The Economic Paradigm and the Human Condition: From Consumerism to Humanistic Leadership

Abstract

This theoretical-exploratory article aims to critically examine the  relationship between the contemporary economic paradigm and the human condition, identifying its ethical implications for social leadership in educational and labor contexts. The scope of the study is propositional: rather than offering closed technical solutions, it seeks to provide orienting criteria for rethinking leadership from a humanistic and integral perspective. The methodology adopted follows a qualitative approach, grounded in a hermeneutic-critical and  interdisciplinary framework that integrates philosophical, sociological, anthropological, and ethical analysis. The core procedure involves hermeneutic textual analysis of works by authors such as Bauman, Fromm, Han, Zamagni, and Mounier, alongside institutional documents from the United Nations, the ILO, and Catholic social encyclicals, in order to interpret the anthropological and ethical assumptions underlying the dominant paradigm. Comparative analysis between opposing models (homo economicus versus homo reciprocans), is also applied to illuminate structural tensions. The study is epistemologically grounded in a personalist anthropology that conceives of the person as a unique, free, and relational being endowed with intrinsic dignity, integrating the bio-psycho-spiritual dimensions as inseparable. The findings show that consumerism reduces the person to a functional instrument, deteriorating human relationships and  dehumanizing labor and educational environments; nevertheless, alternative
models of virtuous leadership emerge, oriented toward the common good and
integral human development, capable of balancing the socioeconomic dimension
without subordinating human dignity to it. Therefore, what is intended is to address a different perspective, one rooted in the present reality.