MANKIND HAVE ALWAYS WANDERED OR SETTLED, AGREED OR QUARRELED, IN TROOPS AND COMPANIES.
ADAM FERGUSON (1723-1816).
Progress is both inevitable and desirable, but we must always be aware of the social costs that might be exacted as progress is made.
Such was the warning of the philosopher and historian Adam Ferguson, who was one of the "Select Society" of Edinburgh intellectuals of the Scottish 
Enlightenment, a group that included the philosopher David Hume and economist Adam Smith.
Ferguson believed, as did Smith, that commercial growth is driven by self-interest, but unlike Smith he analyzed the effects of this development and 
felt it was happening at the expense of traditional values of cooperation and "fellow-feeling."
In the past, societies had been based on families or communities, and community spirit was fostered by ideas of honor and loyalty.
But the self-interest demanded by capitalism weakens these values, and ultimately leads to social collapse.
To prevent commercial capitalism from sowing the seeds of its own destruction, Ferguson advocated promoting a sense of civic spirit, 
encouraging people to act in the interest of society rather than in self-interest.
Ferguson's criticism of capitalism and commercialism meant that his theories were rejected by mainstream thinkers such as Hume and Smith, 
but they later influenced the political ideas of Hegel and Marx.
And because he viewed the subject from a social rather than political or economic angle, his work helped to lay the foundations of modern sociology.
Man is born in civil society... and there he remains.
Montesquieu.
French philosopher.
IN CONTEXT,
FOCUS: Civic spirit.
KEY DATES;
1748 Montesquieu publishes The Spirit of the Laws, arguing that political institutions should derive from the social mores of a community.
1767 Adam Ferguson outlines his views in his book Essay on the History of Civil Society.
1776 With The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith pioneers modern economics.
1867 Karl Marx analyzes capitalism in the first volume of Das Kapital.
1893 Emile Durkheim examines the importance of beliefs and values in holding society together in The Division of Labor in Society.
1993 Amitai Etzioni founds The Communitarian Network to strengthen the moral and social foundations of society.
