When we think about markets we might think about greed, rapaciousness, the exploitation of position, the inequalities of outcomes, subjection of the public good to private gain and all the other ways of summarising everything that is wrong with market based economies.
 
This blog looks at one archetype of a market; one that would have been immediately recognizable to Adam Smith in the 18th century. It describes the case of a contemporary central London street market. It provides an example of a market organized to fulfil a social purpose.
 
This blog looks at the recipe for how a market with a social purpose is cooked up.

​In her novel Romola (1863) George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) depicts four kinds of ethical behaviour: the reasoned, the self-interested, the emotive and the instinctual. They represent styles we can still recognize today. 
 
In today’s diversified and divided societies we face a problem in trying to reach a consensus on all public policy choices where values are important. 
 
George Eliot’s four models of the way different people approach ethical questions illustrate the problems involved in trying to find a pathway through our differences.

The application of this model to today's world suggests that President Trump will likely not be re-elected.