Beyond Self-Interest: Why the Market Rewards Those Who Reject It

(Paperback)

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'Lucid, smartly written ... A welcome intervention into the debate surrounding the future of liberalism' Financial Times 'It takes scholarly courage and knowledge to upend Adam Smith, but this is what Krzysztof Pelc has done . . . Profound and brilliant' Robert Skidelsky 'A fascinating book, bursting with paradoxes, riddles and counterintuitive ideas that will challenge some of your strongest beliefs about how society works' Daniel Susskind Weve learned that the way to get ahead is through strong will, grit and naked ambition. The belief that self-interest makes the world go round has served us well: it has helped make our society more affluent. But does that premise still hold In Beyond Self-Interest, Krzysztof Pelc argues that those who prosper increasingly do so by spurning prosperity, or by convincing others that they are pursuing passion, purpose, love of craft anything but their own self-advancement. From the Puritans, who followed a religious calling and yet made a killing; to the fastest-growing firms of today, who claim to be changing to the world through doing what they love, declaring passion over profit is a profitable move. A bold, incisive and original work that draws on three centuries of intellectual thought, Beyond Self-Interest is a book to upend how we relate to capitalism. What if the true driver of market society is not the appearance of self-interest, but its opposite

Reviews

It takes scholarly courage and knowledge to upend Adam Smith, but this is what Krzysztof Pelc has done in this profound and brilliant study. It is not love of money, he argues, which drives the baker to bake bread, but the disinterested passion for baking, which assures the credibility of his product. There is an urgent moral lesson here for our own age of climate-induced scarcity: GDP is at best a means to the good life, it cannot be its meaning -- Robert Skidelsky
We cannot obtain happiness by pursuing it. Happiness is a byproduct of the pursuit of other goals. In this stimulating and important book, Krzysztof Pelc argues that the same is true of prosperity -- Martin Wolf
A fascinating book, bursting with paradoxes, riddles, and counterintuitive ideas that will challenge some of your strongest beliefs about how society works -- Daniel Susskind, author of A WORLD WITHOUT WORK
Why do so many people perceive capitalism to be failing us This wide-ranging and provocative book argues that modern capitalists have fallen into the trap of believing their own arguments about the benefits of individual self-interest -- Diane Coyle
What if greed is not good What if the pursuit of happiness means embracing values beyond narrow ambition Pelc argues that affluent societies have reached just such a point. Turning both economics and conventional wisdom on their head, he describes a world in which those who shun self-interest may actually end up being most successful - and most fulfilled -- David Pilling, author of THE GROWTH DELUSION
Lucid, smartly written and a welcome intervention into the debate surrounding the future of liberalism. The very idea that to be a liberal - in the sense of advancing the cause of individuals - now requires our societies to move beyond a growth orientation, is a challenging idea worth engaging with * Financial Times *

Author Bio

Krzysztof Pelc is Associate Professor of Political Science at McGill University, having held positions at Princeton, NYU and the University of Copenhagen. He is a contributor to publications including the Washington Post and the Atlantic, and regularly appears on television and radio to speak about current affairs. In 2021, he won the Financial Times essay prize, held on the bicentenary of the Political Economy Club. Born in Warsaw, Pelc grew up in Quebec and now lives in Montreal.