The Korean Journal of Economic Studies
Ethical Judgment on the Competitive Economic System: Focusing on Knight and Veblen
Jonghyun Park (Gyeongsang National University)Year 2022Vol. 70No. 4
Abstract
This article analyzed Knight’s “The Ethics of Competition” in detail and depth, and compared it with Veblen’s works. It was confirmed that despite Knight’s explicit criticism, the two had a lot in common. In particular, the commonalities were prominent in interest in the character of desire or motivation, critical judgment on competitive capitalism, and a negative assessment of the ethics of competition. Their discussions call for the need to re-include the “problem of ethics” in the value judgment of economics and the establishment of new norms that will meet the economic ethics and “generic purposes of life.”