Accepting Sonenscher’s premise (2022) that the historical unfolding of capitalism was preceded by debates over the character of ‘commercial society’, we propose a two-day colloquium bringing together philosophers, intellectual historians, economists, historians of economic thought and legal theorists to discuss the idea of ‘commercial society’ in Smith and Bentham, and to investigate the connections, divergences and oppositions between their philosophies and their political economies. Our goal is to stimulate both fruitful exchanges on the idea of ‘commercial society’ and its relation to liberalism, and a re-evaluation of Smith’s legacy to Bentham’s thought in all its manifold domains.

             Among the themes that will be investigated, there is the critical dialogue that Bentham undertook with Smith’s work, and examining the objections, revisions and potential distortions to which the English philosopher subjected it. How pertinent were the objections raised by Bentham in relation to ‘commercial society’? In what sense did Bentham establish his political economy on principles shared with Smith? To what extent did he subvert the message of Wealth of Nations? What were the commonalities and differences between the two thinkers on morals, law, economics and politics? Which elements in Bentham’s critique shed light on possible blind spots in Smith’s philosophy, and, conversely, what are the weaknesses of that critique? Other contributions will not adopt a comparative view, but will focus on one of the two authors, Smith or Bentham: for instance, in what extent, Smith developed a moral assessment of the commercial society? What are for him the ills and forces of such society?

• Commercial society and economic history: the theory of the four stages (hunting, pastoral, agricultural society, commercial society).

• Commercial society and law: property, intellectual property (patents, innovations), civil code, law, criminal justice, direct legislation, indirect legislation, international law, jusnaturalism, positivism.

• Commercial society and political economy: surplus value, nominal price, real price, division of labour, theory of money, paper money, theory of comparative advantage, market, capital, mercantilism, merchants, banks, industry, agriculture, landlord, pauper, poor, man, woman.

• Commercial and moral society: passions, interest, benevolence, justice, sympathy, egoism, asceticism, calculation, impartiality, moral partiality, honour, glory, false glory, military values, sexual morality.

• Commercial and political society: legislator, state, sovereignty, parliament, public opinion, constitution, political regime, representative democracy, constitutional monarchy, political party, interest groups, elites, interest.

• Commercial society and international trade: criticism of the colonies, Atlantic (America, Latin and South America) and Pacific (China, India, Australia) relations, private commercial companies (VOC, Compagnie des Indes), commercial treaties, History of the two Indies (G-T Raynal).

• Commercial society and world politics: balance of power, empires, cosmopolitanism, France-Great Britain relations, cooperation, war, peace, colonies, alliances, commercial treaties.

• Commercial society and the arts: pleasures, aesthetic categories, the beautiful, the pleasant, the sublime, arts (literature, painting, music, poetry), luxury, entertainment and games.

•  Future of commercial societies: pessimism and decadence, optimism and progress.

ESPOL: European School of Political and Social Sciences.

Université Catholique de Lille.

 PHARE: Philosophie, Histoire et Analyse des Représentations économiques

Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne. 

Centre Bentham.

Sciences Po Paris.