Beyond Self-Interest: Why the Market Rewards Those Who Reject It
Krzysztof Pelc
(Author)
21,000+ Reviews
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Description
A provocative retelling of the workings of self-interest in contemporary market society, which claims the world increasingly belongs to passionates, obsessives, and fanatics: those who do things for their own sake, rather than as means to other ends.In our capitalist market society, we have come to accept that the way to get ahead is through strong will, grit, and naked ambition. This belief has served us well: it has contributed to making our affluent societies affluent. But does the premise still hold? As Krzysztof Pelc argues in Beyond Self-Interest, this default assumption no longer captures reality. There is a limit to the returns of calculation, planning, and resolve, and in a growing number of settings, this limit has been reached. The true idols of market society, he contends, are those who disavow their self-interest, or at least appear to do so: eco-conscious entrepreneurs, media moguls with a mission, and modern-day artisans catering to a well-educated and ever more socially conscious population of consumers. Increasingly, those who prosper do so by spurning prosperity, or by convincing others that they are instead pursuing purpose, passion, love of craft-anything but their own self-advancement. This is the paradox of intention, and it is increasingly defining our lives. Pelc tells the story of this paradox from its unlikely emergence among a group of British thinkers in the early 19th century to its development over the next two centuries, as it was successively picked up by philosophers, novelists, social scientists, and, ultimately, capitalists themselves. All of whom arrived at a common realization: the appearance of disinterest pays, but only if it is believable-which presents the self-interested among us with a tricky problem. Drawing on three centuries of thought about commercial society and the people living in it, this richly researched account of the cycles of capitalism does not naively suggest that we should reject the market. Rather, it calls on us to treat economic growth once more as its earliest theorists did: as a formidable tool of human development, instead of an end in itself.
Product Details
Price
$34.99
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Publish Date
May 17, 2022
Pages
288
Dimensions
6.4 X 9.6 X 1.2 inches | 1.1 pounds
Language
English
Type
Hardcover
EAN/UPC
9780197620939
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About the Author
Krzysztof Pelc is Professor of Political Science at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. He is the author of Making and Bending International Rules: The Design of Exceptions and Escape Clauses in Trade Law. He is also a regular contributor to magazines and newspapers in the US and Canada and a prize-winning essayist and short story writer. He was the 2019 CBC Short Story Prize winner. In 2021, he was the winner of the Financial Times Essay Prize held on the bicentenary of the Political Economy Club.
Reviews
"Careful analytical skill, and eloquent prose render Beyond Self-Interest: Why the Market Rewards Those Who Reject It a rare book that retains academic acuity while speaking to the concerns of readers beyond the ivory tower." -- Kristen R. Collins, World Trade Review"We cannot obtain happiness by pursuing it. Happiness is a byproduct of the pursuit of other goals. In this stimulating and important book, Krzysztof Pelc argues that the same is true of prosperity. Greed will create neither successful businesses nor prosperous societies. Both are byproducts of other passions." -- Martin Wolf, Chief Economics Commentator, Financial Times"It takes scholarly courage and knowledge to upend Adam Smith, but this is what Krzysztof Pelc has done in this profound and brilliant study. It is not love of money, he argues, which drives the baker to bake bread, but the disinterested passion for baking, which assures the credibility of his product. There is an urgent moral lesson here for our own age of climate-induced scarcity: GDP is at best a means to the good life, it cannot be its meaning." -- Robert Skidelsky, Emeritus Professor of Political Economy, Warwick University, and author of Keynes: The Return of the Master"What if greed is not good? What if the pursuit of happiness means embracing values beyond narrow ambition? Pelc argues that affluent societies have reached just such a point. Turning both economics and conventional wisdom on their head, he describes a world in which those who shun self-interest may actually end up being most successful--and most fulfilled." -- David Pilling, Africa Editor of the Financial Times and author of The Growth Delusion: Wealth, Poverty, and the Well-Being of Nations"Why do so many people perceive capitalism to be failing us? This wide-ranging and provocative book argues that modern capitalists have fallen into the trap of believing their own arguments about the benefits of individual self-interest" -- Diane Coyle, Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge, and author of Cogs and Monsters: What Economics Is, and What It Should Be"A fascinating book, bursting with paradoxes, riddles, and counterintuitive ideas that will challenge some of your strongest beliefs about how society works." -- Daniel Susskind, author of A World Without Work
