It is certainly possible to overestimate the practical importance of arguments for the normative legitimacy of global capitalism. But normative arguments continue to circulate in the social world, and it would be foolish to think that they do so without significant social effects. As long as ideological defences of capitalism continue to be produced, there will be a need for ideology critiques.

Arguments – for the normative legitimacy of global capitalism – unfold in three main stages. A normative principle (or set of principles) must be proposed and defended. Then, it must be established that a global capitalist order is compatible with, or even necessary for, the adequate institutionalization of that principle. If the global economy is at present flawed from the standpoint of the given principle, this must be shown to be a contingent matter, capable of being reversed through appropriate reforms.

In the first section I shall present what I take to be the strongest contemporary version of this argument, combining the normative principle articulated by the leading contemporary theorists of global justice with the most significant recent development in mainstream economics – ‘new growth theory’. In the second section, I shall present a critical assessment of this position from a Marxian standpoint. In the third section it will be shown that the position is internally incoherent. The paper concludes with a speculation regarding the future course of global capitalism.