When I saw that expression, "conscious capitalism", I nearly wet my pants with laughter. I shouldn't have though; this is no laughing matter because so many people truly believe that this contradiction in terms is possible in the real world...
Image by BeckyCortino - source: Flickr
Okay, you could say that a system, any system, is the net result of all of our interactions with each other and the physical world, and as such any system will be as good or as bad as the people in it. So if all participants, or at least the vast majority of them, in capitalism act in a socially and environmentally responsible manner, we would then have what we want; a system in which all of us and the environment as well are taken care of. Unfortunately you'd have to make up an idealized version of capitalism to believe that's true. And we do; many of capitalism's perceived benefits are are based on total nonsense. For example, believers in capitalism believe that transactions should be voluntary and unchecked, that free and voluntary exchanges, on account of them being free and voluntary, can only result in an outcome that beneficial for all participants in that exchange.
This is such a load of BS though, and I'll try to explain why. Imagine you see a man floating in the water, a canal, river or lake, and he calls for help; he can't swim and will drown if you don't throw him a life preserver. What do you do? Of course you throw him the life preserver without a second thought. That's not how you're "supposed" to act under capitalism though; you've just let slip away an opportunity of a lifetime! What you should have done is ask the drowning man what he would pay for you throwing him the life preserver. The drowning man would yell "anything you want!" And you should answer "I want everything you own"; the man who's about to lose his life would immediately agree. This is a win-win situation in the system of free and voluntary exchange between rational and calculating actors in the free market; I think no one will disagree that one's life is one's most valuable possession, worth more than all other earthly possessions. I also think no one will disagree that one man has been cheated out of all his worldly possessions, and that the other acted like a soulless sociopath. Still wonder why so many on top of our capitalist social hierarchy are indeed sociopaths?
Wherever there's a hierarchy of power, which is the default in capitalism, not one exchange is free and voluntary. None. You can have voluntary exchanges with family and friends, that tiny part of society where the socioeconomic system has no say (for now at least), where there's no power-hierarchy based on material wealth. The example with the drowning man is extreme, but that's just to make the point; the American health care system, or rather the lack thereof, works exactly like that, which is why prices are skyrocketing every year that this market is left unchecked. And therein lays the problem; capitalism can not be left unchecked. And it's beyond me that this is still a point of fierce debate in the year 2020. However ethical any individual participant in the system may be, they will "fail" in that system as soon as ethics stand in the way of maximizing profits. A "sustainable economy" or a fair or just economy for that matter, is simply not possible under unchecked capitalism.
The Predictable Rise of Conscious Capitalism
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