TEACHING HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT: TIME TO ENHANCE THE MORAL ASPECT?

The discipline of economics as it is now taught at schools and universities is based on the writings of the 18th century moral and political philosophers. However, the moral aspect of their ideas, which was of great significance for the authors themselves, seems quite irrelevant in the contemporary academic environment.

Latest developments in the economic and political life of the civilized world have caused a revival of interest in moral and ethical problems. Growing inequality has gained serious attention of eminent economists in Europe and the United States, but it has not found its proper place in the university curricula, where the rationalistic approach that goes back to Newtonian “rational mechanics” and Bentham’s “hedonic calculus” still prevails.

In Russia, where the mainstream economics obediently follows neoclassical prescriptions, the voices against the so called conventional wisdom have been assiduously ignored. Since this moral negation found its intellectual expression in the sphere of economic theory, it is important to understand whether the moral aspect should be incorporated into the teaching of economics in general and of the history of economic thought in particular. If the decision is made in favour of such changes, then the question arises: how it may be possible to introduce them without provoking adolescent reactions in the students. In this paper we are making an attempt to look again at the works of Adam Smith and his contemporaries, with special attention to their views on the moral and religious aspects of human activity and find out how the economists of the last century and present-day university professors have treated the issues of right and wrong in their books, lectures and academic papers.