Arthur Brooks, of the American Enterprise Institute, right, talks May 12, 2015, with U.S. President Barack Obama and Robert Putnam of Harvard University during the Catholic-Evangelical Leadership Summit on Overcoming Poverty at Georgetown University in Washington. (CNS/Tyler Orsburn)
Arthur Brooks [speaking at the 2020 National Prayer Breakfast, Feb 6th], like so many converts, is fervent in his faith. I make no comment on his commitment to Catholicism, the religion to which he converted as a teenager: There has been enough of calling people "bad Catholics" for one reason or another. But, his commitment to capitalism, the religion to which he converted later in life, is fair game.
Brooks' essay at America has already received a fine rebuttal from Catholic University's David Cloutier, whose recent book,
The Vice of Luxury, I reviewed in two parts,
here and
here. Published
in Commonweal, Cloutier's rebuttal focuses on many of the issues I wanted to take on. For example, Brooks says that five interrelated forces are responsible for lifting millions out of poverty: "globalization, free trade, property rights, the rule of law and the culture of entrepreneurship."
Cloutier notes that the free market advocates like some laws, those which protect property rights, but usually oppose others, such as those that regulate the market. "Catholic free market defenders like Brooks would be well-advised to spend more time articulating with precision the 'strong juridical framework which places [the market] at the service of human freedom in its totality.' If conservatives took this responsibility with seriousness, then perhaps we could get past the canard that government regulation is always and everywhere a hindrance to business and prosperity." Well said.
The issue is deeper than regulation. Brooks and other Catholic free-marketeers are correct that Catholic social doctrine posits a right to private property. But, that is not the end of the story. They tend to ignore the church's teaching on the universal destination of goods. Every person is entitled to own what they need for their sustenance, but whatever they own beyond that has a social mortgage attached. I can conceive of other civil society actors being the beneficiary of that social mortgage, but I do not see why government should not as well. It is typical of Brooks that he highlights those few principles of Catholic social doctrine that do not challenge his faith in the market, but neglects other important principles that would challenge his economic presuppositions.
[...]
... For Brooks and capitalism's other fellow travelers in the Catholic intellectual milieu, capitalism is treated as a given, its laws akin to the natural law, and, in some extreme cases, as a source of divine grace. "For many years, one of my favorite texts in Scripture has been Isaiah 53:2-3: 'He hath no form or comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; he was despised and we esteemed him not.' I would like to apply these words to the modern business corporation, a much despised incarnation of God's presence in this world," wrote Michael Novak in his essay "A Theology of the Corporation." No matter how many times I read those words, I am still shocked by them.
Brooks is far more sophisticated than Novak to be sure. But, he still misses the point. For Catholic social doctrine, the preference for solidarity over competition is a given. The preference of charity, in its fullest sense, over profit is a given. The preference of labor over capital is a given.
The capitalists like to cloak their system with all manner of virtue, and the more morally serious among them, like Brooks, recognize the importance of morality to making capitalism humane, but the morality is always extrinsic, an add-on. I read their defense of the free market and I am always reminded of James Madison defending the Constitution, noting that if men were angels there would be no need for government. If the morality is extrinsic and must be brought to the putatively neutral market, and it must be good for the system to work, then we must find a world of angels, no? And, if men were angels, then any economic system would yield just results, yes? The problem is that men are not angels, and capitalism as a system encourages behaviors that a Christian is called to shun.
[...]