Some Reflections on Ethics and Economics Concerning the German Historical School and Its Reception in Russia

Abstract

It is widely known that the emergence of economic theory as a separate science was connected with /caused by/ its emancipation from moral philosophy. The discovery of Homo oeconomicus, nothing but economic man motivated by self-interest played the major role in that process. But it certainly meant that something like homo oeconomicus could be found in real life. Market economy, turning into a relatively autonomous subsystem of society, provided a mechanism of social coordination alternative not only to orders and traditions, but also to moral norms. This morally neutral way to reconcile private and public interests — the economic way — was emphasized in Mandeville’s “Fable of bees”. Private passions and even vices could be turned into public benefits in case they are given the harmless form of economic interests.¹ Detesting Mandeville’s cynicism, Adam Smith was still impressed by his paradox.² Smith became the first moral philosopher who had two separate images of man for ethics and political economy — and this made him the founder of economics as a separate social science.³