manderville is talking about what we now call virtue signalling. Heis saying, people are constantly saying, i want to be charitable. What they're really doing is pushing them forward,. And in that sense, the charity schools are just a form of virtue signalling. People aren't really interesting in the children of the poor, and giving maisulation. The intention doesn't tell you what the outcome's going to be. If you put everyone on welfare, you may actually be making it harder for them to go on and look for work the enterprise.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Bernard Mandeville (1670-1733) and his critique of the economy as he found it in London, where private vices were condemned without acknowledging their public benefit. In his poem The Grumbling Hive (1705), he presented an allegory in which the economy collapsed once knavish bees turned honest. When republished with a commentary, The Fable of the Bees was seen as a scandalous attack on Christian values and Mandeville was recommended for prosecution for his tendency to corrupt all morals. He kept writing, and his ideas went on to influence David Hume and Adam Smith, as well as Keynes and Hayek.
With
David Wootton
Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Helen Paul
Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
And
John Callanan
Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King’s College London
Producer: Simon Tillotson