My faith in free-markets is not ideological. That is to say, I am no market fundamentalist who believes that unfettered markets automatically operate in the most efficient and “economic” of ways, producing optimal results. My confidence in free-markets stems, rather, from my view of the market as an ethical human institution.
In a perfect social world populated by omniscient utility-maximizers, there would be no reason to quibble with (doctrinaire) anarchists and market fundamentalists who contend that there can be liberty without law. But, given that human beings are only capable of being human beings; my faith in free-markets rests upon this ethical institution being interconnected with a proper institutional framework which includes politics and society.
Why do you support free-markets?
Brian A. Pitt
“I don’t have faith in the market; I have evidence.”–Thomas Sowell
“My faith in free-markets is not ideological. That is to say, I am no market fundamentalist who believes that unfettered markets automatically operate in the most efficient and “economic” of ways, producing optimal results.”
I think you are contrasting yourself with a straw man. Consider those who we often perceive as ‘market fundamentalists’:
a) Friedrich von Hayek, whose commitment to markets was almost identical to yours – they are normatively and politically preferable to an economy organised around plans. They also tend towards efficiency, but this was secondary for Hayek.
b) Chicago neo-classicists, who were dogmatically committed to efficiency, but therefore became only ambiguously attached to markets. Hierarchies, monopolies, families and communities could often be more efficient than competitive markets. It simply required aggressive use of neo-classical economics to assess which worked best in which situation (the tradition of Coase, Posner, Becker etc).
My point is, either a commitment to markets is normative or it is utilitarian. Yours appears normative. It may be a happy coincidence that markets are often both fair and efficient, as Posner once argued. But not even the most extreme market fundamentalist (whoever he may be) be ideologically committed to the empirical likelihood of efficiency.
Why do I support free markets? I don’t even believe they exist! What are you actually trying to ask?
Also, what definition of “ideology” are you using to claim that your faith is not ideological? From an Althusserian perspective, all beliefs are ideological. The metrics you (or Sowell) might use to evaluate your evidence for free markets, for example, are just as much and as deep a system of unjustified beliefs as anything else.
More to the point of the post itself, you write: “But, given that human beings are only capable of being human beings; my faith in free-markets rests upon this ethical institution being interconnected with a proper institutional framework which includes politics and society.”
How is that a “free market”? What do you mean to say you want a market interconnected to politics and society but that is also free? What is it free from?
All I see here is a bundle of contradictions in search of some clarifying definitional insights.
“market fundamentalists who contend that there can be liberty without law”
Does anyone actually contend that?
Whoever coined the term “free market” deserves a prize for clever propaganda. Such a comforting phrase conjures up images of a little village with happy people bartering and selling to everyones advantage. In reality though, things are quite different.
I think calling the free market system an “ethical human institution” is asking a bit much. A competitive market for child sex slaves is not ethical, nor is a market for human organs. In fact, by definition, a truly free market must be devoid of ethics as any attempt to apply ethical restraints would be in the form of regulation thereby restricting the “freedom” of the market. Just listen to the PR industry cry foul every time their manipulative and high tech methods of indoctrinating children into a life of materialistic greed come under scrutiny.
Ethics are problematic for the free market as they inevitably ask for restricting something profitable (cigarettes, junk food), or producing more of something that is not (AIDs drugs for poor Africans etc).
Let’s just call it a human institution and leave it at that.
And yes, of course your belief in free markets is idealogical, as pointed out by the above posts.
Here’s my argument, from a forum we ran recently on The Moral Case for Capitalism.
http://pl842.pairlitesite.com/2010/02/04/love-justice/
A video of my remarks is also available on rossbemmett.com