Debate: Are Markets Moral?

A debate chaired by Brigitte Granville

Professor of International Economics and Economic Policy

School of Business and Management

Queen Mary, University of London

Tuesday 24 April 2007 at 6pm

Mason Lecture Theatre

The Francis Bancroft Building,

Queen Mary, University of London

Panelists -

Dr. Sarah Brosnan, a primatologist at the Department of Anthropology, Emory University in Atlanta

The RH Charles Clarke, MP

Dr. Oliver Curry, Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science, London School of Economics

Professor Oliver Goodenough, of the Vermont Law School and Dartmouth College

Lord Robert Skidelsky, Professor, University of Warwick and Honorary Fellow, Jesus College, Oxford

Are markets moral?

The widely held model of amoral capitalism suggests not. But is this a real portrait of private sector economics or a distorted cartoon, perpetuated by ideologues from both the left and the right, in the face of the real evidence?

The Centre for Globalisation Research (CGR) at the School of Business and Management, Queen Mary University of London, in collaboration with the Gruter Institute for Law and Behavioral Research, sponsored a classic debate on this important question.

This debate was the culmination of more than two years of coordinated research on the role of values in free enterprise, funded by the John Templeton Foundation. It brought together two teams of rigorous, passionate and articulate academics, business practitioners, policy makers, and opinion shapers. They proposed and opposed a simple resolution: Markets Are Moral. Along with their formal speeches pro and con, the debaters fielded questions from the audience.

This compelling clash of ideas led the participants to conclude that in fact values are at the core of a market-based economy.

A follow up debate is planned for Fall 2007 in the United States.