Empathy as a constituent of social reality: an ontological reading of Adam Smith

Abstract This paper makes a contribution to the literature on ontology and the history of economic thought firstly by providing an ontological reading of Adam Smith and then by expanding the analysis to accommodate a key ontological feature of the Smithian theory—the intersubjectivity of needs emerging from the limits of empathy. This reading of Adam Smith reveals his theory of empathy is not only related to ethics, but also to social phenomena. The intersubjective needs that the limits of our empathy have brought into existence are shown here as one such social phenomenon and can thus be considered a proper subject of social ontology. The paper tries to expand the social ontological project of Tony Lawson so as to accommodate analysis of such a concept of need.