Abstract
This paper sketches five systems of economic ethics in the course of Western history: the Ancient Greeks and Romans, Biblical Judaism and early Christianity; British empiricism; Social Darwinism; and the Church’s modern Social Teachings. This historical perspective helps the reader find the new global ethics of sustainable development that today’s world requires to address most of the pressing issues we are currently facing.
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Notes
- 1.
For a recent and short survey of economic and institutional change over time, see my book The Ages of Globalization: Geography, Technology, and Institutions, Columbia University Press, 2020.
- 2.
For a short discussion of Aristotle’s theory of human nature, see my paper on “Aristotle, eudaimonia, neuroscience and economics,” Chapter 3 of A Modern Guide to the Economics of Happiness, edited by Luigino Bruni, Alessandra Smerilli, and Dalila De Rosa, Elgar Press, 2021.
- 3.
- 4.
- 5.
Matthew 25:31–46.
- 6.
For a glorious history of the reception of Aristotle’s work at the medieval University of Paris, see Rubenstein (2004).
- 7.
For a recent and superb discussion of the history and content of the Church’s social teachings, see Annett (2022).
- 8.
- 9.
See, for instance, Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905).
- 10.
For a scintillating analysis of Hobbes and his belief in insatiable desires, see David Wootton, Power, Pleasure and Profit: Insatiable Appetites from Machiavelli to Madison, Harvard University Press, 2018.
- 11.
- 12.
- 13.
Regarding the Bengal drought of 1770, Smith had written in the Wealth of Nations that “a famine has never arisen from any other cause but the violence of government attempting, by improper means, to remedy the inconveniences of a dearth.”
- 14.
Spencer coined the phrase “survival of the fittest” in Principles of Biology (1864), five years after Darwin’s Origin of Species, and which Spencer had read and adapted. By 1868, Darwin adopted Spencer’s phrase. Though Darwin emphasized that evolution could induce cooperation within a species, his use of Spencer’s phrase left the impression that evolution is a ruthless process in which the unfit are doomed to perish in competition with the fit.
- 15.
Kant wrote approvingly of Hume, noting in Observations on the feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (1764) that “The Negroes of Africa have by nature no feeling that goes beyond foolishness.” https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520240780/observations-on-the-feeling-of-the-beautiful-and-sublime
- 16.
UN Resolution 65/309 adopted on July 19, 2011. https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/715187/files/A_RES_65_309-EN.pdf?ln=en
- 17.
For an overview of the challenges of sustainable development, see my book The Age of Sustainable Development, Columbia University Press, 2015.
- 18.
- 19.
- 20.
References
Annett A (2022) Cathonomics: how catholic tradition can create a more just economy. Georgetown University Press, Washington, DC
Davis M (2002) Late Victorian holocausts: El Niño famines and the making of the third world. Verso Press, New York
Nietzsche F (1887) The genealogy of morals. Trans. Walter Kaufmann, Random House, New York. 1967
Rubenstein RE (2004) Aristotle’s children: how Christians, Muslims, and jews rediscovered ancient wisdom and illuminated the middle ages. Mariner Books, Boston
Smith A (1776) Wealth of nations, chapter IV, book IV. Online here http://files.libertyfund.org/files/220/0141-02_Bk.pdf
Weikart R (2004) From Darwin to Hitler: evolutionary ethics, eugenics, and racism in Germany. Palgrave Macmillan, New York
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Sachs, J.D. (2023). The Economy of Francesco and the Age of Sustainable Development. In: Rotondi, V., Santori, P. (eds) Rethinking Economics Starting from the Commons. Contributions to Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23324-1_15
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