There have only been three instances where Adam Smith has mentioned the words “Invisible Hand” in the number of works that he has published (while alive or posthumously). The first would be in his writings on astronomy, the second in the “Theory of Moral Sentiments” and the third would be in the “Wealth of Nations”. In the “Theory of Moral Sentiments”, he explores moral ideas and products as a result of our nature as social beings. Here, the invisible hand is used to invoke idea of the unintended social benefits of an individual’s self-interested, self-benefitting action.

Economics is in itself an exploration of the ways to distribute scarce resources amongst the populous. I would like to explore the second use of this term with the help of an example of the coating made of Vertically Aligned Nanotube Arrays known as Vantablack. For our purposes, we will be taking a look at its artistic licenses. For those who haven’t heard of Vantablack, it is a coating that was accidently created by Surrey NanoSystems in the United Kingdom. Currently, the only person with the license to use it in an artistic context is a sculptor called Anish Kapoor (A well-known work of his is Chicago’s Bean). Reinstating the principle of the invisible hand, there will be unintended social benefits which occur due to one’s self-benefitting actions.

In an ideal situation, Anish Kapoor would motion to share the licensing for Vantablack with other artists in order to have maximum social benefits for all. However, this would be in conflict with his best interest which would be to keep it to himself and to maintain his monopoly over the scare resource (which here is the licensing to use the coating, Vantablack). If he did choose to help the cause of licensing the use of this coating for other artists, it may help to provide greater social benefits by increasing the chance of creating thought provoking art through the coating. Yet he has not, and continues to exercise an artistic monopoly over it. Here, he is acting in his best self interest while still going against maximum social welfare.

This example can be used to show that the Invisible Hand Rule, while still beneficial in the assessment of various economic situations, is not a hard and fast rule and does not work in every situation.