On economics and philosophy: G. E. Moore's imprint on the Cambridge Apostles from Principia Ethica to My Early Beliefs.

The present work investigates the economic thought of the Cambridge Apostles, the famous à©lite intellectual group which counted J.M. Keynes among its members. In the first decades of the XX century the Apostles' Society worked as a first-class think-tank where a cross-fertilization of feelings and ideas among some of the most brilliant minds of the time occurred in a peculiarly interdisciplinary context. G. E. Moore (1873-1958), one of the most influential British philosophers in the fields of metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics, was the leader of the Apostles' Society at the beginning of the century. His great book, Principia Ethica (1903), through a radical criticism of idealism, hedonistic utilitarianism, and empiricism, undermined the philosophical basis of Victorian conventional morality, and was enthusiastically greeted by the young Apostles. Moore indicated the states of consciousness consisting in the pleasure of human intercourse and the enjoyment of beauty as the greatest intrinsic goods; for them only he endorsed the performing any public or private duty. From the perspective of the historian of economic thought, there are three problems related to Moore's impact on the Apostles. The first is the difference between the young and the mature Keynes's adhesion to Moore's teachings, as reported in My Early Beliefs (1938); the second relates to the divergent interpretations that the Apostles gave of Moore's influence on them; the third contrasts Moore's †˜unwordliness' with the Apostles-economists' intellectual and professional concerns. The first problem has been tackled by most authors who have studied Moore's influence on Keynes, but the other two have been largely neglected. In particular, the paradox referred to in the third question has not been convincingly explained. Moreover, while in the last thirty years the philosophical foundations of Keynes's economics have been the subject of a very extensive literature, and Moore's influence has been duly acknowledged, the same cannot be said for Keynes's fellow Apostles. The present research aims to assess the impact of such similar philosophical background on their views: it emphasizes, first, the simultaneous recurrence of ethical, social and political elements in the works of the Apostles-economists in the first decades of the XX century. Second, it points to some neglected features in Moore's philosophy that shaped the Apostles' concerns as well as their intellectual approach. By tracing the Moorean elements in the economic thinking of the Apostles-economists a richer picture of Cambridge economics comes to light. Their works display numerous and significant common features. One of these is the interweaving of positive and normative economic arguments; a characteristic which is in line with the Marshallian tradition, and is reinforced by both Moore's emphasis on ethical ends in terms of good states of consciousness and his rejection of hedonism. Moreover, is evident that Keynes was not the only philosopher-economist of the group. Authors commonly considered as economic theorists strictu sensu, like Gerald Shove and Ralph Hawtrey, if read in this context reveal fascinating philosophical proclivities and display original approaches to economics. However, Moore's teaching bore fruit beyond the relationship between economics and philosophy, as some Apostles applied the philosopher's categories and methodology in the field of political science, and others tackled the international policy issues of their time with similar tools. This leads to a reconsideration of the meaning and impact of Moore's Principia Ethica. Far from being the manifesto of †˜a life of retirement among fine shadows and nice feelings' (Russell 1967: 71), the book was regarded as a blueprint for correct reasoning, both in moral reflection and other disciplines. The young Apostles were fascinated with the values of Principia Ethica but also with Moore's method, a style in argumentation that suited their leanings. As for these values, it will be shown that Moore's ideal utilitarianism supplied ethical justification not only to aesthetes and artists, as is commonly maintained, but to social reformers as well, as Moore valued states of consciousness deriving from love and beauty, but also the abolition of cruelty and injustice. Thus the Apostles shared a similar stance towards two focal issues of their time: economic justice and international conflicts. Moore's rebuttal of rational egoism and utility maximization is significant in relation to both the Apostles' views of the methodological status of economic science and their political vision, which spanned from a progressive-internationalist kind of liberalism to socialism. On the whole, the conclusions of the work challenge Keynes's interpretation of Moore's influence on the Apostles in My Early Beliefs. Though Keynes is obviously an unavoidable term of reference, I aimed at giving the other Apostles some focus of their own. The similarities among the various authors are highlighted, but not to the detriment of their individual profiles, as many of them were very interesting and original thinkers. The peculiarities of their approach emerge with greater evidence once contributions addressing a wide range of topics are considered, and both published and unpublished sources are taken into account, with special emphasis placed on papers presented at the Society's meetings. Chapter 1 investigates the young Shove's elaboration of Moore's ethics in his unpublished 1911 fellowship dissertation on political philosophy, here discussed with reference to both the acceptance and elaboration of Principia Ethica by the Apostles and Shove's intellectual and personal biography. Chapter 2 aims to contribute to an appraisal of the complexity of Cambridge welfare economics by discussing Ralph Hawtrey's critical approach to it. Well-known for his works in monetary and trade cycle theories, Hawtrey was greatly influenced by the philosophy of Moore, and in particular shared his non-utilitarian ethics, as is revealed by some of his lesser-known †˜philosophical' and †˜political' writings, some unpublished, where he formulated an original methodological approach to economic science. Chapter 3 explores the topic of economic justice in the writings of G. Lowes Dickinson, Shove, Hawtrey, Dennis Robertson, Hugh Meredith, Julian Bell, Frank Ramsey, and of Hugh Dalton, one of Moore's †˜lay' followers. Their analysis of economic inequality is reviewed with reference to the Cambridge tradition in economics, represented by H. Sidgwick, A. Marshall and A. C. Pigou, the impact of Fabianism, and J.M. Keynes's views on social justice. Many Apostles wrote extensively on war and international relations, becoming widely-read and influential opinion-makers. Russell, Hawtrey, Woolf, Shove, Dickinson, Dalton, and, of course, Keynes were among them, and their contributions are addressed in chapter 4. They held similar views on WWI and the Peace treaty, were prominent in the creation of the League of Nations, and regarded free trade as a vehicle of peace and civilization. The chapter unearths the existence of a common †˜Apostolic' internationalist paradigm and assesses its features in relation to both Carr's utopianism/realism dichotomy and more recent International Relations theories. In the concluding remarks the existence of an Apostolic social science tradition is argued for.