Is Market Society Intrinsically Repugnant?

Jason Brennan ()
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Jason Brennan: http://www.jasonfbrennan.com

Journal of Business Ethics, 2013, vol. 112, issue 2, 281 pages

Abstract: In Why Not Socialism?, G. A. Cohen argues that market society and capitalism are intrinsically repugnant. He asks us to imagine an ideal camping trip, which becomes increasing repugnant as it shifts from living by socialist to capitalist principles. In this paper, I expose the limits of this style of argument by making a parallel argument, which shows how an ideal anarchist camping trip becomes increasingly repugnant as the campsite turns from anarchism to democracy. When we see why this style of argument fails to generate interesting objections to democracy, we then see why it also fails to generate interesting objections to market society. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2013

Keywords: G. A. Cohen; Capitalism; Socialism; Greed; Community (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10551-012-1248-z

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