Pownall on Smith on colonies

Abstract

As early as 1776, Thomas Pownall published a review of the Wealth of Nations in the form of a letter to its author, that may help us analyse a much-debated issue in our discipline: Adam smith's thought on colonies. Both friends and enemies of the empire took comfort in the Wealth of Nations. Accordingly, Smith's ambiguities on the subject have been pointed out by specialists, from Henry Brougham and Jeremy Bentham in the early days of the nineteenth century down to Bernard Semmel in 1970. On the other hand, Donald winch and others have forcibly argued that Smith's imperial 'project', so heartily supported later by J.S. Nicholson and the liberal imperialists, accounts for no more than a ballon d'essai. And the best textbooks in the history of economic thought at present coincide in placing Adam smith within the classical stream of hostility towards colonies