The Moralization of the Markets

The Moralization of the Markets PDF Author: Nico Stehr
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 1412815878
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 381

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Book Description
Nothing affects the modern economy (and society) more than decisions made in the market place, especially, but not only, decisions made by consumers. Although it is not startling to suggest that decisions made in production are affected by choices consumers make, consumers have long been viewed, not only by academic economists, as individual, isolated rational actors that make or refrain from purchases purely on the basis of narrow financial considerations. Markets are not and never were morally neutral. Market relations have always had an often taken-for-granted moral underpinning. The moralization of the markets refers to the dissolution and replacement of the conventional moral underpinnings of market conduct, for example, in the music market, financial markets, and corporate governance. It further implies not only the heightened importance of new ethical precepts, but the significant change in the role of moral ideals in market behavior. These profound transformations of economic conduct are accompanied and co-determined by societal conflicts. The moralization of markets represents thus a new stage in the social evolution of markets. The book is divided into four parts, in which the twelve chapters, written by contributors from different social science disciplines, deal with the context of the moralization of the markets; the major social institutions; and present case studies that examine European and American attitudes and behavior towards tobacco and GMO; expansion of the private and ethics in business; and how workers respond to the new corporate norms. This volume will be of interest to sociologists, economists, social scientists, and the general consumer alike.

The Moralization of the Markets

The Moralization of the Markets PDF Author: Nico Stehr
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 1412815878
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 381

Get Book Here

Book Description
Nothing affects the modern economy (and society) more than decisions made in the market place, especially, but not only, decisions made by consumers. Although it is not startling to suggest that decisions made in production are affected by choices consumers make, consumers have long been viewed, not only by academic economists, as individual, isolated rational actors that make or refrain from purchases purely on the basis of narrow financial considerations. Markets are not and never were morally neutral. Market relations have always had an often taken-for-granted moral underpinning. The moralization of the markets refers to the dissolution and replacement of the conventional moral underpinnings of market conduct, for example, in the music market, financial markets, and corporate governance. It further implies not only the heightened importance of new ethical precepts, but the significant change in the role of moral ideals in market behavior. These profound transformations of economic conduct are accompanied and co-determined by societal conflicts. The moralization of markets represents thus a new stage in the social evolution of markets. The book is divided into four parts, in which the twelve chapters, written by contributors from different social science disciplines, deal with the context of the moralization of the markets; the major social institutions; and present case studies that examine European and American attitudes and behavior towards tobacco and GMO; expansion of the private and ethics in business; and how workers respond to the new corporate norms. This volume will be of interest to sociologists, economists, social scientists, and the general consumer alike.

Moralizing the Market

Moralizing the Market PDF Author: Yves-Marie Péréon
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421424851
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 223

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Book Description
"In the late 1960s, France attempted a complete overhaul of its financial regulations without being forced to do so by a stock market crash or the collapse of its banking system. Out of pure political expediency, Gaullist reformers seized the opportunity offered by a minor insider trading case to establish the "Commission des Opérations de Bourse (COB), an independent commission in charge of regulating the securities market. Even more surprisingly, these staunch defenders of national sovereignty drew their inspiration from an American model, the Securities and Exchange Commission. Rather than a comparative study of securities regulation in France and the United States, the book is an investigation of the dynamics of policy transfer in the field of securities regulation. Along the way, it reveals a great deal about French and American perceptions of morality and capitalism, but also, more generally, about the exercise of political power in modern democracies, the interaction between business and government, and the mechanisms of institutional innovation"--

Moralizing the Market

Moralizing the Market PDF Author: Yves-Marie Péréon
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 142142486X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 223

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Book Description
A novel historical perspective on how stock markets influence each other internationally. A nation usually overhauls its financial regulations after a stock market crash or the collapse of its banking system. In 1967, France did something rare. Out of pure political expediency, Gaullist leaders and senior civil servants seized the opportunity offered by an insider-trading case and established an independent commission to regulate the securities market: the Commission des Opérations de Bourse, or COB. Despite their staunch defense of national sovereignty, these reformers drew their inspiration from an American model, the Securities and Exchange Commission. Highlighting the international sources for national reform, Yves-Marie Péréon’s Moralizing the Market explores the dynamics of policy transfer in securities regulation—a subject that has rarely been considered from a historical perspective. That regulation has been used to attract investors and foster market development challenges the view that the French government only attempted to develop the stock market as part of a global wave of deregulation in the 1980s. Indeed, the creation of the COB reveals a great deal about the exercise of power in modern democracies, the interaction between business and government, and the mechanisms of institutional innovation. Moralizing the Market will appeal to professors and students of economic history, international relations, and political science, as well as business and finance historians, policy makers, and professionals.

Morals and Markets

Morals and Markets PDF Author: Viviana A. Rotman Zelizer
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231545428
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Life insurance—the promise of an insurer to pay a sum upon a person's death in exchange for a regular premium—is a bizarre enterprise. How can we monetize human life? Should we? What statistics do we use, what assumptions do we make, and what behavioral factors do we consider? First published in 1979, Morals and Markets Is a pathbreaking study exploring the development of life insurance in the United States. Viviana A. Rotman Zelizer combines economic history and a sociological perspective to advance a novel interpretation of the life insurance industry. The book pioneered a cultural approach to the analysis of morally controversial markets. Zelizer begins in the mid-nineteenth century with the rise of the life insurance industry, a contentious chapter in the history of American business. Life insurance was stigmatized at first, denounced in newspapers and condemned by religious leaders as an immoral and sacrilegious gamble on human life. Over time, the business became a widely praised arrangement to secure a family's future. How did life insurance overcome cultural barriers? As Zelizer shows, the evolution of the industry in the United States matched evolving attitudes toward death, money, family relations, property, and personal legacy.

The Morals of the Market

The Morals of the Market PDF Author: Jessica Whyte
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1786633116
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
The fatal embrace of human rights and neoliberalism Drawing on detailed archival research on the parallel histories of human rights and neoliberalism, Jessica Whyte uncovers the place of human rights in neoliberal attempts to develop a moral framework for a market society. In the wake of the Second World War, neoliberals saw demands for new rights to social welfare and self-determination as threats to “civilisation”. Yet, rather than rejecting rights, they developed a distinctive account of human rights as tools to depoliticise civil society, protect private investments and shape liberal subjects.

The Oxford Handbook of Freedom

The Oxford Handbook of Freedom PDF Author: David Schmidtz
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199989435
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 545

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Book Description
We speak of being 'free' to speak our minds, free to go to college, free to move about; we can be cancer-free, debt-free, worry-free, or free from doubt. The concept of freedom (and relatedly the notion of liberty) is ubiquitous but not everyone agrees what the term means, and the philosophical analysis of freedom that has grown over the last two decades has revealed it to be a complex notion whose meaning is dependent on the context. The Oxford Handbook of Freedom will crystallize this work and craft the first wide-ranging analysis of freedom in all its dimensions: legal, cultural, religious, economic, political, and psychological. This volume includes 28 new essays by well regarded philosophers, as well some historians and political theorists, in order to reflect the breadth of the topic. This handbook covers both current scholarship as well as historical trends, with an overall eye to how current ideas on freedom developed. The volume is divided into six sections: conceptual frames (framing the overall debates about freedom), historical frames (freedom in key historical periods, from the ancients onward), institutional frames (freedom and the law), cultural frames (mutual expectations on our 'right' to be free), economic frames (freedom and the market), and lastly psychological frames (free will in philosophy and psychology).

Moralizing Capitalism

Moralizing Capitalism PDF Author: Stefan Berger
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3030205657
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 343

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Book Description
This book adds a crucial focus on morality to the growing literature on the history of capitalism by exploring social and cultural perspectives on the economic order that has dominated the modern world. Taking the study beyond narrow economic confines, it traces the entanglement between moral sentiments and capitalism, examining both moral critiques and moral justifications. Company bankruptcies, systems of taxation, wealth, and the running of stock exchanges were attacked on moral grounds, while ideas of economic justice and the humanization of capitalism loomed large over moral critiques. Many movements, from antislavery to labour campaigns, were inspired by aspirations to improve capitalism and halt the moral decay that was felt to have affected large sections of society. This book questions how moral sentiments are defined and have changed over time, and how these relate to both capitalism and anti-capitalism. Covering a range of different social movements and ethical issues, the 13 chapters present a moral history of capitalism, understood not simply as an economic system but as an order that encompasses all areas of modern life.

Moralizing Technology

Moralizing Technology PDF Author: Peter-Paul Verbeek
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226852903
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 195

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Book Description
Technology permeates nearly every aspect of our daily lives. Cars enable us to travel long distances, mobile phones help us to communicate, and medical devices make it possible to detect and cure diseases. But these aids to existence are not simply neutral instruments: they give shape to what we do and how we experience the world. And because technology plays such an active role in shaping our daily actions and decisions, it is crucial, Peter-Paul Verbeek argues, that we consider the moral dimension of technology. Moralizing Technology offers exactly that: an in-depth study of the ethical dilemmas and moral issues surrounding the interaction of humans and technology. Drawing from Heidegger and Foucault, as well as from philosophers of technology such as Don Ihde and Bruno Latour, Peter-Paul Verbeek locates morality not just in the human users of technology but in the interaction between us and our machines. Verbeek cites concrete examples, including some from his own life, and compellingly argues for the morality of things. Rich and multifaceted, and sure to be controversial, Moralizing Technology will force us all to consider the virtue of new inventions and to rethink the rightness of the products we use every day.

The Moral Background

The Moral Background PDF Author: Gabriel Abend
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691171122
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 413

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Book Description
In recent years, many disciplines have become interested in the scientific study of morality. However, a conceptual framework for this work is still lacking. In The Moral Background, Gabriel Abend develops just such a framework and uses it to investigate the history of business ethics in the United States from the 1850s to the 1930s. According to Abend, morality consists of three levels: moral and immoral behavior, or the behavioral level; moral understandings and norms, or the normative level; and the moral background, which includes what moral concepts exist in a society, what moral methods can be used, what reasons can be given, and what objects can be morally evaluated at all. This background underlies the behavioral and normative levels; it supports, facilitates, and enables them. Through this perspective, Abend historically examines the work of numerous business ethicists and organizations—such as Protestant ministers, business associations, and business schools—and identifies two types of moral background. "Standards of Practice" is characterized by its scientific worldview, moral relativism, and emphasis on individuals' actions and decisions. The "Christian Merchant" type is characterized by its Christian worldview, moral objectivism, and conception of a person's life as a unity. The Moral Background offers both an original account of the history of business ethics and a novel framework for understanding and investigating morality in general.

Post-Growth Living

Post-Growth Living PDF Author: Kate Soper
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1788738896
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
An urgent and passionate plea for a new and ecologically sustainable vision of the good life. The reality of runaway climate change is inextricably linked with the mass consumerist, capitalist society in which we live. And the cult of endless growth, and endless consumption of cheap disposable commodities isn't only destroying the world, it is damaging ourselves and our way of being. How do we stop the impending catastrophe, and how can we create a movement capable of confronting it head-on? In Post-Growth Living, philosopher Kate Soper offers an urgent plea for a new vision of the good life, one that is capable of delinking prosperity from endless growth. Instead, she calls for a renewed emphasis on the joys of being, one that is capable of collective happiness not in consumption but by creating a future that allows not only for more free time, and less conventional and more creative ways of using it, but also for more fulfilling ways of working and existing. This is an urgent and necessary intervention into debates on climate change.