"Finn begins his essay by taking to task three Nobel laureates (Friedman, Buchanan, and Hayek) for presenting amoral defenses of voluntary self-interest and markets. This seems a little high-handed. The body of work of each of these brilliant economists is enormous, yet incompletely surveyed by Finn. [...] My most notable complaint about Finn’s presentation is with regard to the overuse of straw men. For example, Bernard Mandeville is not representative of market economists and certainly should not be lumped with Hayek and the other Nobel laureates. The arrival of Wal-Mart in Argentina does not render small businesses powerless; rather it forces them to be more competitive and efficient (while decreasing prices for lower income consumers—Wal-Mart's target market in Latin America). Income inequality is only a bad thing when there is not mobility in the income distribution over time. Finally, market proponents are way beyond pointing to the failures of communism as evidence and currently tout the double-digit unemployment and lack of economic growth in the socialist states of Europe. [...] I agree with Finn that pursuit of self-interest in markets must be constrained by the moral frameworks established by government, institutions, individuals, and groups. Adam Smith agreed as well. [...] In summary, Finn’s observation is neither original nor new. The issue for the reader to decide is whether Finn’s four problems and moral ecology provide frameworks that facilitate the debate over justice in markets and ultimately its progress."

"This is a clearly written and highly interesting book. Finn demonstrates his strengths as a well‐trained economist and a well‐trained philosopher. The combination of these skills is sorely lacking among most practitioners of economics, and Finn is able to bring economic and moral arguments together in a cogent and useful way. [...] I particularly like the sense of balance in the book. Finn avoids falling into the trap of so many commentators who write about justice and markets. He neither rails against market outcomes nor broadly blesses them; instead he develops a conceptual framework by which market outcomes may be evaluated. At several places, he does a very nice job of describing ways in which quite similar market behavior may be “just” in one context but “unjust” in another. The book is quite short, and in many places I wished that Finn had written a slightly longer book. [...] Probably the biggest missing piece in the book was its limited discussion of the role of government. [...] That said, this is a book I highly recommend to any readers interested in the topic of markets and morality."

"Daniel Finn's goal in The Moral Ecology of Market is to develop a framework for intelligent discussions of political and economic matters. [...] Fundamentally different conceptions of what markets are lead to substantive differences on economic policy. Finn's framework of ecology does not so much overcome such differences as prove them. While appearing neutral, Finn's conception of markets is no more neutral than the framework he develops. This would not be a problem except for the fact that the purpose of the framework is to provide a focus for reasonable debate. [...] The Moral Ecology of Markets
is better read as a critique of libertarianism and a classic apology for hearing the concerns of social justice than as providing a framework for agreement."

"Serious defenders of markets can complain that much of the structure identified here is misleadingly characterized. [...] The market idea can do a lot more than he suggests. However, he does the literature a service by producing this classification of aspects to discuss."