James Anderson of Hermiston
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West Ham
West Ham is in the London Borough of Newham in London, England. In the west it is a post-industrial neighbourhood abutting the site of the London Olympic Park and in the east it is mostly residential, consisting of Victorian terraced housing interspersed with higher density post-War social housing...
, Essex) was a Scottish agriculturist, journalist and economist. A member of the Edinburgh Philosophical Society, Anderson was a prominent figure in the Scottish Enlightenment
Scottish Enlightenment
The Scottish Enlightenment was the period in 18th century Scotland characterised by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishments. By 1750, Scots were among the most literate citizens of Europe, with an estimated 75% level of literacy...
. He invented the Scotch Plough.
Early years
Anderson was born at Long Hermiston, Midlothian, and educated at RathoRatho
Ratho is a village and civil parish in the west of Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland. It was formerly in the old county of Midlothian. Newbridge and Kirkliston are other villages in the area. The Union Canal passes through Ratho. Edinburgh Airport is situated only 4 miles ...
School and Edinburgh University. At the age of fifteen, after the death of his parents, he took over the working of the farm, which his family had occupied for several generations.
Family
In 1768 Anderson married Margaret Seton (died 1788), and took over the management of a farm in AberdeenshireAberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...
of 1300 acre
Acre
The acre is a unit of area in a number of different systems, including the imperial and U.S. customary systems. The most commonly used acres today are the international acre and, in the United States, the survey acre. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land.The acre is related...
s (5.3 km²). They had thirteen children.
Economic Theorist
Some historians believe Anderson was the root source for Marx's critique of capitalist agriculture. In 1777 Anderson published An Enquiry into the Nature of the Corn Laws in which he introduced what was to become the Malthusian/Ricardian theory of rent. In Marx's view, Anderson's original model was far superior to the variant later offered by the classical economists Thomas MalthusThomas Malthus
The Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus FRS was an English scholar, influential in political economy and demography. Malthus popularized the economic theory of rent....
and David Ricardo
David Ricardo
David Ricardo was an English political economist, often credited with systematising economics, and was one of the most influential of the classical economists, along with Thomas Malthus, Adam Smith, and John Stuart Mill. He was also a member of Parliament, businessman, financier and speculator,...
since it placed strong emphasis on the possibility of continuing agricultural improvement.
Rent, Anderson argued, was a charge for the use of the more fertile soil. The least fertile soils in cultivation generated an income that simply covered the costs of production, while the more fertile soils received a "certain premium for an exclusive privilege to cultivate them; which will be greater or smaller according to the more or less fertility of the soil. It is this premium which constitutes what we now call rent; a medium by means of which the expence (sic) of cultivating soils of very different degrees of fertility may be reduced to a perfect quality." For Malthus and Ricardo this differential rent was sourced in the natural productivity of the soil apart from human influence. Anderson, however, insisted that continual improvement of the soil was possible and that the productivity of the least fertile soil could rise to a point that brought it much closer to that of the most fertile land; but also that the converse was true and humans could degrade the soil. Where fertility problems arise in agriculture, for Anderson this was a consequence of the failure to adopt rational and sustainable agricultural practices. He argued that since the land in England was farmed by capitalist farmers, this posed obstacles to rational agriculture, since the farmer tended to avoid all improvements, the full return for which would not be received for the duration of the lease.
Marx's critique of capitalist agriculture drew upon Anderson's analysis and he insisted that soil fertility was a historical issue, and that fertility could both improve or decline. The irrationality of capitalist agriculture, he argued, was bound up with the whole antagonism of town and country out of which bourgeois society had arisen.
Publisher
In 1783 he settled in Edinburgh. In 1791 he started a weekly publication called The Bee, which was largely written by himself, and of which 18 volumes were published. In 1797 he began to reside at IsleworthIsleworth
Isleworth is a small town of Saxon origin sited within the London Borough of Hounslow in west London, England. It lies immediately east of the town of Hounslow and west of the River Thames and its tributary the River Crane. Isleworth's original area of settlement, alongside the Thames, is known as...
, and from 1799 to 1802 he produced a monthly publication, Recreations in Agriculture, Natural History, Arts and Miscellaneous Literature. He was also the author of many pamphlets on agricultural and economical topics, under numerous aliases, including Agricola, Germanicus, and Timothy Hairbrain. One of his first publications was A Practical Treatise on Chimney
Chimney
A chimney is a structure for venting hot flue gases or smoke from a boiler, stove, furnace or fireplace to the outside atmosphere. Chimneys are typically vertical, or as near as possible to vertical, to ensure that the gases flow smoothly, drawing air into the combustion in what is known as the...
s (1776). He was a friend of Jeremy Bentham
Jeremy Bentham
Jeremy Bentham was an English jurist, philosopher, and legal and social reformer. He became a leading theorist in Anglo-American philosophy of law, and a political radical whose ideas influenced the development of welfarism...
, and involved in the latter's idea of an ideal prison or Panopticon
Panopticon
The Panopticon is a type of building designed by English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the late eighteenth century. The concept of the design is to allow an observer to observe all inmates of an institution without them being able to tell whether or not they are being watched...
. Anderson also corresponded with George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
.
Inventor
The engineer James GreenJames Green (engineer)
James Green was a noted civil engineer and canal engineer, who was particularly active in the South West of England, where he pioneered the building of tub boat canals, and inventive solutions for coping with hilly terrain, which included tub boat lifts and inclined planes...
responsible for the building of some of the first canal Boat Lifts
Boat lift
A boat lift, ship lift, or lift lock is a machine for transporting boats between water at two different elevations, and is an alternative to the canal lock and the canal inclined plane....
credited their invention to Dr James Anderson.
Honorarium
In 1780 he received an LLDLegum Doctor
Legum Doctor is a doctorate-level academic degree in law, or an honorary doctorate, depending on the jurisdiction. The double L in the abbreviation refers to the early practice in the University of Cambridge to teach both Canon Law and Civil Law, the double L indicating the plural, Doctor of both...
(honorary doctorate in law) from Aberdeen University.
External links
- http://cepa.newschool.edu/het/profiles/jamesanderson.htmDr. James Anderson (honorary doctorate in law, 1780, AberdeenAberdeenAberdeen is Scotland's third most populous city, one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas and the United Kingdom's 25th most populous city, with an official population estimate of ....
), in History of Economic Thought, Scottish Enlightenment, Center for Economic Policy Analysis (CEPA), New School University] - (1777) Observations on the Means of Exciting a Spirit of National Industry
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