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This title in other formats:The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerceby Deirdre N. Mccloskey
Synopses & ReviewsPublisher Comments:For a century and a half, the artists and intellectuals of Europe have scorned the bourgeoisie. And for a millennium and a half, the philosophers and theologians of Europe have scorned the marketplace. The bourgeois life, capitalism, Menckens “booboisie” and David Brookss “bobos”all have been, and still are, framed as being responsible for everything from financial to moral poverty, world wars, and spiritual desuetude. Countering these centuries of assumptions and unexamined thinking is Deirdre McCloskeys The Bourgeois Virtues, a magnum opus that offers a radical view: capitalism is good for us. McCloskeys sweeping, charming, and even humorous survey of ethical thought and economic realitiesfrom Plato to Barbara Ehrenreichoverturns every assumption we have about being bourgeois. Can you be virtuous and bourgeois? Do markets improve ethics? Has capitalism made us better as well as richer? Yes, yes, and yes, argues McCloskey, who takes on centuries of capitalisms critics with her erudition and sheer scope of knowledge. Applying a new tradition of “virtue ethics” to our lives in modern economies, she affirms American capitalism without ignoring its faults and celebrates the bourgeois lives we actually live, without supposing that they must be lives without ethical foundations. High Noon, Kant, Bill Murray, the modern novel, van Gogh, and of course economics and the economy all come into play in a book that can only be described as a monumental project and a lifes work. The Bourgeois Virtues is nothing less than a dazzling reinterpretation of Western intellectual history, a dead-serious reply to the critics of capitalismand a surprising page-turner. Review:"Eschewing the notion that capitalism is evil and the middle class is soft and cowardly, University of Illinois professor McCloskey argues that bourgeois economic practices and people promote the widest possible range of virtues. An economically free and prosperous middle class is not only peaceable, law-abiding and prudent, McCloskey argues, it can also be artistic and spiritual, and support traditional cultures, protect the environment, win wars, make discoveries and care for the unfortunate better than aristocratic or proletarian social organizations. Though her overarching aim is to develop a modern theory and taxonomy of virtues, promoting libertarian economic views and summarizing 250 years of normative economic writings, McCloskey only sketches her argument here; the details will be left to three subsequent volumes. Most of this book is a technical survey of virtues that emphasizes Catholic theology, though it includes material from other traditions. The prose style is arch and obscure, often relying on brief quotations from philosophers, economists and historians and then rebutting them. Without the future volumes, these challenging 600 pages represent a highly idiosyncratic survey with no obvious focus. (June)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.) Review:"A significant contribution to the study of the moral basis of economic life and thought. McCloskey has woven many sources and a number of traditions together to provide the beginnings of an argument and discussion of the role of virtues in economic life. Her approach intersects with, but also challenges, ongoing steams of research in the areas of behavioral economics and social, cultural, and institutional economics, and her vision is original." Review:"The Bourgeois Virtues is the most comprehensive attempt yet published to show that Sunday and Monday virtues are compatible and complementary. Deirdre McCloskeys grasp of history, philosophy, the social sciences and non-Christian religions makes the treatment of the classical virtues rich and deep."-James Halteman, Christian Century Review:"This book is unfair in many ways. For all the seriousness of the content, it is written in such a beguiling manner that the reader is seduced into reading for sheer enjoyment rather than dutifully putting together wisdom and enlightenment." Review:"An impressive collection of intellectual riches."-Alan Ryan, New York Review of Books About the AuthorDeirdre N. McCloskey is distinguished professor of economics, history, English, and communication at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Among her many books are Crossing: A Memoir and If Youre So Smart: The Narrative of Economic Expertise, both published by the University of Chicago Press. Table of ContentsPreface
Acknowledgments Apology: A Brief for the Bourgeois Virtues I. Exordium: The Good Bourgeois II. Narratio: How Ethics Fell III. Probatio A: Modern Capitalism Makes Us Richer IV. Probatio B: And Lets Us Live Longer V. Probatio C: And Improves Our Ethics VI. Refutatio: Anticapitalism Is Bad for Us VII. Peroratio 1. The Very Word “Virtue” 2. The Very Word “Bourgeois” 3. On Not Being Spooked by the Word “Bourgeois” Part 1 - The Christian and Feminine Virtues: Love 4. The First Virtue: Love Profane and Sacred 5. Love and the Transcendent 6. Sweet Love vs. Interest 7. Bourgeois Economists against Love 8. Love and the Bourgeoisie Part 2 - The Christian and Feminine Virtues: Faith and Hope 10. Faith as Identity 11. Hope and Its Banishment 12. Against the Sacred 13. Van Gogh and the Transcendent Profane 14. Humility and Truth 15. Economic Theology Part 3 - The Pagan and Masculine Virtues: Courage, with Temperance 16. The Good of Courage 17. Anachronistic Courage in the Bourgeoisie 18. Taciturn Courage against the “Feminine” 19. Bourgeois vs. Queer 20. Balancing Courage 21. Prudence Is a Virtue 22. The Monomania of Immanuel Kant 23. The Storied Character of Virtue 24. Evil as Imbalance, Inner and Outer: Temperance and Justice 25. The Pagan-Ethical Bourgeois Part 5 - Systematizing the Seven Virtues 26. The System of the Virtues 27. A Philosophical Psychology? 28. Ethical Striving 29. Ethical Realism 30. Against Reduction 31. Character(s) 32. Antimonism Again 34. Dropping the Virtues, 1532–1958 35. Other Lists 36. Eastern and Other Ways 37. Needing Virtues Part 6 - The Bourgeois Uses of the Virtues 38. P & S and the Capitalist Life 39. Sacred Reasons 40. Not by P Alone 41. The Myth of Modern Rati What Our Readers Are SayingBe the first to add a comment for a chance to win!Product Details
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