Eshet Conference 2019 Metaphor and narrative in Sismondi's economic discourse

Eshet Conference 2019

  Metaphor and narrative in Sismondi's economic discourse
                              Francesca Dal Degan, University of Pisa

If I were to identify the main character of the intellectual impetus of Sis-mondi, I would affirm him as a
scholar of liberty. Sismondi’s scientific research can be placed at the heart of this human experience, the
fields and rhythms of which were penetrated by his analytical gaze, and the focus of his intellectual
attention was directed at distinguishing the authentic expressions of its mystifying manifestations. As a
narrative of liberty, his research deals with the problem of providing or restoring meaning to words,
concepts, and interpretations of facts. “Surplus” and not just “profit” to mean “wealth”, “wealth” and not
just “capital” to describe the resources of an economic system, “bonheur” and not needs’ satisfaction to
identify the goal of human and social development constitute the most evident examples. In a further
sense, like a real narrative, Sismondi’s discourse needs to refer to a hermeneutical context provided by
his philosophical vision of human and social life. For this purpose, Sismondi’s research relates to
institutional, historical, and contextual analysis where the sense of being free, which is active in any
given society, can be captured. The investigations of social sciences have been precisely directed at
finding “principles” of liberty’s relationships within political, economic, and social contexts. These
principles, like mixed entities, result from rigorous analysis, a forward-looking impetus, and repeated
tests conducted in the laboratory that was constituted by history for social scientists. They are not
presented merely as logically interrelated concepts in a rational reconstruction of causal order but as
“reasons” that have to be constantly compared with the human aspiration of happiness and its most
difficult element: the relationship between diversity and unity, between distinction and association,
between plurality and singularity.

This was animated by a dual awareness: on one hand, individuality understood as a reserve of original
potential and capacity, and on the other, participation in a network of relations necessary for the
fulfillment of one’s own singularity—human beings committed to industrious activities directed to

producing surplus thus experiencing the value of their individuality in being able to depend on their own
capacity to live and cooperate with others. In essence, the experience of liberty, understood as a result
that can only be attained jointly, which becomes effective only when shared and which even in its own
generative dynamic implies the development of single individualities, was recognized as the most
authentic fruit in the discovery of modernity, and it needed to be explored in its intrinsic causal “plot.”

This tension compels one to reread the age-old question of the relationship between the many, the few,
and the one, transforming it into a modern experience of a sociality that is asserted through new ways of
how being free is perceived. The aim is not only to evaluate to what degree a sort of con- crete “social”
relationship can be reconciled with an ideal of liberty, but in a rigorous way to also simultaneously have
both the conditions for the existence of that relationship and the unit of measurement of their value.
Economics, as the main science of measure, is assumed by the author to be like the key discipline, where
the oxymoronic condition of man can be dissolved in an experience of human and civil growth. Is it not
the science of demand to respond to the need of giving a voice to social agents and thus offer a political
way to build and express common will?

At the core of this argument, it is possible to identify the origin of the impulse to create an authentic
(because of being more concerned with human experience) vocabulary for scientists and citizens. A
vocabulary that can be utilized for saying “liberty” and denouncing “oppression,” affirming that
“economics” is mainly a “science of distribution” and a science of demand and, before that, a science of
appropriation and of production.

An instrument displayed by the author in order to enrich the vocabulary of the social scientist consists of
integrating economic reflection with narrative pieces of economic reflection, such as the fable of
Gandalin, the sorcerer’s apprentice who represents the industrialist in New Principles:

Mais nous nous souvenons d’avoir entendu conter dans notre enfance qu’au temps des enchantements, Gandalin, qui logeait
un sorcier dans sa maison, remarqua qu’il prenait chaque matin un manche à balai, et que disant sur lui quelques paroles
magiques, il en faisait un porteur d’eau qui allait aussitôt chercher pour lui autant de seaux d’eau à la rivière qu’il en désirait.
Gandalin, le matin suivant, se cacha derrière une porte, et en prêtant toute son attention, il surprit les paroles magiques que le
sorcier avait prononcées pour faire son enchantement; il ne put entendre cepen- dant celles qu’il dit ensuite pour le défaire.
Aussitôt que le sorcier fut sorti, Gandalin répéta l’expérience; il prit le manche à balai, il prononça les mots mystérieux, et le
manche à balai porteur d’eau partit pour la rivière et revint avec sa charge, il retourna et revint encore, une seconde, une

troisième fois; déjà le réservoir de Gandalin était plein et l’eau inon- dait son appartement. “C’est assez, criait-il, arrêtez;”
mais l’homme machine ne voyait et n’entendait rien; insensible et infatigable, il aurait porté dans la maison toute l’eau de la
rivière. Gandalin, au désespoir, s’arma d’une hache, il en frappa à coups redoublés son porteur d’eau insensible; il voyait alors
tomber sur le sol les fragments du manche à balai, mais aussitôt ils se relevaient, ils revêtaient leur forme magique et couraient
à la rivière. Au lieu d’un porteur d’eau, il en eut quatre, il en eut huit, il en eut seize, plus il combattait, plus il renversait
d’hommes machines, et plus d’hommes machines se relevaient pour faire malgré lui son travail. La rivière tout entière aurait
passé chez lui, si heureusement le sorcier n’était revenu et n’avait détruit le charme. L’eau cependant est une bonne chose,
l’eau non moins que le travail, non moins que le capital, est nécessaire à la vie. Mais on peut avoir trop, même des meilleures
choses. Des paroles magiques prononcées par des philosophes, il y a bien- tôt soixante ans, ont remis le travail en honneur.
Des causes politiques, plus puissantes encore que ces paroles magiques, ont changé tous les hommes en industriels; ils
entassent les productions sur les marchés bien plus rapidement que les manches à balai ne transportaient l’eau, sans se soucier
si le réservoir est plein. Chaque nouvelle application de la science aux arts utiles, comme la hache de Gandalin, abat l’homme
machine que des paroles magiques avaient fait mouvoir,mais pour en faire relever aussitôt deux, quatre, huit, seize, à sa place:
la production continue à s’accroître avec une rapidité sans mesure. Le moment n’est-il pas venu, le moment du moins ne peut-
il pas venir, où il faudra dire: “C’est trop ?1

[I remember, when I was a child, and the world was still full of fairies and enchanters, to have heard the story of Gandalin,
who lived with a magician, and how he observed that every morning his master took a broomstick, and after pronouncing
certain words over it, turned it into a water carrier, which brought as many buckets of water from the river as were needed for
daily use. One morning, Gandalin hid himself behind the door, and by paying close attention overheard the words used by the
magician to effect the trans- formation. He could not, however, discover the words that put an end to it. As soon as the
magician went out, Gandalin took the broomstick and pronounced the mysterious words, and it immediately set off for the
river and returned with the bucket full; it departed and returned again, until Ganda- lin’s cistern was full and began to run
over his room. Then, Gandalin began to call out “Stop, that’s enough,” but the enchanted man neither heard nor saw; without
sense, it was incapable of fatigue. Gandalin, in despair, seized an axe and attacked his senseless water-carrier. The broomstick
soon fell to pieces, but each piece resumed its office of water-carrier, and rushed off to the river; instead of one, he got four,
eight, 16 water carriers; the more he struggled, the more he destroyed, the more mechanical water carriers arose to do his
work in spite of himself. The whole river would soon have been poured over him had the magician not returned and dissolved
the charm. Water, however, is a good thing and as necessary to life as labor and capital. But one can have too much of the
best things. A few magical words pro- nounced by some philosophers about 60 years since have ennobled labor. Political
causes still more potent than these words have transformed all men into laborers, who bring their productions to the market
much more rapidly than the broomstick brought water from the river and with equal disregard of the cistern being full. Each
fresh application of science to the useful arts, such as Gandalin’s axe, struck down the laborer who had been aroused by those
magical words, but only to call forth four, eight, or 16 others in his place. Production continues and increases with a
measureless rapidity. Has the moment not come when we must call out with Gandalin, “Stop; it is enough!”]

1
    Sismondi (2018b, pp. 291–292).

The preference for a narrative expression of social phenomena sits well with Sismondi’s interest in
identifying the concrete conditions for the emergence of “raison,” which could be at the basis of
economic growth, social development, and human happiness. Thus, science is more clearly articulated
as a plot of a “civilized development” process, focused on the perfectionnement and pursuit of happiness
as a “civil reflection culture”2 than a rigorous or more specialized analysis of facts.
Despite the fact that, in standard historiography, this characteristic of Sismondi’s method has been
evaluated as fragile, even superficial and lacking the rigor offered by his contemporary more specialized
social scientists, such as those belonging to the Ricardian school, Sismondi’s approach actually reflects
a genuine scientific need to maintain the complexity of reality even at the highest level of analysis by
building a methodological apparatus for dealing with the two-way interactions between the motives and
actions of individuals and the social environment within which they live and the generative power of
these relationships to create scientific knowledge.
It is interesting to notice that, as observed by Faccarello and Izumo, several French economists
recognized that this methodological point of view constituted “one of Smith’s greatest achievements
which had to be applied to political economy”3. For instance, Pierre Prevost stressed this point by
criticizing Ricardo’s approach to economic studies: “All is extreme in this system of thought. No
consideration is paid to modifying circumstances and consequences are inferred from each other with
too much confidence,”4 and Jean-Baptiste Say criticized Ricardian school’s reasoning from abstract
principles and focused on the necessity to maintain the complexity of reality:

They keep on generalizing and I am afraid that they have all moved away from the path of nature that only shows us
complicated phenomena and moves toward its goal in its own way and despite the rules that we wish to impose on it.5

Another methodological element of Sismondi’s approach to social studies is represented by the
maintaining of a constant interaction among different scientific discourses.6

2
  Koselleck (1990, p. 24).
3
  Faccarello and Izumo (2014).
4
  Prevost (1818, p. 14).
5
  Say (1825, p. 270). For an interesting commentary on French reception of Ricardo’s methodological perspective, see Beraud
and Faccarello’s article in Faccarello and Izumo (2014
6
  On Sismondi’s methodological approach, the reference is to Grossmann (1972); also, the discourse developed in this book
does not concern Sismondi’s epistemological “vision”. About Sismondi’s method, see also Gislain (1996), (1998) and (2000);
Dal Degan (2002).

In 1803, Sismondi explained his views on the relationships among different human sciences to be
safeguarded when carrying out economic analysis. Whenever economists have looked beyond their field,
they have mostly looked at natural sciences, but Sismondi recognized in economics a societal discourse
that needed to express a more complex experience in order to accomplish its specific function of
promoting better standards of life in individual and social terms.
In the first draft of Richesse Commerciale, Sismondi presents a metaphorical image that can help capture
his view of relationships among sciences:

Les sciences humaines sont comme des secteurs de cercles concentriques dont le nombre est infini; l’homme est placé à leur
centre, il voit entre chaque rayon une science; il découvre ainsi l’enchaînement et les rapports des unes avec les autres, mais
plus la science s’éloigne de sa vue et de sa portée, plus elle s’élargit, plus elle s’étend; il a beau la diviser et la subdiviser,
chacune de ses portions est illimitée, et fait partie de l’infini [Human sciences are like sectors of an infinite number of
concentric circles. Man is at the centre, and between each spoke he sees a science. He thus discovers the links and relations
among sciences. However, the more science distances itself from his view and his range, the more it broadens and expands;
it is pointless to divide and subdivide science as each of its portions is unlimited and part of infinity.]

Following the idea that metaphorical discourse has a strategic value for comprehension, as the seminal
work of Black (1962) made clear and the conspicuous literature confirms,7 I will attempt to highlight the
epistemological message of this metaphorical image. In particular, through this metaphor, the economist
reveals a methodological approach to economic theory characterized by an interdisciplinary vision that
persists in all his work. Human sciences, among which economics figures prominently, are similar to a
series of sectors of concentric circles with overlapping limits. As an observer at the centre of a
geometrical space, the economist was not only interested in one sector, the economy, but in the
“enchaînements” among human sciences and the limits of his science overlapping with the limits of the
others. Even when focusing on one of these sectors, the observer must pay attention to the others when
engaged in the construction of an analytical theory. An interdisciplinary approach, in fact, is the only
viable response in order to overcome the limits of human capacity and understand the concrete
interdependent reality of phenomena.
The image of concentric circles, when considered a geometrical division of the space in which the
observer is placed, reminds the reader of an existing order among different fields of knowledge that can
only be partially perceived by the human mind: the complexity of sciences has, in fact, an infinite scope.

7
 Shibles (1971), Ricoeur (1975), Levin (1977), AA.VV. (1979), McCloskey (1983), Hesse (1988), Montuschi (1993), Busino
(2000), Besomi (2011), Langer (2015).

The vagueness due to the infinite dimension of the spectrum of sciences and the limits of the human mind
are linked to the scope of the space of human experience as well as to the historical and temporal structure
of this experience. Just as different dimensions of life need to be enlightened by their reciprocal
connections in human experience, in economics, by focusing on dynamic relations with other sciences,
it is possible to build an analytical apparatus that is better able to manage the vagueness of reality without
claiming completeness.
The importance of enriching and “complicating” economic discourse was stressed when Sismondi
referred to the language of mathematics:

Je généraliserai dans cette note ce qui est exposé dans le texte, et j’adopterai cette fois seulement le langage des sciences
exactes: mais je le répète, ce ne sera que cette fois, car appliquer ce language à une science qui n’est point exacte, c’est
s’exposer à des erreurs continuelles. L’économie politique n’est point fondée uniquement sur le calcul, une foule
d’observations morales qui ne peuvent être soumises au dernier, altèrent sans cesse les faits; vouloir en faire constamment
abstraction, c’est pour le mathématicien supprimer au hasard des figures essentielles de chacune de ses équations8 [I will
generalize in this note that which is outlined in the text and for once I will adopt the language of the exact sciences. However,
I wish to reiterate that it is a one-off occurrence since applying this language to a science, that is not at all exact, means risking
continual errors. Political economy is not only based on calculation as facts are constantly altered by a plethora of moral
observations that cannot be calculated; the desire to constantly abstract is the same as randomly suppressing essential figures
in a mathematician’s equation.]

That which is difficult to describe solely with mathematical language makes room for the use of other
kinds of language. In this sense, the image of concentric circles illustrates the cognitive place of figurative
and descriptive assertions in economics and clarifies their strategic role: as cross-meanings or meta-
theoretical frameworks they bring to light the dynamic relations among sciences that are impossible to
render with mathematical abstractions alone.
Moving beyond the boundaries of single sciences is useful, above all, when analytical difficulties emerge.
As Fiori (2001) observes in relation to Sismondi’s master, Adam Smith, the recourse to the metaphor of
the invisible hand reveals an explanatory difficulty in economic analysis:

the hand that guides identifies a problem that has not been resolved analytically, that is to say, how real market processes,
albeit in non-optimal conditions, can be configured as an order, and not as a chaotic aggregation of conflictual interests. Since
theory cannot explain this type of order, there is space for a cognitive metaphor to be used heuristically; a metaphor that

8
    Sismondi (2012a, p. 80).

ostensively represents how invisible forces, despite moving away from the “natural order,” can bring about both forms of
order and development9

Sismondi’s choice of economic discourse, which is open to interdisciplinary percolation, plays a similar
role by seeking a way to respond to an explanatory impasse in a richer and more complex argumentative
structure. This becomes clear when we consider Sismondi’s economic writing in relation to his political
and historical reflections. It is interesting to note that Sismondi’s first economic publication, Tableau de
l’agriculture toscane,10 was conceived by the author through successive drafts, and the most important
part for economic reflection, the part dedicated to the size of farms, was imported from his political
writing, Essais sur les constitutions des peuples libres.11 In paragraph XXIII “Grandeur des fermes,”
which was inserted only in the last draft of the Tableau de l’agriculture toscane, Sismondi admits that he
focused on one of the questions “les plus epineuses et les plus compliquées qu’elle nous présente et n’ont
jamais été bien résolues, quoiqu’un grand nombre d’écrivains des deux partis les ayant decideés fort
légèrement, en ne les considerant que sous un seul point de vue.” The size and specific structure of
properties present in social organization was, in fact, the “political” element that needed to be taken into
account in economic analysis aimed at establishing the correct causal relationships among different kinds
of social revenues and between wealth and happiness. Farms are not only considered by the author to be
neutral spaces of production; their political dimension is important as well. Thus, in economic discourse,
frameworks derived from political studies are powerful tools that serve to detect the non-neutral value of
the form of social institutions and establish the wide and multi-stratified bases of economic analysis12.
Also, on this occasion, Sismondi pointed out another consequence of this epistemological view when he
recognized the need to carry out a contextual analysis of economic phenomena. While a multidisciplinary
approach was necessary to construct a phenomenon without reductionist temptation (“constructive
method” in the words of Grossmann13), attention to contextual structures was necessary to establish the
correct direction of the causal link in a more complex economic analysis. In fact, the direction of causal
links among different phenomena is a consequence of their concrete and multifaceted context. This
becomes more evident if we take into account an “episode” described by Sismondi in his correspondence,
where he clarifies what he was affirming in relation to the size of farms and distribution of wealth in the

9
  Our translation, Fiori (2001, pp. 79–80).
10
   Sismondi (1801), now in Sismondi (2018a).
11
   More precisely, in Essais, Sismondi focused on the importance of distribution of properties and the size of the farms in
order to explain the prosperous and virtuous economic situation of United States.
12
   See Dal Degan (2002).
13
   Grossmann (1972).

Tableau of agriculture toscane. A “petit débat” with his philosophy teacher at the Academy of Geneva,
Pierre Prevost,14 led Sismondi to explain that the production of “produit brut,”15 the real indicator of
social wealth, also depends on the size of farms because only through a decentralized spread of petites
fermes could production of surplus be transformed into real wealth for people and not into profit for a
few landowners: “Le produit net peut être supérieur dans les vastes domaines mais le produit brut est
plus considérable dans les petits; ils nourrissent une population plus nombreuse.”16
However, in interpreting Adam Smith’s thoughts on this topic, Pierre Prévost observed that Sismondi
could not make the increase in profit and the progressive decrease of land revenues dependent on the size
of farms, but on another element: “les salaires des ouvriers sont en raison directe du progrès.”17 The
automatic increase of the income of workers due to progress was precisely the core of the reasoning
criticized by Sismondi. The direction of changes in revenue levels depends, in his view, on the particular
structure of property present in a specific context, that is, on the institutional assets of society:

J’ai souvent eu le tort de ne pas développer assez ma pensée, c’est ce qui a occasionné entre autres vôtres observations sur la
page 191. En comparant le commerce à l’agriculture je n’ai pas voulu dire que ce fut de la même cause que provident la
diminution des profits de l’un et de l’autre, notamment de la moindre étendue des entreprises. J’ai voulu seulement prévenir
les lecteurs par cet exemple qu’un grand profit pouvait fort bien ne pas être un grand Bonheur pour l’État, ni le signe de grande
prospérité18 [I have often been wrong in not further developing my thoughts, which has led, inter alia, to your observations
on page 191. In comparing commerce with agriculture, I did not mean to suggest that the same factors lead to the decrease of
profits of both, notably the lesser extent of firms. I merely wished to inform readers with this example that significant profits
could certainly turn out not to be great Happiness for the State, nor the sign of great prosperity.]

In particular, a decentralized structure of property is invoked by the economist and not just for efficiency
in distributing wealth among citizens. The specific distribution of property rights in a social context
determines the direction of causal links between economic factors such as profits and salaries.
Interestingly, in analyzing Tuscan agriculture, Sismondi discovered the relevance of institutions, such as
firms, to economic functioning, and he began building a methodological apparatus for dealing with the
two-way interactions between the motives and actions of individuals and the social environment within

14
   Pierre Prévost was a relevant figure in Sismondi’s formative years
15
   In Sismondi’s economic analysis, the distinction between “produit brut” and “produit net” has a central value for identifying
a real increase of wealth for all participants in economic activity. About this important distinction, see the editors’ introduction
to Sismondi (2018a).
16
   About this aspect cfr. Gislain (2001, pp. 335–421).
17
   Letter to Sismondi, 3 March 1802, in Sismondi’s Archive of Pescia (Florence), AS A 16 n. 182.
18
   Letter from Sismondi to Pièrre Prevost, 2 March 1801, in Sismondi (1933–1954, pp. 14–16).

which they live. The first phase of this building activity was importing tools and frameworks from his
political writings into his economic analysis: this marks the birth of the institutional approach to
economy, which is often considered Sismondi’s most interesting contribution to economic theory.19 The
author refers to economic institutions in order to detect the architecture of human and social relations as
a naturalist or an antiquarian (in his words) would:

D’ailleurs je suis persuadé qu’on est tombé dans de graves erreurs, pour avoir toujours voulu généraliser tout ce qui se rapporte
aux sciences sociales. C’est au contraire dans les détails qu’il est essentiel d’étudier la condition humaine. Il faut s’attacher
tantôt au temps, tantôt à un pays, tantôt à une profession, pour voir bien ce qu’est l’homme, et comment les institutions
agissent sur lui20 [Moreover, I am persuaded that we have made serious mistakes in generalizing everything related to social
sciences. By contrast, it is essential to study the human condition in its details. The focus must sometimes be on time, or on a
country, or a profession in order to better understand what man is and how institutions affect him.]

In particular, Sismondi’s analytical progress shows the existence of conditions that cannot be fixed in
“ceteris paribus” clauses. This approach went deeper in the following phases of Sismondi’s economic
researches as it clearly emerges in his article “Balance des consommations avec les productions,”
published in 1824 in Revue Encyclopédique and later reprinted in the second edition of Nouveaux
Principes, in which Sismondi criticizes the Ricardian perspective on the natural economic mechanism of
adjustment between supply and demand, observing that the adjustment appears spontaneous if we take
away considerations of space and time, that is, the structural dimensions of our social experience and
life:

Pour étudier ce mécanisme social, nous choisirons l’agriculture, comme exemple, et nous ne verrons dans l’agriculture que le
labourage, faisant abstraction de ses autres produits ... mais en même temps, nous prendrons la société dans son organisation
actuelle, avec des ouvriers sans propriété, dont le salaire est fixé par la concurrence, et que leur maître peut congédier, des
qu’il n’a plus besoin de leur travail, car c’est précisement sur cette organisation sociale que porte nôtre objection21 [In order
to study this social mechanism, we will take agriculture as an example and focus on labor in agriculture, abstracting its other
products ... but at the same time, we will take society with its current organization, characterized by landless laborers whose
salary is fixed by means of competition and who can be fired at will by their masters when their labor is no longer needed. It
is precisely this social organization to which we object.]

19
   J. Weiller e G. Desroussilles (1976) wrote: “Comme un Stendhal, il est fasciné par le rôle des institutions et des décisions.
C’est un historiciste et un institutionnaliste, aux sens juridique et sociologique du terme.”
20
   Sismondi (2018b, p. 253).
21
   Sismondi (2015b, p. 524).

To summarize, in the first phase of his economic reflection, Sismondi was particularly interested in
shedding light on the effects produced by the spatial conditions of social organizations on the creation
and distribution of wealth, while in a more advanced stage of Sismondi’s studies, the historical dimension
of human experiences is taken into account, and new tools are developed in economic analysis.
On closer inspection, the image described at the beginning of this chapter conveys a meaning that is
linked to the particular geometrical structure of concentric circles. This structure seems to suggest the
necessity to express a movement, a dynamic progressive extension of circles moving toward infinity.
The hypothesis is that it constitutes a seminal figure shaping future acquisitions of methodological
perspective for Sismondi. What is certain is that in subsequent phases of his intellectual activity, in fact,
Sismondi focused on time as an element inherent to the structure of social organization and the nature of
life. Taking into account the temporal dimension of our social organizations, he grasped the entrenched
and invisible powers linked to the capitalistic mechanism of production and distribution of wealth, and
he denounced the negative influence of this “historical” mechanism on the conditions of life in industrial
societies.
In conclusion, through this approach, characterized by an extended use of metaphorical and descriptive
images, analyzing and engineering social contexts, and, including a temporal dimension in economic
analysis, Sismondi shows his identity as a social scientist. Thus, it is not surprising that along with JS
Mill, he was the first to use the term “social science” in his writings.22 It has been said that Sismondi’s
analysis, in the landscape of the time, is heterodox.23 In particular, the major contribution of his heterodox
approach to economy consists of the integration of spatial and time dimensions in economic analysis, a
contribution that allows us to identify Sismondi as the founder of economics as a social science, where
the aim of social sciences consists of finding ways to establish conditions of liberty within a plural
organization in order to produce common good, primarily intended as social and economic well-being.24

Nous avons donné le nom de sciences sociales à toute cette division des sciences humaines qui se rapporte à la formation et
au maintien des sociétés, à toutes les spéculations de la théorie, à tout le dépôt de l’éxperience qui peut éclairer les hommes
et les faire arriver plus sûrement au but pour lequel ils s’unissent et s’associent, savoir leur bien commun25 [We named social
sciences the whole division of the human sciences, which relates to the formation and maintenance of societies, to all the

22
   As Senn (1958) observed, J. S. Mill (1981) used the term “social science” in the article “Civilisation” published in 1836 in
The London and Westminster Review.
23
   Gislain (1996).
24
   Sismondi (2018b, p. 5, 659, 660, 684). In this perspective, see the Sismondi’s reading offered by Lutz (1999).
25
   Sismondi (2018b, p. 5).

speculations of theory, to all the repository of experience that can enlighten men and make them achieve more surely the
purpose for which they unite and associate themselves, namely their common good.]

Ultimately, while Sismondi emphasized that economics was substantially interrelated with other human
sciences through the metaphorical image of “concentric circles” in Richesse commerciale, in his later
work, he defined economics “science of distribution” and “science du lien,” thus revendicated its intrinsic
political dimension and including it in the circle of social sciences.
As per this perspective, it is meaningful that both Sismondi’s political and economic models take into
account the image of concentric circles, at least in their main characteristics, which in movement suggests
an articulation of relations that lead to the centre from the margins and towards the margins from the
centre spread, an image of rarefied geometry in which the matrix of Sismondi’s republican creed or his
ethical liberalism26 can perhaps be found27 and in which the frequency of a movement suggests to
recognize the political character of social bonds considered as the real place of liberty.
This is where the fate of the intellectual plays out: an impossible dialog with the Ricardian school, a
marginal position because always being “on the margins” of the debate between “Revolution and
Reaction”, almost substantially ignored—at least by contemporaries—his social scientific contribution
excessively tilted toward the consideration of the generative nature of the “social bond”, “intersubjective
relations” for the progression of the individual and for the well-being of the community in a moment in
which the seventeenth century perception of the importance of man as a subject of rights was being
pushed out by a more abstract vision of the individual and society, bereft of ethical dynamics.28

26
   When discussing republicanism or ethical liberalism, attributing the former with a strong “subjective” component and
enriching the latter in a relational sense does not change the substance much. Sismondi saw himself as follows:
Je suis libéral et, mieux encore républicain, mais jamais démocrate ... mon idéal en fait de gouvernement, c’est l’union et
l’accord des éléments monarchiques, aristocratiques et démocratiques, c’est-à-dire la république romaine enfin dans ses beaux
jours de vertu et de force, et non les principes modernes, que je ne reconnais nullement pour des principes. Sismondi (1933–
1954, III, p. 284)
27
   It is interesting to notice that Harrington, an author whom Sismondi refers to in his Oceana, proposed the geometrical image
of sphere to illustrate republican political dynamics: “Les mouvements (election des differents ordres de la société) que l’on
fait voir sont sphériques, et ces mouvements ont leur centre; c’est pourquoi il sera necessaire, avant d’aller plus loin, et pour
mieux comprendre le tout, de faire voir le centre duquel émanent tous les mouvements de cette république”, p. 323. For an
interesting reading about the political value of spatial metaphors see Heurtin (1994).
28
   The reference here is to the idea that the most important contribution of eighteenth century culture, at least at an ethical-
anthropological level, is revealed in the discovery of the subject as the fulcrum of rights and potential, while in the nineteenth
century, “a valere come perno dell’ordine: è piuttosto una grandezza collettiva (la nazione, la società, il popolo, la repubblica,
lo Stato) che si propone come il fondamento di un ordine nel quale il soggetto è ricompreso,” Costa (2000, p. 629). Jaume
brilliantly describes the drift of the reflection on liberty at Coppet and the progressive affirmation of a doctrine based on an
abstract idea of reason: ‘Rémusat parle société, opinion, partis, générations surtout, il partage la théorie doctrinaire de la
gestion de la société à travers la “souveraineté de la raison.”’ And again: ‘On retrouve ici le credo philosophique de Victor
Cousin, exprimé à la même époque: contre l’individualisme moderne, il faut dire que la raison est “impersonnelle” et que “la
verité n’est à personne” parce qu’alors elle ne serait plus la vérité ... c’est à ce moment que commence le divorce entre le

liberalisme du sujet individual ... et le liberalisme des grands intérêts appuyés sur la puissance publique.’ Jaume (2000a, pp.
226–227).