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nydus/A History of Greek Economic ThoughtPublic

This volume provides a reinterpretation of Greek economic theory by examining the relationship between ancient thought and modern humanitarian economy. The text analyzes Greek economic ideas within the context of the contemporary economic environment and provides a bibliography of relevant scholarly works.

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Table of Contents

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

it, and very probably his standpoint came much nearer being that of the average Athenian citizen.

b) The confusion was not merely with individual ethics, for Greek moral philosophy always had the welfare of the state for its goal. Indeed, the basal reason for this close union of economics, ethics, and politics is the true idea that the state should rise above internal strife, and unite all in a care for the common interest.9

c) The standpoint of the Greek philosophers is certainly no more to be criticized than is that of the so-called orthodox political economy.10 They represent two extremes. If the Greek theory did not give to wealth its full right, and was open to the charge of sentimentalism, the Ricardian doctrine, with its “economic man,” which eliminated all other ideals and impulses, was an unreal and pernicious abstraction. Of the two errors, the Greek is the less objectionable, and is more in accord with the trend of

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