Annual Lecture

Ieder jaar organiseert UUCEMS een publiekslezing in het Engels. In 2023 was de spreker prof. dr. Tess Knighton. Eerder werd de lezing verzorgd door onderzoekers als prof. dr. Alec Ryrie en prof. dr. Linda Briggs. 

Annual Lecture 2025

Richard Price’s Prudence and the Unintentional Invention of Modern Capitalist Values (1758-1790)

Speaker: Professor Jake Soll (University of Southern California)

15 mei 2025
15:30-17:00 uur

Locatie: Alex Brenninkmeijerzaal, Johanna Hudiggebouw, Achter Sint Pieter 200.

Registration link for live attendance: https://forms.gle/meMhdYyM7SAhJUjG9. The talk can be followed online via this event link.

 

Historians have typically traced a the tradition of Machiavellian Classical Republicanism as a political and moral movement opposed to commercial values.  While recent research has shown pro-commercial strains of republicanism — in the Dutch Republic for example — my presentation will show a more complex relationship between republican ideas of liberty and capitalist traditions. The example of Richard Price shows a remarkable attempt to use capitalism to create an innovative form of prudence to mitigate the dangers of finance and complex trade.  Paradoxically, by trying balance greed and finance with anccounting and probabilistic prudence, Richard Price helped build essential elements that would support the rise of financial capitalism. 

 

The talk will be followed by drinks.

 

This talk is organized by UUCEMS in collaboration with the UU Descartes Center for the History and Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities