Market Fundamentalists are an Existential Threat

I did not know when I was a young man that my field of study, economics, would some day become the basis of a religion, one powerful enough to threaten the very existence of human beings.

Neoclassical economics was rightly proud of one of the more brilliant proofs in the history of the world. The proof began with clear and focused inspiration by Adam Smith, carried on through the 19th century, especially with Ricardo, the Austrian marginalists, and Walras; was modified critically by Pareto; and was parsed and formalized by the modern general equilibrium theorists and greats such as Arrow and Debreu.

That proof said something extraordinary. It said that if certain exacting conditions could be fully met, a free market system is provably the best economic system imaginable, best meeting the needs of individuals in a society that embraces it.

This is not merely an ideological assertion. Not rhetorical. Not a point of view. This is the product of a massive compilation of mathematical and logical argument. It is not to be dismissed merely as a matter of politics -- at least, not by the rational.

Many took this quite seriously, as they should. Many argued very forcefully that capitalism must be assertively advanced at the expense of other, lesser, systems. The belief in markets, the belief in capitalism, took on a religious fervor. In its extreme form, it took on the form of faith-based dogma, a body of belief best described as market fundamentalism.

Good economists understood that the proof, nifty and clever as it was, is subject to those "exacting conditions." Good economists understood that the proof says IF those conditions are met perfectly THEN the case is made.

Unfortunately, two things are undoubtedly true, and all good economists know both.

One, those conditions are never met, and have never been met. That is, the proof in favor of capitalism is a proof in favor of one economic system over another in a fictitious world of theory only.  A world that does not and has never existed.

Two, and it took another profound proof to understand this, economists discovered the second best theorem that says, in short, that if you do not meet all those exacting conditions perfectly (say you meet them all approximately) there is no guarantee that the results will resemble the results of perfect competition at all. In other words, economic systems are subject to a form of chaos such that 100% of the conditions lead to something optimal, yet 99% of the conditions may lead to something awful. Catastrophe theory in action.

As the conditions are never met, there is no economic theory that says that in the real world there is actually a general case for capitalism. The case for capitalism must be made on a case-by-case basis, examining the well being of people before and after they move to and from capitalism to and from other economic systems.

None of this has stopped the Market Fundamentalists from carrying on, quite dishonestly, as if economists have provided them with a sacred text that says that unfettered markets are good for all of us. They fill the Congress, think tanks, and other places of influence, pushing for the interests of the few (capitalism does remarkably well for the 1%) but pushing for them disingenuously in the name of a political-economic system that they claim, feverishly, is good for everyone. But the evidence says this is palpably untrue. Some forms of capitalism in many places have done the poor grave harm; life-and-death harm is exceedingly common.

And it is not just about inequality. It is also about human survival, as capitalism allows powerful parties who are grossly enriched by unfettered environmental regulation to destroy our air and water and biosphere broadly for profit. They do so in the name of market fundamentalism, literally mocking those who would ask, can we not do better by collectively acting as if we all matter? If extinction by environmental devastation is the outcome on the one hand, we must surely consider alternatives to a system that is killing us (and many innocents who have neither say nor profit in our system).

As Naomi Klein says, "this changes everything." Political economic discourse must admit that capitalism, at least in its current form, may be lethal. Reasonable people examining alternatives may disagree. E.g., is Sanders' social democracy, what he calls democratic socialism, nearly enough?  But those who would trot out their market fundamentalism, and deny most of the scientific and other evidence before our eyes, in order to continue to profit from their special place in the system, are guilty of negligent homicide -- of entire species, homo sapiens, and many others. This is a hanging offense, but if we do not stop them, there will be no one left to hang them when we reach what the Cambridge University Center of Catastrophe Studies considers the limit beyond which the last 100,000 human beings, living in a stone age of sorts, can never be expect to bounce back. This tragic end to humankind may take place in the next century.

When the last woman standing pounds her fist into the earth and curses the rest of us, it will be far too late to say "I told you so."  Can the market fundamentalists be defeated in time?  We may have already run out of time, but our only hope is to RESIST today.  Even without our withdrawal from the Paris Accords we are behind the eight ball. The fate of humankind may well hang in the balance of the Congressional elections of 2018. 

**This is a gentle re-write of an earlier posting.

Tolerate the intolerant but not their intolerance

An important issue not well resolved (and it won't be here, although I wish to advance it a step or two) is the matter of the ethical demands on us to:

1) tolerate the intolerant;
2) tolerate intolerance.

They are quite distinct.

The three ethical traditions are, in their simplest form, about ethical judgment based upon (1) character (2) intention (3) outcome. I take this brief moment to be didactic for this reason: the third ethical tradition -- the one in which utilitarianism, for example, is situated -- says the ethical value of an action must account for its outcomes, its effects.

Tolerate the intolerant:

For a host of reasons, we can never be sure that our evaluation of others is not biased and distorted. So those we view as intolerant may not be in any objective sense. Further, the world changes and most of us understand this (except for religious fundamentalists) so what may be a very unpopular opinion today may actually be acceptable, even essential to our survival, tomorrow.

An argument can be made that a free society must tolerate the intolerant. We must make room for religious fanatics, racists, sexists, zealots of all sorts. We must protect their voice. (We must protect their right to speak -- we must not force anyone to listen to them -- a confusion of the radical right.) To tolerate the intolerant -- to give them a seat at the table, a plate of food, a vote -- seems to pass the character test (we give the same dignity to others as we wish for ourselves). It passes the intention test -- we intend to offer equality of opportunity to all. I has a tougher time against the oucomes test (by giving the KKK a parade permit, we may do harm to someone.)  By passing two and potentially failing one ethical tradition's test, we give tentative approval to the principle that we must tolerate the intolerant.

Tolerate intolerance:

It is very important to distinguish tolerating the intolerant from tolerating intolerance. To tolerate is to advance the social value that tolerance must take place even when the costs to the tolerater is higher than the benefit. (Even when I am repulsed by theocrats who would say terrible things about my gay family and friends, I must not oppress the intolerant theocrats.)

But must I tolerate their intolerance? On the face of it, and I think once we probe more deeply, no. Tolerating the intolerant -- giving them voice and a place at the table -- is not at all the same thing as tolerating their intolerance. If the social value is that I must tolerate them, the reciprocal is true: they must tolerate me. I must grant the religious fundamentalist the right to say his scripture criticizes sexuality or mixed fabrics or shaving or whatever else Ecclesiastes might offer up (and there is plenty -- much of it fodder for the modern secularist) -- but that fundamentalist is out of line when he tries to invade the civic sphere and impose his beliefs on me (seeks to regulate my behavior).

What of so-called intolerance toward intolerance? There is really no legitimate logical category here, although many seem to think so. The university, with special obligations to open discourse, is often criticized for showing intolerance to intolerance -- but that is in fact its job: promote tolerance while promoting critical and skeptical reception for all new (non-disproved) ideas. What the university must not do is (1) above -- show intolerance to the intolerant. That is, to their person, or to their rights as people. This includes the right to speak out. Universities must protect the right of minority views to be expressed, but not in any way condone the views, expressed, especially if they are themselves intolerant.

Note that no one is obliged to listen to the intolerant -- or to anyone -- speak. Leave the speaking hall empty, if you please. But don't block his right to speak.

But even here there is a caveat. When is it ethical to block a speaker? By the third tradition, it is ethically compelling to block a speaker who may cause harm: say one who advocates violence against some identifiable group in the university or surrounding community. This has to be exercised with great care, but this ethical duty does exist.

It is slightly outside this discussion, but universities have one more obligation: to allocate their scarce resources most effectively. Their scarce speaker monies and scarce university facilities need to be managed to best advance the mission of the university. Discourse in the university is supposed to meet a higher standard of evidence and rhetoric and respectfulness than in ordinary civic discourse. A university should not fall prey to inviting the most popular or most exciting speakers -- but those who have met the highest standards of scholarship and can raise the level of discourse on their campuses. Universities have the right and obligation, both, to turn away speakers who are popular because of their political positions but who have not demonstrated scholarly capacity and discipline. Those speakers have plenty of other outlets in our fact-free and logic-free society.

Of course, universities should protect the right of unpopular but scholarly speakers from speaking when vocal student groups are intolerant of them or even their point of view (separate, as above). But if the speaker is himself espousing intolerance, it is a judgment call, as the outcomes (ethics) argument gives them at least one ethical leg of the stool to sit on. This is the grey area that has so many incensed and confused. There is no iron clad rule -- and certainly none following directly from the First Amendment, as much as the lazy would like -- to resolve this conflict.

Bottom line:

It is arguable that we should try to tolerate the intolerant (as people), but we must decline to tolerate intolerance in all people who wish to participate in our society, especially when the form of that intolerance could do harm.  

Universities have no faux First Amendment obligation to allow anyone to speak on their campuses.  In the civic sphere, everyone not inciting violence or espousing intolerance has the right to speak (but not necessarily to be heard.)  In academic life, a higher standard holds. Universities have the right and indeed the obligation to raise the level of discourse and encourage their students to engage with the highest levels of public intellectualism or scholarship they can attract.  A political litmus test on those potential speakers who meet those higher standards is not appropriate, however;  insuring that quality ideas and arguments advanced and received with tolerance and without violence can be heard by those who wish to hear them is a duty, however, that should be fulfilled.