Socio-economic Equality in Adam Smith's Work

The times during which Adam Smith lived and published his remarkable works, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (TMS) and The Wealth of Nations (WN), were very divided on philosophical, political and economic grounds. Interestingly, the sixth and last edition of TMS was published in 1790, coinciding with the beginning of the French revolution and the emergence and uprising of radical egalitarian ideas across Europe. Hence, I was curious to understand what Adam Smith, the moral philosopher, thought of equality. In this essay, I would like to discuss Smith’s views on equality and egalitarianism from a moral and socio-economic perspective based on his first book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments. I would also like to loosely define ‘egalitarianism’ as a doctrine that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities.

In TMS, sympathy is a central aspect of social interactions and moral judgements and it is implied that all human beings have a propensity toward sympathy (Dwyer). Sympathy is the ‘fellow-feeling’  that helps us relate to passions, people and situations. But this sympathy is the result of the impartial spectator’s understanding of emotions and actions. The ‘impartial spectator’ seems to stand as the assessor or regulator (Darwall) of one’s moral judgements. When we sympathise, we imaginatively put ourselves into the situation of others and judge our actions by evaluating if an unbiased, third-person observing us from outside would take the same actions that we have in those situations.

It is at the very first few pages of TMS that Smith’s morally egalitarian views start to come across.

Smith acknowledges that due to the innate selfishness of human beings, it is difficult to look beyond our own interests at the interests of others. He says that,

‘… Before we can make any proper comparison of … opposite interests, we must change our position. We must view them, neither from our own place nor yet from his… but from the place and with the eyes of a third person, who has no particular connexion with either, and who judges with impartiality between us.’ 

The fact that people put themselves in the place of others to be able to empathise and identify with them, implicitly means that we consider the individuals who we are sympathising with as having equal worth, or simply as individuals worthy of our perspectives.

Smith even goes on to say that those individuals who do not treat others around them as equals or see themselves in a heightened manner than those around them, instigate us. He states:

‘What chiefly enrages us against the man who injures or insults us, is the little account which he seems to make of us, the unreasonable preference which he gives to himself above us, and that absurd self-love, by which he seems to imagine, that other people may be sacrificed at any time…’ (TMS II.iii.1.6)

It seems quite obvious by now that according to Smith, we all assume equal worth and when we are treated differently, in disagreement with the worth we think we share with others, makes us resentful.

I think that this implies that the underlying assumption of moral equality and the prerequisite to view all human beings as equal is at the forefront of sympathy and hence, all social interactions. Consequently, it seems fair to say that Smith was most certainly believed in and endorsed moral equality.

In the same book, however, Adam Smith’s views on socio-economic equality are quite ambiguous and perplexing for a number of reasons.

Firstly, Smith, in a stark contrast to what is generally perceived of him, does not seem to give a lot of importance to the attainment of wealth. In certain parts of TMS, he considers a ‘clear conscience’ to contribute to a man’s happiness more than ‘accessions of fortune’. Smith even goes on to call the latter ‘superfluous’. He also states that ‘…In what constitutes the real happiness of human life, they (the poor) are in no respect inferior to those who would seem so much above them. In ease of body and peace of mind, all the different ranks of life are nearly upon a level…

Here, Smith does not seem to think of the poor as any less worthy than the rich, which is in agreement with the moral equality. He does not see differences among people with differing status in society as a representation of their innate characteristics or worth. Instead, he simply accepts the existence of socio-economic distinctions of ranks and material inequality between the ‘labouring classes’ and the aristocracy. Although Smith doesn’t explicitly talk about the causes or consequences of economic inequality in TMS, he certainly believes that economic inequality alters the way people sympathise. This distortion of sympathies due to socio-economic inequality causes people to admire the rich and disregard the poor.