The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce

48 apologywith Ridley the bourgeois towns. A society of free individuals in smallenough communities for trust to build was in fact Prince Kropotkin’s pacificbrand of anarchism, though he thought of capitalism as state-sponsoredmonopolies and therefore believed that he opposed it. Ridley and I boththink that an unsubsidized capitalism works, and that state socialism, or asubsidized and regulated capitalism, does not. Ridley instances as a sadexample his own city of Newcastle-upon-Tyne: “In two centuries it has beentransformed from a hive of local enterprise and pride . . . into the satrapy ofan all-powerful state....In two centuries the great traditions of trust, mutualityand reciprocity on which such cities were based have been all butdestroyed—by governments.” 117Our communitarian friends, to the contrary, say that public goods arenot provided in capitalist societies, and that therefore we should steadilyexpand the power of the state. The communitarians, unfortunately, are mistaken.I do wish the way forward were expanding the power of philosopherkings and queens over our lives. That would be convenient for us all, andconsistent with the self-interest of corporations and NGOs and, as a bit of aphilosopher herself, Deirdre McCloskey. But unhappily it isn’t so.Philip Selznick concedes at the end of his eloquent book advocating aDeweyan communitarianism, The Moral Commonwealth, that “The ‘bourgeoisvirtues’ of thrift and fair dealing are real enough. But those virtues donot insure that collective goods will be protected or achieved.” 118 I say thatthrift and fair dealing are only the beginning—that civic solidarity, inventivecourage, and the human connections of the marketplace are bourgeoisvirtues. If the assertion is that bourgeois virtues do not ever, or even usually,choose the collective goods we need, it is factually mistaken, as Ridley’sNewcastle of 1800 and a hundred other examples could show. The privateprovision of lighthouses on Britain’s coasts in the nineteenth century is afamous one, “famous” at any rate among economists. 119We have a choice between a collective good springing from bourgeoisvirtues or a collective good ordered up by the government. Neither is perfect,but perfect worlds are not on offer. I would say that most public/collectivegoods are best provided by free exchange and bourgeois citizenshipwithin a minimal state ...all right:by a much smaller state than the one weat present have.Economists would admit that the bourgeois virtues do not “insure” thatpublic goods are provided, “insuring” like a proof on a blackboard. That lit-