James Anderson of Hermiston - Economic Theorist

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 Malthus and David Ricardo 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.