Are Markets Moral?

In modern society, exchanges between people increasingly take the form of buying and selling goods and services for money. This book addresses the question of what happens to the morality of a society in which money rules the roost.
Based on a collection of conference papers, the volume scrutinizes the functionality of a capitalist market society, which is usually praised for the efficiency and dynamism, rather than for its morality. It addresses the dualism behind capitalism's encouragement of greed, which is often considered to be a moral failing, while also being a driver behind economic growth. A major theme of the book is in examining the contamination of moral values, including discussion on security, equality, corruption, the moral limitations of markets, the relationship between money and society, and the problems facing public policy.
Markets and Morals provides an insightful debate on the morality of a capitalist market, and is essential reading for scholars and researching of economics and ethics, and it will also appeal to policy-makers, practitioners and the interested lay reader.

Edward Skidelsky is a lecturer in the Philosophy Department of the University of Exeter, UK. He contributes regularly to the New Statesman, Spectator and Prospect. His previous books include How Much is Enough? and Ernst Cassirer: The Last Philosopher of Culture.

Robert Skidelsky is Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick, UK. His three volume biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received numerous prizes, including the Lionel Gelber Prize for International Relations and the Council on Foreign Relations Prize for International Relations. He is the author of The World After Communism (1995) and co-author of How Much is Enough? He was made a life peer in 1991, and was elected Fellow of the British Academy in 1994. He is chairman of the Govenors of Brighton College.