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Economic and Business Ethics in Select Italian Scholastics (ca. 1200–1450)

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Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics

Abstract

Between 1200 and 1450, Italy was one of the main actors in the “commercial revolution,” which took place in this period. This protagonism positively impacted scholastic reflection on economic ethics. Against the background of earlier chapters, four important authors among a great number of Italian scholastics have been chosen for closer examination: Olivi, Astesanus, Bernardino of Siena, and Antonino of Florence. They justified and exalted the importance of commerce and the social role of merchants praised for their honest work. The profit merchants made was considered to be a just recompense for their service of transporting, storing and improving goods. Profit was not, however, to be sought out of greed or avarice but in order to sustain one’s family and give alms. All authors were unanimous in their condemnation of usury as a form of exploitation of the poor. Their distinction between usury and interest and the establishment of so-called extrinsic titles to interest paved the way for the modern system of regulated interest rates in legal financial markets.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This concept was popularized particularly (but not created) by Robert S. Lopez. See his various writings, especially Lopez [4, 5]. See Lopez [5] for a description of the “Age of the Commerical Revolution”.

  2. 2.

    See also Lopez [4], 95.

  3. 3.

    See also Roover [2], 200ff.

  4. 4.

    For an excellent overview, see Wittreck [9], 139ss; Wood [8], 79ss; Pirenne [12], 130ss.

  5. 5.

    For a complete explanation, see Roover [2], 183ff.

  6. 6.

    See also Wood [8], 199ff.

  7. 7.

    This book contains Peter Olivi’s Tractatus de emptione et venditione, de usuris et de restitutionibus, written in the 13th century, 69ff.

  8. 8.

    The “Spirituals” were a group of friars who were discontent with the development of the mainstream of the Franciscan Order and wanted to return to the original radicalism of St. Francis. They ended up becoming extremists and were condemned by the Church. See Iriarte [32], 107ff.

  9. 9.

    For this biography, cf. Spicciani, Amleto, and Vian, Paolo, and Andenna, Giancarlo. 19982. Usure, compere e vendite. Europía, 173f.

  10. 10.

    Olivi together with all other scholastic teachers condemned artificial famines brought about by monopolies. Cf. Spicciani, Amleto, and Vian, Paolo, and Andenna, Giancarlo. 19982. Usure, compere e vendite. Europía, 48.

  11. 11.

    In his commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, Olivi identified “rationes seminales” in a general way as the potentiality contained in things, Quaestiones in secundum Librum Sententiarum, q. 31, edited in 1922 by Bernardus Jansen SJ, vol. I, Quaracchi: Collegium S. Bonaventurae.

  12. 12.

    Bernardino paraphrases this passage from Olivi in his Sermo 34 (Bernardino of Siena (1956), 165ff).

  13. 13.

    This distinction was a result of canonical regulation.

  14. 14.

    From this positive evaluation, one must except the antisemitic passage in Summa, II, t. 47. Bernardino in tone is even more belligerently antisemitic.

  15. 15.

    Cf. also Aquinas, (1999)3, II-II, q. 77, a. 1c.

  16. 16.

    The Bull “Inter multiplices” (May 4, 1515) promulgated by Leo X recognized the “Montes Pietatis” as charitable institutions, with an interest rate that had to be reasonable (i.e., covering the running costs). The prohibition of requiring interest remained in force even after the publication of this Bull, unless the interest of the loan was to be used for the salaries of the employees and to cover the other costs of the “Montes Pietatis” and not simply to pay for the loan as such. Cf. Denzinger Heinrich, and Hünermann, Peter. 2003. Enchiridion Symbolorum. Bologna: EDB, nos. 1442–1444.

  17. 17.

    Confront with the online version of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek of München, http://www.digitale-sammlungen.de/index.html?c=autoren_index&l=de&ab=Antoninus+%26lt%3bFlorentinus%26gt%3b.

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  1. Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Piazza di Sant’Apollinaire, 49, 00186, Rome, Italy

    Prof. Martin Schlag

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  1. Peter Löscher-Stiftungslehrstuhl für Wirtschaftsethik, Technische Universität München, München, Germany

    Christoph Luetge

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Schlag, M. (2013). Economic and Business Ethics in Select Italian Scholastics (ca. 1200–1450). In: Luetge, C. (eds) Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1494-6_84

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1494-6_84

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