... of a natural order underpinning human society is the cornerstone of liberal internationalism. For the clearest statement of this position, we must turn to the Scottish political economist and moral philosopher, Adam Smith. By pursuing their own self?interest, individuals are inadvertently promoting the public good. The mechanism, which intervenes between the motives of the individual and `ends' of society as a whole, is ... what Smith referred to as `an invisible hand'. Although Smith believed that the natural harmony between individual and state did not extend to a harmony between stat...

• Word Count: 3075
• Approx Pages: 12
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... elimination of government-granted monopolies and internal tolls and tariffs, ideas that found their rallying cry in the famous slogan, laissez-faire, laissez-passer." The Physiocrats exerted a profound influence on Adam Smith, who had spent time in France in the 1760s and whose classic "The Wealth of Nations" embodied the Physiocratic attack on mercantilism and argued that nations get rich by practicing ... free trade. Of Smith, Turgot, and the Physiocrats, the great French political leader and author Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850) wrote: The basis of their whole economic system may be tr...

• Word Count: 2777
• Approx Pages: 11
• Grade Level: Undergraduate