In this article, I sketch two related areas of error in current Catholic objections to democratic capitalism: (1) the attack on capitalism as being condemnable as a system (much as socialism is condemnable as a system); and (2) the disregard for the virtue of prudence that is entailed in opposing free enterprise today. I then suggest how prudence itself, in our time, recommends free enterprise both in providing for needs and in fostering communities of virtue. I conclude by drawing illustrations of my thesis from a novel that deservedly won the 1998 Pulitzer Prize.
Todd R. Flanders, "Liberty and the Virtue of Prudence: A Catholic Perspective," Journal of Markets & Morality 2, no. 1 (Spring 1999): 102-113