The excesses of capitalism are not simply a question of bad management and a political unwillingness to properly regulate it by imposing the right sort of checks and balances, but symptoms of a fundamentally and irretrievably flawed system that tends toward destruction of human and other life.
The idea of capitalism as an expression of economic freedom
that also secures moral and political freedom of thought, or the
notion that "free-market" economies are guided by an impartial
mechanism of supply and demand - an "invisible hand" to use Adam
Smith's metaphor - are both powerful indoctrinating notions. As such, they bear
little resemblance to actual reality. Smith himself never used the word
"capitalism," preferring to call his economics a "system of
natural liberty." In fact, the inner logic of capitalism can be difficult
to get hold of simply because there have been different configurations of capitalism
throughout history. In its classic form, before the advent of corporations
(when there was still an implicit sense of social responsibility, and
insatiable greed was considered a vice), capitalism might have appeared less
virulent. Additionally, there is reason to believe that capitalism unfolded
differently in different countries with distinct political and legal
frameworks."There is "capitalism" and then there is "really existing capitalism." What then is 'really existing capitalism?'"
All of these contingent factors are worthy of consideration
in any assessment of capitalism. However, it is also reasonably clear that once
we actually look at history, it is difficult not to conclude that pretty
much every embodiment of capitalism - classical capitalism,
oligarchic or corporate capitalism, casino capitalism, entrepreneurial
capitalism - presuppose similar elements: private property, ownership of the
means of production, notions of unlimited growth, the maximization of profit,
using wealth to create wealth. They also all embody a form of instrumental
rationality, the kind of rationality concerned with maximizing profits and
minimizing costs. In its globalized corporate form, capitalism has been able to
relentlessly realize this form of instrumental reasoning on a large scale - and
thereby show itself as one of the most destructive and undemocratic economic
system humans have ever come up with. Unfortunately, neither propaganda nor abstract economic
theory can help us to grasp this fact. The reason is primarily that the latter
do not really speak to the false theories of human nature capitalism
presupposes. Nor do many of them elaborate capitalism's legitimating
normative-moral or political origins. Most crucially, they are often silent
regarding the devastating impact that it has had on the environment since it
first emerged during the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. As
Chomsky insightfully puts it, "There is "capitalism" and then
there is "really existing capitalism." What then is
"really existing capitalism'?
Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century gives
us a few clues, though not by any means, the whole picture. Replete with
startling empirical evidence in the form of charts, graphs, informative
statistics, mathematical-logical expressions and astute critical-historical
analyses, Piketty's work draws a number of sobering conclusions about the
present dynamics of wealth and income distribution that exposes not merely the
dark underside of capitalism but a central contradiction within it. Thus,
Piketty concludes ". . . wealth accumulated in the past grows more rapidly
than output and wages. This inequality expresses a fundamental logical
contradiction. The entrepreneur inevitably tends to become a rentier, more and
more dominant over those who own nothing but their labor. Once constituted,
capital reproduces itself faster than output increases. The past
devours the future."
The past devours the future. But, what if the
bizarre inverted logic of capitalism has always been its real point? What if,
under the rubric of capitalism, the powerful elite are given permission to act
as if it simply doesn't matter whether their ever-expanding wealth might
actually devour the future, or "wear the world out faster" to borrow
a phrase from Orwell? Do they not often appear to live in an all-consuming
present - get what you can for yourself right now, and don't worry about
others, or even about tomorrow? Moreover, is not such an attitude, sanctioned
by capitalism, the reason why this particular economic system requires endless
cycles of economic crisis? Perhaps Piketty's point is that if it doesn't matter to the
elite, it should at least matter to us. But if it does matter, then
it is up to the rest of us - including experts like Piketty who grasp the
reality of capitalism better than anyone else - to imagine real alternatives to
such an economic system, to think outside of the present paradigm of endless
development, profit maximization and disastrous austerity measures imposed on
whole populations. Despite the apparently glaring "logical"
contradiction within capitalism, Piketty still holds to the idea that
it can be properly disciplined through a progressive annual tax on wealth. It
is not the conclusion he should have reached given his thorough and prescient
analysis.Looking at the history of capitalism, it is difficult not to conclude that growing inequality expresses a fundamental property of and not a contradiction within capitalism.
Of course, Piketty is by no means alone in wanting to save
capitalism from itself. Capitalism - no matter what its excesses, or how
destructive it is for life or democracy - is invariably held as our default
economic system, grudgingly acceded to even by popular left-oriented economists
such as Paul Krugman, Nouriel Roubini or Joseph Stiglitz. As Chrystia Freeland
unabashedly concludes in Plutocrats, The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich
and the Fall of Everyone Else, despite all its faults, we continue to need
capitalism because, "very much like democracy," it is "the best
system we've figured out so far." [1]
Thus, if capitalism appears to go wrong, this is not because it is grounded on
a misreading of history, internal contradictions, false theories about nature or
human nature, or misguided moral and political presuppositions. Rather, the
excesses of capitalism are simply a question of "bad management' and a
political unwillingness to properly regulate it by imposing the right sort of
checks and balances.
In fact, Piketty's proposed wealth tax solution may do more
to obscure than resolve the really existing contradictions of capitalism.
Looking at the history of capitalism, it is difficult not to conclude that
growing inequality expresses a fundamental property of and not a
contradiction within capitalism. Inequality is built into capitalism.
If there is a contradiction here it is a material not a logical one. In other
words, it is the contradiction between an economic system that is radically
indifferent to the health and well-being of the planet as a whole versus the
economic, moral and environmental obligation to preserve and sustain such
health and well-being. If I am right that the inner logic of capitalism inevitably
leads to a hegemonic, macro-structural world-system of unequal human social,
political and economic relations guided by elite greed that does not reflect
the best interests of the majority of people, the common good or indeed the
good of the planet itself, then Piketty's assumption that we could ever regain
control over an "endless inegalitarian spiral' by imposing a progressive
tax on capital seems, is at best, rather fanciful. A more fitting conclusion in
the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis and the efforts of the elite to
profit from the latter would be to ask the question whether we should continue
advocating for a capitalist system that glorifies profit over people or start
thinking about how to reorganize our economy around common goods such as the
health and well-being of our present world.
Instead, many contemporary economists repeatedly tell us
that our only tenable alternative is to tame capitalist excess through
regulative initiatives. This has been done before and it can be done again, the
argument goes. Thus, it is claimed that we can and did rein-in or mitigate the
severity of capitalist exploitation, and the massive wealth and income
disparities that followed from it. However, it should now be abundantly clear
that the internal and structural logic of exploitation, wealth-income disparities
and the profit-oriented colonization of social and political relations can only
be regulated for short periods. It can never be fundamentally altered. Indeed,
as Piketty has persuasively argued, relentless exploitation, colonization and
massive inequality were only temporarily pre-empted by a war economy and FDR's
regulatory initiatives. By the late 1970's, the internal logic of capitalism
had re-established its hegemonic status and all of the built-in excesses of the
capitalist economic system once again became normalized and necessary.
What if . . . we are all conditioned to see the world in terms of individual economic self-interest rather than in terms of common human good or planetary limits, health and equilibrium?
What this tells us is that regulatory reform of capitalism
will only be allowed for a brief period. In other words, to the extent that it
can obscure or prevent us from perceiving the inner logic of a system of
structured inequality, or distract us from the most deleterious effects of
capitalism on the environment and on human health and well-being, minimal
regulation may be deemed necessary by the elite for a short period of time.
However, as Naomi Kleinhas convincingly argued, the "collective
vertigo' caused by wars, economic upheaval, environmental or political crisis,
environmental disasters can also be exploited as the perfect means through
which a capitalist system of greed takes over markets, amasses fabulous
fortunes and bankrupts the wealth of the commons. Perhaps the refusal to ask critical questions about the
viability of capitalism might be explained by the fact that even today many
economists still hold onto the mythic assumption that the "impartial"
self-regulating market is no more than a theoretical expression of the
"order of human nature" itself and not, after all, a product of
powerful political and moneyed interests. This belief has distant origins in
Thomas Hobbes fear-inspired mechanistic account of human beings who in their
natural state are war-like and driven by self-interest. Not only does the
latter perspective resonate in many manifestations of capitalist theory, it
also underscores a desire to replicate in economic theory what nature
apparently prescribes - a war-like disposition disciplined through competitive
markets based on innate selfishness. But what if the incapacity to imagine
alternatives is not because we are naturally selfish, but simply a function of
the reality that in capitalist societies we are all conditioned to
see the world in terms of individual economic self-interest rather than in
terms of common human good or planetary limits, health and equilibrium?This perfectly predictable inversion, where government becomes a handmaid to moneyed interest, is precisely the "logic of a capitalist system."
Over time, the promotion of selfishness as a virtue not only
changes the way we look at ourselves, it influences the way we relate to each
other and to the planet itself. Instead of citizens who define themselves in
relation to common goods, we are reduced, under the selfish orientation of
capitalism, to aggregates of self-interested atomistic individuals encouraged
to believe that we can continue a lifetime of limitless consumption. Those who
are entirely left out of the consumer game - the increasing numbers of
homeless, stateless refugees, destitute and imprisoned whose day-to-day life is
taken up by the fight for mere survival - are the necessary residue of a global
capitalist system. From its inception, capitalist economic theory has pushed
the idea that the market would only be able to regulate itself if it were not
subject to external and coercive government interference or regulation.
However, the reality is that capitalist accumulation was never actually
severed from politics or government, but invariably parasitic upon it. It
has always been intimately tied to publicly funded government
tax-breaks and subsidies, to war, colonial-imperial expansion, and industrial
ambitions. What happened is simply that massive capitalist accumulation was
allowed to entirely invert the power relation between moneyed interests and
government. Thus, an elite class of bankers, financiers and industrialists
(eventually expressing itself through corporate ownership) have become so
powerful, they are able to coerce governments and states to go along with
whatever is in their minority interest. This perfectly predictable inversion,
where government becomes a handmaid to moneyed interest, is precisely the
"logic of a capitalist system," which renders any suggestion of
government imposed progressive taxation rather fantastical.
Related to this, faith in the promise of capitalism might
also have to do with a kind of wilful blindness about the actual origins of
capital. As Karl Polyanyi reminds us, many scholars and economists tenaciously
hold to Adam Smith's idea that the division of labor has always been
based upon markets of some kind because our "propensity to barter, truck
and exchange one thing for another" is simply ingrainedin the natural
order of things. But, clearly we do not need capitalism - the privatizing of
wealth and the socializing of costs - to show us how to barter, truck or trade
goods. Indeed, capitalism is actually inimical to bartering or trading,
precisely because it is driven by individual profit and monopolization, not by
the fair exchange of goods. The FTA (Free Trade Agreements), NAFTA (North
American Free Trade Agreement) and TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) are the
awful modern exemplars here.
There is nothing impartial about early capitalism's inextricable relation to colonialism, slavery or plunder for private gain.
Polyani quickly dispels Smith's historical misreading of the
division of labor as structured by capitalism by reminding us that up to
Smith's time such a propensity toward the individual pursuit of unfettered
profit based on wage labor "had hardly shown up on a considerable scale in
the life of any observed community and had remained, at best, a subordinate
feature of economic life . . . "[2].
The historical and anthropological evidence clearly suggests that it was not
until the industrial age that the capitalist-inspired "wealth of
nations" was realized by a hegemonic economic system guided by
self-interested priorities and the exploitation of material goods and human
beings in a relentless pursuit of profit for the few. Before this period, our
economics were oriented by social, community, tribal and familial concerns that
were considered far more important than the private possession and accumulation
of goods based wholly on economic self-interest. A more precise and broad-based historical study would
conclude that, in point of fact, there isn't anything in nature, the human
condition, morality or history that necessitates the adoption of capitalism.
It would also disclose that there is nothingimpartial about early
capitalism's inextricable relation to colonialism, slavery or plunder for
private gain. In point of fact, the historical reality is that market
capitalism is intimately tied to a colonial-imperialist political agenda. This
imperialist history clearly demonstrates that there is also very little that is
"free" about a "free-market" that derives its freedom to
accumulate wealth by way of slave labor, slave wages, debt bondage, unjust land
confiscation and the expropriation of common lands and resources into private
hands. In America, the so-called "free market" wedded private
self-interested exploitation of labor with imperialist state interest on a
scale that dramatically dwarfed the brutality of old-world Europe. It should
not be in the least surprising then that the slave plantation might capture the
essence of our modern global capitalist system, insofar as it is built on the
premise of extracting maximum labor at minimal cost.
Of course when one looks at history, it is not immediately
apparent that the "founding fathers' of capitalism - John Locke, Adam
Smith, David Ricardo - wanted to intentionally construct a system that would
entrench massive inequality. The latter figures were highly articulate,
systematic, future-oriented thinkers who believed that private property, free
trade, competition and laissez-faire capitalism were inherently good, and had
an unlimited potential to raise the general welfare of society.
However, even here, those who enjoyed the fruits of a capitalist political
economy were relatively few - certainly not the working class or slaves. Each
of these illustrious thinkers exemplifies in his writings the material
contradictions that capitalism represents. To be fair, from the perspective of the 18th and
19th centuries, the planet did appear to have unlimited potential for
growth, not to mention individual and social enrichment. Moreover, the science of pollution and toxicity of
industrial chemicals 200 years ago was nowhere near the advanced state it is
now. However, the material contradictions of capitalism are starkly illustrated
even in its earliest philosophical foundations. Thus, on the one hand,
John Locke's (1632-1704) political philosophy begins (as against Hobbes') with
the idea that in our "original state of nature," we are not in a
state of war, but in a state of " 'perfect freedom' to order our action,
and dispose of our possessions and persons, as we think fit, within the bounds
of the law of nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any
other man." This state of nature, Locke believed, is also a state ".
. . of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one
having more than another." [3]
However, on the other hand, not all people were heir to
such "perfect freedom" in their "natural state" or
otherwise; nor did they have possessions or reciprocal power. In fact, a good
many of them were not even treated as "persons" or individuals, but
as mere "savages." There is nothing fair or equal about the fact that
Locke's tremendous wealth was directly the result of investments in the silk
and slave trade. Indeed, he believed that important, moneyed land barons should
form "a government of slave-owners" and suggested that children over
3 years of age who were from families on relief should attend "working
schools" so they would be "from infancy . . . inured to
work" [4]. Appearances notwithstanding, the "sacred and inviolable right to
property" that Locke espouses is not something either slaves or the
laboring classes were granted. The "perfect freedom" was indeed
"perfect servitude" of those who were not white Europeans.
Behind the wonderful talk of liberal values,
"increasing the common stock of man through money" and individual
rights, Locke put forward an absolutist theory of property that would provide
legitimacy to the imperialist ambitions of England and wealthy English
landowners in America. The problem is that Locke's morally grounded theory of
the right to private property presupposes the expropriation of ancestral native
lands, the existence of slavery and the impoverishment of laboring classes. As
Ronald Wright has astutely noted, quoting from Senator Dawes in his Allotment
Act, the problem with "Indians" is that they lacked
"selfishness, which is the bottom of civilization"![5] What
we are compelled to conclude here is that these historical facts are not
unpredictable events or anomalies of capitalism, but perspectives and practices
intrinsic to the expansion of a capitalist economy.
The unavoidable question is why Smith advocated a "capitalist economic system" that glorified unbridled competition - a practice he intuited would inevitably corrupt our "natural sentiments" and deepen a proclivity toward selfish behaviour?
The Scottish Enlightenment thinker Adam Smith (1723-1790)
believed that not only did competition mitigate the ruthlessness of
self-interest, but the providential "invisible hand of the market"
would ensure that in promoting our self-interest we would be simultaneously
promoting the interests of society, whether we intended to do so or not. But,
the rational or enlightened self-interest of Smith's economic man breaks down
fairly quickly within the logic of monopolistic capitalism. Smith, like
Piketty, is prescient enough to caution about the monopolistic trajectory of
capitalism and the potential that industry and business had for influencing
politics in their favour over the good of consumers and society as a whole.
Moreover, against the logic of unfettered capitalist accumulation, he also
thought laborers should be well paid and the rich and indolent taxed for the benefit
of the poor. At the same time, Smith's "merchant" is not much
different than the modern corporate CEO. A merchant he explains ". . . is
not necessarily a citizen of any particular country. It is in a great measure
indifferent to him from what place he carries on his trade; and a very trifling
disgust will make him remove his capital, and together with it all the industry
which it supports, from one country to another." [6]It
is not hard to imagine that the "trifling disgust" classical
merchants or modern CEOs experience is a consequence of having unions or
governments interfere with their profits by demanding workers receive a living
wage.
In the end, the unavoidable question is why Smith advocated
a "capitalist economic system" that glorified unbridled competition -
a practice he intuited would inevitably corrupt our "natural
sentiments" and deepen a proclivity toward selfish behaviour? If the
answer is that it is the self-correcting, providential "invisible
hand" that reconciles selfishness and the general welfare of society, then
Smith's entire economic system rests on a fiction: There just is no such thing
as an "invisible hand," nor has there ever been any such providential
or moral self-correcting mechanism within capitalist economics. Given this, it
is difficult not to conclude that Smith (again, like Piketty) did, in
fact, fully grasp the adverse effects and inherent material contradictions of
capitalism. Nevertheless, he held steadfastly to the idea that a phantasmal
occult force (the invisible hand) would enable our natural sympathy with the
plight of others and our natural self-interested expression of individual freedom
to live peacefully together.
What is startling is not how different, but how similar the
speculative capitalist mindset has always been. The early 19th century
economist, broker and speculator David Ricardo ". . . made the bulk of his
fortune as a result of speculation on the outcome of the Battle of Waterloo, using methods that today
would result in prosecution for insider trading and market manipulation."[7] It is not a great leap
from insider trading (which Milton Friedman, much later, enthusiastically
endorsed) to securities fraud, negligent subprime mortgage lending, unregulated
credit default swaps and so on. But it is also evidently true that wealth is
power - power cashed out at the political level. Ricardo, who was able to use
his largesse to buy a seat in the UK Parliament, would probably not have had
any problem with the Supreme CourtCitizens United decision to remove
limits on corporate political donations. Perhaps we have here one of the
earliest exemplars of how moneyed interest, power and political ambition are
easily woven together in a capitalist political economy. At any rate, it is
clear that the very visible hand of the elite class inevitably
renders government "by and for the people' pretty much irrelevant - or
better, invisible.
As for economic theory, Ricardo's
assumption that with social progress, the price of labor is "dear
when it is scarce and cheap when it is plentiful" might explain why today
the super-rich have "stopped worrying and learned to love unemployment and
under-employment." As the rich have become even richer since the 2007
financial crisis, the global unemployment rate has steadily increased such that
by 2015, 205 million people will be out of work - and this doesn't even touch
those who have given up looking for a job. Of course, Ricardo, like Marx after
him, was clever enough to recognize that the interests of wealthy landowners
were often in direct opposition to the good of society and would inevitably
create tension and upheaval. This did not, however, prevent him from advocating
for the abolition of the Poor Law which, he believed, encouraged people to be
lazy and irresponsible - "are there no prisons? . . . are there no
workhouses?"
Despite some indications to the contrary, Hobbes' theory of
human nature is unambiguously presupposed in Locke, Smith and Ricardo's
elaboration of capitalist political economy. All are essentially in agreement
with the idea that we are "by nature" selfish creatures. Perhaps it
is only in this sense we can be said to be "equals" - we are all
equally selfish. However, such a presupposition, by any objective measure, is
simply false. We know today, from abundant empirical, sociological,
psychological, genetic, archaeological and anthropological evidence, that
Hobbes' theory of human nature as intrinsically "selfish" is deeply
flawed. We are not "naturally" selfish - though we can, indeed, learn
to be so. In other words, within a capitalist system it can become trueover
over the course of time that an elite few will be chiefly oriented by greed,
narcissism or selfishness - and some of the latter not so very far from the
"squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old
sinners!" Dickens describes Mr. "Scrooge" as in A Christmas
Carol. Of course, today the latter are no longer viewed as "sinners."
The real problem is that in our present world they are the "glorified
masters" of our economies and governments. They are continuously praised,
deferred to, considered "above the laws of the land" and allowed to
live in a world of unabashed opulence entirely walled off from the rabble of
mankind. Succinctly put, in capitalism, the greedy of the world have discovered
their ideal legitimating cover: the promotion of a self-serving economics that
turns the vice of selfishness into the highest virtue human beings can
realize! [8]
History aside, from our own contemporary perspective, we can
get a sense of "really existing capitalism' by virtue of the following
thought-experiment, which reveals the latter in its unadorned state. Imagine
that we were able, right now, to ask the 7 or so billion people living on the
planet whether they would choose an economic system that would inevitably lead
to massive wealth and income inequalities, that would severely limit equal
opportunity, that would force whole populations to live under perpetual
economic austerity, that would erode any possibility of meaningful and
democratic political participation, that would devastate the health of the
planet and the human body while externalizing the costs of such destruction
onto everyone, with the exception of a very privileged few.
Now . . . how many people do you think would actually opt
for such an arrangement? Honest answer: Almost no one! The only people who
would agree to such a set of conditions would be an infinitesimally small group
whose present privileged economic status would be protected and furthered by
maintaining the status quo. The fact is that though there are many
manifestations of the capitalist system, the intentional logic of capitalism
always was, and still is, the same: to protect and perpetuate the power, status
and privilege of the few, while impoverishing everyone else.
Given this, you might think that we would seriously question
anyone who asserts that capitalism best captures or reflects the essential
capabilities, wants, desires or needs of human beings - or that it, in any way,
helps to preserve or sustain the resources of the planet for future
generations. If anything, capitalism has become the medium where what is worst
in us is magnified and given legitimacy - materialism, greed, indifference to
the suffering of others, deceitfulness and hubris - while diminishing the
importance of justice, benevolence and environmental stewardship. Hopefully,
Piketty's book will be a wake-up call - not a call to fix capitalism, but to
overcome it. The fact is that even if a tax on wealth could somehow reconcile
the logical contradiction within capitalism, it will do nothing to prevent
corporations from their "race to exploit what is left" [9];
it will not stop them from moving us closer to ecological disaster by
extracting oil from bituminous sands or minerals from impoverished third world
countries; it will not deter the Wall Street mega banks like Goldman Sachs, the
"vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity" (to borrow Matt
Taibbi's startling and vivid description) from sucking the life out of national
economies; it will not impede the chemical industry from polluting the
environment and using whole populations as unwitting research objects for
profit; it will not avert the continuing dissolution of democracy by the
superrich Koch brothers . . . and on and on.
Notwithstanding all that has been said, it is still
conceivable that we could reverse our present "conditioning" by
thinking and acting in different ways - by recognizing that, progressively,
with the help of others, we could cultivate radically different perspectives
and practices (economic and otherwise). But any such effort must assume that we
are also acutely aware of the ubiquity and the powerful force of capitalist
propaganda. As Henry Giroux reminds us "dominant power works relentlessly
through its major cultural apparatuses to hide, mischaracterize or lampoon
resistance, dissent and critically engaged social movements. This is done, in
part, by sanitizing public memory and erasing critical knowledge and
oppositional struggles from newspapers, radio, television, film and all those
cultural institutions that engage in systemic forms of education and memory
work."[10]
Above all, the possibility of alternative economic visions,
perspectives and practices have to be grounded in the reality that we share a
limited world, and that we are and have always been capable of creating an
economic system and public policies that preserve the health and well-being of
the planet and all of the creatures that inhabit it.
NOTES:
1. Chrystia Freeland, Plutocrats,
The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else. Anchor
Canada 2012. p. xvi. Freeland is likely drawing from Churchill's oft-quoted
conclusion that "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all
the others."
2. Karl Polanyi, The Great
Transformation, The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time, Beacon Press
1957 pp. 45-58
3. John Locke, "The Second Treatise
of Government", in Princeton Readings in Political Thought, edited by
Mitchell Cohen and Nicole Fermon. Princeton University Press, 1996. pp. 243-4
4. See Howard Zinn, A People's
History of the United States, Harper Perennial Modern Classics 2005. pp. 73-75
5. Ronald Wright, What is America: A
Short History of the New World Order, Vintage Canada, 2009. p. 116
6. To really understand the tension
within Smith's thought it is helpful to read both An
Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations and The
Theory of Moral Sentiments.
7. Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the
Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations Book III, Chapter IV.
8. You can find Ayn Rand's and
Nathaniel Branden's The virtue of Selfishness: A New Concept of Egoism.
9. See Michael Klare's The Race for
What's Left: The Global Scramble for the World's Last Resources, Picador,
2012
FRED
GUERIN: Fred Guerin is an independent scholar with a Ph.D in philosophy who
lives in La Ronge, Saskatchewan, and runs a human relations consulting
business. He is editing and publishing his dissertation, "Critical and
Practical Knowing Through the Ancient Concept of Phronesis" and writing an
article for a volume on Aristotle with Northwestern University Press.
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