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Beyond Rights and Price: Liberalism with Taste 

Can individuals still experience meaningful moral relationships with one another in a liberal, commercial society that is not based on one vision of the common good? Relatedly, can liberal, commercial society support and encourage the development of moral judgment? My project argues that since its emergence, liberalism has been concerned with moral development in addition to the protection of individual rights, justice, rule of law, and the flourishing of markets. Focusing on the thought of David Hume, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Adam Smith, and Alexis de Tocqueville, I show how taste serves as a solution to problems brought about by modernity such as faction, self-deceit, individualism, and value determined only by the market. I define taste as a form of aesthetic judgment that is formed through intersubjective discussion and affective reasoning. I demonstrate how the development of taste parallels and supplements the development of moral judgment. While scholarship in political theory traditionally draws on Kant’s highly rational and apolitical understanding of aesthetics, I show how the capacity for this affective aesthetic judgment can develop two politically desirable outcomes in a society that requires both self-governance and collective decision-making: individual autonomy and bonds between individuals.

I explore the social relationships and moral judgment that are possible in liberal society because of the market, limited government, rule of law, and individual rights. While these components are considered the essential parts of a liberal society, I argue that liberalism also needs taste. Taste serves as a supplement to market relations and the legal framework of rights, fostering the moral possibilities of commercial society and the emotional connections between citizens that are necessary for a robust liberal politics. My project contributes to on-going debates in political science about the potential for morality in a market economy; the role of emotion in political discourse; and the benefits and costs of liberalism.

Publications

“‘The Monetary Link’: Tocqueville on the Second Bank of the US and Liberal Political Economy.” 2020. in Exploring the Social and Political Economy of Alexis de Tocqueville eds. Peter Boettke and Adam Martin. London: Palgrave Macmillian.

“The Silent Role of Emotion in Hayekian Political Economy.” 2018. in Exploring the Political Economy and Social Philosophy of F. A. Hayek. eds. Peter J. Boettke, Virgil Henry Storr, Jayme S. Lemke. New York: Rowman & Littlefield International.

“The Economic Education of Emile: Reinterpreting Rousseau’s Use of Robinson Crusoe.” 2018. History of Political Thought. 39 (4); 662-689. 

“Beyond the Efficiency of the Market: Adam Smith on Sympathy and the Poor Law.”2017. In Interdisciplinary Studies of the Market Order: New Applications of Market Process Theory. Eds. Peter Boettke, Christopher Coyne, and Virgil Storr. London: Rowman and Littlefield International Ltd.

Edited Volumes

Book Reviews

“Political Economy: Moral, Political, and Economic Judgment for the Citizen” 2023. Review of Recovering Classical Liberal Political Economy: Natural Rights and the Harmony of Interests by Lee Ward. Political Science Reviewer 47 (1): 500-510.

“Markets Clearly Make us Moral, Yet Doubts Persist.” forthcoming. Review of Do Markets Corrupt our Morals? by Virgil Storr and Ginny Choi. Review of Austrian Economics.

Works in Progress

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