Friedrich List on Adam Smith

Friedrich List was a prophet of industrialization advocating policies designed for a successful long-run catching-up process of the German economy to the dominant English economy. List considered Adam Smith as the leading economist representing British interests. His relationship with and assessment of Smith was ambivalent. On the one side, List was a student of the Scotsman who talked of the “great Adam Smith” or the merits of Smith who had introduced the analytical method to political economy. On the other side, List criticized Smith for only dealing with the individual and the cosmopolitan economy but overlooking the important national economy at the intermediate level. The article focuses on those issues which are relevant for a comparison of List’s views with those of Smith: the stages theory of economic development, productive forces including mental capital, and the controversial debate between free trade and protectionism.