In Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life, Michael Novak elevates the status of business to the realm of a religious calling. Contrary to the prevalent notion that individuals in business are motivated principally by greed, Novak's vision of business people celebrates their creativity, practical realism and efforts in building community (119). Furthermore, Novak regards successful business people as individuals who have discovered their personal destiny as determined by God (18). However, what begins as a thought-provoking examination of the moral dimension of business becomes a biased promotion of the existence of business. Novak makes generalized statements about why business is a positive and moral entity (126) without delving into the many injustices and problems that occur in business. In this essay, Novak's seemingly moralistic presentation of business and business people will be shown to contain an extreme conservative bias.
Before launching into a discussion about business and business people, Novak cleverly entices the reader into agreement with him about the importance of responding to one's calling and fulfilling one's destiny in life (18-20). In fact, many of the personal stories about the business people who have created their businesses from scratch are extremely inspiring (20-23). Thus, Novak succeeds in bathing the people in business with an angelic glow of goodness. Furthermore, he succeeds in getting the reader on his side.
However, even in his celebration of Andrew Carnegie's greatness as a businessman, Novak includes a very disturbing account of Carnegie's stance in the Homestead Steel Strike in 1892, in which 12 people died (61). Although Novak simply writes off this incident as an example of Carnegie's imperfection, the details given by Novak about Carnegie's behavior reflect the latter's treachery and hypocrisy in his treatment of workers. For example, according to Novak, Carnegie deliberately in...