The bourgeois virtues Book

McCloskey writes an apology for capitalism. Not an argument that capitalists are without vice (the world is fallen, and no one is without vice), but that capitalism is not, as it has too often been defined, greed incarnate, an inherent vice. Capitalism, on the whole, is supportive of virtue. Virtue is, in the long-term, “smart business.” Ethically speaking, “dealing” (capitalism) is better than “stealing” (communism, socialism, imperialism, bribe-soaked bureaucracy). As Churchill said of democracy, capitalism is the worst economic system, except for all the others that have been tried.

But it isn’t just the left that gets capitalism wrong. It’s the right too: “They believe that capitalism and profit are good for business but have nothing to do with ethics, that the poor should shut up and settle for what they get…They think Jesus got it all wrong in the Sermon on the Mount.” Those in the middle don’t quite have it right either: they believe in the “laughably nonethical character of capitalism.” Even McCloskey’s publisher laughed out loud at his suggested title, “Bourgeois Virtue.” It’s time to treat the bourgeois more fairly, McCloskey thinks, time to examine how capitalism works, and works “pretty well,” not just as an economic system, but as a system that makes the practice of virtue possible, and, indeed, often preferable. The primary bourgeois virtues, according to McCloskey, are love, faith, hope, courage, temperance, prudence, and justice. (Sounds more like the fruits of the spirit than the fruits of any economic system to me…but her point is that capitalism does not discourage these virtues and more often rewards them than not.)

I stopped reading the book partway through, not because it is particularly poorly written, but because I don’t really need to be convinced of her argument, and her work isn't clearly organized enough to enable me to use it to convince others of her argument. She throws in a few too many names that may cause the eyes of some readers to glaze over, and she relies too heavily on the work of and direct quotes from others. The length alone may make the tome tedious for almost anyone (and this is but the first of four planned volumes!). Her tone is moderate, almost friendly. Because I haven’t finished it, it wouldn’t be fair of me to say that she does not support her argument well enough, but so far I get the impression she does not. I suspect Adam Smith did a much better job in “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” (of intellectually defending his position, that is, not of writing; his prose is beyond tedious).

What she seems to be defending is not an unregulated capitalism, but the mostly unhampered freedom to trade, make an honest living, and, for the most part, to enjoy the fruits of one’s own labor—without being criticized or demeaned for doing so. She is defending the bourgeois from those who paint them as greedy or vapid, by showing capitalism to be a system that actually more readily encourages virtue than socialism, communism, or any other economic system. She does not seem to be doing this in any systematic way, however, and there isn’t enough economics in the book for my taste. It is really more philosophy than economics.