Subsidiarity, Mission, and the Moral Foundation of Commercial Society
Cambridge University Press recently published an article co-authored by Emmett McGroarty, Executive Director of the Belmont House on Capitol Hill.
In this article, he discusses civic virtue, economic enterprise, and the costs of government centralization. Keep reading to explore the abstract, or scroll down for the link to the full text:
The theory of this essay is (i) that Tocquevillian democracy functions as a work shed in which the citizen actively builds society and, in the process, develops virtues; (ii) that the citizen brings those virtues to the workplace to the benefit of that enterprise and commercial society; (iii) that those virtues are particularized in the workplace; and (iv), without democracy, capitalism’s inculcation of virtue in the person is incomplete. Tocquevillian democracy encourages the citizen to shun the inward focus of individualism in favor of a disposition critical to both capitalism and democracy: the disposition to create positive associations with others, external and internal to an enterprise or association. Tocquevillian democracy complements capitalism, ameliorating human vices of greed and selfishness. Imbued with an outward-looking disposition, the market agent is encouraged to suppress individualism and selfishness and instead embrace a mission of service to society. Government centralization, particularly the usurpation of local power, has negative consequences which affect commercial society, impairing the moral formation of the market agent and the worker.
