Adam Smith Wealth Of Nations Analysis

In his hallmark work The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith generates a Hobbesian dilemma when he asserts in Book I that man posses “the propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another” (Smith, 25). Smith supports this claim as the principle from which the division of labor originates, citing the example of tribespeople exchanging surplus goods. However, does man really have this natural propensity to trade, rather than a natural propensity to fight and steal as argued by Thomas Hobbes? What keeps tribespeople from murdering each other to collect additional surplus without having to sacrifice their own goods? In his earlier work The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith answers these questions with the virtue of justice. Before explaining and unpacking the concept of justice, Smith describes approved punishment as necessary for
Why does the arrow-maker not just murder the brazier and steal his surplus of bronze? In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith addresses these questions by arguing that the fear of punishment keeps one from committing malice acts. He writes: “Nature has implanted in the human breast that consciousness of ill desert, those terrors of merited punishment which attend upon its violation, as the great safeguards to protect the weak, to curb the violent, and to chastise the guilty” (97). Therefore, the arrow-maker does not murder the brazier because he knows he would face societal resentment and punishment. On the other side, Ambassador X from Economic Gangsters chooses to almost never honor the justice of New York City parking system because he will never face punishment (Fisman, 85). In conclusion, Smith admits man may not posses the natural propensity to trade; however, the virtue of justice creates the peaceful society in which trade does occur. Perhaps he suspected his economic arguments in the Wealth of Nations were better served by “natural propensity” than endowed