Competing Catholic Views on Private Property and Free Enterprise

The present paper demonstrates that there was a sea change of opinion amongst Catholic theologians, in general, and Jesuits in particular, on the issues of private property, economic regulation of the economy and free enterprise. The earlier members of this Order, stemming from the School of Salamanca in the 16th century at the time of the founding of the Society of Jesus, in the main favored economic freedom; their modern successors, with some minor exceptions, take the opposite point of view. Several hypotheses to account for this phenomenon are then raised and discussed.