In July 2020 the former chair of the economics department at Harvard wrote an article for the NY Times titled C.E.O.s Are Qualified to Make Profits, Not Lead Society. It pissed me off. I responded in Forbes with CEOs Have A Responsibility To Help Lead Society.
The article left me with a question: How can one of the most prominent economic thinkers in the world have such a myopic view of the mandate of corporate leadership, the most highly compensated members of our society. Some quick research ruled out the possibility that he was a rogue bad apple. Something more systemic was going on.
Being in the middle of Covid, with too much time on my hands, I did a deep dive on the history of economics. I read a lot of books to better understand how some of the more odious “values-free” truths came to dominate the economics profession and thus our society.
One of the best books I read was The Battle For Human Nature by Barry Schwartz. It was written in 1986 but read like it could have been written today. In it he makes an expansive and compelling case that many of the challenges we face today are rooted in an oversimplified and mechanistic conception of human nature conceived by a variety of social sciences, in particular, economics.
For my second episode of The Possibility of Business I’ve invited Barry on to discuss the book, its implications on our world today, and where he sees hope for tomorrow.
About Barry Schwartz
Barry Schwartz is an emeritus professor of psychology at Swarthmore College and a research associate at the Haas School of Business at Berkeley. He has spent fifty years thinking and writing about the interaction between economics, psychology, and morality. He has written several books that address aspects of this interaction, including The Battle for Human Nature, The Costs of Living, The Paradox of Choice, Practical Wisdom (with Kenneth Sharpe), Why We Work, and most recently, Choose Wisely (with Richard Schuldenfrei). Schwartz has spoken four times at the TED conference, and his TED talks have been viewed by more than 25 million people.
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About The Possibility of Business Podcast
I believe business has the opportunity to be a larger net positive force in society than it is. Moreover, I believe it has an obligation to be. I’ll talk with leaders and thinkers who believe that too. We’ll explore what they’ve found works, what doesn’t, and what they’re encouraged about on the road ahead.
Episodes will be available here on Substack and wherever you watch or view podcasts.
