NYU's, and ThinkMarkets', Mario Rizzo makes a powerful case for reasonable ideology. Here's his conclusion:
An
ideology can serve as a rough guide to ethical considerations. For
example, some people believe that it is immoral to “reward” people for
irresponsible economic behavior. Maybe a policy wonk disagrees because
he thinks that systemic effects are all that matter. Is the citizen to
be faulted for acting or evaluating on the basis of this belief ? In
general, the belief makes good sense. As a long-run rule of behavior,
the idea that economic actors should bear both upside and
downside risk would have saved us, for example, from the Fannie-Freddie
over-expansion in the first place as shareholders would not have
believed in implicit guarantees. Is this an idea we want people to give
up without resistance? I do not think so.
Ideology
is okay. It is fine to be ideological. It is indispensible to effective
analysis of the world. Just make sure that the ideology makes real
sense.
