Dr Kenneth Silver | Trinity College Dublin

He teaches courses on ethical conduct both within and outside of the marketplace. Dr. Silver researches on an array of cross-disciplinary topics relevant to appropriate business conduct, exploring questions about what corporations are, what they are for, and the extent of their responsibilities and rights. Dr. Silver graduated with a Bachelors degree in Philosophy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Doctorate in Philosophy from the University of Southern California.

Title | 'A Hermeneutic Objection to Markets'

Abstract:

The limits of markets debate concerns what it is permissible to commodify. In response to certain apparently repugnant markets, some have attempted to develop a semiotic objection stemming from what it would mean to permit a given market, what this might express about us. But few are convinced. It is hard to maintain that a market in a good expresses much of anything, and whatever harm comes about through such expression can be outweighed.

Here, I resuscitate the spirit of this objection in what I brand a hermeneutic objection to markets: commodifying certain goods has implications for our concepts in ways that perpetuate hermeneutical injustices, apart from whatever harm happens to be caused by the market. In particular, commodification changes the association of concepts for certain populations, compelling associations that should corrupt the concept, yet do not. Where these corruptions are unjustly imposed or distributed, this constitutes a form of hermeneutical injustice.