For years and years I have been quoting Hayek as saying:
Capitalism depends upon values which it did not create and cannot replace.
I am sure I read something by him that was very close to this at some point. I thought it was from The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism, but when I looked in there, I found the concept but not the pithy summary.
The sentence comes pretty close to summing up my whole political philosophy, and I did not originate it.
Does anyone know where I got it?
I believe you may be referring to the following: “Capitalism presumes that apart from our rational insight we possess a traditional endowment of morals, which has been tested by evolution but not designed by our intelligence.” – Hayek in S. Kresge and L. Wenar, ed., ‘Hayek on Hayek: An Autobiographical Dialogue’ (Routledge, 1994), p.62.
Great line. Could say the same thing about western civilization.
SN — that is close. Thank you. He said it different ways in different places. I am trying to find the short version, which I do not think is just my summary.
“Capitalism depends upon values which it did not create and cannot replace”
The word “capitalism” can be replaced with any of the following, and the sentence retains it profunity: Communism, Socialism, Islam, Christianity, Liberalism, Libertarianism, War, Prostitution, Politics, Charity, Prosperity, Poverty. Our core values, which Maslow arranged in a pyramid (sans eye), are the product of evolution; all the rest (-isms etc) are merely adaptions to changes in our environment.
Sol, I don’t agree. Hayek talks about cultural norms which develop over time which are not biological, and some cultures have developed more advantageous ones. The biological bedrock is the same for everyone, yet different groups of people facing roughly identical natural constraints perform very differently. Hayek was talking about that.
Heh:
I don’t suppose you were thinking of this?
I’ve heard that before but I thought it was Max Weber. I thought it was part of his whole argument about the role of Protestant beliefs in the development of capitalism.
I would look in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
Of course Hayek said something many things very similar.
The quote sounds a lot like Schumpeter. His Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy is largely an elaboration of that quotation.
Lex, I don’t have my copy handy, but this looks like something Michael Novak said in The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism.
Hayek, Weber, Schumpeter and Michael Novak. A distinguished pedigree indeed.
I am starting to think that the quote, in that form, may be an amalgam formed in my little brain, and not an exact quote.
Then take credit for concision.
OK, I take credit for concision.
But I want to be able to attribute it to Hayek.
Not surprisingly, more people pay attention to him than to me.