Soros on Values

Pages 112-115:

People have bemoaned the lack of shared social values throughout history, but there is one factor at play that makes the present different from other times: the spread of market values that give precedence to self-interest over the common interest... lasting relationships have been replaced by individual transactions... national economies have been superseded by an international economy, but the international community, insofar as it exists, shares few social values...

We are inclined to take social or moral values for granted... "intrinsic" or "fundamental"... Nothing could be further from the truth... Social values are reflexive. They are influenced by social conditions and, in turn, play a role in making social conditions what they are...

Social values express a concern for others. They imply that the individual belongs to a community... whose common interest takes precedence over individual self-interests... [M]arket fundamentalism... maintains that the common interest is best served by everyone pursuing her own self-interest. That gives the pursuit of self-interest a moral blessing. Those who adopt the creed tend to come out ahead because they are not encumbered by moral scruples in a dog-eat-dog world -- and such success can be reinforcing...

[Humans] tend to reach out for values that extend beyond their narrow selves. Even when they pursue their self-interest, they seem to have a need to justify their behavior by appealing to principles that go beyond themselves. As Henri Bergson pointed out, morality can have two sources: tribal belonging and the universal human condition.

Page 125:

Although social values and moral precepts are in doubt, there can be no doubt about the value of money. That is how money came to usurp the role of intrinsic values.