Legitimacy of speculation was fought over competing forms of imagination

Evidence

This history of the speculative imagination is important because it is a history of vexed division around the moral legitimacy of speculative activities. Right from the outset, what came to be accepted as legitimate speculation diverged markedly for formal incorporated exchanges such as the CBOT on the one hand and informal bucket shops on the other. Whether speculation is rational or irrational became a key battleground in the conflict between markets and publics during the nineteenth century’s concluding decade. Public discourse was rampant: What makes speculation ethical, and thus legitimate? And, contrarily, what makes it morally dubious, and ultimately irrational? To answer these questions, traders, regulators, and even legal experts centered specifically on the types of imagination underpinning speculative activities in and out of the pits. For speculating in formal exchanges and bucket shops alike was imagined: no underlying assets were ever delivered; not even contracts exchanged hands. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 188

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the ‘speculative imagination’ concept and bucket shops vs. formal exchanges distinction that structures the chapter.
• XREF: Connects to Stäheli’s ‘economic fictionality’ concept and to the reader’s interest in how speculation shapes social imagination. — connects to: Speculation’s moral triumph over gambling rested on discursive framing rather than underlying imagination — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with…, 616; Western philosophy’s equating of imagination with fantasy delegitimizes it as irrational; Delusion claims equal rights with truth because both involve imagination — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 153 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Social and political forces drive the speculative imagination’s history and swings. #expands (0.80) — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 260
• Western philosophy’s equating of imagination with fantasy delegitimizes it as irrational #corroborates (0.78)
• Western political thought has systematically subordinated imagination to rationality #corroborates (0.78) — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 147
• Delusion claims equal rights with truth because both involve imagination #exemplifies (0.75) — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 153