From the end of the 5th century in the Attic classics, new forms of verbal art come to the fore. Along with literature intended for recitation, literature for reading only appears.
Both the content and technique of artistic works have become new. Prose takes its classical form - historical narrative, oratory and philosophical dialogue. It was in prose that the writer now spoke about the fate of the people, about the dignity of a person, about his attitude towards society and another person. Literature approached everyday life: the main theme of classical prose of the 5th-4th centuries. became polis modernity, shown without historical distance, without mythological conventionality, with factual accuracy.
The advent of the "age of prose" was due to the needs of polis democracy as a system of government, in which the speaker's ability to influence a mass audience played a decisive role in the adoption of laws in the national assembly and in sentencing in court.
And such a high verbal culture was created. It was formed as a result of that new way of teaching, which became widespread in Greece in the middle of the 5th century. and served as the beginning of all subsequent liberal arts education in Europe. Its founders were the sophists ("teachers of wisdom") - people from the eastern and western outskirts of the Hellenic world. Traveling from city to city, they gave paid lectures and undertook to reveal the secrets of oratorical success to anyone, informing their listeners of special techniques for skillfully composing speeches.
Athens was the most convenient field for their activities, and here by the end of the 5th century. the new technique of literary skill brought its real fruits in the form of works of Attic prose, far gone both in ideological content and in form from the traditions of the Ionian prose that preceded them.
History of world literature: in 9 volumes / Edited by I.S. Braginsky and others - M., 1983-1984
Along with behaviorism and Gestalt psychology, psychoanalysis. This is how the Austrian doctor called his teaching Sigmund Freud(1856-1939).
At first, Freud was engaged in the treatment of neurotic patients with mental disorders of people. He tries to explain the symptoms of the disease by the dynamics of nervous processes. However, neither in physiology, nor in the psychology of consciousness that prevailed at that time, he saw the means to explain the causes of pathological changes in the psyche of his patients. And not knowing the reasons, I had to act blindly.
And then Freud turned to the hidden, deep layers of the human psyche. Before Freud, they were not the subject of psychology, after him they became an integral part of it.
Freud made an important discovery that overturned the traditional view of the psyche: in the life of a person, his unconscious desires, aspirations and inclinations play a predetermining role, rather than consciousness and reason. Thus, the primary role in a person's life is played by sexual desires, and often they are the causes of nervous and mental illnesses. But these same drives take part in the creation of the highest cultural values of the human spirit.
Freud claims that the unconscious is rooted in the natural givenness of the human being. So, Freud created theory of the unconscious. According to her, there are three areas in the human psyche: consciousness - I (ego), preconscious - Super-I (superego) and unconscious - IT (id).
preconscious consists of hidden or latent knowledge. This is the knowledge that a person has, but which is not present at the moment. Concerning consciousness, then Freud assigned him the role of a servant of the unconscious. He even says that the mind is powerless in the face of unconscious drives (it should not be forgotten that Freud worked primarily with neurotic patients who really could not be responsible for their actions).
Super-I- contains a system of values and norms that are compatible with those accepted in the environment of a person, which allow him to distinguish what is good and what is bad, what is moral and immoral. Freud divided the superego into two subsystems: conscience and the ego-ideal. Conscience includes the ability for critical self-assessment, and the Ego-ideal forms from what the parents and the person himself approve and highly value, it leads the person to set high standards for himself.
The Super-I does not let the instincts into the "I", and then the energy of these instincts is sublimated.
Sublimation- this is the transformation of the energy of repressed, forbidden desires into other activities that are allowed in society. If the energy of "libido" does not find a way out, then a person will have mental illness, neuroses, tantrums, longing. To save from the conflict between "I" and "IT" used means of psychological protection. Protective behavior allows a person to protect himself from those problems that he cannot solve yet, allows you to relieve anxiety from threatening events (loss of a loved one, favorite toy, loss of love from other people, loss of love for yourself, etc.), allows " get away from a threatening reality”, sometimes transform this threat.
Freud singled out the following defense mechanisms:
1) repression of desires- involuntary removal of unpleasant or unlawful desires, thoughts, feelings, experiences in certain situations from consciousness to the area of the unconscious psyche "IT"; suppression is never final, repressed thoughts do not lose their activity in the unconscious, and to prevent their breakthrough into consciousness, a constant expenditure of mental energy is required, as a result of which energy may not be enough to maintain a person’s activity and health, as a result, repression is often a source of bodily psychogenic diseases. nature (headaches, arthritis, ulcers, asthma, heart disease, hypertension, etc.). The psychic energy of repressed desires is present in the body of a person, regardless of his consciousness, finds its painful bodily expression. The result of suppression is a demonstrative indifference to this area of reality. Allocate complete suppression - when painful experiences are so suppressed that a person completely forgets them, and does not know that they were in his life, but they indirectly affect his health and behavior. Repression is partial suppression, a person “restrains” experiences, tries not to think about them, but cannot completely forget them, and repressed experiences “erupt” in the form of unexpected violent affects, inexplicable actions, etc .;
2) negation- withdrawal into fantasy, denial of any event as "untruth". “This cannot be” - a person shows a vivid indifference to logic, does not notice contradictions in his judgments;
3) rationalization- an unconscious attempt to justify, explain one's wrong or absurd behavior, the construction of acceptable moral, logical justifications, arguments to explain and justify unacceptable forms of behavior, thoughts, actions, desires, and, as a rule, these justifications and explanations do not correspond to the true reason for the act committed, and the true reason may not be realized by a person;
4) inversion or opposition- substitution of actions, thoughts, feelings that meet a genuine desire, with diametrically opposed behavior, thoughts, feelings (for example, a child initially wants to receive his mother's love for himself, but, not receiving this love, begins to experience the exact opposite desire to annoy his mother, anger her, cause a quarrel and hatred of the mother towards herself);
5) projection - an unconscious attempt to get rid of an obsessive desire, an idea by attributing it to another person, attributing one's own qualities, thoughts, feelings to another person - that is, "distance of the threat from oneself." When something is condemned in others, it is precisely this that a person does not accept in himself, but he cannot recognize it, does not want to understand that these same qualities are inherent in him. For example, a person claims that "some Jews are deceivers", although in fact this may mean: "I sometimes deceive"; thus, projection allows a person to place the blame on someone else for their shortcomings and blunders. Projection also explains social prejudice and the scapegoat phenomenon, since ethnic and racial stereotypes are a convenient target for attributing negative personality characteristics to someone else;
6) substitution- the manifestation of an emotional impulse is redirected from a more threatening object or person to a less threatening one. For example, a child, after being punished by his parents, pushes his little sister, breaks her toys, kicks the dog, that is, the sister and the dog replace the parents at whom the child is angry. Less common is this form of substitution when it is directed against oneself: hostile impulses addressed to others are redirected to oneself, which causes a feeling of depression or condemnation of oneself;
7) insulation- separation of the threatening part of the situation from the rest of the mental sphere, which can lead to separation, split personality, to an incomplete "I";
8) regression- a return to an earlier, primitive way of responding, stable regressions are manifested in the fact that a person justifies his actions from the position of a child’s thinking, does not recognize logic, defends his point of view, despite the correctness of the interlocutor, the person does not develop mentally and sometimes childhood habits return ( bite your nails, etc.). In severe cases, when “the present situation is unbearable for a person”, the psyche defends itself, returning to an earlier and safer period of its life, for example, to early childhood, and regression leads to a loss of memory of later periods of life. More "milder" manifestations of regression in adults include intemperance, displeasure (pouting and not talking to others), resisting authority, childish stubbornness, or driving a car at recklessly high speeds.
The Unconscious (IT) is governed by two principles: the pleasure principle and the reality principle. This means that unconsciously any person seeks, first of all, to receive pleasure, but at the same time he must reckon with the requirements of the environment (observe the principle of reality).
Those desires that a person cannot satisfy are repressed (the mechanism of repression) and are realized in fantasies. But such a suppressed and repressed desire of man continues to exist and waits only for the first opportunity to become active.
Freud identified three main forms of manifestation of the unconscious: dreams, erroneous actions(forgetting things, intentions, names, reservations, etc.) and neurotic symptoms.
In psychoanalysis, a number of methods have been developed to identify unconscious complexes. The main ones are the method of free association (say whatever comes to mind) and the method of dream analysis. Both methods involve the active work of the psychoanalyst, which consists in interpreting the words or dreams of the patient.
Thus, psychoanalysis comes to the conclusion that the psyche is wider than consciousness.
Psychoanalysis was developed in the person of Carl Jung (1875-1961) and Alfred Adler (1870-1937).
Psychoanalysis in the early 90s of the 19th century from the medical practice of treating patients with functional mental disorders. Freud dealt with neuroses. Freud's work was greatly influenced by Bernheim.
Cathartic method - with the help of hypnosis, traumatized experiences and emotions can be revived in memory, this will allow them to be experienced again, as a result of which a cure may come.
Freud called psychoanalysis (the study and interpretation of dreams, reservations, forgetting) a new form of therapy and research method. The core of psychoanalysis is the doctrine of the unconscious
Three periods of study (three stages in the formation of psychoanalysis);
1. 1897-1905 - psychoanalysis - a method of treating neuroses with attempts at general conclusions about the nature of mental life. The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1904), Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905). In 1902, a circle of psychoanalysis was formed.
2. 1906-1918 - general psychic doctrine of personality and its development. "Totem and Taboo" (1912), "Leonardo da Vinci" (1910). In 1910 - international interest. Departure from psychoanalysis by Adler and Jung (individual psychology and analytical psychology). In the same period, the structure is being developed: consciousness, preconsciousness, the unconscious and attraction (sexual, self-preservation).
3. The middle of the 20s - the doctrine of three instances - "I", "IT", "Ideal-I". Freud's book
"I and It" (1923). Freud identified three areas of the psyche:
The conscious has the property of experiencing;
· preconscious - hidden unconscious, has the ability of consciousness.
The unconscious is the repressed unconscious psyche.
· Analysis of free pop-up associations;
The interpretation of dreams. Sleep - desires that we don’t want to admit to ourselves, because. they are unacceptable.
· Analysis of the erroneous actions of everyday life (slips of the tongue, sayings, loss of things) are not random and are expressed impulses and intentions, which should be removed and hidden from consciousness.
With their help, a person betrays his secrets.
There is a clash of two tendencies: desire and censorship. Under the influence of censorship, desire is forced out into the unconscious, where it exists in an altered form.
Representation of the dynamics of the unconscious sphere. The yuessoznannoe is repressed and could not; ;, conscious.
Three formations of the psyche (ideas about the structure of the psyche):
Super-consciousness - Super-I (moral limitation, conflict between the desired and the prohibition I.
Consciousness - I (partially conscious and unconscious, the suppressor of It);
· Preconsciousness - It (the unconscious, guided by the principle of pleasure - the driving force of behavior).
Ideas about drives: sexual drive, drive to self-preservation and drive to death. A child is born filled with sexual desires, which are based on the energy of "libido".
Stages of child development:
Birth trauma
Oral stage (up to 1 year) - libido is taken out..
Anal (up to 3 years);
Phalic (4-5 years). The object of the libido is the parent (Oedipus complex, Electra complex);
· Latent (] ] -12 years) - time to master the culture.
· Genital (12-16 years) - the final choice of the object of libido. The child takes his father and mother as a model and transfers his instincts to another object.
Regression is one form of protection. A person jumps to a more primitive stage (biting his nails, biting a pen, etc.).
Adler denied sexual etiology. Not sexual attraction, but a feeling of incomplete value and the need to compensate for a defect occupy a central place in the personality and act as factors in the development of everyone. A person strives to overcome inferiority. Inferiority - goal - style;. life.
Jung is a follower of Freud. The doctrine of the unconscious and the process of personality development. He singled out the psyche: conscious and unconscious (personal and collective unconscious).
You can also find information of interest in the scientific search engine Otvety.Online. Use the search form:
More on the topic General characteristics of classical psychoanalysis.:
- GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF CLASSICAL POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Classical political economy originated in England at the end of the 17th century. and in France at the beginning of the 18th century, replacing mercantilism.
K. Marx called mercantilism the first theoretical study of the foundations of capitalist production. At the same time, he emphasized that the real science of modern economics begins only from the time when theoretical research passes from the process of circulation to the process of production. This transition was carried out by classical political economy.
For the first time, the term "classical political economy" was used by Marx in relation to the school that began to study the internal laws of bourgeois society. K. Marx wrote: "... by classical political economy, I understand all political economy, starting with W. Patty, which explores the internal dependencies of bourgeois relations of production."
If the mercantilists in their analysis proceeded from a rather storied understanding of the process of circulation and therefore saw only the external side of its phenomena, then the classics took the sphere of production as the subject of study and laid the foundation for the scientific analysis of this sphere. Thus, a change took place, a profound shift in the very subject of political economy, which, from considerations of the principles of managing the country's economy, turned into a science of categories and the laws of economic life. It was the classical school, in particular, the works of A. Smith, that turned political economy into a full-fledged scientific discipline.
The classics proclaimed the idea of a natural order, the operation of objective economic laws. And this changed the direction of research from a system of regulatory rules to economic freedom, which alone ensures the effective development of the economy.
The classical school, in contrast to the mercantilists - supporters of state intervention in economic life, proclaimed the principle of economic freedom, economic liberalism. The classics were opponents of protectionism. They solved the problem of value, which at that time was one of the central ones in economic analysis, mainly from the standpoint of labor theory, using the abstract-deductive method of studying economic phenomena.
A general assessment of classical political economy in the former Soviet literature was carried out according to the scheme of K. Marx, who, before the classics, ranked economists from Patty to Ricardo in England and from Buagilbert to Sismond in France. Marx called the work of A. Smith and D. Ricardo the pinnacle of classical political economy, with which, in his opinion, the classical school has exhausted itself.
Classical political economy, which had a truly scientific character, is being replaced, according to Marx, by "vulgar", that is, non-scientific political economy. If the classics were engaged in a real scientific analysis of the laws of development of capitalism, then the representatives of vulgar political economy acted only as apologists, conscious defenders of capitalism. Marx associated the transition to vulgar political economy with the intensification of the class struggle.
Marx called Say and Malthus the founders of vulgar political economy. He criticized the "vulgar economists" for departing from the labor theory of value and concealing the exploitative nature of the relationship between wage workers and capitalists.
The thesis about the vulgar nature of the Polish-Kardian political economy was widely developed throughout the so-called Marxist literature.
Accordingly, all modern Western political economy was also declared unscientific. Such a conclusion was simply absurd, since these economic theories were successfully used in the economic policy of Western states. To justify the Marxist thesis, many Soviet Marxists even had to put forward the no less absurd idea of two functions of political economy: practical and ideological, on the basis of which the conclusion was made that it was possible to use the practical recommendations of Western economists.
In Western literature, there is a different approach to the evaluation of classical political economy, to the definition of its chronological boundaries. Western economists pay tribute to the classical school, but do not idealize its theoretical developments, but evaluate them in the context of the historical development of economic ideas. In classical political economy, they also refer to the whole of the political economy of the 19th century. The well-known American economist J.K. Galbraith wrote about this: “...And Ideas. Smith were developed by David Ricardo, Thomas Malthus and especially John Stuart Mill and were called the classical system. In the last quarter of the XIX century. Austrian, British and American economists supplemented the theory with the so-called marginal analysis, and this eventually led to the replacement of the term "classical economic theory" with the term "neoclassical economic theory".
Marx K., Engels F. Works. - 2nd view. - T.23. - S. 89.
Galbraith J.K. Economic theories and goals of society. - M., 1979. - P.36.
classical school. Stages of development of the classical school
The classical school originated at the end of the 17th century. (England) - early XVIII century. (France).
There are 4 stages in the development of the classical school:
Stage 1 covers the period from the end of the XVII century. before the beginning of the 2nd half of the 18th century. This is the stage of expansion of the sphere of market relations, refutation of ideas.
Representatives of this stage: William Petty and Pierre Boisguillebert, who put forward the theory of labor value. In accordance with it, the source and measure of value is the amount of labor expended on the production of products. They saw the basis of the wealth of the state not in the sphere of circulation, but in the sphere of production.
The school of the Physiocrats, which became widespread in France, completed the 1st stage. The authors of this school, François Quesnay and Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, in their search for a "pure product" attached decisive importance along with labor to the land.
Stage 2 covers the period of the last third of the 18th century. and is associated with the name of Adam Smith, who formulated the concept of economic liberalism. Much thanks to him until the 30s. 20th century the provision on non-interference of the state in free competition was considered irrefutable.
Stage 3 falls on the 1st half of the 19th century, when the industrial revolution ended in a number of developed countries. Among the representatives of this stage: Jean Baptiste Say, David Ricardo, Thomas Malthus, F. Bastiat, G. Carrie.
Stage 4 covers the 2nd half of the 19th century. Representatives: Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill.
General characteristic features of the classical school:
1) rejection of protectionism in the economic policy of the state;
2) the predominant analysis of the sphere of production in isolation from the sphere of circulation, the development and application of progressive methodological methods of analysis;
3) attempts to identify the mechanism for the formation of the cost of goods and fluctuations in the level of prices in the market due to production costs or the amount of labor expended;
5) an attempt to justify the dynamism and equilibrium of the state of the economy;
6) money was recognized as a spontaneously separated commodity in the world of commodities, which cannot be canceled by any agreements.
The teachings of the physiocrats
The word "physiocracy" is of Greek origin and in translation means "the power of nature." In this sense, the Physiocrats proceeded from the decisive role in the economy of land, agricultural production.
The central ideas of the theory of physiocracy are as follows:
1) economic laws are natural (that is, understandable to everyone), and deviation from them leads to a violation of the production process;
2) the source of wealth is the sphere of production of material goods - agriculture. Only agricultural labor is productive, since nature and the earth are working, while labor in other areas (trade and industry) is unproductive or "fruitless";
3) Physiocrats understood the net product as the difference between the sum of all benefits and the costs of producing a product in agriculture. This excess (pure product) is a unique gift of nature. Industrial labor only changes its form without increasing the size of the net product;
4) the Physiocrats analyzed the material constituents of capital, distinguishing between "annual advances", annual expenditures and "primary advances", which are the fund for the organization of agriculture and are spent immediately for many years to come. "Primary advances" (costs of agricultural equipment) correspond to fixed capital, and "annual advances" (annual costs of agricultural production) correspond to working capital;
5) the money was not included in any of the types of advances. For the Physiocrats, there was no concept of "money capital", they argued that money in itself is sterile, and recognized only one function of money - as a means of circulation. The accumulation of money was considered harmful, since it withdraws money from circulation and deprives them of their only useful function - to serve as an exchange of goods.
The Physiocrats reduced taxation to three principles:
- first, taxation should be based directly on the source of income itself;
- secondly, it must be in a certain constant ratio with these incomes,
- thirdly, it should not be too burdened with the costs of collection.
Francois Quesnay (1694 - 1767), the founder of the physiocratic school, was the court physician of Louis XV, and took up economic problems at the age of 60. His main works: "Population" (1756), "Farmers", "Grain", "Taxes" (1757), "Economic Table" (1758), which entered the history of economic thought as the first attempt at macroeconomic analysis.
In this work, the author showed how the total annual product created in agriculture is distributed among social groups, and also presented the main ways of its implementation in the form of a directed movement with three peaks (classes), combining all acts of exchange into a mass movement of money and goods, but at the same time excluding the process of accumulation.
The methodological platform for Quesnay's economic research was the concept he developed about the natural order, the legal basis of which, in his opinion, is the physical and moral laws of the state that protect private property, private interests, ensuring the reproduction and proper distribution of benefits. As the scientist argued, the private interest of one can never be separated from the general interest of all, and this happens only with state regulation.
He considered it expedient to concentrate the highest state power in the hands of one enlightened person who possesses knowledge of the laws - the natural order - necessary for the implementation of state administration.
In the theoretical legacy of F. Quesnay, an important place is occupied by the doctrine of the net product, which is now called the national income. In his opinion, the sources of this pure product are the land and the labor of people employed in agricultural production applied to it. But in industry and other sectors of the economy, there is no net increase in income, but only a change in the primary form of this product. Thinking so, Quesnay considered industry useless. He proceeded from the position put forward by him about the productive essence of different social groups in society.
At the same time, Quesnay argued that the nation consists of three social groups:
a) productive (persons employed in agriculture - farmers and rural wage workers);
b) barren (persons employed in industry, as well as merchants);
c) owners (persons receiving rent - landowners and the king).
And although the division of society into farmers, owners and industrialists actually corresponded to the division of society (peasants, nobles, townspeople), it is important to note that Quesnay was one of the first to divide society into classes on an economic basis, that is, on the basis of the relationship of each class to production. and appropriation of the surplus product.
Based on his doctrine of net income (monetary value of the net product), Quesnay believed that land rent should be the only source of taxation.
According to the widespread point of view, especially among Marxists, Quesnay's system has only historical interest: all its main provisions allegedly fell under the blows of criticism and the influence of life facts. This is justified by the fact that allegedly no one else believes in the existence of once and for all established laws of social organization, and optimistic hopes for the action of a reasonably understood interest turned out to be an illusion. All types of labor, according to Marxism, create values; land does not create a net income, and production takes place here under the same general laws as in all processing and fabrication.
However, there were other views on Quesnay's legacy. So, since the 1960s. Quesnay's system was creatively developed by Nikolai Rudenko, and his achievements were highly appreciated by Andrei Sakharov in the late 1970s, which proved the historical importance of Quesnay's legacy as an alternative to Marxism in the modern world.
Anne Robert Jacques Turgot (1727-1781) was born in France. According to family tradition, he graduated from the theological faculty of the Sorbonne, but became interested in economics. In 1774 - 1776 he served as controller general of finances. Collaborated with educators in the "Encyclopedia" D. Diderot.
The main work of A. Turgot is “Reflections on the Creation and Distribution of Wealth” (1770).
Following Quesnay and other physiocrats, he defended the principle of freedom of economic activity and shared their view of agriculture as the only source of surplus product. For the first time, he singled out entrepreneurs and hired workers within the "agricultural class" and the "class of artisans".
Turgot first described the difference between capital and money and singled out profit as a special kind of income. In general, the teachings of A. Turgot coincide with the teachings of the Physiocrats, but the following ideas should be noted:
- income from capital is divided into costs for creating products and profits on capital (wages of the owner of capital, entrepreneurial income and land rent);
- the exchange is mutually beneficial to both commodity owners, and therefore there is an equalization of the values of the exchanged goods;
- the payment of loan interest is justified by the loss of the income of the lender in granting the loan;
- current prices in the market, from the point of view of A. Turgot, are formed taking into account supply and demand, being a criterion by which one can judge the excess or lack of capital.
Concept of economic liberalism
Adam Smith was born in 1723 in Scotland in the family of a customs official. In 1751 he was appointed professor of logic at Glazkov University, and at the end of the year he moved to the department of moral philosophy. A friendship with the economist David Hume led him to study economics.
In 1764, he left the chair and accepted an offer to accompany the young lord, stepson of the Duke of Buccleuch, during a trip abroad. The journey lasted over 2 years. Smith traveled to Toulouse, Geneva, Paris, met with Quesnay and Turgot. On his return to Scotland, he set about writing a book, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, which was published in 1776.
Smith considered the economic development of society and the improvement of its well-being to be the subject of study of economic science. The source of wealth is the sphere of production.
The basic principles from which Smith proceeded were formed in close connection with the doctrine of the "natural order" created by the physiocrats. However, if the latter put the "natural order" depending on the forces of nature, then Smith believed that it was determined by human nature and corresponded to it. A person is an egoist, he pursues only personal goals. The personal interest of one individual is limited only by the interests of others. Society consists of many individuals, and the interests of society are made up of the interests of its members. Therefore, the analysis of the public interest must be based on an analysis of the nature and interests of the individual.
People need each other as selfish, they provide mutual services, so the only form that allows the best way to achieve mutual service is exchange.
By the action of the "economic man", whose only motive is the pursuit of wealth, Smith tried to explain all economic processes.
The concept of economic liberalism occupies a central place in his teaching: market laws can best affect the economy when private interest is higher than public interest, i.e. when the interests of society as a whole are considered as the sum of the interests of its constituent persons.
The state must maintain the regime of natural freedom: protect the rule of law, free competition and private property. It should also perform such functions as the organization of public education, public works, communication systems, transport and public utilities.
Smith wrote, "Money is the great wheel of circulation." The income of workers, in his opinion, is directly dependent on the level of national wealth of the country. He denied the regularity of the decrease in wages to the level of the subsistence minimum.
The views of the scientist on the division of labor are widely known. Smith's central idea is that the source of wealth is labor. He puts the wealth of society in dependence on 2 factors: the share of the population employed in industrial labor; labor productivity.
However, Smith noted that the second factor is more important. In his opinion, specialization increases labor productivity. He revealed the universal nature of the division of labor from simple operations in the enterprise to industries and social classes. Since the division of labor causes a reduction in production costs, it opens up scope for the use of machines, since only simple operations could be mechanized.
By focusing his attention on exchange value, Smith finds the yardstick in the labor costs of producing commodities. This is at the core of the exchange. Labor is the source of value. Under the natural price, he understood the monetary expression of exchange value and believed that in a long trend, the actual market prices tend to it as a kind of center of fluctuations. When balancing demand and supply in conditions of free competition, market prices coincide with natural prices.
Capital is characterized by Smith as one of two parts of the stock from which income is expected, and the other part is that which goes to consumption. He introduced the division of capital into fixed and circulating. Smith believed that the capitalist economy can be in 3 states: growth, decline and stagnation. He developed 2 interconnected schemes of simple and extended reproduction. In the scheme of simple reproduction, there is a movement from the social reserve to the gross product (income) and the compensation fund. In the expanded reproduction scheme, savings and accumulation funds are added. Expanded reproduction creates the dynamics of the country's wealth, depends on the growth of capital accumulation and on more efficient use. Smith discovered the phenomenon of technological progress as a factor of expanded reproduction.
Source - T.A. Frolova History of economic doctrines: lecture notes Taganrog: TRTU, 2004
