5.24.2015

Breaking The Rules

globalinequality: Henry and Kant: outsourcing morality: (emphasis by TNB)
But what I found interesting  in this story is not soccer but the role of morality and the institutions. The common defense of Henry’s act was as follows: sure, handball is a violation of soccer rules, but it is no different from a professional foul, or simulations to force a penalty kick. In every soccer game players try to use these tricks in order to win. To quote José Mourinho's famous words: to win is my job. So, the defense of Henry went on: it is the task of the referee, that is of institutions, to catch him, prevent them from breaking the rules and eventually to punish him. Hence Henry’s handball is not his problem (everybody would do the same), but the problem of inefficient institutions. Either the referees were not up to the task or soccer should improve its institutions, for example by the introducing more referees or by the use of video recordings. 
Now I would like the reader to forget that we are talking about soccer. Consider it more generally.  Henry’s defense implies that  in life everything is allowed in order to achieve one’s objective,  and one should not feel at all bad or dishonest for doing it.  Institutions ought to prevent the achievement of such goals by illegal means. If I am a trader on Wall Street, my objective is to make money, by whatever means I can. It is the role of institutions to stop me. If they failed and the financial crisis happened, it is because they were badly designed. The entire moral order of society is outsourced, away from individuals and their internal controls to  institutions. We do not expect ourselves to be moral and behave fairly. It is not our duty: it is the duty of society to provide good institutions which would  punish those who steal and lie, and to create a good system of incentives which would reward those who contribute to society through their work, capital or inventiveness. 

Until those institutions are destroyed in the interest of "freedom", "the free market", "the invisible hand" or "getting government out of the way".

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