THE DISMAL RELIGIONS

Religion, Economics, and the Market Paradox: an Interview with Robert H. Nelson (Religion & Liberty, Jan/Feb 2002)

R&L: In your latest book, you compare economics to religion. Why?

Nelson: Because economics is a belief system with powerful moral implications. I use the term religion in a broad sense, as something that provides a framework for one's values or some purpose to one's life. I am convinced that people must have some sort of religion, that no one can live entirely free from a framework of meaning. Of course, not all religions require a God, as Judaism or Christianity do.

Further, I refer to economic theology because many economists explain the nature of the world in economic terms. In this way, the members of the economics profession function as the “priests” of economic progress. In fact, economic progress has been the leading secular religion of the modern age, especially since the late nineteenth century and the Progressive Era.

R&L: What is the origin of American economic religion?

Nelson: Through the latter part of the nineteenth century, there was a powerful secular Calvinist strain in American life, especially in Social Darwinism. In this perspective, successful businessmen--the Andrew Carnegies and so forth--were the "elect," as revealed through the results of the competitive market system. Successful entrepreneurs were God's agents and the advocates of progress leading to heaven on earth.

In the twentieth century, the progressive movement had closer affinities with the Roman Catholic tradition. Each placed a great emphasis on helping the poor, for example. And in terms of the structure of authority, the welfare state is similar to the Catholic Church, with a central authority in Washington, D.C., rather than in Rome. There are obviously crucial differences, but Thomas Huxley did once describe socialism as “Catholicism minus God.”

However, American progressivism was a watered-down, Milquetoast version of European socialism, because progressivism had to accommodate itself to the very powerful democratic traditions in the United States. For example, the government could not nationalize most industries, such as transportation, communications, and electricity. The government, through regulation, did tell businessmen in these industries what to do, but it did not actually seize their property, as often happened in Europe.

The best thing about Social Darwinism--or sociobiology or evolutionary psychiatry or whatever they're calling it these days to remove the racist taint--is listening to folks who believe in Darwinism try to explain why survival of the fiittest doesn't apply in economics. Posted by Orrin Judd at July 15, 2003 9:26 AM