Re-thinking Capitalism: What We can Learn from Scholasticism?

Domènec Melé ()
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Domènec Melé: University of Navarra

Journal of Business Ethics, 2016, vol. 133, issue 2, No 7, 293-304

Abstract: Abstract The macro-level business ethics in Scholasticism contrasts with modern Anglo-Saxon Capitalism, which is very influential worldwide. Scholasticism, developed between the thirteenth and the mid-seventeenth centuries, deals with key elements of free market morality, including private property, contracts, profits, prices, and free competition. For over 500 years Scholasticism tried to understand economic phenomena and business activities and reflected on them from an ethical perspective. Scholasticism offered the crucial lesson of the centrality of justice and the role of practical wisdom in considering market morality. Justice is seen as both a virtue and a principle, and commutative justice (justice in exchanges) with the common good of society as the reference for the Scholastics, is regarded as being especially important.

Keywords: Aquinas; Business ethics; Capitalism; Christian ethics; Contracts; Economic ethics; Free market; Just price; Market morality; Private propriety; Scholasticism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10551-014-2368-4

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