Ethics, Finance, Crisis

My word, is this brilliant! Excerpts from a new book by Adam Arvidsson & Nicolai Peitersen, The Ethical Economy. They are publishing it online and making it it into a Wiki as well, so it can be group edited.

The most important assets in today's financial crack - mortgage-backed securities, credit card debt and many intangibles, like brand values are essentially securitizations of what we could call 'life conduct'. The value of a mortgage or of  credit card debt depends on the life conduct of the borrower. The value of a brand depends on the life conduct of consumers (this is actually what is measured in brand valuation schemes) and of the ethical conduct of the company that owns the brand; the value of a real estate market depends on the life conduct of  the inhabitants of a neighborhood or a city- after all this is what 'creative city' policies are all about. And to a large extent the productivity of a knowledge intensive company is about the life-conduct of its employees. So in many ways current financial markets build on the direct securitization of life-conduct, of ethically coherent forms of life.

Securitization of life conduct, yes, as in the securitization of the public square by venture entrepreneurs and forprofit social media; the securitization of wisdom/folly by think tanks;  the securitization of intellectual dishonesty, spectacle, and disinformation by newscasters; the securitization of surveillance by government and business;  the securitization of prisons, violence, and war. We have securitized and bankrupted an entire way of life. At least we have bubble-bailouts.  An old progressive adage is that we must be the change we seek in the world; in community with others, we can and must exemplify an ethical way of life that defies securitization, or keeps it in its place, subordinate to our humanity.

Comments

[JJ Commoner]

Money versus humans. So far, in round 9 its money ahead on all the refs' cards. Money is markets, and money makes the world go round.

It's only when people (re) discover that their lives depend on other peoples' lives and reciprocal generosity that markets may be pushed back upon to re-discover an appropriate role in the conduct of human activities. Our consciousness, both individual and collective, is much greater than just money and markets.

Its good that the future lies in front of us. We may yet get to discover who we are.

[Phil]

The book looks really interesting. That is heavy duty "Critical theory" and philosophy that they have hooked up with web theory. They are taking a philosophical tradition forward, I think. That is very promising, as if some muse or angel were waking up.

[tom matrullo]

From the book's intro:

...this situation seems to be thoroughly ungovernable. National and international politics is ever more blatantly a playground for elite and oligarchic interests and democracy a media-show to deceive the masses (Iraq docet!). This way the masses abandon politics and voting figures are steadily declining in the US and Western Europe, making 'democracy' but a shallow catchword to be used with the utmost cynicism (as in'spreading democracy to Iraq'). Even sincere politicians are too tied up to old and ever more irrelevant ideologies that at best have nothing to say about today's realities and, at worst, turn into almost Orwellian variants of NewSpeak, like 'New Labour' or Silvio Berlusconi's constant invocations of 'freedom'. The only thing left are irrational and extreme populist movements, xenophobia, neo-nazism, religious bigotry like Muslim and Christian fundamentalism, with their various charismatic and apocalyptic manifestations and a wide-spread demoralization and cynicism. This move away from politics is understandable and entirely rational since states are less and less able to or even interested in doing something to benefit the average citizen, and in particular the poorerthan-average citizen.

The problem is that not much else seems to be able to offer anything in its place....

At the same time, however we are in the midst of what can very well be described as a new enlightenment....

This looks really impressive - very large in scope - the past put in relation to the present in very suggestive conjunctions. Managing to talk about ethics and economics in ways that largely had been hard to do, so totally separated have they become. Cogent insights everywhere.

[Phil]

I want to read the book and its index. Wittgenstein? Rawls? Habermas? The securitization of Wittgensteins "forms of life" or Habermas's public square is about as powerful a new thought as I have come across in a long time. It is a systematic thinking of what it means to be inside Wealth Bondage with no egress, all the exits leading only to further scene rooms, all, as in a Las Vegas Casino, under surveillance from the control booth.

[Phil]

"Securitizing Web 2.0." "Securitizing the social web." Have we not seen a good deal of this, starting right from the beginning with the muddy thinking of The Clue Train Manifesto which put the language of liberation inside a book devoted in the end to marketing.

[JJ Commoner]

"Securitizing Web 2.0." "Securitizing the social web." Have we not seen a good deal of this, starting right from the beginning with the muddy thinking of The Clue Train Manifesto which put the language of liberation inside a book devoted in the end to marketing.

Yes, it was apparent from the opening question and hasn't deviated much yet ... there are a few who have ventured beyond the confines of thatparticular conversation (Lovink, Vaill, Bauwens, Federman, Lessig, maybe) but they mostly get lost in the din.

[Phil]

Do social systems, ways of life, ethical, spiritual and political communities fit inside a securitzation system, as with Omidyar.net, or Face book, so the ant farm is monetized, or will the denizens of these monetized systems overthrow those in the control room and regain control of their own lives? "Change" intones Obama, after focus group testing the phrase. That, and the bailout, is all part of the securitization of a passive populace, manufacturing and managing the consent of governed. Maybe through online civic discourse a few see the possibility of a new social order, where think tank thinkers and brand managers are kept like plow horses in barns, as exhibits in a museum of 20 century capitalism. That is a nonprofit for which I would be happy to raise money.

[Happy Hobo (The Tag Closer)]

nichts