Mądrzy i cnotliwi, bogaci i możni: autorytet w myśli Adama Smitha .......... 171

WISE AND VIRTUOUS, RICH AND POWERFUL: AUTHORITY IN THE THOUGHT OF ADAM SMITH

Adam Smith enumerated four primary factors that bring advantage over other people: physical strength and mental capabilities (including wisdom and virtue), age, wealth, and superiority of birth. He recognized that the relative importance of these factors changes as societies enter successive stages of development. The processes of this kind also affect the formation of general rules of morality, which earn the status of authority when internalized by individual people. The wealthy, who become authorities in certain areas of life (fashion, for instance), are admired and emulated. Although according to Smith one would be better off admiring the wise and virtuous, the rich and powerful are more conspicuous and as a result the social hierarchy is usually based upon them. The article mentions also the idea of the „invisible hand”, or more precisely the problem of unintended consequences as presented in the thought of Adam Smith.