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Published by EH.NET (June 2002) 
 
Andrea Finkelstein, _Harmony and the Balance: An Intellectual History of Seventeenth-
Century English Economic Thought_. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000. x + 381
pp. $49.50 (cloth), ISBN: 0-472-11143-4.
 
Reviewed for EH.NET by Edward J. Harpham, School of Social Sciences, University of Texas
at Dallas. <[log in to unmask]>
 
 
Historians of seventeenth-century economic thought in England find themselves trapped in a
rather curious dilemma. On the one hand, most are interested in understanding the
intellectual origins of a modern economic view of the world. Essentially this means
investigating the historical development of the tools of modern economic analysis. Does a
particular writer grasp some aspect of marginal utility theory or the quantity theory of
money? What are the limits to a particular theorist's view of economic problems? Following
the lead of Joseph Schumpeter, students adopting this perspective often turn the history
of economic ideas into a history of the tools of economic analysis.
 
On the other hand, many want to place economic ideas in the seventeenth century in one of
a variety of contexts. One context, for example, involves the specific historical context
out of which specific economic ideas emerge. How did the economic and political events of
the day such as banking or trade crises shape the economic ideas of a particular writer?
What special interests or biases might influence the development of one set of ideas
rather than another? Here the history of economic thought is turned into one dimension of
a broader sociology of knowledge. Barry Supple's _Commercial Crisis and Change in England,
1600-1642_ (1959) is perhaps the classic example of such an approach. A second contextual
approach tries to grasp economic ideas in terms of he general intellectual environment of
the times. For example, how do the assumptions of a modern scientific or an
individualistic worldview affect the way economic theorists conceptualize economic
problems? Joyce Appleby's _Economic Thought and Ideology in Seventeenth Century England_
(1978) is a notable contribution to this genre. Finally, there is the biographical
context. English economic writers in the seventeenth century came from a variety of
backgrounds, ranging from merchants seeking special privileges to intellectuals committed
to a particular political agenda to officials trying to justify governmental policy.
Moreover, their ideas were expressed in a number of different genres rather than a
consistent scientific literature. Biographic context aims to help explain why certain
economic ideas were developed at particular points in time, and what their conceptual
limitations might be. Karen Vaughn's _John Locke, Economist and Social Scientist_ (1980)
is an excellent example of this approach.
 
The problem facing the historian of economic thought is how to integrate the study of the
tools and concepts of modern economic analysis with one or all of these contextual
approaches. Andrea Finkelstein's strategy echoes that of E.A.J. Johnson's _Predecessors of
Adam Smith_ (1937) and William Letwin's _The Origins of Scientific Economics_ (1963) in
many ways. First, she identifies a number of key contributors to the century's economic
debates. For Johnson, these figures were Gerard de Malynes, Edward Misselden, Thomas Mun,
William Petty, and Nehemiah Grew. For Letwin, they were Josiah Child, Nicholas Barbon,
John Collins, William Petty, John Locke, and Dudley North. Finkelstein splits the
difference between the two, looking at Malynes, Misselden and Mun in Part I, at Petty,
Child and Locke in Part II, and at North, Barbon, and Davenant in part III. She is
unapologetic in her selection, noting that these figures are generally recognized by
historians of conomic thought as the best that the century had to offer.
 
Second, she organizes her study of each trio of theorists around a few themes. Part I
seeks to explain how the balance of trade theory articulated by Malynes, Misselden and Mun
provided a new perspective for viewing the self-interested behavior and the market
alongside a more traditional organic view of society as a harmonious whole. Many of the
tensions and contradictions in their thought must be understood in terms of the "logical
impasse" created by the attempt to accommodate balance of trade theory into a societal
model of a harmonious universe. Part II's analysis of Petty, Child, and Locke is held
together by the idea that new mechanical models of society based on the work of Harvey,
Descartes, and Hobbes displaced the old organic model of the body politic sometime during
the middle decades of the seventeenth century. This new approach which stressed the
uniformity of human behavior and the idea that individuals acted from a pleasure-pain
calculus became the philosophical foundation of economic thought for two new models of
economic life: a circulatory model and a national accounting model. The central theme of
part III is balance. Essentially what Finkelstein appears to mean here is that each
theorist sought to integrate some new notion of balance into the new models of polity and
economy developed by earlier thinkers in the century.
 
Third, Finkelstein spends considerable time providing a biographical background to each of
the writers. Each substantive chapter begins with an overview of the writer's life and
career and an analysis of the controversies that shaped his economic writings. Finally,
most chapters conclude with an in-depth discussion of the key economic ideas that are
found in a particular writer's work, such as money, demand, value, circulation and the
like.
 
There is much to be learned from Finkelstein's book. It is hard to argue with her choice
of figures. All but on is commonly recognized as a leading contributor to economic thought
in the century. The choice of Davenant may surprise some, being a figure largely ignored
in standard histories of modern economic thought. His contributions to the economic and
political controversies of the day are undeniable and his inclusion may help to broaden
most economists' understanding of early founders of their discipline.The biographical
analysis of these figures is excellent, moving beyond that of predecessors like Johnson
and Letwin. Finkelstein takes seriously the idea that we must understand the context in
which the author is writing if we are to grasp the ideas developed by an author. Similarly
her analysis of various modern analytical ideas developed by each of the theorists is
thoughtful and creative, while not being overly critical. Finkelstein is sensitive to the
idea that these writers might have something to teach modern economists about the way we
have come to think about economic issues and problems.
 
The problem with the book resides in the larger themes that Finkelstein tries to use to
make the book a unified whole. Some of these themes work well. For example, the idea that
the balance of trade theory of Malynes, Misselden and Mun may have introduced an
irreconcilable tension into an organic view of the body politic is intriguing. Finkelstein
does a pretty good job arguing her case in Part I. But the unifying themes of mechanism
and balance in Part II and III are less well developed and need a more careful
elaboration. There is no doubt that the mechanistic universe of Harvey, Descartes, and
Hobbes played a major role in shaping the intellectual climate of seventeenth-century
England. But Finkelstein's contention that it may be a unifying feature tying together the
economic thought of Petty, Child, and Locke is suggestive at best. Her rich discussion of
each thinker's work seems to belie the fact that they are taken from a common cloth.
Similar problems haut the analysis of the idea of balance in Part III. Davenant's civic
humanist concerns over balance in a commercial society seem to be a far cry from the
concerns of North or Barbon. Throughout Part III, it is often difficult to understand what
is being balanced or what is balancing what. As in Part II, some of the grand themes of
the book tend to get in the way of the rather intriguing discussions of each individual
thinker
 
Other problems exist with Finkelstein's attempt to place an individual's economic ideas
into larger intellectual contexts like Baconian authoritarianism, millenarianism, civic
humanism, natural law theory, or theories of Aristotelian harmony. While readily using
these terms to situate the economic ideas of seventeenth-century England, Finkelstein does
not always carefully explain the complexity and mixed meanings built into these concepts.
Nor does she ever adequately explain why some authors appealed to one set of ideas while
others appealed to another. Was an economic way of thinking about the world trapped in a
variety of competing perspectives or was it integrally connected to them?
 
One shouldn't be too critical of Finkelstein's effort to bring some order to a myriad of
economic arguments developed by thinkers in the seventeenth century. Finkelstein's study
reminds us how complex intellectual discourse was in the early modern era and why we
should be wary of one-size-fits-all interpretations. Faults aside, Finkelstein has
presented us with an insightful and, at times, thought-provoking book on economic ideas in
seventeenth-century England. It is a good starting point for anyone interested in gaining
a deeper insight into the controversies and ideas that shaped early modern economic
thinking.
 
 
Edward J. Harpham has published numerous articles in the history of seventeenth- and
eighteenth-century political and economic thought. He is the editor of _John Locke's Two
Treatises of Government: New Interpretations_ (1992).
 
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