Project: VEGA 2/0013/23
Duration: 1. 1. 2023 - 31. 12. 2025
Principal Investigator: Mgr. Dominik Želinský, PhD.

The figure of the charismatic businessman or businesswoman is one of the key social types of the contemporary economic system. The two richest entrepreneurs in the world, Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, are commonly described as charismatic personalities who are not concerned with profit but with transforming society. We can easily find others: Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey or Peter Thiel, whose technological products have changed society, culture, and politics. The ‘Innovation, Disruption, Prophecy‘ project aims to understand the significance of this social type from a sociological perspective. At a time when the ambitions of charismatic entrepreneurs are moving from the sphere of economics to politics (let us not forget that even Trump and Babiš were originally business celebrities), or their business empires such as Amazon or Facebook are becoming transnational political entities, answering this question is a pressing exigency. Do we live in an era of "charismatic capitalism" (Biggart, 2014)?