5 - The global economy from a moral point of view

Summary

There are many moral points of view and each one thinks it has a claim to our affections. In fact, the Chinese philosopher and jurist Mo Ti argued that each and every person has his or her own unique, particular, and completely idiosyncratic moral basis for judging the things of this world and the next. It is therefore impossible, Mo Ti argued, to arrive at a common standpoint for evaluation of something as complex and important as the global economy.

So, in the context of this book, it is initially difficult to decide upon which moral point of view has the most salience from which to offer a credible critique of the global economy. From which vantage-point should we sharpen the edge of our evaluative powers? Whose perspective should we embrace? Whose benefits should we endorse? A necessary preliminary observation points out that considerations regarding the economy are very much rooted in the material, non-transcendental reality of the life-world. On the other hand, morality, from whatever point of view you take it, is not necessarily bound by the physical restraints and causal sequences that drive the life-world. Morality is open to the outer limits of human imagination, embracing all mental constructions about the workings of the life-world and all that which might be beyond the life-world.

I want to suggest in this chapter that, of all the possible moralities that could be brought to bear in analysis of the global economy, an aspect of humanism – stewardship – has a particular relevance.