----------------- HES POSTING ----------------- The question was about Smith's 'notion' of the nation. The replies have been about (our) notion of the nation state as it relates to Smith. One could also ask what Smith himself meant by the word 'nation'. It certainly doesn't mean a modern nation state in his usage, because he uses the word (e.g. in the preface to the Wealth of Nations) to include 'savage nations of hunters and fishers' as well as 'civilised and thriving nations'. It seems at a first look to be almost interchangeable with 'country' and with 'society', though 'country' in the eighteenth century did not necessarily mean the same as nation state - it could refer to a region or county. When Smith uses 'nation' to refer to primitive peoples, the word seems to imply a wider grouping than 'tribe', and may perhaps refer to a cultural grouping of people who share a way of life. I suspect that the word did not have a fixed and clear-cut meaning for Smith. There is an interesting question about the size of the implicit unit whose wealth is discussed in the Wealth of Nations. Tony Brewer ------------ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ------------ For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]