PRINCIPIA ETHICA E FILOSOFIA SOCIALE

The Principia Ethica of G.E. Moore highly influenced the Society of the Apostles and the Bloomsbury Circle, and hence the ‘vision’ of J.M. Keynes. In Schumpeter’s words: “General Theory is the final outcome of Keynes’s protracted struggle to make his vision of our era analytically operationalâ€. The Closing Notes on the social philosophy which the General Theory could lead to, represent in fact the best example of an economic theory intended to found a plan of economic policy, indicating the right way towards the greater good. Nowadays, the most apparent inadequacies of the economic society in which we live are the same as those reported by Keynes in 1936: the inability to provide full employment and the arbitrary and unfair distribution of wealth and income. What should be done, and could be done, if we all really share the view that unemployment and inequality are evil to be healed? According to Keynes, three things should be done: a redistribution of wealth and income, the euthanasia of the Rentier, and a wide socialization of the investment. This is a realistic and analytically well-founded design; however, “The trouble is that capitalist leaders in the City and in parliament are not able to distinguish between the new instruments and measures to save capitalism and what they call Bolshevismâ€.