The CEU Lectures: Lecture Four, George Soros on Capitalism versus Open Society

On Thursday, October 29, 2009, George Soros delivered the fourth of “The CEU Lectures”, on “Capitalism versus Open Society”

In this lecture George Soros explored the conflict between capitalism and open society, market values and social values. “By claiming to be value free, market fundamentalism has actually undermined moral values”, stated Soros criticizing the prevalent economic doctrine of the last 25 years. “I define market fundamentalism as the undue extension of market values to other spheres of social life, notably politics”, he noted.

Markets are supposed to act as an invisible hand, bringing demand and supply into balance.

“What makes the invisible hand so efficient is that there is no need to exercise moral judgment, but society cannot exist without some ethical precepts”, added Soros.

“Claiming that the failures of government intervention proved that free markets are perfect is simply bad logic”, argued Soros. However, he condemned market fundamentalism as a false and dangerous doctrine, and was in favor of keeping government intervention and regulations to a minimum for other, better, reasons.

“People should separate their role as market participants from their role as political participants,” proposed Soros, because, he continued, as market participants they ought to pursue their self interests; while as participants in the political process they should be guided by public interest.

Video and transcript

• See this lecture and Q&A session on the Financial Times website here: http://www.ft.com/soroslectures
• Additional information about the series and full transcripts are provided by the Financial Times on the following summary page: http://www.ft.com/indepth/soros-lectures