CONSUMPTION‐John Paul II, Catholic social thought and the ethics of consumption

Abstract

In this essay, the author identifies three reasons why consumption, or more precisely excessive consumption, is emphasized in Catholic social thought including most recently John Paul II’s 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus: the moral conflict between the abundance enjoyed by the few and the poverty endured by the many; the threat to the environment from excessive consumption; and the human degradation from a cultural environment wherein having more is valued above being more. In his essay, Wilber offers a personalist alternative to the neo‐classical position that satisfying individual preferences, as expressed in the market, is the only measure of economic welfare.

Citation

Wilber, C.K. (1998), "CONSUMPTION‐John Paul II, Catholic social thought and the ethics of consumption", International Journal of Social Economics, Vol. 25 No. 11/12, pp. 1595-1607. https://doi.org/10.1108/03068299810233213