Expulsion from paradise

• Autor(a) principal: Lisboa, Armando de Melo
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista Brasileira de Desenvolvimento Regional (Online)
• Texto Completo: https://ojsrevista.furb.br/ojs/index.php/rbdr/article/view/5770
• topic: Individualism; modern economy; private interests; private wealth; State.; Economía moderna; Estado; individualismo; intereses privados; riqueza privada.; Economia moderna; Estado; individualismo; interesses privados; riqueza privada.

This work aims to uncover the germination period of the modern economic thought. At the end of this period it appeared as “Politics Arithmetic”, a calculation to the King’s service, knowledge for the State. It shows the development of the opposition between man and the city, the private interest and the polis, which has already manifested in the Greek world. In this context of ruptures that lead of Thomism/holism to atomism/modern individualism, the economy leaves the social web and takes its present face, imposing the dynamic conflict in which the private enrichment is emancipated and opposed to the public interest. Thus, expels from Paradise – not by any transcendent angel, but by fortuitous consequences of human history – and attached to the life of scarcity (a concept derived from the economic-theological conception that professes the infinite insatiability of human desire), the economy will perform as dismal science. It seeks responding to the growing tensions generated, and to reconciling them, that Adam Smith will lift his “Wealth of Nations”, centered on the metaphorical and epiphanic concept of the invisible hand. Among the factors driving this process, three of them will be examined here.JEL-Code | D31; B50; P17.