The good old days yet to come: postalgic times for the new spirit of capitalism

Abstract

The spirit of capitalism has been read from biographies, accounting methods and popular managerial texts. Here we explore it by report on a ‘compressed ethnography’ of a festival-type event for practising and budding entrepreneurs, the Do Lectures. Our analysis provides insight into a developing spirit of capitalist enterprise not yet discursively settled into text or organizational practice. We suggest that the event and its surrounding virtual community constructions contain intimations of a different spirit founded on the incorporation of a range of temporally conditioned beliefs related to the natural environment, work and organization. This in turn, we argue, suggests that spirits of capitalism can be understood as temporally more complex than as a series of linear progressions. We conclude by noting the potential for conceptual development to better interpret and understand the pasts, presents and futures of capitalism through this approach.

Keywords::

• capitalism
• environment
• ethnography
• nostalgia
• spirit

Notes

^1. The German term Geist is variously translated into English as ghost, spectre, mind, drive, moral, spirit-mind and spirit.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Chris Land

Chris Land is a Reader in Work and Organization at the University of Essex. His research focuses on the relationships between various forms of value, including economic, social, ethical and aesthetic values. His most recent book is the Routledge Companion to Alternative Organization.

Scott Taylor

Scott Taylor is a Reader in Leadership & Organization Studies at the University of Birmingham. Most of his research explores the interplay of religious or spiritual belief and work. He’s currently co-chair of the Critical Management Studies division of the Academy of Management.