For the sociologist, it is a question of time. Sennett explained how contemporary capitalism has spread a brutal short-termism around the world. It manifests itself, first, in corporate behaviour and, say, the desperate need to improve results each and every quarter, or the loss of interest in owning companies in favour of trading them, to deliver quick returns. But soon, the short-termism negatively affects people. It means that we can no longer construct a narrative of our lives by the work we do, because we chop and change employment and don't have careers. Similarly, it erodes the humanly rewarding notion of offering service to a company, since the dominant model of employment is selling yourself to the highest bidder.
Susie Orbach felt that the ethical problem was different again. In short, economic metaphors have come to dominate the way we talk about ourselves. So, we think of ourselves as consumers. Or, an individual's worth is mostly assessed by their accomplishments. Or again, people seek to belong in the world by marketing themselves like brands on the internet. What capitalism has done is erode the rich variety of notions of what can count as good so that all we are left with is the "good" of unbridled growth.
The moral problems, then, are serious. But what of the moral solutions? The difficulty here is that words like "moral", or "virtue", have themselves been tarnished. We squirm when people use them – as the archbishop himself acknowledged when he listed the four cardinal virtues: prudence, fortitude, temperance and justice. Bar the last one, justice, which is in pretty good health, there is a need to unscramble them in an effort to make them more palatable. It needs to be explained that prudence means good judgment, fortitude implies courage, and that temperance is a kind of emotional intelligence; or emphasised that the aim of virtue ethics is not to enforce a moral code but is rather to enable our humanity to flourish.
These are great points. I really like that Vernon emphasizes that virtues are not a restraint to our individual humanity, but that they allow individuals to live more abundant and satisfied lives. However, Vernon goes on to faultily blame Adam Smith and his invisible hand:
Part of the problem here is capitalism, again. Its success stems in large part on appealing to our worst instincts. In one formulation at least, it is a system in which each person is supposed to look after their own self-interests, deliberately to the exclusion of others. That is the "ethical" thing to do, since by the power of the invisible hand, good is then bound to spread to all. No one believes that anymore.
I have begun to read Smith's Wealth of Nations, with the intent of making it through all 1,200+ pages. It is like the Bible in that it is often quoted and referenced, but usually out of context, and by people who have never read it. I am currently on page 20, so it will be a while before I claim to be a Smithian scholar, but having read several blogs, papers, and the forward to the Bantam edition by Alan Krueger, it is very clear that not only is Smith's thought more nuanced than most give him credit for, his words have been much distorted by those in the laissez-faire, capitalism triumphs all, and "greed is good" crowds.
Smith used the term "invisible hand" only once, and it was a common expression of the day, not a defining element, metaphor, theory, explanation, or summary of Smith's ideals. Smith also goes into detail in his works to differentiate self-interest from selfishness or greed. He was critical of entities that, through government-granted monopoly or limited liability, separated the interests of the owners from the interests of the managers and workers, which I personally view as a curse to our modern version of corporate capitalism. The term capitalism hadn't been invented while Smith was alive, and he despised the term laissez-faire. Overall, he saw order coming out of chaos in the action of individuals, but made plain that both governments and privileged businesses distorted the natural market between people.
The ethical thing to do is to act ethically. This is much easier for individuals with a moral or ethical framework to do. It is much more difficult for a non-human legal entity, such as a corporation, to do.
2 comments:
Critics of Smith always seem to forget that he also wrote The Theory of Moral Sentiments.
Indeed. He thought of Moral Sentiments as his most important work, and the two are certainly inter-related. It will eventually get on my reading list, with the emphasis on eventually.
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