In this episode, I speak with Luke Burgis about Rene Girard, the mimetic cycle, imitation, desire, and scapegoating, and how these things play out in business, commerce and everyday life. We discuss his forthcoming book, Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life. Themes include how are desires our shaped by others, the leveling of desire through social media, the problem of scapegoating including not only scapegoating of the innocent, but how the the guilty be scapegoated to distract attention from other guilty parties. We also discuss positive and negative mimesis, and a number of writers and entrepreneurs including Max Scheler, Alexis De Tocqueville, Peter Thiel, Nassim Taleb, and why Rene Girard’s insights have much to say about commerce, our contemporary political economy, and our everyday life. We did this interview earlier this year while he was in the midst of writing, but the book is now finished and will be out in Spring of 2021.
Biography
Luke is an entrepreneur in residence and Director of Programs at the Ciocca Center for Principled Entrepreneurship at Catholic university of America. He’s Managing Partner of Fourth Wall Ventures, an incubator that he founded to build, train, and invest in people and companies that contribute to a healthy human ecology.
After a brief career in investment banking and private equity, he started his first company at age 23 and was named a “Top 25 Entrepreneur Under 25” by Business Week for growing it into one of the most innovative food access businesses in the country. Luke is also the founder of two more startup companies that he led as C.E.O. to high growth and sustainability. Fit Fuel, the e-commerce company that he founded, has been recognized as having an outstanding company culture. He formed a close partnership with Zappos.com.
Luke is co-author of the book Unrepeatable: Cultivating the Unique Calling of Every Person. He is also a recognized expert in René Girard's mimetic theory and author of the book Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life (St. Martin's Press, 2021).
He has a B.S. from the Stern School of Business at New York University and an S.T.B. in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross.
Resources
See Rene Girard Books Below
Catholic University of America Busch School of Business
Ciocca Center for Principled Entrepreneurship
Website
Anti-Mimetic: Luke on Substack
Books
Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life
By Burgis, Luke
Unrepeatable: Cultivating the Unique Calling of Every Person
By Luke Burgis, Joshua Miller PhD
By Girard, René
I See Satan Fall Like Lightning
By Rene Girard
Deceit, Desire, and the Novel: Self and Other in Literary Structure
By Girard, Prof Ren?
Ressentiment (Marquette Studies in Philosophy)
By Max Scheler, Lewis B. Coser, William W. Holdheim
By Alexis de Tocqueville
By Girard, René
Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World
By Girard, René
Ep. 21: Luke Burgis: The Economy of Desire: Rene Girard on Commerce and our Everyday Life