Introduction -- Unintended consequences -- The origin of money -- Segregation -- The invisible hand -- The origin of money reconsidered -- Models and representation -- Game theory and conventions -- Conclusion

This book examines the use, principally in economics, of the concept of the invisible hand, centering on Adam Smith. It interprets the concept as ideology, knowledge, and a linguistic phenomenon. It shows how the principal Chicago School interpretation misperceives and distorts what Smith...

One of the central tenets of mainstream economics is Adam Smith's proposition that, given certain conditions, self-interested behavior by individuals leads them to the social good, almost as if orchestrated by an invisible hand. This deep insight has, over the past two centuries, been taken out...

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Preface -- 1 Adam Smith's Invisible Hand and the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences -- 1.1. The Research Protocols of Economics, the Ironies That Result from Them, and Other Preliminaries -- 1.2. Adam Smith and Some Nobel...

In praise of dissent -- The theory of the invisible hand -- The limits of orthodoxy -- The economy according to law -- Markets and discrimination -- The chemistry of groups -- Contract, coercion, and intervention -- Poverty, inequality, and globalization -- Globalization and the retreat of...