind of historian: “But, you add, it does not have the moderate tone of history. And what does it matter to me in what tone he has shown himself; provided that it is that of his century, which is as good as any other, that it instructs me, that it moves me, that it astonishes me? Thucydides did not write history like Xenophon, nor Xenophon like Titus Livius, nor Titus Livius like Sallustus, nor Sallustus like Tacitus, nor Tacitus like Suetonius, nor did Voltaire write history like the Abbé de Vertot, nor the Abbé de Vertot like Rollin, nor Rollin like Hume, nor Hume like Robertson. Does the philosopher treat history like the scholar, the scholar like the moralist, the cold moralist like the eloquent man? Well! Raynal is a historian such as there has never been before, and so much the better for him, and so much the worse for history. […] Well, erase the word “history” from the frontispiece of his book, and shut up. The book that I love and that kings and their courtiers hate is the book that gives birth to Brutus. Let us give it the name we want.
And why does the abbé not have the modern tone of the historian? Because, between three to four thousand pages, there are perhaps fifty or so that the enthusiasm of virtue, or the horror of vice, will have dictated”.
- 42.
See Rothschild’s famous claim on the supposed irony of the “invisible hand” (Rothschild 1994).
- 43.
Because of this contingency of history, Europe is therefore not a model to follow, as Pitts (2005, 32–33) notes.
- 44.
- 45.
- 46.
The question is asked from the very first lines of the book (“Europe has founded colonies everywhere; but does it know the principles on which they should be founded?”), while Smith never seems to ask himself the question of the legitimacy of colonization as such.
- 47.
“If we had made them [the Indians] aware that reciprocal utility is the basis of commerce, if we had encouraged their culture and industry by exchanges equally advantageous to them and to us, we would have gradually reconciled the spirit of these peoples. We would have come to the point of living among them, of forming around us stable and solidly policed nations, whose forces would have protected our establishments by a reciprocity of interest” (book 5, quoted in Pujol 2015).
- 48.
- 49.
For Williams, Smith's opposition to colonial rule would derive largely from its impact on the metropolis rather than on conquered and colonized peoples. Thus, Smith would not have the philosophical resources to truly criticize colonization as such, an assertion which might be questioned, as we show it below by looking at his theory of private property.
- 50.
See a similar idea in Turgot (Le Masne 2016, 103–104).
- 51.
On Smith’s critique of the mercantile system in relation to colonization, see Diatkine (2020, 122–137).
- 52.
- 53.
For a similar point, see Ince (2016, 20), according to which even though Smith did not explicitly rationalize the issue of the colonial appropriation of land, he would emphasize the injustice of this appropriation, against Locke and de Vattel.
- 54.
- 55.
See also the “plundering of the defenceless natives […] stript of all that they had” (WN, IV.vii.a.16, 561).
- 56.
In his TMS Smith underlines the great virtues (of self-command) of savages and the adaptative character of morality, as well as the ethical dilemmas of so-called civilized peoples.
- 57.
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the participants of the SEAA conference on the “Force du Commerce” in Paris in January 2020, of the online conference on “The Making of the Modern International Realm” in April 2021, and of the online workshop in preparation of this book on July 20, 2022, whose numerous comments on previous versions of this chapter helped to improve it. My special thanks go to Gabriel Sabbagh for the numerous and stimulating discussions we had on several issues raised in this paper.
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Walraevens, B. (2024). Colonization, Commerce and Global History: Adam Smith and Raynal’s Histoire des Deux Indes. 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_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-45713-5_7
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