Erik Hammar

After two years in the world of strategy consulting, I am leaving the industry to return to academia for a year.

Strategy consulting is interesting in various philosophical, political and economic ways. Philosophically, the consulting process has struck me as a near-pure embodiment of Humean reasoning. That is, it functions by way of wholeheartedly pragmatic, goal-oriented reasoning. It does not reason about its goals (e.g., “cut costs”, “expand profit margins”) as such, other than in very limited ways. This kind of reasoning is often called “Humean” as it resembles reason as characterised by the philosopher David Hume. We cannot, he argued (roughly), reason about ends or goals. Reason can help us know how to get somewhere, but not give reasons for why we should ultimately go there rather than anywhere else. Many disagree with this “thin” characterisation of human reason. However, regardless of how right Hume was about reason in general, the description seems pretty apt when it comes to the reasoning employed in strategy consulting. Consultants don’t question the goals or parameters of their reasoning. Rather, they adopt a goal, devise rationally defensible routes for how to get there, and present the conclusions to the client (and then, hopefully, they get paid).

One might read the above as a criticism of the industry, as a description of something inherently unjust or immoral about it. But that’s not what I have in mind. The moral debate comes higher up the chain. If one thinks ethics allows for some element of market forces within a decent society, one will consequently have to accept that people will act according to the incentives presented within a market system. I think it would be odd to argue that markets should be part of a society’s economic system, but that businesses should be blamed if they act in line with the market incentives thus created. With markets come market actors, acting in commercially rational ways.

Of course, if you think markets ought indeed to be replaced by some other economic system, you might also think that even if there are market incentives in existence today, we really shouldn’t act on them. By way of analogy: If you think it a bad thing that alcohol is available for purchase, you can also hold that no one should buy alcohol and that they would be morally blameworthy if they did. However, one struggles to see the internal logic of the view that alcohol should be sold, alright, but we are morally blameworthy if we buy it. Of course, we should here note one important distinction: One may still think it a good thing that alcohol should be allowed to be sold freely. One might be concerned about putting too much power into state regulatory hands, or about the slippery slope of prohibiting the sale of certain goods. Think of the free speech activist who certainly doesn’t want to legally prohibit rudeness towards pious religious people, but who still thinks it would be a bloody good idea for everyone to behave politely towards them. But that’s quite different from thinking it a good thing that alcohol is actually on offer.

As I think market forces do play an important role in a well-functioning economic system, I don’t think the pragmatism of consultants as such is blameworthy. Yet, like with all general principles, one can imagine outlier cases, where the principle comes under pressure. Sometimes business incentives collide with other duties we have, and individuals might face difficult choices. The real answer to such collisions, if genuine, has to be systemic. But that fact does not mean we won’t face dilemmas in our daily lives, as consultants or otherwise. I won’t dive into this question more deeply, but it is important to acknowledge it.

Over the coming year, I will be studying for an MSc in political theory. Political theory has a duty to contribute not only to theoretical, utopian philosophising, but also to practical political issues of order and stability, reform and radicalism, in a way that acknowledges actual political circumstances. Jeremy Waldron has talked of political political theory, noting that political theorists haven’t had enough to say about institutions and practical, real world politics. Indeed: we must seek to link up the currents of both abstract political theory and modern political science, arriving, hopefully, at something actionable yet normative, pragmatic yet ethical.