Abstract

This essay examines market morality from a sociological perspective. Focusing upon a case study of Poland, it highlights the effects historical socio-political forces have upon popular attitudes toward unequal accumulation. Poland's unique mythology of wealth is rooted in both peasant and literary subcultures, and the communist experience. Public opinion surveys demonstrate that negative attitudes toward wealth accumulation were pervasive in Poland during the early 1990s. Actual capital accumulation suggests that, in the early years of the post-communist transition, Polish reality largely substantiated Polish mythology. Political connections were often used to enter the Polish business elite, and shady practices employed to maintain such positions. The essay explores this correlation, highligjhting social mythology's joint dependence on cultural residue and reality, as well as the effects of social, political, and economic forces upon societal attitudes toward morality in the marketplace.