The most important figure in Enlightenment economics was Adam Smith who is considered to be both a pioneer in political economy and the father of modern economics. ... Smith perceived people as selfish who only worked harder and produced more when given an incentive. ... Smith believed that there was no need to regulate markets because people's greed combined with the law of supply and demand would regulate markets by themselves. ... Adam Smith became the father of modern economics during the Enlightenment. ... Smith is also responsible for the development of the invisible hand metaphor a...

• Word Count: 1343
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Two of the big promoters of change for the individual were John Locke and Adam Smith. ... Adam Smith was also an innovative thinker who helped boost the single rights of one man to the forefront of society. ... Before Smith, the mercantilist view was dominant. ... Smith also felt that the individual worker in business was responsible for creating wealth in a nation, because they were essential to making the whole thing work. ... This view came about because of innovative thinkers like Locke and Smith, proving that if you have a big enough lever you can move the world. ...

• Word Count: 919
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

These philosophers, including Locke, Smith, Wollstonecraft, Rousseau, and Montesquieu, proved as a guiding force through the best and worst parts of the French revolution. ... To solve the financial crisis, the works of the Scottish philosopher, Adam Smith, is represented and had to be used. Smith believed that rational self-interest and competition can lead to economic prosperity through free market capitalism opposed to mercantilism. ... John Locke and Adam Smith influenced phase one to me because they both wanted to reform government through rising up to create a better government and to ...

• Word Count: 1221
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The Enlightenment philosophers had a belief in the rights of humankind, they fought for what they believed in and in a way influenced our freedom and rights today. These four Enlightenment philosophers had different ideas, like the equality for women, freedom of religion, freedom from economics, a...

• Word Count: 665
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The Physiocrats exerted a profound influence on Adam Smith, who had spent time in France in the 1760s and whose classic "The Wealth of Nations" embodied the Physiocratic attack on mercantilism and argued that nations get rich by practicing free trade. Of Smith, Turgot, and the Physiocrats, the great French political leader and author Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850) wrote: The basis of their whole economic system may be truly said to lie in the principle of self-interest. . .. ...

• Word Count: 2777
• Approx Pages: 11
• Grade Level: Undergraduate