Mind vs. Money: The War Between Intellectuals and Capitalism

313 Pages·2010·4.16 MB·English

by  Alan S. Kahan

MINDvs.
M O N E Y

MINDvs.
MONEY
The War between
Intellectuals and Capitalism
Alan S. Kahan
~~ ~~o~;~~~~~up
LONDON AND NEW YORK
First published 2010 by Transaction Publishers
Published 2017 by Routledge
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Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2009038143
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kahan, Alan S.
Mind vs. money : the war between intellectuals and capitalism /
Alan S. Kahan.
p.cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-4128-1063-0
1. Capitalism. 2. Intellectuals. I. Title. II. Title: Mind versus
money.
HB501.K224 2009
330.12’2--dc22
2009038143
ISBN 13: 978-1-4128-1063-0 (hbk)
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Part I: Mind vs. Money
1. The Ivory Tower at War 3
Mind vs. Money
Who Are the “Intellectuals”?
An Accidental Aristocracy
The First Thing We Do, Let’s Get
Rid of All the Intellectuals?
An Insoluble Problem?
2. The Three Don’ts 29
A Very Brief History of Western Intellectuals
The Three Don’ts
The First Don’t—The Classical Background
The Second Don’t—The Christian Background
The Third Don’t—The Democratic
Background
3. The Unexpected Honeymoon of Mind and Money, 65
1730-1830
The Point of Departure
Justifi cations of Commerce
Why the Honeymoon Began
Why the Honeymoon Ended
Part II: Intellectuals and their Discontents:
The Nineteenth Century (1850-1914)
4. How Capitalism Lost the Struggle Over Character 99
A Fairy Tale
The Self-Made Man
The Hypocrite
Family Values
The Aristocratic Critique of Stupidity
Bohemian vs. Bourgeois: Criticizing a Lifestyle
The Question of Technology
Our Mutual Incomprehension
5. Academic Alternatives to Capitalism 133
The Babel Project: Building Alternatives to Capitalism
In the Beginning There Was Marx
The Moral Community: Toennies
The Protestant Critique of Capitalism: Veblen
Sweetness and Light, Sturm und Drang:
Arnold and Nietzsche
With a Friend Like This, Who Needs Enemies?
—Tocqueville
Part III: Triumphs and Tragedies of the Anti-Capitalist
Spirit: The Twentieth Century (1914-2001)
6. War 171
Why Great Revolutions Did Not Become Rare
Continuity and Change after World War I
Communism: The Red and the Pink
Fascism
Social Catholicism
The New Deal
Why Smart People Persist with Dumb Mistakes
7. Retreat 209
The Culture Wars
The Myth of Alienation
Aristocratic Reactions: Heidegger,
the Frankfurt School, and Foucault
Make Love, Not Money: The Counterculture
The Neoconservatives—A Contradiction within
the Intellectual Class?
8. Recent Battles 241
Anti-Americanism as an Anti-Capitalist Movement
The French Case
The Anti-Globalization Movement
Green vs. Gold
A Digression: Feminism and Capitalism
9. On Intellectuals in Democratic Society 269
The Hundred Fifty Years War
The Chapter Tocqueville Never Wrote
Capitalism’s Moral Culture
Reforming the Intelligentsia
The Games People Play
The Intellectual Limits of Capitalism
General Education
Détente
Index 293

Acknowledgments
In writing this book I have often benefi tted from the kindness of
strangers and of friends. I owe thanks to the Earhart Foundation for a
summer research grant that allowed the project to begin, and to Florida
International University for granting me a year’s leave in which to pursue
it. I received valuable comments and advice from many more people than
can be mentioned here, but among them must be singled out Nicholas
Capaldi, Farley Chase, Henry C. Clark, Aurelian Craiutu, John Hellman,
Irving Louis Horowitz, Robert Johnson, Jonathan B. Imber, Kenneth
Lipartito, Aurora Morcillo, Filippo Sabetti, and Richard Whatmore. To
all of them my thanks. All responsibility for the remaining errors in their
fi elds of expertise is my own. Above all I wish to thank my family, who
have been living with this project for more years than I care to count.
ix