Adam Smith on Foreign Policy

I am reading The Mind and the Market: Capitalism in Western Thought where Smith says something everyone agrees with - but few practice:

The only world that will work has to be good for everyone.

Smith made the same point in regard to colonies. They were good for the nation insofar as they extended the market, making a more productive division of labor possible. But to grant British merchants a monopoly on trade with the colonies benefited merchants at the expense of the nation, an expense that was aggravated by the military costs of maintaining such monopolies by force. 

Such companies, which established military control over foreign regions in order to maintain their own trade monopoly, were detrimental to the home country and ruinous to the subject nations, Smith maintained. The consumers of the home country suffered all the disadvantages that came from an exclusive supplier unrestrained by the forces of competition and free to undersupply the market and thus raise prices for imported goods.

This not only applies to trade with foreign countries, it also applies to the home market. Consumers should not be considered fair game, open to exploitation by any provider - but equals, that must be protected, so that everything works properly.

I am speaking of Ethics here, that every company (and every organization) gives plenty of lip-service to - but little else.