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Power, Pleasure, and Profit: Insatiable Appetites from Machiavelli to Madison
David Wootton guides us through four centuries of Western thought to show how new ideas about politics, ethics, and economics stepped into a gap opened up by religious conflict and the Scientific Revolution. As ideas about godliness and Aristotelian virtue faded, theories about the rational pursuit of power, pleasure, and profit moved to the fore.
390 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2018
29 people are currently reading
535 people want to read
About the author
David Wootton
87 books51 followersMA, PhD (Cantab), FRHistS
David Wootton is Anniversary Professor of History. He works on the intellectual and cultural history of the English speaking countries, Italy, and France, 1500-1800. He is currently writing a book entitled Power, Pleasure and Profit based on his Carlyle Lectures at the University of Oxford in 2014. His most recent book is The Invention of Science, published by Allen Lane.
In 2016 he will give the annual Besterman Lecture at the University of Oxford.
He was educated at Oxford and Cambridge, and has held positions in history and politics at four British and four Canadian universities, and visiting postions in the US, before coming to York.
David Wootton is Anniversary Professor of History. He works on the intellectual and cultural history of the English speaking countries, Italy, and France, 1500-1800. He is currently writing a book entitled Power, Pleasure and Profit based on his Carlyle Lectures at the University of Oxford in 2014. His most recent book is The Invention of Science, published by Allen Lane.
In 2016 he will give the annual Besterman Lecture at the University of Oxford.
He was educated at Oxford and Cambridge, and has held positions in history and politics at four British and four Canadian universities, and visiting postions in the US, before coming to York.
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August 31, 2020
In traditional cultures, societies organized themselves around virtues that contributed to the unity of their culture. For the Greeks, one of the fundamental virtues was "arete," living up to one's full potential through a life of moderation and honor. For the Hebrews, it meant living a life that was "tamim" while participating in the "Tikkun olam." For Buddhists, it meant following the eight-fold path; for Christians, the belief in salvation through Christ; for Muslims, a pious focus on Allah, the all-powerful and all-merciful. In practice, each had often serious flaws, but what they had in common was a belief system that pointed beyond the individual self.
In Western Europe, as society emerged from the Middle Ages, a major realignment of the culture occurred. The seven heavenly virtues and the seven deadly sins were focused primarily on how one could either benefit or harm others. But then the focus shifted from other-directed or God-directed community values to self-directed values. Instead of reflecting on how one's behavior benefited or harmed the community, the focus became how one's behavior would benefit oneself. In his "Power, Pleasure and Profit," David Wootton traces this realignment from its progenitors like Machiavelli, Hobbes and Bentham, to its consolidation as a cultural base through the Enlightenment, the work of Adam Smith, and the founders of the United States like James Madison. Tracing this realignment over a period of three centuries demonstrates how thoroughly entrenched these values - power, pleasure, and profit - have become, and how the resulting culture in which there is no such thing as "enough" since these can be pursued without limit.
For Aristotle and the Greeks, the key to virtue, and therefore happiness, is moderation - the ability to recognize and respect limits. For Machiavelli, however, virtue, and therefore happiness, had everything to do with acquiring power and glory. For Hobbes, there is no "summum bonum," except as it profits an individual in the fight of all against all. So we arrive at a culture of competition and self-gratification, through which lens we look at the purpose of government, the economy, and even the past. In this culture, Utility replaces virtue (chapter 5), because, as Diderot wrote in 1757, "The best government is that which makes the greatest number of people happy," not in the pursuit of a classic idea of virtue, but as a pursuit of private interests, an idea that found its way into the Federalist Papers and the American Constitution. And the state itself requires a system of checks and balances (chapter 6) because, as David Hume wrote in 1741, "...every Man ought to be supposed a knave" in the pursuit of private interests.
Wootton then discusses how Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations" (1776) was interpreted as using the "invisible hand", a "market mechanism that contains a feedback loop which makes it self-equilibrating" to control this knavery. The idea of an economy and a government as a self-governed feedback system had come a far way from Thomas More's "Utopia" (1516) in which the solution to people's knavery was to eliminate the pursuit of profit, provide full employment, and plan for every possible eventuality through a powerful central authority. In More's society, social stability and happiness are to be achieved by the utopian state. In Smith's society, these will be achieved through free markets regulated by the invisible hand of competing interests.
Before he published "Wealth of Nations," however, as Wooton notes, he published "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" in 1759, "a book which advocated action for the welfare of others, action based on sympathy and benevolence...." For Smith, the self-interest of the market is not at odds with the welfare of others - "...a prudent man would have found that individual happiness and the economic activities which benefit society are not mutually exclusive" (Ryan Hanley in Appendix E). The free market might require adjustments from time to time, which the invisible hand would manage, but it would not, in the end distribute its benefits unfairly. Despite a history of a consequent unequal distribution of benefits, and despite Smith's assertion to the contrary about this unfairness, "The Wealth of Nations" has become dogma, and "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" has become all but ignored.
While someone might argue that, "First, in the spirit of "Wealth of Nations" they get rich; and then, in the spirit of "The Theory of Moral Sentiments," they give their money away," markets are amoral, and in the absence of any other-directed overriding cultural virtue, the seconds part of the proposition does not necessarily follow from the first. Smith might have seen charity as the solution to inequitable distribution, but charity was by no means obligatory, and government intervention was abhorrent. People can watch their power, pleasure and profit accumulate far beyond what is necessary for a satisfactory existence (who, after all, can put a limit on "satisfactory"?) - a far cry from Candide finding happiness in tending his garden or Rousseau's admiration for his "noble savage" (however the notion may seem inappropriate today). As Wootton puts it, "...we look out at the world from within the iron cage of Smith's system," where exploitation of labor and the environment, poverty, famine, and gross economic and social disparity are the norm. (And yes, the markets have raised millions out of severe poverty over the past 100 years, but not out of the gross disparity or into the comfort of not having to worry about famine and well-being.)
As an aside, while Wootton traces the history of how we got to this point in Western culture, it is by no means a problem unique to Western culture. As long ago as the 6th century BCE, the "Tao te Ching" tells us that
"If I have one ounce of sense,
I will follow the great Way,
And fear only to stray from it.
The great Way is very straight,
But people love to deviate from it.
When the palace is magnificent,
The fields are filled with weeds,
And the granaries are empty.
Some wear lavish garments,
Carry sharp swords,
And indulge themselves in food and drink.
They possess more than they can spend or use.
This is called the vanity of robber barons.
It is certainly not the Way of Tao."
The Way being a life centered on equity, balance and harmony.
Contemporaries of this process of realignment had already begun to see the problems that would result. William Blake writes of the "self-forged manacles" one wears as a result of living in this iron cage. The Earl of Shaftesbury writes of how "Men [are led] into that path which afterwards they cannot easily quit." We find ourselves today in the iron cage of Quantitative Easing which, if we were to try to leave it, could ruin our economy. Wootton calls this cage "The Enlightenment Paradigm," which he summarizes on pp.242-244, and which Marx, Freud, and Darwin failed to break open, despite their revolutionary ideas, and which Max Weber saw as a trap. Despite the comment about a prudent man, a system based on the unlimited pursuit of power, pleasure and profit is not one to recognize, let alone encourage, prudence.
Robert Musil, in "The Man Without Qualities" (vol 1, 1930), develops the theme of what it means to live an authentic life in a world where the dominant system cannot supply even the basic necessities of life to all people, let alone provide for their moral or spiritual advancement. This idea became one of the major themes of 20th century literature, resulting the the awarding of several Nobel Prizes. Yet here we are, at the end of the process Wootton so thoroughly describes. He recognizes that capitalism as it actually exists has to change in order to survive, but his book serves primarily as a background to a plethora of books now being published that suggest alternatives.
E.F. Schumacher addressed this dilemma in "Small is Beautiful in the 1970's, but here is a list of books that have come out recently:
Paul Collier, "The Future of Capitalism"
Rutger Bregman, "Humankind: A Hopeful History
Warren Valdman, "Accountable: The Rise of Citizen Capitalism"
Thomas Piketty: "Capital and Ideology"
Michael Lind: "The New Civil War: Saving Democracy from the Metropolitan Elite"
Their proposals range from the socialist Piketty's "participatory socialism" made possible by a 60-70% tax on higher incomes and inheritance to the conservative Lind's recommendation of economic pluralism that would give the working class effective systemic influence in the economy (re-distributive taxes not needed). Each takes a somewhat different approach, but each tries to find a way to break out of the iron cage of the Enlightenment Paradigm of "the way things are" that current events make increasingly necessary.
In Western Europe, as society emerged from the Middle Ages, a major realignment of the culture occurred. The seven heavenly virtues and the seven deadly sins were focused primarily on how one could either benefit or harm others. But then the focus shifted from other-directed or God-directed community values to self-directed values. Instead of reflecting on how one's behavior benefited or harmed the community, the focus became how one's behavior would benefit oneself. In his "Power, Pleasure and Profit," David Wootton traces this realignment from its progenitors like Machiavelli, Hobbes and Bentham, to its consolidation as a cultural base through the Enlightenment, the work of Adam Smith, and the founders of the United States like James Madison. Tracing this realignment over a period of three centuries demonstrates how thoroughly entrenched these values - power, pleasure, and profit - have become, and how the resulting culture in which there is no such thing as "enough" since these can be pursued without limit.
For Aristotle and the Greeks, the key to virtue, and therefore happiness, is moderation - the ability to recognize and respect limits. For Machiavelli, however, virtue, and therefore happiness, had everything to do with acquiring power and glory. For Hobbes, there is no "summum bonum," except as it profits an individual in the fight of all against all. So we arrive at a culture of competition and self-gratification, through which lens we look at the purpose of government, the economy, and even the past. In this culture, Utility replaces virtue (chapter 5), because, as Diderot wrote in 1757, "The best government is that which makes the greatest number of people happy," not in the pursuit of a classic idea of virtue, but as a pursuit of private interests, an idea that found its way into the Federalist Papers and the American Constitution. And the state itself requires a system of checks and balances (chapter 6) because, as David Hume wrote in 1741, "...every Man ought to be supposed a knave" in the pursuit of private interests.
Wootton then discusses how Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations" (1776) was interpreted as using the "invisible hand", a "market mechanism that contains a feedback loop which makes it self-equilibrating" to control this knavery. The idea of an economy and a government as a self-governed feedback system had come a far way from Thomas More's "Utopia" (1516) in which the solution to people's knavery was to eliminate the pursuit of profit, provide full employment, and plan for every possible eventuality through a powerful central authority. In More's society, social stability and happiness are to be achieved by the utopian state. In Smith's society, these will be achieved through free markets regulated by the invisible hand of competing interests.
Before he published "Wealth of Nations," however, as Wooton notes, he published "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" in 1759, "a book which advocated action for the welfare of others, action based on sympathy and benevolence...." For Smith, the self-interest of the market is not at odds with the welfare of others - "...a prudent man would have found that individual happiness and the economic activities which benefit society are not mutually exclusive" (Ryan Hanley in Appendix E). The free market might require adjustments from time to time, which the invisible hand would manage, but it would not, in the end distribute its benefits unfairly. Despite a history of a consequent unequal distribution of benefits, and despite Smith's assertion to the contrary about this unfairness, "The Wealth of Nations" has become dogma, and "The Theory of Moral Sentiments" has become all but ignored.
While someone might argue that, "First, in the spirit of "Wealth of Nations" they get rich; and then, in the spirit of "The Theory of Moral Sentiments," they give their money away," markets are amoral, and in the absence of any other-directed overriding cultural virtue, the seconds part of the proposition does not necessarily follow from the first. Smith might have seen charity as the solution to inequitable distribution, but charity was by no means obligatory, and government intervention was abhorrent. People can watch their power, pleasure and profit accumulate far beyond what is necessary for a satisfactory existence (who, after all, can put a limit on "satisfactory"?) - a far cry from Candide finding happiness in tending his garden or Rousseau's admiration for his "noble savage" (however the notion may seem inappropriate today). As Wootton puts it, "...we look out at the world from within the iron cage of Smith's system," where exploitation of labor and the environment, poverty, famine, and gross economic and social disparity are the norm. (And yes, the markets have raised millions out of severe poverty over the past 100 years, but not out of the gross disparity or into the comfort of not having to worry about famine and well-being.)
As an aside, while Wootton traces the history of how we got to this point in Western culture, it is by no means a problem unique to Western culture. As long ago as the 6th century BCE, the "Tao te Ching" tells us that
"If I have one ounce of sense,
I will follow the great Way,
And fear only to stray from it.
The great Way is very straight,
But people love to deviate from it.
When the palace is magnificent,
The fields are filled with weeds,
And the granaries are empty.
Some wear lavish garments,
Carry sharp swords,
And indulge themselves in food and drink.
They possess more than they can spend or use.
This is called the vanity of robber barons.
It is certainly not the Way of Tao."
The Way being a life centered on equity, balance and harmony.
Contemporaries of this process of realignment had already begun to see the problems that would result. William Blake writes of the "self-forged manacles" one wears as a result of living in this iron cage. The Earl of Shaftesbury writes of how "Men [are led] into that path which afterwards they cannot easily quit." We find ourselves today in the iron cage of Quantitative Easing which, if we were to try to leave it, could ruin our economy. Wootton calls this cage "The Enlightenment Paradigm," which he summarizes on pp.242-244, and which Marx, Freud, and Darwin failed to break open, despite their revolutionary ideas, and which Max Weber saw as a trap. Despite the comment about a prudent man, a system based on the unlimited pursuit of power, pleasure and profit is not one to recognize, let alone encourage, prudence.
Robert Musil, in "The Man Without Qualities" (vol 1, 1930), develops the theme of what it means to live an authentic life in a world where the dominant system cannot supply even the basic necessities of life to all people, let alone provide for their moral or spiritual advancement. This idea became one of the major themes of 20th century literature, resulting the the awarding of several Nobel Prizes. Yet here we are, at the end of the process Wootton so thoroughly describes. He recognizes that capitalism as it actually exists has to change in order to survive, but his book serves primarily as a background to a plethora of books now being published that suggest alternatives.
E.F. Schumacher addressed this dilemma in "Small is Beautiful in the 1970's, but here is a list of books that have come out recently:
Paul Collier, "The Future of Capitalism"
Rutger Bregman, "Humankind: A Hopeful History
Warren Valdman, "Accountable: The Rise of Citizen Capitalism"
Thomas Piketty: "Capital and Ideology"
Michael Lind: "The New Civil War: Saving Democracy from the Metropolitan Elite"
Their proposals range from the socialist Piketty's "participatory socialism" made possible by a 60-70% tax on higher incomes and inheritance to the conservative Lind's recommendation of economic pluralism that would give the working class effective systemic influence in the economy (re-distributive taxes not needed). Each takes a somewhat different approach, but each tries to find a way to break out of the iron cage of the Enlightenment Paradigm of "the way things are" that current events make increasingly necessary.
January 16, 2020
David Wootton's earlier book, _The Invention of Science_, is a must-read.
I was hoping the same magic in this book. What I got was not exactly the same magic, more just a reminder of that magic.
The primary problem is that this book is cobbled together from a variety of papers that all kinda sorta cover the same territory (how did we come by our current understanding of "desire" and its place in society, as compared to earlier such understandings). And it *feels* like something cobbled together. The tone varies dramatically from one chapter to another, as does the level of detail.
Even with that unfortunate background, as one might hope, Wootton is constantly surprising, usually with new slants on apparently settled subject, rarely with cliches.
There's definitely the germ of a good book here, maybe _The Invention of Social Science_; but unfortunately that book is still to be written.
I was hoping the same magic in this book. What I got was not exactly the same magic, more just a reminder of that magic.
The primary problem is that this book is cobbled together from a variety of papers that all kinda sorta cover the same territory (how did we come by our current understanding of "desire" and its place in society, as compared to earlier such understandings). And it *feels* like something cobbled together. The tone varies dramatically from one chapter to another, as does the level of detail.
Even with that unfortunate background, as one might hope, Wootton is constantly surprising, usually with new slants on apparently settled subject, rarely with cliches.
There's definitely the germ of a good book here, maybe _The Invention of Social Science_; but unfortunately that book is still to be written.
April 16, 2019
The shift from medieval Europe to our modern world was the shift from collective security based on fixed social positions to a more fluid relationship between working to better yourself and having personal greed marketed as a public service by labeling it the "invisible hand."
Why I started this book: Short audio, to fill the gap between waiting for my library holds.
Why I finished it: This was not the book that I was expecting to read. Wootton traced the formation and history of the ideas of political power, individual pleasure versus society's gain and economic profit. Probably familiar territory to philosophy majors but it was new ground for me.
Why I started this book: Short audio, to fill the gap between waiting for my library holds.
Why I finished it: This was not the book that I was expecting to read. Wootton traced the formation and history of the ideas of political power, individual pleasure versus society's gain and economic profit. Probably familiar territory to philosophy majors but it was new ground for me.
January 25, 2019
This engaging work looks at the transition that occurred in the Western world in the early modern period. Wootton shows how the values of the Enlightenment, against which we are constantly carping, were put in place both in theory and practice. The result, free markets and political liberty, he argues, now serve to keep the values we have been complaining about for ages, because there are real complaints to be lodged, still the main ones.
I am no expert. I do find the book persuasive. He does explain in a way that is plausible why we are constantly complaining about the Enlightenment and yet cannot be free of it: we value the benefits of free markets and political liberty which are predicated on that Enlightenment ordering of values too much. It is a thought-provoking work and illuminating.
I am no expert. I do find the book persuasive. He does explain in a way that is plausible why we are constantly complaining about the Enlightenment and yet cannot be free of it: we value the benefits of free markets and political liberty which are predicated on that Enlightenment ordering of values too much. It is a thought-provoking work and illuminating.
August 27, 2019
Really more of a 3.5 but I like the author's other works and so don't want to hurt his ratings. This was a bit scattered. I understand the thematic approach, but it just didn't work too well in this one. It was a bit too caught up in markets and the economy. At times, I wasn't quite sure what he was trying to say, although all his works are so clear. Not a great place to start if you want to read Wootton, but certainly not a waste of time.
November 25, 2023
I’m a huge fan of The Invention of Science, and was very interested in the premise of this book. However here the author is much more interested here in showing that he has the right interpretation of what Machiavelli, Hobbes and A. Smith actually meant. I just care very little about what this “great men” thought. I would have much prefer an angle similar to The Invention where the focus was on how entire societies thought at different points in time and how that thought evolved.
May 20, 2019
A tough book to get through. Wootton seems motivated by economy and determined to condense very deep points about the Enlightenment paradigm into 9 short chapters, yet liberal in his digressions and segues. Deserves a second re-read if and when I have the time.
July 29, 2019
Good way to see how many of the Political Theory books relate to each other.
November 21, 2025
This book is about the new ideas and values, or Paradigm, that the Enlightment has brought to the world, and that continue to explain our current ways to understand that pleasure and happiness matter more than anything else.
Indeed, before the Enlightment, the supreme values were dictated by religion and by philosophy. In human history, It has become apparent, very early, that desires were limitless and that the temporary satisfaction for getting one soon led to the longing for the satisfaction of a new one, and like this ad infinitum.
Ancient Greek philosophers explained that virtue, moderation, and reason could lead to happiness by mastering our passions. The important was to be the best you could be.
But the modern commercial society has eroded these aristocratic values, and replaced them by a new culture of pleasure and profit or a "triumph of passions" which leads to the "enslavement of reason". It is now not much condemned to seek limitless power and pleasure. So this books explains how this immoderation has become accepted as a social conduct.
How have we come from a culture where the highest goal was tranquility of mind (by quietening desires) to one that encourages us to get what we want at each moment even though we know that this leads to a desperate quest because new desires always arise? The writer says that we live in an Hobbesian world: in a culture of self-gratification and competition. Hobbes wrote that to attain our desires we need power and status. And. to do so we are in competition with each other. To sum up Leviathan: humans need to escape from a state of nature in which they are in remorseless competition.
So, we are in this race to satisfy our desires and the author shows how Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Adam Smiths and many other thinkers have said about this fact.
From the point of view of the economy, Adam Smith, with his invisible hand metaphor, explained how this potential conflict or competition is turned into cooperation because selfish actions of individuals have as unintended consequences a social benefit.
This is just a fraction of what lies in this book, which in the end, explains how "there are people who have come to accept that virtue, honor, shame, guilt, count for almost nothing and that all that matters is success."
Now, fortunately "success" or "felicity"or "happiness" does not mean the same to everyone. I'll finish with this quote from Dante, cited by the author: " Scienzia (Knowledge) è ultima perfezione della nostra anima, nella quale sta la nostra ultima felicità." Yes, success or happiness can come from learning, knowing more about our world. In this respect, it is interesting to read what Universities mottos are because they all convey their own vision of success. The Free University of Brussles (ULB, VUB), for example, has adopted the motto "Sciencia vincere tenebras". It's quite tragic to know that some people rejoice in exactly the opposite: cultivating ignorance and superstition...
Indeed, before the Enlightment, the supreme values were dictated by religion and by philosophy. In human history, It has become apparent, very early, that desires were limitless and that the temporary satisfaction for getting one soon led to the longing for the satisfaction of a new one, and like this ad infinitum.
Ancient Greek philosophers explained that virtue, moderation, and reason could lead to happiness by mastering our passions. The important was to be the best you could be.
But the modern commercial society has eroded these aristocratic values, and replaced them by a new culture of pleasure and profit or a "triumph of passions" which leads to the "enslavement of reason". It is now not much condemned to seek limitless power and pleasure. So this books explains how this immoderation has become accepted as a social conduct.
How have we come from a culture where the highest goal was tranquility of mind (by quietening desires) to one that encourages us to get what we want at each moment even though we know that this leads to a desperate quest because new desires always arise? The writer says that we live in an Hobbesian world: in a culture of self-gratification and competition. Hobbes wrote that to attain our desires we need power and status. And. to do so we are in competition with each other. To sum up Leviathan: humans need to escape from a state of nature in which they are in remorseless competition.
So, we are in this race to satisfy our desires and the author shows how Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Adam Smiths and many other thinkers have said about this fact.
From the point of view of the economy, Adam Smith, with his invisible hand metaphor, explained how this potential conflict or competition is turned into cooperation because selfish actions of individuals have as unintended consequences a social benefit.
This is just a fraction of what lies in this book, which in the end, explains how "there are people who have come to accept that virtue, honor, shame, guilt, count for almost nothing and that all that matters is success."
Now, fortunately "success" or "felicity"or "happiness" does not mean the same to everyone. I'll finish with this quote from Dante, cited by the author: " Scienzia (Knowledge) è ultima perfezione della nostra anima, nella quale sta la nostra ultima felicità." Yes, success or happiness can come from learning, knowing more about our world. In this respect, it is interesting to read what Universities mottos are because they all convey their own vision of success. The Free University of Brussles (ULB, VUB), for example, has adopted the motto "Sciencia vincere tenebras". It's quite tragic to know that some people rejoice in exactly the opposite: cultivating ignorance and superstition...
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April 27, 2025excruciating
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews