CAPITALISM'S ACHILLES HEEL Dirty Money and How to

Philosophy Becomes Culture 331
• The state of international law.
• New theories of global justice emergent in recent years.
From this grounding in world issues, formulate a revised set of
philosophical concepts that can serve to enhance capitalism’s
contributions to global prosperity.
The past 30 to 40 years have been the most active period in history exploring
alternative conceptions of justice. This has been conducted almost
entirely behind ivied walls, unseen by the vast majority of participants in the
free-market system. The challenge I pose does not rule out a utilitarian social
contract, though I personally find those three words to be self-contradictory.
I share the philosopher Bernard Williams’ anticipated obituary for utilitarianism:
“The day cannot be too far off in which we hear no more of it.” 39 In
place of utilitarianism, new concepts of justice provide a rallying point for
twenty-first-century needs, commented upon further in Chapter 12.
The third part of capitalism’s threatening continuum is distorted philosophical
underpinnings. We have rejected Adam Smith’s ethical prerequisites
for operation of free markets and have adopted strict interpretations of Jeremy
Bentham’s utilitarian rationalizations. The capitalism–utilitarianism
union has remained virtually unchanged for two centuries. It is unlikely to
survive another century. There are alternatives far more conducive to world
progress, and capitalism needs to enfold new thinking in order to refresh its
mandate and lift the whole of humanity.