Economic Compulsion and Christian Ethics

Barrera addresses adverse effects of market operations on individuals from the viewpoint of Christian ethics.

Albino Barrera (Author)

9780521853415, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 8 September 2005

268 pages, 1 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.57 kg

'… this book … is well worth the effort, deeply instructive as it is about matters with which we should all be concerned …' Heythrop Journal

Markets can often be harsh in compelling people to make unpalatable economic choices any reasonable person would not take under normal conditions. Thus, workers laid off in mid-career accept lower-paid jobs that are beneath their professional experience for want of better alternatives. Economic migrants leave their families and cross borders (legally or illegally) in search of a livelihood. These are examples of economic compulsion. These economic ripple effects have been virtually ignored in ethical discourse because they are generally accepted to be the very mechanisms that generate the market's much-touted allocative efficiency. Albino Barrera argues that Christian thought on economic security offers an effective framework within which to address the consequences of economic compulsion.

General editor's preface
Preface
Part I. The Nature and Dynamics of Economic Compulsion: 1. Markets and coercive pecuniary externalities
2. The regressive incidence of unintended burdens
Part II. Setting the Moral Baseline and Shaping Expectations: 3. Economic security as God's twofold gift
4. Retrieving the biblical principle of restoration
Part III. Contemporary Appropriation: 5. Economic rights-obligations as diagnostic framework
6. Application: the case of agricultural protectionism
7. Summary and conclusions
References
Index.

Subject Areas: Economic theory & philosophy [KCA], Christian theology [HRCM]