Abstract

Adam Smith’s fame as the ‘founder’ of economics has led to him being claimed as an inspiration by many subsequent thinkers. This chapter examines the claims of a particular group of thinkers who have identified Smith as an intellectual inspiration and forefather. The ‘New Right’ thinkers who participated in the revival of classical liberal political and economic ideas in the second part of the twentieth century have made a particular claim on Smith and this chapter takes this claim seriously and explores its validity. Cutting through the rhetoric, it examines what three representative thinkers of this ‘school’, Milton Friedman, James Buchanan, and Friedrich Hayek, actually say about Smith and what they claim to have learned from him.