The businessmen as knights of the social ideal: Alfred Marshall and the moralization of capitalism

This article studies the role of the businessmen in Marshall’s views on the progress towards the social ideal. The analysis is grounded on a perfectionist reappraisal of the Marshallian principle of justice supported by an historical perspective and some of Marshall’s unpublished papers. It updates and questions the broadening process of the economic chivalry of businessmen in the social space. More particularly, it pays attention to the evolutionist conception of morality which underlies this process.