Ancient economic thought - Chanakya
Abstract:
Chanakya (350–283 BCE) also known as Kautilya or Vishnugupta was the advisor to the Maurya Emperor Chandragupta and was the chief designer of the rise of power. The father of economics Adam Smith is regarded as the founder of economics and his famous book “The Wealth of Nations". Economics as always been regarded as a western subject even scholars have always looked up to the western world for economic thoughts and ideas. The Indian ancient treasure relating to the subject economics was untouched until the handwritten manuscript of Arthashastra was discovered after about two thousand years in 1902 of its formulation. Arthashastra literal meaning is Rule of Money or Economics. As the saying goes
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He encouraged mining, managing livestock, afforestation, maintenance of recreational forest etc. Irrigation to be maximised for proper growth and stability. With that the state should provide marketing system for the agricultural produce. All natural resources like forest land, mineral, underground water, wild animals, fish etc are the property of the state. He was aware of the concept that future productivity of mankind is only possible with the judicious use of available natural resources. In present day economic term we call it as 'sustainable …show more content…
Though king was the supreme head of the state and was monopolistic, Chanakya suggested and encouraged cooperation between the private sector and state. Because the private sector would act like a backbone to the state during any emergency.
Kautilya favoured free enterprise economy, where government should not intervene in the price policy; prices should be determined by the free play of demand and supply of goods and services. There are few areas where state need to intervene in the economic life, they are the superintendent of slaughterhouse, the superintendent of prostitutes, the superintendent of ships, the superintendent of passports and the office of the city superintendent. His state resembles the modern state which facilitates on the functioning of the market forces for the sake of common good.
He has the idea of the modern day concept of passport- document that facilitates the movement of people. This is the first instance where the concept of movement of people across border was
His speech was replicating on how he felt about wealthy people was alleged of in the past days and how he relate his feeling to his current period, the circulation of the wealth in the country. He spoke about how there is no link that connects the wealthy and the less fortunate, which he stated: “The problem of our age is the proper administration of wealth, so that the ties of brotherhood may still bind together the rich and poor in harmonious relationship”. Subsequently, the wealthy and the poor do not have any type of association with them; it is tough for them to get along. Thereby have so much effect on the working environment, bring about friction between the employers and employed. They employers feel a lot of stress to use the law of competition in a stringent economy that was going on so that he or she can get along and make money without minding what the consequences maybe.
Wealth is driven by commerce. Wealth in any form is the root of all needed things in the sense that currency is the simplification of ones own definition of wealth by being the common denominator that translates through the world. Translating wealth is most commonly left to the rich and philosophically inclined such as Adam Smith, Andrew Carnegie, and Andrew K. Gailbraith. Adam Smiths realism rhetoric stood that in order for a prosperous town to exist there first had to be an equally if not better country-side because Adam Smith believed that wealth was a measure of how much land one had and how much of it could be cultivated for the use of planting crops and manufacturing raw goods and how close it was to any town.
Before Adam Smith’s push for this, it was common for governments to make most the decisions about what to trade and how much everything was. He wrote The Wealth of Nations to help this cause change. He also wrote that if individuals pursue their own self-interest, they would help the society (Doc C). Individual freedom is the key to a better economy as well.
Towards the end of the Revolutionary War, the founding fathers decided that that the colonies would need some form of government that would unify them. At the same time, they decided that they wanted to avoid creating a monarchial type of government from which they had just split. The period just after the Revolutionary War was a critical time for the fledging country and it was important that the government formed would not only unify the colonies and protect them, not only from foreign countries, but also from destroying themselves internally.
Ayse Meryem Gürpınar Akbulut October 11, 2016 SPL 501 / On Adam Smith and Karl Polanyi Adam Smith and Karl Polanyi are philosophers of two different eras, 18th and 20th centuries respectively. While the former witnessed early periods of the capitalist system with the emergence of the industrial revolution, the latter had opportunity to analyze the consequences of a mature capitalist system. Since both of them believe in social being of humans, they differ in methodological terms while analyzing the human beings. Smith, as employing the methodological individualism, focused on the human nature and human behavior. According to his perspective, a socio-economic system emerges through individual tendencies, intentions, and behaviors without
The Early Industrial Revolution America in the 17th century was a time of exponential progress and innovation. The fledgling nation had now become a behemoth, and with thousands of new workers and immigrants flooding the U.S, they provided a reliable resource for cheap labor for the industrialist allowing them to create new technologies faster and more inexpensive . The stage was set for an early Revolution; not just a political one a industrial and manufacturing one. This boom was caused by a variety of factors such as a booming economy due to new trade routes and economic opportunities, government support in the industrial/manufacturing field, and a cheap workforce in the form of immigrants which caused an early development of manufacturing/industrialization.
Adam Smith’s main idea was that the government should not regulate trade but rather individuals could handle their own affairs in trade and business. Adam Smith's economic theories were particularly influential in Britain, Europe and America. The Wealth of Nations had a profound effect on how the government in America was organised.
1. The goals of stability are maintaining stable prices and full employment, and keeping economic growth reasonably smooth and steady. A situation of having a stable source of financial income that allows for the on-going maintenance of one 's standard of living currently and in the near future. The attempt to balance an economic policy so that everyone benefits fairly. Situation in an economy in which the division of resources or goods among the people is considered fair.
The economic views of Adam Smith and Karl Marx Microeconomics Eduardo De Oliveira Superti Table of Contents: Abstract 3 Introduction 4 The economic views of Adam Smith 5 The economic views of Karl Marx 6 Adam Smith vs. Karl Marx 7 Examples in the world of today 9 Conclusion 10 Recommendations 11 Bibliography 12 Introduction Adam Smith and Karl Marx were completely contrasting economists throughout their time and had an enormous effect on the world and the way we view economics. They represent the ideas of capitalism and socialism.
Adam Smith is an 18th-century philosopher and free-market economist. He is known as the father of economics and is famous for his ideas about the efficiency of the division of labor and the societal benefits of individuals ' pursuit of their own self-interest. Smith is best known for two classic works: The Theory of Moral Sentiments, and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. The latter, usually known as The Wealth of Nations, is the first modern work of economics and the book which is considered in this research. This research will discuss chapter four of The Wealth of Nations (WN), specifically Smith’s paragraph of water diamond paradox.
The notion of modern state started emerging in the sixteenth century and with the span of time, this idea of modern state became universal through conquest and overpowering. Modern state, i.e. the enriched and the precise form of absolutist state aspires for the pursuit of central power in the state and makes its way regularized for the national system of power to get implemented. The concept of modern state has been there since the Westphalia Peace Treaty in the mC17. But even before that peace treaty, the similar form of state was there in the form of imperialism and there existed the princely states which used to be governed by the imperial authorities. Now with the formation of modern state the other forms of power structures has become weak and has now been exhausted.
On the basis of this situation, politicians have the power and authority in controlling businesses. Lastly, political science and economics go hand in hand. As for the capital owners, politics are means to gain more capital and vice versa. Politicians are also bound by their self-interests to get benefited without thinking the welfare of the others. Politicians or the government must be the driving forces to attain efficiency and development for the sake of the progress of our country.
Resources are either owned privately or by the state and more importantly, the resources are controlled or heavily regulated by the state through a large amount of government power or large administrative concentration of power. Examples of some countries that are a command economy include North Korea, Cuba, the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. Although, market and command economies may seem completely different from each other they share a few similarities such as, a command and market economy both have producers and consumers, goods, services, and labor.
Regulations that the government implement, licensing for example, increases the barrier of entry into the market and decreases ways for the traders to gratify consumer demand. This case is prevalent in the monopoly market. The market is sometimes best to decide how much and what to produce since it has better information and knowledge of the consumers compared to the government. Economic decisions may also not be competent when the government is motivated by political power rather than economic imperatives. Sometimes, economic policies are designed to retain power rather than to ensure maximum efficiency in the economy.
His approach takes into account the capitalist system as a whole. His work helps us to account for the disparities evidenced in the world between the developed and the underdeveloped world as a result of capitalism. This may be used as a basis for prescribing long term solutions to continued underdevelopment in third world