The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

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The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism is a 1982 book^[1] by philosopher Michael Novak, in which Novak aims to understand and analyze the theological assumptions of democratic capitalism, its spirit, its values, and its intentions. Novak defines democratic capitalism as a pluralistic social system that contrasts with the unitary state of the traditional society and the modern socialist state. He analyzes it as a differentiation of society into three distinct yet interdependent power centers: a political sector, an economic sector, and a moral-cultural sector. Democracy needs the market economy and both need a pluralistic liberal culture. Against the continuing growth of democratic capitalism, modern socialism has contracted from a robust utopian program into vague "idealism about equality" and overwrought criticism of capitalism, most notably in the "liberation theology" of Latin America. Novak ends with the "beginnings of a theological perspective on democratic capitalism" illuminated by the journey from Marxism to Christian realism of Reinhold Niebuhr.

Irving Kristol described Novak's book as "unquestionably a major work for our times." The Spanish translation of the book served as inspiration for the Chilean lawyer and politician Jaime Guzmán where he was not satisfied by Hayek's thought.^[2]