The history of modern economics abounds with pleas for more pluralism as well as pleas for more unification. These seem to be contradictory goals, suggesting that pluralism and unification are mutually exclusive, or at least that they involve trade-offs with more of one necessarily being traded...

Introductuion -- 1. Adam Smith on self-interest -- 2. Jeremy Bentham on self-interest -- 3. John Stuart Mill on self-interest and the assumption of economic theories -- 4. Leon Walras’ idea of human nature and theory of property: free exchange, communism, and association -- 5. Self-interest in...