Tag archive for ‘capitalism’
Angela Merkel: The World’s ‘Most Valuable Leader’
Forget Barack Obama. Forget the Hu Jintao/Wen Jiaboa duo, or David Cameron or Vladimir Putin. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel is the world’s most important leader. The latest report showing Germany’s economy growing at a blistering annual rate of nearly 9%, well into recovery from a US-made economic collapse, is just further evidence of the obvious. Despite [...]
The Eye of the Euro-Storm
The European project is in deep crisis. Angela Merkel’s ban on the short selling of Eurobonds in Germany is symptomatic of the European political elite’s lack of a coherent response to the crisis, just as was the confused ‘shock and awe’ bailout ten days ago. Ironically, the financial markets have recognised this confusion by redoubling [...]
Taming the Tiger – The Challenge for European Social Democracy
Can social democracy hold the tiger of capitalism in check or is global capital now too liquid for any social democracy to control? Is the carefully managed European balance between people and capital becoming unsustainable and should we be looking for alternative, more humane, economic strategies? Capitalism has brought many benefits to western Europe and [...]
The Party of European Socialists: A Democratic Way Forward
The Party of European Socialists has done some important initial work in preparing the ground for a more democratic and social European future. It has introduced consultation and participation into new areas of European politics. I think it needs to go to the next stage to truly become a force for the democratisation of the [...]
There Is No Third Way: Why Social Democrats Must Be Anti-Capitalists
If social democracy has a future, then it can only lie in fully accepting the lessons of its own past, both distant and recent. Today, almost exactly twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it is surely clear that the record of reforming governments before and after that momentous event has belied many [...]
A Social-Democratic Strategy for Growth
An ethically informed strategy, based on growth through investment and better employment conditions, is also the most effective. Our debate on the good society should not seek to design a social model based on ethical principles. Rather, ethics should help us in determining the direction and means by which we as democratic socialists seek to [...]
Capitalism – A Love Story
I haven’t seen the movie yet but this interview with Michael Moore is quite interesting…
The Ethics of Capitalism
After a few quite hard weeks of work the new issue of Social Europe Journal is finally out, addressing the ethical foundations of capitalism and society. I hope you enjoy your reading and make sure you leave your thoughts on the articles on our website here. You can also read the newsletter announcing this issue [...]
Capitalism and Christian Ethics
I. As recently as 2003, in a – purportedly critical – introduction to neoliberalism, we read the following: “The left/socialist and church-based critiques of neoliberalism are in agreement that the market encourages a ‘destructive egoism’. Resistant to learning, the churches cultivate the idea of the fundamentally good, socially responsible individual, and look with biblical aversion [...]
The Ethics of Capitalism
In the last couple of years, the world economy has been rocked by uncontrollable increases in agricultural commodities worldwide, the rollercoaster ride of crude oil prices and the global credit crunch that has led to the global economic crisis, plunging into negative growth even the most robust economies. The EU economy has not been shielded [...]
Morality and Capitalism in Sociological Perspective
Whether neoliberals can claim that their form of free-market capitalism is a moral force is debatable (which from a deontological viewpoint is very debatable), but they certainly claim it is superior to all other forms capitalism as well as socialism. This stands in contrast to social democratic and Christian democratic conceptions of capitalism which regard [...]
Capitalism and Ethical Life
In the park across the road the boys hang out on the benches. Throughout the day and long into the night, when the call comes in one will cycle off up the road and return with the small wrap. It’s a just in time, overheads free, networked, post post-fordist economy of primitive accumulation. A life [...]
