Capitalism's Moral Economy
How have people historically sought to make economic markets fairer?
From business and its social responsibilities to how moral ideas change business organization, my research probes the moral economy of capitalism.
Exploring how historical actors sought to make business fairer and more socially responsible suggests possibilities and lessons for the present
Market Morality and its History
Capitalist markets have their own ethical and moral frameworks and my research explores them. I examine how people have thought about fairness in markets over time. Should all market actors play by the same rules? If so, what are the rules? How are they interpreted and enforced?
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A commitment to market morality and fairness can lead to surprising changes. Explore my new article in the journal Enterprise & Society that links moral ideas about fair competition with the campaign for law reform in Britain during the 1840s and 1850s. The modern corporation with limited liability emerged in Britain from these efforts in 1855 along with the legal recognition of co-operatives in 1852.
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The History of Business and its Social Responsibilities
My research also explores the critical debates and historical experimentation around responsible business. Societies around the world have debated whether businesses have social responsibility? How have these responsibilities changed over time and why? These questions are explored in a volume of essays by leading business historians that I have co-edited with William Pettigrew, A History of Socially Responsible Business, c.1600–1950 (Palgrave MacMillan, 2017).
I am now developing a study of how these ideas of fairness have led to significant innovation in business organization over time and introduced new perspectives into capitalisms moral economy. The book will survey the development of alternative forms of business organization that seek to directly harmonize private and social interests, from co-operatives to B Corps and digital autonomous organizations.
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Not everyone agrees that business has social responsibilities, of course. My new article on the intellectual background to Milton Friedman's famous critique of corporate social responsibility ("CSR") contextualizes his arguments.
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This research spans intellectual, business and also legal history, and I have written on the history of business organization. Interested in the long history of corporate laws and social purpose? Have a look at my exploration of what may be the oldest still-cited corporate law case in the Anglo-American world, The Case of Sutton's Hospital (1612).
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My other research develops a model to understand this dynamic and the "social life" of the corporation, for example, in a recent article, The Hudson's Bay Company, Social Legitimacy, and the Political Economy of Eighteenth-Century Empire.
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