Apology of the order and division of work in Adam Smith and Émile Durkheim

Abstract

This article extends the different arguments of Adam Smith and Émile Durkheim about the apology of social order. Their points underlay the naturalization of the division of labor. Adam Smith discusses issues of “negotiating, exchanging, and persuading” which he believes belong to human nature together with the forms of the division of labor, the specialization of task and the exploitation of one’s self-esteem to achieve what one desires. At the same time, the argument is that natural progress and general abundance are distributed among the members of society which is related to the above conditions. Within this position, the ‘selfish nature’ of economic activity can be thought of as altruistic. On the other hand, Émile Durkheim discusses the division of labor as belonging to the law of nature and with a moral function to be fulfilled through the activities that people perform by the specificity of the activities that they perform. Durkheim engages notions of interdependence; social solidarity; organic solidarity; and guarantor of social cohesion. For Adam Smith, the idea of the “invisible hand” of supply and demand is sufficient for corporate self-regulation. For Émile Durkheim, the state cannot avoid the role of society’s “brain” to regulate problems [anomie] which are still unresolved by the lack of complete sedimentation of organic solidarity. For both theorists, the division of labor fulfills the civilizing role of empowering and distributing wealth and solidary social bonds. Thus, the apology of order has been stated as effective with discourses based on the idea of human nature and in two of the new modern sciences: Political Economy and Sociology.