Knowledge, innovation and emulation in the evolutionary thought of Bernard Mandeville

Of the early modern writers on the division of labour, Bernard Mandeville alone extended it to all aspects of human activity and emphasised its role in a cumulative process of evolution in which each generation modified and built on what had been achieved by earlier generations. This required exploration of the mechanisms through which new knowledge was developed as well as the means by which knowledge was transmitted between the generations. The present article examines Mandeville’s treatment of these mechanisms and explores their theoretical origins. It examines Mandeville’s understanding of the role of the division of labour in facilitating discovery and learning and the role of education and imitation in transmitting social knowledge. It shows that, for Mandeville, innovators were people of ordinary capacity who were alert to the opportunities and challenges of their environment. As a result of specialisation, they possessed tacit knowledge which was actualised in what they did rather than in theoretical propositions. Mandeville’s evolutionary thought influenced subsequent writers on political economy and evolutionary social thinkers. It may also have had some influence on Charles Darwin, though it is not, in itself, Darwinian. © The Author 2013. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. All rights reserved.

Bernard Mandeville and the doctrine of laissez-faire

The view of Mandeville as a pioneer of laissez-faire is difficultto reconcile with his repeated insistence that private vices were turnedinto public benefits by the ‘dexterous management of the skilfulpolitician’. Even if references to the skilful politician are regarded asshorthand for a legal and institutional framework, there remains thequestion of whether such a framework is a spontaneous order or theproduct of purposeful experiment as Mandeville thought? Mandevillewarned about the harmful effects of meddling but his complaint wasabout the actions of fashionable do-gooders rather than government. Heunderstood that the voluntariness of a transaction could be regarded asa defence against complaints of unfairness but he was quick to pointout the limitations of voluntariness especially in the market for labour.Mandeville’s objective was to teach people what they are not what theyshould be. He pointed to the strengths of the emerging market systembut was not afraid to expose its faults.

19/6/20, journée des salopettes, Mlle Clairette Bernard, Mlle Andrée Beryl : [photographie de presse] / [Agence Rol]

Référence bibliographique : Rol, 59764

L'Union littéraire des poètes et des prosateurs : journal bi-mensuel... / Jean-Bernard, rédacteur en chef ; D. Jacques, secrétaire de la rédaction

Variante(s) de titre : L'Union littéraire et le Sonnettiste réunis

L'Union littéraire des poètes et des prosateurs : journal bi-mensuel... / Jean-Bernard, rédacteur en chef ; D. Jacques, secrétaire de la rédaction

1880/06/25 (A7,N11).

L'Union littéraire des poètes et des prosateurs : journal bi-mensuel... / Jean-Bernard, rédacteur en chef ; D. Jacques, secrétaire de la rédaction

1881/04/10 (A8,N7).

L'Union littéraire des poètes et des prosateurs : journal bi-mensuel... / Jean-Bernard, rédacteur en chef ; D. Jacques, secrétaire de la rédaction

1880/04/25 (A7,N8).