Transfiguring Capitalism

Addresses key problems in contemporary life, and raises important questions about our growing awareness of the limits of contemporary ways of living with modern economies and modern religion. This book explores possible alternatives to such capitalism.

Since the publication of Max Weber's classic, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, it has long been assumed that a distinctly Protestant ethos has shaped the current global economic order. Against this common consensus, Kathryn D. Blanchard argues that the theological thought of John Calvin and the Protestant movement as a whole has much to say that challenges the current incarnation of the capitalist order. This book develops an approach to Christian economic ethics that celebrates God's gift of human freedom, while at the same time acknowledging necessary, and indeed vital, limitations in the context of material and social life. Through sustained interaction with such unlikely dialogue partners as Adam Smith, Milton Friedman, Deirdre McCloskey, and Muhammad Yunus, this book shows that the virtues of self-denial, neighbor love, and sympathy have been quite at home in the capitalism of the past, and can be again. Though self-interest has enjoyed several decades as the unquestioned ruling principle of American economics, other-interest is steadily coming back into view, not only among Christian ethicists, but among economists as well. This book explores the important implications of this shift in economic thinking from a theological perspective.

From wealth creation to wealth distribution and social ethics, from urban mission to religious studies and psychology the work of John Atherton was breathtaking in scope and variety. Unifying all of his work however, was a concern with engaging the work of theology with wider society.With contributions from some of the leading lights in public theology today, this book offers not only an appreciation of John Atherton's work within a prodigiously large array of disciplines, but also an attempt to ask 'what next', taking his work forward and considering where the future of public theology might lie. John Atherton's last published article is also reproduced.

This imaginative and ambitious book rethinks the nature of capitalism. Lippit, a leading heterodox economist in the USA, here delivers a comparative study of different forms of capitalism. He first critically examines the three main capitalist prototypes: * the Anglo-American, market-driven version* the welfare-state capitalism of continental Europe* the state-led capitalism of East Asia.After investigating their various intricacies, he then goes on to analyze the common weaknesses of each different strand. A provocative and stimulating read, this book wi.

"Prophecies about the end of capitalism are as old as capitalism. None of them, so far, has come true. Yet we keep looking into the crystal ball in search of harbingers of doom. Francesco Boldizzoni gets to the root of the very human need to imagine a better world and uncovers the mechanisms by which the same forecasting mistakes are made over and over again. He offers a compelling solution to the puzzle of what is capitalism and why it seems able to survive all sorts of shocks. The global crisis that developed countries faced at the beginning of the twenty-first century has undermined faith in the capitalist market economy bringing once again to the forefront questions about its long-term prospects. Is capitalism on its way out? If not, what should be expected from future crises? Will society be able and willing to bear the social and environmental costs of creative destruction and relentless financialization? These and other questions have lain at the heart of political economy since the age of Karl Marx. Foretelling the End of Capitalism takes us on a journey through two centuries of unfulfilled prophecies to challenge the belief in an immutable destiny"--

Transcending Capitalism explains why many influential midcentury American social theorists came to believe it was no longer meaningful to describe modern Western society as "capitalist," but instead preferred alternative terms such as "postcapitalist," "postindustrial," or "technological." Considering the discussion today of capitalism and its global triumph, it is important to understand why a prior generation of social theorists imagined the future of advanced societies not in a fixed capitalist form but in some course of development leading beyond capitalism.Howard Brick locates this postcapitalist vision within a long history of social theory and ideology. He challenges the common view that American thought and culture utterly succumbed in the 1940s to a conservative cold war consensus that put aside the reform ideology and social theory of the early twentieth century. Rather, expectations of the shift to a new social economy persisted and cannot be disregarded as one of the elements contributing to the revival of dissenting thought and practice in the 1960s.Rooted in a politics of social liberalism, this vision held influence for roughly a half century, from its interwar origins until the right turn in American political culture during the 1970s and 1980s. In offering a historically based understanding of American postcapitalist thought, Brick also presents some current possibilities for reinvigorating critical social thought that explores transitional developments beyond capitalism.

Most scholarship on nineteenth-century America’s transformation into a market society has focused on consumption, romanticized visions of workers, and analysis of firms and factories. Building on but moving past these studies, Capitalism Takes Command presents a history of family farming, general incorporation laws, mortgage payments, inheritance practices, office systems, and risk management—an inventory of the means by which capitalism became America’s new revolutionary tradition. This multidisciplinary collection of essays argues not only that capitalism reached far beyond the purview of the economy, but also that the revolution was not confined to the destruction of an agrarian past. As business ceaselessly revised its own practices, a new demographic of private bankers, insurance brokers, investors in securities, and start-up manufacturers, among many others, assumed center stage, displacing older elites and forms of property. Explaining how capital became an “ism” and how business became a political philosophy, Capitalism Takes Command brings the economy back into American social and cultural history.

Is social enterprise yet another example of the expansion of the market into all areas of life and society, in this case the marketization of poverty? Or does it offer genuine hope as part of a solution to some of the challenges facing contemporary society, and as an example of an economy of mutuality? Framing this question theologically, does it offer the potential of “faithful economic practice”? The Promise of Social Enterprise makes the case that how we answer this depends on the language we use to describe—and perform—social enterprise. Arguing for the need to move beyond the narrow and reductionistic logic of mainstream economics, the economic nature of the language of gift and mutuality is explored. Drawing on the theological framework of Pope Benedict XVI and the work of John Barclay on Paul’s understanding of the social implications of the Christ-gift, this book considers the contribution that a theology of gift, with its incongruity and mutuality, makes to the theory and practice of social enterprise.