Poglądy społeczno-ekonomiczne Ferdynanda Zweiga

Abstract

The work The Socio-economic views of Ferdinand Zweig is the first among our academic publications to show the biography and the whole scholarly and journalistic output of F. Zweig. In the inter-war period, F. Zweig was a professor of economics at the Jagiellonian University, and one of the main founders, side by side with Adam Krzyżanowski and Adam Heydel, of the liberal current in the Polish socio-economic thought, i.e. of the so-called „Cracow school”. In that period his research and publications were connected with economics. He was not, however, only a theorist of economics. He showed a lively interest in the Polish and foreign economic scene, which resulted in his becoming an editor of the economic column of the „Ilustrated Daily Courier”, a paper that was particularly popular before the war, and in his writing of numerous articles that appeared in that daily. In those publications a certain discrepancy manifested itself. In the province of theory, Ferdinand Zweig, a representantive of classical economics, was a firm supporter of liberalism. In the field of practical reality, however, the solutions put forward by F. Zweig often diverged from liberalism. Was it then the case that a theorist of liberalism betrayed his own ideals in practice? It is impossible to understand this without taking into account his historiosophical concept of the four systems of economics. In the first half of the 20th century, the liberal ideas gave way to the nationalist and socialist ones. This, according to Zweig, was an objective process, and, among other things, a consequence of the monopolisation of the world economy. Is it possible, in a situation where the free market cannot function properly, to recommend and apply the liberal recipes? A liberal who does not want to become confined to the zone of theoretical considerations is forced to make some pragmatic concessions, and to agree on, sometimes far-reaching, compromises, and, in particular, such a liberal has to accept the growing role of the state in economy. This, as F. Zweig claims, is not tantamount to a capitulation. He believed in the renaissance of liberalism, and maintained that man’s life is, above all, a sphere of freedom. He suggested, furthermore, that liberalism should be enriched with elements of social security, which made him one of the precursors of neoliberalism. F. Zweig’s historiographic concept acquires an additional meaning in the light of the event that are nowadays taking place in the countries of the East Central Europe. The Second World War was an important breakthrough in F. Zweig’s life. Not only did it make him stay in Britain for good, but also it changed his scholarly interests. F. Zweig quickly became a well-known researcher in the field of sociology of labour. He wrote in English, and published many works, popular in the West but unknown in Poland, which led up to his vision of the nascent „new, acquisitive society” of the masses. This vision allows us to see that his faith in a renaissance of the liberal ideals was disturbed. He still, however, advocated a search for new solutions, realising that the highest aim was to defend an open society, open in the Popperian sense of the word.