RT Article
T1 Distributism 2.0: Putting Holiness Back in Commercial Society
JF American catholic philosophical quarterly
VO 99
IS 2
SP 267
OP 296
A1 Robson, Gregory
LA English
YR 2025
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1936043386
AB This article examines how and how far distributism is compatible with socialism and capitalism and how distributist political economy might enhance the holiness of society. After preliminaries on Christianity and political economy, I describe distributism in the light of Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum Novarum (1891) and suggest that distributism is incompatible with traditional socialism. After this I consider the potential compatibility of distributism and a version of capitalism, first indicating inadequacies in G. K. Chesterton's and Hilaire Belloc's understandings of capitalism. The article then argues that distributist capitalism is achievable if and because holiness in a life is often supported by wealth, but that wealth need not include productive property. A wealth-based conception of distribution that is fit for modern commercial society, which I call Distributism 2.0 (or "distributalism"), emphasizes attending to God's will in the day-to-day decisions that together constitute the bulk of the life of any person or business.
DO 10.5840/acpq2025521317