Against the idea that market economy is something greedy and immoral, we will set out the idea that market economy based on firms has a very positive moral content: the possibility of excellence of human action. Firms based on people acting together, sharing the culture of the organization, toward virtue-based ethics, create and distribute most of the economy’s wealth, innovate, trade and raise living standards. We will present a criterion which states that social coordination improves if the process of creation (...) of individual possibilities of action, which is carried out in the social institutions—in our case, the firm—is extended. There is a retention of possibilities that is formed in the institutions and transmitted culturally. In that moment entrepreneurship emerges, the creative tension that expands, maintains, or diminishes the possibilities of action. Hence, the firm is the institution that carries out a very important practice: fostering new possibilities of individual action. In this paper, we will adopt the point of the view of the acting person. The reality we observe is personal action within its cultural and institutional dimensions. A theory of personal action in societal institutions bridges the way from virtue-based ethics toward ethics of institutions. (shrink)

Esta breve exposición del pensamiento de Lévinas presentará el esquema de las ideas nucleares para que el lector tenga una idea del potencial del pensamiento de Lévinas para la realidad económica. Lévinas señala el camino para superar los reduccionismos económicos: integrar la libertad humana dentro del Ser, dentro de su relación con el Otro. Para desarrollar una teoría económica que aspire a ser parte de una filosofía política completa que integre la paz, la libertad y la justicia como integrantes del (...) Bien Común con la aspiración de la persona al Bien, la Verdad y la Virtud. La economía como proceso de innovación y creación es una ampliación de satisfacción de necesidades y una ampliación de posibilidades de acción. Hay una retención de posibilidades que se plasman en las instituciones y se transmiten culturalmente. Estas posibilidades de acción ya institucionalizadas se transmiten a las personas para que realicen sus proyectos. (shrink)

In the economical changing and political disturbing times we are living a question concerns us all: Is this the society I want to live in? What are the opportunities I have to pursue in my socio-cultural environment? Which echoes the ancient Greek ethical questions: What is the best city to live in? What do I want to do with my live? In this book the author goes back to the primary reality of our lives: human action. From the analysis of (...) the anthropological elements of human action -culture, society, individual action- the book will help the reader to understand the construction of our economic reality and how to approach the perennial ethical question: How can I develop excellence in my life? (shrink)

The defence of the market and economic freedom have been the main objectives of the investigations by liberal thinkers such as Milton Friedman, Gary Becker, F Hayek and L Von Mises. Bearing in mind that the first two economists are the maximum exponents of the Chicago School and the last two of the Austrian School, it is often concluded that the theories of both schools are similar. This book demonstrates that in reality, there is no convergence or complementariness to be (...) found between both schools of thought. The anthropological categories, contributed by Mises, allow us to understand all human phenomena from the view of the man who acts. In this view, economics is part of a philosophical system whose core is the creative capacity of people. Becker’s work, on the other hand, is concentrated on the generalization of the _homo economicus_ as the basis for explaining all human behaviour. He generalizes the maximizing principle to explain all human reality, and extends the scope of the application of a so-called scientific and technical view of the world. In this key volume, an important read for those in the fields of economic theory and political economy, Javier Aranzadi argues, in essence, that the tradition of Hayek and Mises encourages a humanistic liberalism, whereas the Chicago School proposes only a technical humanism. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to present the dynamics of the structure of human action to enable us to link the organizational level of institutions, norms, and culture of the firm. At the organizational level, the existing institutions and culture are the confines of our individual action. However, at the individual level, we focus on the external consequences of our acts. It is our acts that maintain social institutions and culture. The ethics of personal virtues demands an ethics of (...) institutions, the ethics which deals with the institutional means of realizing individual ends. All individuals choose courses of action by deciding what type of life is worth living. In this view, virtue (arete) occupies a central position, defining the paradigm that each society with its institutions and norms sets as the model of life to be lived (eudiamonia). (shrink)