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Capitalism generally refers to
- and beliefs about the advantages of such practices.
Etymology
The lexical roots of the word capital reveal roots in the trade and ownership of animals. The Latin root of
the word capital is capitalis, from the Indo-European kaput, which means "head", this being how wealth was measured. The more heads of
cattle, the better. The terms chattel (meaning goods, animals, or slaves) and even cattle itself also derive
from this same origin.
The lexical connections between animal trade and economics can also be seen in the names of many currencies and words about
money: fee (faihu), rupee (rupya), buck (a deerskin), pecuniary (pecu), stock (livestock),
and peso (pecu or pashu) all derive from animal-trade origins.
The word "Capitalism" was in fact not used by Karl Marx, who only spoke about
capital; although it is not completely clear who used the word in its current,
systemic context first, it was coined and introduced into the economic discourse by Werner Sombart in his 1906 classic, Modern Capitalism.
History of capitalism
The development of capitalism as a belief system would not have been possible without many different factors.
Of special note should be the work of Adam Smith, thought of as the father
of modern economics, whose book The Wealth of Nations can
be said to have created the field of economics and developed it into an autonomous systematic discipline. Smith wrote the book in part as a rebuke of imperial mercantilism which was popular at the time. It made possible the further study of economics, elevated it into
its own separate field of science and thus lead to the creation of capitalism.
Smith himself never used the term. He described his own views as "the system of natural liberty."
Capitalism as an economic system
There is much debate over how to define capitalism. Some proponents of capitalism (like Milton Friedman) tend to emphasize the role of (presumably efficient) free markets, which, they claim, promote freedom and democracy. For many (like Wallerstein), capitalism hinges on the elaboration of an economic system in which goods and services are traded
in markets, and capital goods
belong to non-state entities, onto a global scale. For others (like Marx), it is
defined by the creation of a labor market. As Marx observed (see also
Hilaire Belloc) capitalism is also distinguished from other market
economies with private ownership by the concentration of the means of production in the hands of a few.
According to Karl Marx, the treatment of labor as a commodity led to people
valuing things more according to their price rather than their usefulness (see commodity fetishism) and to an expansion of the system of commodities. Marx observed that some people
bought commodities in order to use them, while others bought them in order to sell elsewhere at a profit. Much of the history of
late capitalism involves what David Harvey called the "system of flexible accumulation" in which more and more things become
commodities the value of which is determined by their exchange rather than by their use. Thus not only are pins commodities;
shares of ownership in a factory that makes pins become commodities; then options on shares become commodities; then portions of
interest rates on bonds become commodities, and so on. The predominance of commodity speculation in modern capitalism very much
shapes its results.
The following example introduces many of the ideas involved in capitalism. When starting a business, the initial owners typically provide some money (the Capital) which is used by the business to buy or rent some means of production. For example, the
enterprise may buy or rent a piece of land and a building; it may buy machinery and hire workers (Labour). The commodities produced by the workers are sold by the
capitalist, who pays the workers a portion for their labor, pays other overhead costs, and keeps the rest as profit. If more money is needed than the initial owners are willing to provide, the business
may to borrow a limited amount of extra money with a promise to pay it back with interest - in effect it may rent more capital. The business is granted a degree of legal authority, and
control, over a set of factors of production (as
economists call them). The business can register as a corporate entity,
meaning that it can act as a type of virtual person in many matters before the law (see Companies for listing of such entities). The owners can pay themselves some of the income derived from the
business (Dividends), sell shares in the
company, or they can sell all of the equipment, land, and other assets, and split
the proceeds between them.
Traditionally capitalist economies have had corporations working along the lines of the above example existing in parallel
with other types of organisation such as governments, sole traders, partnerships and sometimes cooperatives, credit unions, and other entities. Observers do not always agree which of these organisations, or
which features of them are part of capitalism, although most often companies, or many features of their operation, are included
as part of the definition.
Additionally, many of the characteristics and techniques of business workings in the above example existed before capitalism,
and many have continued to be added. So this leaves much room for debate. However, many people agree that it was around the time
when share-trading in corporate bodies became common and widely understood
that capitalism can be said to have begun, even though there is often disagreement that it was the share-trading itself that
defined capitalism. Such share trading first took place widely in Europe during the 17th century and continued to develop and
spread thereafter, although the word "Capitalism" itself did not come into use until the 19th century.
One can view shares as converting company ownership into a commodity - the ownership rights are divided into units (the
shares) for ease of trading in them. In a similar way, one can view bonds as a commoditisation of debt. Other financial instruments have come into being since the early years
of capitalism that have commoditised fluctuations in markets, future prices, classes of items, and many other things. Increases
in communications technologies have helped facilitate an increase in the number and availability of financial instruments, and
the ease of trading.
Under the bulk of capitalist economies, a predominant proportion of productive capacity has belonged to corporate bodies such
as companies. Therefore, to a large degree, authority over productive capacity has resided with the owners of companies. Within
legal limits and the financial means available to them, the owners of each company can decide how it will operate. This normally
includes deciding the following things (among many others):
- which land production will take place on,
- how many people to employ,
- what activities employees will do,
- which machines and tools to use for production.
In larger companies, authority is usually delegated in a hierarchical system of management. When company ownership is spread among many shareholders, the shareholders generally have votes in
the exercise of authority over the company in proportion to the size of their share of ownership.
Importantly, the owners receive any profits or proceeds generated by the productive capacity that they own - sometimes in the
form of dividends, other times in the form of profits being re-invested in the capacity that is owned. The price at which
ownership of productive capacity sells is generally in rough proportion to the profits currently being generated and/or expected
to be generated by that productive capacity in the future. There is therefore a financial incentive for owners to exercise their
authority in ways that increase the productive capacity of what they own. Various owners are motivated to various degrees by this
incentive - some give away a proportion of what they own, others seem very driven to increase their holdings. Nevertheless the
incentive is always there, and it is credited by many as being a key aspect behind the growth exhibited by capitalist economies.
Meanwhile, some critics of capitalism claim that the incentive for the owners is exaggerated and that it results in the owners
receiving money that rightfully belongs to the workers, while others point to the fact that the incentive only motivates owners
to make a profit - something which may not necessarely result in a positive impact on society.
Characteristics of Capitalist Economies
Capitalist economies have shown an erratic but sustained tendency towards economic growth, when measured as an increase in
GDP. They have on occasion been through nearly disastrous periods (such as the Great depression), and some have argued that it has only been government intervention that has prevented
capitalist economies from collapsing, while others maintain that it was government intervention that caused such disasters. The
former argue that it is only government intervention that has enabled capitalist economies to ever grow at all, or even that
economic growth in capitalist economies is not due to capitalism itself, but exists despite capitalism - perhaps due to some
other reason such as increased scientific knowledge, or some form of 'imperialism'. Others have argued that the natural tendency of capitalism is to continuous growth and that
government intervention in the form of subsidies and taxes is the cause of depressions. Yet others argue that growth, or often
growth without enough freedom, is a bad thing. Still others argue that modern capitalism has been a disaster because of its other
effects besides the growth of GDP. Further discussion on these points might be found in following sections. Nevertheless, good or
bad, because of or despite capitalism, it can be seen from history that there has been a sustained tendency for capitalist
economies to grow over time.
It should be noted, however, that many economic systems that have existed for significant periods of time have also exibited
economic growth. Thus, although such growth is an aspect of capitalism, it is by no means unique to capitalist economies.
Distribution of Wealth
Capitalist economies have shown an uneven distribution of wealth. Typically between 0.5% and 1% of people own more
than half of productive capacity, if not half of all wealth. Various studies have shown distributions with the peak in the
distribution at or near zero with fewer people owning progressively higher wealth. Common mathematical models of such
distributions include power-law distributions, exponential
distributions, and mixtures of the two. In these distributions some people own hundreds of thousands, or sometimes millions of
times more than average.
The distribution of wealth in capitalist economies is one of its most contentious issues. To properly visualise the shape of
these distributions it is useful to imagine what it would be like if some other commonly known characteristic of people were to
be distributed this way. If height were distributed in the same way as wealth with the same average height as now, most people
would be under 1 meter (3 feet) tall, but you would still see people 100 kilometers (60 miles) tall, if you could see up that
far, and the wealthiest would rise well into space.
This seems to strike many people as being unfair and/or dysfunctional, while others don't see it as a problem.
Arguments directed against unfairness or disfunctionality have a tendency to go roughly as follows. Most characteristics of
people, such as height or weight, and it might be surmised people's ability to be productive, are distributed according to a bell
shaped curve with a peak at the average and few people far on either side. For example, there are very few people who are twice
as high, as average, or who can run twice as fast or have twice as high an IQ. The fact that capitalism doesn't distribute wealth
in a similar fashion must mean either that people do not exhibit their full productivity under capitalism, or that those with
greater wealth inherently use the capitalist system as a way of enforcing the "exploitation" of those with less economic power by
not fully rewarding employee productivity or by stealing the creative ideas of others, in the form of modern copyright laws which
favor the legal copyright holder and not the actual creator. Thus they accumulate more wealth for themselves in a cyclical
fashion (as the old statement goes "the rich get richer").
Arguments of people who don't see uneven wealth distribution as a problem tend to argue that it is associated with, or a
byproduct of, the overall increase in total of wealth, and often that it is more important that a high proportion of people have
enough wealth to live above a minimum standard, rather than that everyone have a similar amount. Free market theories are often
used in which voluntary economic exchange is seen as leaving both parties better off as both would not be trading unless the
outcome of the trade was an improvement for both. According to this view, even if the resulting distribution is not even, at
least it is better than if there were no trading.
Another outlook that downplays the blame of capitalism for disparities in wealth distribution is that economic systems are not
even the main culprit. The economist Thomas Sowell has attributed factors
such as geography, climate, culture, and natural resources as primary reasons for inequity. Alternatively, the claim is made that
capitalist economics is not a zero-sum game and that wealth is not
"distributed", but actually "created" through innovation, and risk-taking. The writer P.J. O'Rourke has explained this view by comparing the alternative perspective to a pizza where people taking
too many slices leaves somebody with just the box. By this way of thinking, the "pizza" (or zero-sum) model of wealth is a
drastic oversimplification. In response, critics of capitalism have argued that even if these arguments could justify
some economic inequity, they cannot explain the extreme inequality that capitalism brings with it.
Other points of view on capitalism's wealth distribution include:
- Collection of wealth in relatively few hands serves a function that in the end benefits all. (see philanthropist)
- Capitalist economies allocate wealth to the rich because they deserve it (see wealth).
- Society requires that they have it as an incentive, or for any number of reasons (see motivation).
- Wealth is not beneficial to anyone - not even the wealthy.
- The cause is not enough capitalism.
- Perhaps government interference in markets protects the wealthy.
- Capitalism hasn't been properly implemented yet.
- Uneven distribution of wealth shows capitalism to be faulty, or immoral.
- Present wealth distribution is the only possible outcome of capitalism.
- Many people have little wealth left over after living expenses, so they can't make it grow quickly.
- Wealth is defined and judged incorrectly, in many different ways.
- Financial markets and banks where most wealth is stored act as a means of redistribution of wealth ( see banking and stock market). Some say
that this causes a the simple dollar amounts assigned to a persons "net worth" to be completely misleading and inflated.
Further discussion on these points might be found in following sections. While it may be debated as to whether capitalism
causes the uneven distribution of wealth in capitalist economies, or whether it is good or bad, it is clear that capitalist
economies do have uneven wealth distributions.
Evolving Network Structure
Capitalist economies have large numbers of companies and people free to enter into many types of arrangements with each other.
The economy reacts to various changes in technologies, discoveries, and other situations, by means of companies and individuals
re-assessing their arrangements with each other. Therefore, the control mechanisms of the economy, and the way that information
flows through it, evolve over time, and are subject to a kind of "survival of the fittest" form of selection not unlike
biological entities. Analysis of the networks of connections and arrangements in the
economy has shown a degree of similarity to other networks such as the phone system or the Internet. [1] has examples of networks of company board members. Networks of customer
links, and monetary flows exhibit similar structures.
Some see the evolution of capitalist economies as a positive adaptation and tendency towards improvement. Others see it as
pointless random and chaotic fluctuations. If economic practices can be mapped to a fitness landscape in which optimization of the
distribution of wealth is evolved then both viewpoints
are valid, since random and chaotic fluctuations could be viewed as mutations. It
is possible that capitialism is a local optima or maxima, but
this is dependent on the valuation of the goals for the distribution of wealth, such as the goodness of equal distribution or the reduction of waste.
Unknown/Unapproved Direction of Capitalist Economies
While there is a great deal of planning within companies and other organisations in capitalist economies, there is no
economy-wide direction, or even any reliable prediction or knowledge of how the economy will behave or perform more than a year
into the future. While nearly all transactions may be approved of and planned by the people taking part, many society-wide
phenomena emerging from the transactions or markets are often not planned, predicted, or approved or authorised by anyone.
Unemployment/Employment
Since individuals typically earn income through finding a company for which to work, it is possible that not all individuals
will be able to find a company that will want their labor at a given time. This would not be such a big problem in an economy in
which individuals had access to the resources to provide for themselves, but when ownership of the bulk of productive resources
is collected in relatively few hands, most individuals are made dependent on employment for their well being. It is normal that
all real capitalist economies have fluctuating unemployment rates typically between 3 and 15%. Some economists have used the term
the "natural rate of unenployment" to describe this situation. Occasionally employment rates have reached levels of 30%, and
occasionally they have fallen to 2 or 1%, but rarely is there enough employment for all. Some economists consider a certain level
of unemployment to be necessary for capitalist economies to function. Some political figures have claimed that the "natural rate
of unemployment" shows the inefficencies of a capitalist economy, since not all resources, human labor in this case, are
efficiently allocated.
Criticisms of Capitalism
Marxists and others criticize capitalism for enriching capitalists (owners of
capital) at the expense of workers without necessarily
working themselves ("the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer"), and for the degree of control over the lives of workers
enjoyed by owners. Supporters of capitalism counter this criticism by claiming that ownership of productive capacity provides
motivation to owners to increase productive capacity and so generally increase the average material wealth ("we all get richer").
Opponents of capitalism counter this by pointing out that the average inflation-adjusted hourly wage in the United States is below what it was 35 years ago.
Marxists believe that the capitalism allows capitalists - the owners of capital - to exploit workers. The existence of private
property is seen as a restriction on freedom. Marxists also argue that capitalism has inherent contradictions that will
inevitably lead to its collapse. Capitalism is seen as just one stage in the evolution of the economy of a society.
Marxists also often argue that the structure of capitalism necessarily leads to unjust exploitation of workers, regardless of
whether or not the political system is one of an elected democracy or not. For this reason Marxists typically emphasise the
capitalist economic system of western countries rather than the democratic political system. A capitalist system is an economic
system - although often associated with democratic political systems, they are independent from each other. Capitalist systems
have often functioned under unelected governments, some examples being Hong Kong,
Singapore, and Chile under the rule of
General Pinochet.
In mainland China differences in terminology sometimes confuse and
complicate discussions of Chinese economic reform.
Under Chinese Marxism,
which is the official state ideology, capitalism refers to a stage of history in which there is a class system in which the
proletariat is exploited by the bourgeoisie. In the official Chinese ideology, China is currently in the primary stage of
socialism with Chinese
characteristics. However, because of Deng Xiaoping's dictum to
seek truth from facts, this view does not prevent China
from undertaking policies which in the West would be considered capitalistic including employing wage labor, increasing
unemployment to motivate those who are still working, transforming state owned enterprises into joint stock companies, and
encouraging the growth of the joint venture and private capitalist sectors.
Capitalism and Imperialism
J.A. Hobson, a British liberal writing at the time of the fierce debate on
imperialism during the Boer War, observed the spectacle of the Scramble for Africa and emphasized changes in European social structures
and attitudes as well as capital flow, though his emphasis on the latter seems to have been the most influential and provocative.
His so-called accumulation theory suggested that that capitalism suffered from under-consumption due the rise of monopoly
capitalism and the resultant concentration of wealth in fewer hands, which apparently gave rise to a misdistribution of
purchasing power. Logically, this argument is sound, given the huge impoverished industrial working class then often far too poor
to consume the goods produced by an industrialized economy. His analysis of capital flight and the rise of mammoth cartels later
influenced Lenin in his Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism, which has become a
basis for the modern neo-Marxist analysis of imperialism.
Contemporary World-Systems theorist Immanuel Wallerstein
perhaps better addresses Hobson's counterarguments without degrading Hobson's underlying inferences. Wallerstein's conception of
imperialism as a part of a general, gradual extension of capital investment from the center of the industrial countries to an
overseas periphery thus coincides with Hobson's. According to Wallerstein, Mercantilism became the major tool of semi-peripheral, newly industrialized countries such as Germany, France, Italy, and Belgium. Wallerstein
hence perceives formal empire as performing a function analogous to that of the mercantilist drives of the late seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries in England and France. The expansion of the Industrial Revolution hence contributed to the emergence of an
era of aggressive national rivalry, leading to the late nineteenth century scramble for Africa and formal empire.
Capitalism as an ideology
As with many common words, and most particularly ideologically laden words, "capitalism" has many meanings. There can be great
confusion amongst these meanings, and readers must be careful of which meaning a writer intends in any particular usage.
"Capitalism" as a phenomenon (the system of the private ownership of capital goods) is certainly different from "capitalism"
as an ideology (the philosophical advocacy of that system). Moreover, the precise ideology meant by "capitalism" in the latter
sense differs: what a Marxist or Green may describe as capitalist ideology may seem
thoroughly alien to what a classical liberal means by calling himself a capitalist, and vice versa.
Opponents of capitalism sometimes deny that these represent subtantially different things, or say they go hand-in-hand. This
criticism is often founded upon the Marxist idea that ideology is largely a consequence of underlying economic realities -- or
the simplification thereof which holds that people favor ideologies which justify their behavior or privilege.
Although it is arguable whether these meanings the word "capitalism" of the same kind are somehow "equivalent" under someone's
subjective notion of equivalence, for the sake of not making a straw man argument
when accusing someone else to be a proponent of capitalism, these different concepts must be clearly distinguished.
Capitalism and political ideologies
Some political ideologies favor capitalism:
- Libertarianism, sometimes also called
classical liberalism, defends a capitalist
free market with minimal state intervention. Minarchist libertarians see the role for government in the economy as solely defending the rights of the
participants against violence, theft, fraud, and damages such as pollution. Anarcho-capitalists see no role for government whatsoever.
- Conservatism varies depending on countries in its
specific stances. In Western nations, conservatives often defend the status quo of capitalist practices. Most people who call
themselves politically conservative however, economically subscribe to Mercantilism. See also political conservatism.
- Objectivism argues that from the
individual's standpoint, the only moral economic system is capitalism, since capitalism itself can never come to exist without
free men who act rationally and within the bounds of their unalienable, and
rationally derived, rights.
Some ideologies favor a mixed economy with capitalist and state-run elements:
- Mercantilism defends a mostly free market within the
nation, but proposes state intervention to protect domestic commerce and industries against foreign competition. See also
protectionism, and in opposition, free trade, and Crony capitalism.
- Social democracy and new liberalism argue for extensive state regulation and partial
intervention in an otherwise capitalist economy. Social democrats occupy a position between socialists and classical liberals
with regards to economic matters. They see a need for government to regulate employment, trade, and labor, and sometimes favor
nationalization of certain industries. See also welfare state, political liberalism.
- Distributism desires an economy with private property
and with almost all people possessing a means of production. This would take place in for example a country of sustenance
farmers. In a distributist economy, laws would be made to restrict larger corporations from taking over. Distributists favor
achieving these goals not primarily through government regulation, but firstly through grass roots efforts and
collaboration.
- Fascism established a state-controlled economy with powers
delegated to capitalist interests subservient to the central government. Socialists sometimes describe modern capitalism as
"fascist", meaning an analogy to historical fascism with its cooperation (or cronyism) between industry and government.
Some ideologies oppose capitalism and support a collectively run economy:
- Socialism argues for greater state control of the economy
than under social democracy. Areas of capitalism or private ownership may remain in certain sectors (such as small businesses) under socialism, but industry and labor are regulated by the state for the benefit of the
populace at large.
- Communism is a variant of socialism which calls for the
overthrow of the capitalist system and the establishment of public ownership of the means of production. Communists see socialism
as a stage towards the establishment of a stateless and classless economy. Historical Soviet Communism, a system of Party-controlled socialism, is distinct from the Communist ideal.
- Libertarian socialism argues for
collective control of the economy without the need for a State, or with only a very limited (minimalist) State that exists solely
for the purpose of guaranteeing and protecting communal property and human rights.
- Anarchism strives for the immediate abolition of both the
State and private property, and the establishment of a communal society quite similar to the one advocated by communists as their
final goal (but in contrast to the communists, anarchists oppose the idea of a transitional socialist stage).
Arguments for and against capitalism
Since there are so many divergent ideologies backing or fighting capitalism, there is no possible agreed upon argument list
for or against it. Each of the above ideologies makes very different claims for or about capitalism. Some ideologies refuse to
use the word at all.
There seem to be four separate and distinct questions about capitalism which have clearly survived the 20th century and remain hotly debated today. Certain thinkers claim or claimed to
have simple answers to these questions, but political science
generally sees them as scales or shades of grey:
Is capitalism moral? Does it actually encourage traits we find useful or appealing in human beings? Yes: Ludwig von Mises, Ayn Rand,
Robin Hanson No: John
McMurtry, Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin
Is capitalism ethical? Can its rules and contracts and enforcement systems be made wholly objective of the people
administering them, to a greater degree than other systems? Yes: Buckminster Fuller, John McMurtry, Friedrich Hayek No: Karl
Marx, Peter Kropotkin, Vladimir Lenin
Is capitalism efficient? Given whatever moral purposes or ethical standards it might serve, can it be said to allocate energy,
material resources, or human creativity better than any of the alternatives? Yes: Ludwig von Mises, Paul Hawken, Joseph Schumpeter No: Peter Kropotkin, Rosa Luxemburg
Is capitalism sustainable? Can it persist as a means of organizing human affairs, under any conceivable set of reforms as per
the above? Yes: Buckminster Fuller, Paul Hawken No: Joseph Schumpeter,
Karl Marx, Vladimir
Lenin, Leon Trotsky
Why does no one agree what capitalism is?
It's hard to answer this objectively. Apparently there has never been a clear agreement about the linguistic, economic, ethical and moral implications, that is, the "political economy" of capitalism itself.
Rather like a governing political party that everyone seeks to control, regardless of ideology, the definition of "capitalism"
at any given time tends to reflect the current conflicts between interest groups.
The non-obvious combinations demonstrate the complexity of the debate. For instance, Joseph Schumpeter claimed in 1962 that capitalism was more efficient than any alternative, but doomed due
to its complex and abstract rationale which the ordinary citizen would not ultimately defend.
Also, the overlapping claims confuse most debaters. Ayn Rand made an original
defense of capitalism as a moral code, but her arguments for its efficiency
were not original, and selected to support her moral claims. Karl Marx believed
capitalism efficient but unfair at the administration of an immoral purpose, and thus ultimately unsustainable. John McMurtry, a current commentator within the anti-globalization movement, believes it has become
increasingly fair at the administration of this immoral purpose. Robin
Hanson, another current commentator, asks if fitness and fairness and morality can ever really be separated by other than
electoral political means?
In whose interest is capitalism?
Finally, the arguments appeal strongly to different interest groups, and often support their positions as "rights".
Currently recognized property owners, especially corporate shareholders and holders of deeds in land or rights to exploit
natural capital, are generally recognized as advocating extremely
strong property rights.
However, the definition of capital has broadened in
recent years to recognize and include the rationales of other major interest groups: artists or other creators who rely on
copyright law, legal patent and trademark holders who improve what they call
intellectual capital, workers who are largely trading in
their own less creative labor guided by a body of shared and imitative instructional capital - the trades themselves, all have reasons to prefer status quo property law
over any given set of proposed reforms.
Even judges, mediators or administrators charged with fair execution of some ethical code and the maintenance of some
relationship between human capital and financial capital within a capitalist representative democracy, tend to have strong self-interest
reasons to argue for one view or another - typically, that view that assigns them a meaningful role in the capitalist
economy.
Karl Marx made the strong claim that this role actually affects their
cognition, and leads them inexorably to irreconcilable points of view, i.e. that no agreement about capitalism was possible by
"class collaboration", and "class struggle" between these defined it. This view was advocated by many revolutionary movements of
the 20th century, but was often abandoned in practice as it seemed to lead
to "class war", endless violence between those with irreconcilable points of view.
Today, certain parties that were traditionally opposed to capitalism, e.g. the Communist Party of China, see some role for it in the development of their society. In such cases,
debate focuses on incentive systems, not on the overall moral structure or ethical clarity of "capitalism". Former
anti-capitalist groups holding such views are generally seen as having "switched sides", however, and they are often no longer on
good terms with their old allies.
What is capitalism good for?
One important modern argument is that capitalism simply isn't a system, merely a set of questions, challenges, and assertions
regarding human behavior. Like biology, or ecology and its relationship to animal behavior, it is made complex by human language, culture and ideas. Jane Jacobs and George Lakoff
argued separately that there was a Guardian Ethic which was
fundamentally related to nurturing and protection of life, and a Trader
Ethic more related to the unique primate practice of trade. Jacobs thought that the two were made and kept separate in
history, and that any collaboration between them was corruption, i.e. any unifying system that claimed to make assertions
regarding both, would simply be serving itself.
Other doctrines focus narrowly on the application of capitalist means to natural capital (Paul Hawken) or individual capital (Ayn
Rand) - assuming a more general moral and legal framework which discourages these same mechanisms when applied to non-living
beings coercively, e.g. "creative accounting" combining individual creativity with the complex instructional base of accounting
itself.
Aside from the very narrow arguments advancing specific mechanisms, it is quite difficult to distinguish critiques of
capitalism from critiques of Western European civilization, colonialism or
imperialism. These arguments often recur interchangeably within the context
of the extremely complex anti-globalization
movement, which is often (but not universally) described as "anti-capitalist".
See also
- Capitalism.org
- distributed resource allocation
- Related topics: History of Economic
Thought, Emergence of early
capitalism
- Related words: capitalist.
- Related ideologies: classical liberalism (libertarianism, minarchism,
anarcho-capitalism), conservatism (political
conservatism), mercantilism, protectionism, social democracy (welfare state, liberalism,
political liberalism, liberal democracy), state interventionism, state
capitalism, socialism, fascism,
communism, libertarian socialism.
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