The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce

134 chapter 8The English aristocracy defended itself in a democratic age as a serviceclass, going to Eton the better to serve king and country. Dedicated to lovingEngland, and incidentally getting employment in politics and the Empire,they viewed themselves as upholding an alternative to a bourgeois ethicimagined as Prudence Only. Remember John Gielgud as Master of TrinityCollege in Chariots of Fire scolding the Ben Cross character for transgressingthe code of the amateur, the lover. Now the children of the aristocracy go toEton and thence to careers as chartered accountants in a global economy—nothing so quaint as England, my England. Prudence Only reigns, it is said.Love is devalued, at least in capitalist theory.But love in the extended sense is necessary for a company, or England, orany human project. Love does make the world go round. Robert Frank hasargued at length that the trustworthiness necessary for business “is motivatednot by rational calculation,” which would reduce all virtues to Prudence,“but by emotions—by moral sentiments, to use Adam Smith’sterm.” 15 True. But there is a deeper argument available. Harry Frankfurtpoints out that “love makes it possible . ..for us to engage wholeheartedlyin activity that is meaningful.” 16 Humans want meaning. They just do, andthey do not make an exception for capitalism.C. S. Lewis composed a paean to male friendship—he wisely realized hehad a less-than-reliable understanding of women’s friendships—in whichthe friends sit side by side looking at a beloved object, trading remarksabout it. Aristotle also thought this third thing to be looked at together wasessential for friendship. So it is with the project at the office this week, or theSuper Bowl on TV, or Shane and Starrett in the movie bonding in work,“their minds . ..on that old stump.” 17 “Friendship must be about something,”writes Lewis, “even if it were only an enthusiasm for dominos orwhite mice....Friends...are all travelers on the same quest.” 18 Such malefriendship is how a company of men works wholeheartedly to make deals orautomobiles.A woman would say that friendship is about the friend or, still better,about the relationship. She or it, not the Super Bowl, is the object. Thefemale version of friendship is how a company of women works wholeheartedly.Think of women cleaning up after a meal, the point being to helpJane. I have a friend who founded a small publishing company, and at firstshe tried an exclusively motherly style of leadership. She found she had tobring in some of the father. Her company works on loving relationships,