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To your nuanced answer, has there been a time when Capitalism didn't seek to dominate all of it's regulatory bodies? Unions, governments, activists, even other

To your nuanced answer, has there been a time when Capitalism didn't seek to dominate all of it's regulatory bodies? Unions, governments, activists, even other Capitalists as they represent competition. There's a reason leftists call Imperialism the highest form of Capitalism.

nickik 8y ago
Of course they do. Adam Smith already understood this. However, just because any group in society wants to change the rules of society to their benefit, does not make the existance of those groups a bad thing per se. Sometimes people act as if that was unique for capitalist. In fact Unions, Activists, Government burocracies and so on have the exact same insentives, they want to change rules to benefit them. The reason leftists call Imperialism the highest statge of capitalism is because these leftists had a very limited understanding of both history and the reasons behind imperialism. Their theory never made much sense and much modern history has desproved these simplified Leninist notions.
- Stranger43 8y ago
  The right is just as bad as history and have mostly manage to erase the economic system Smith wanted abolished, and according to Marx had re-emerged after Smiths dead. Or to put it differently capitalism was never envisioned as a critique of socialism, but as a critique of nationalist mercantilism, which is the same system international socialism was supposed to tackle a century after Capitalism had failed. Though by then Imperialism had replaced mercantilism as the common name for a system where one large property owners competed with each other for world supremacy with little regard for mere renters/workers. Once could argue that capitalism was revived after the two wars to end all wars finally managed to wipe out the old feudal order(at least in Europe) but one could also argue that the european disaster merely reset the clock and gave rise to a new (mostly American) aristocracy which is now finally becoming visible as a aristocracy. For a lot of 3rd world the end of European hegemony after world war 2 was perceived more a handover from one set of foreign owners to a new one, then "freedom and democracy", and the us have toppled more democracies then it helped build, giving some credence to the theory of the US as a mercantilist empire rather then capitalist democracy. In a lot of ways the problem is that few modern politicians(and that economist is in practice often a subclass of politician) dare to leave the confines of circular logic where morality can be a simple matter of good vs evil and history is a consistent narrative going from the bad old times to the brave new world. Which gives rise to an extremely toxic debate culture of fractions yelling general insults of each other, using words that have long since lost any resemblance of coherent meaning.
  - nickik 8y ago
    Honestly I have no idea what you mean by the words you say. By no strech of the imagination was did capitlaism fail. In fact the strech from 1870 to 1914 was the largest and strongest period of growth thanks to capitlaism and increasing trend, specialisation and so on. Feudalistic order as a system of economics had long stopped in most of western Europe and even in Russia. The feudalistic titles still being around and having some meansing does absoutly not make the economics system feudalistic. I am not defending imperalism, of course those nations that were under fogin occupation did not really participate in this system and therefore could not get the same benefits. However it is equally false to say that capitlaism only worked because of imperalism. In fact, as Adam Smith said, it would be better if everybody were equally capitalistic. The raise of nations like Japan, Taiwan and so many others made us all richer. I wish nations in Africa and Latin America would also manage to adopt a better system.
    - Stranger43 8y ago
      To pretend that 1870 to 1910(also known as the long depression in literature) was some kind of glory period of equality and democracy is only almost plausible because of the complete dissater that follows, and completely at ods with just about every credible history book written about that period. Wars of conquest still happen doing that period, and new colonies are still being formed. Where the myth of the glorious 19th century comes in is that it's fundamental to america's founding myth that it was a democracy(as defined by the modern UN) prior to or even doing the 1st world war, and did not evolve into one almost as gradually as the Europeans empires. Dickens and Rasputin is from the late 19th century, as is the term rubber baron and banana republic and America main foreign policy activity is to topple Latin American states and patrol china in defense of American corporations(in colaboration with Britain, germany and Japan an event that's forgotten in the US but definitely not in china). The traditional agrarian feudal order with serfs and knights are of cause gone, replaced by mercantist national companies like the British east India company targeted by the Boston tea party and the primary subject of Smiths criticism, but the aristocratic system is still in place and it's a low point in terms of economic equality not a high point(for the west equality peaks sometimes between Nixon taking office and Reagan leaving office, where as global equality might actually be increasing). But of cause if you are one of the many who have bought the myth that Smiths wealth of nations is about socialism(the fact is that smith never writes a single word about socialism), and that the long depression never happened we are of cause not even talking the same language but thats of cause the core problem with our political discourse. And the reason that the old ideals about the good king/dictator/chairman keeps reemerging as the lone alternative to the bad power brookers corrupting the system. My point is that both sides is essentially working from a historic narrative thats more myth then reality, and that it's really hard to explain the incredible increase in wealth that we have seen since the last war to end all war ended as a result of anything but technological developments and prolonged peace

nickik 8y ago

Of course they do. Adam Smith already understood this. However, just because any group in society wants to change the rules of society to their benefit, does not make the existance of those groups a bad thing per se. Sometimes people act as if that was unique for capitalist. In fact Unions, Activists, Government burocracies and so on have the exact same insentives, they want to change rules to benefit them. The reason leftists call Imperialism the highest statge of capitalism is because these leftists had a very limited understanding of both history and the reasons behind imperialism. Their theory never made much sense and much modern history has desproved these simplified Leninist notions.

Stranger43 8y ago
The right is just as bad as history and have mostly manage to erase the economic system Smith wanted abolished, and according to Marx had re-emerged after Smiths dead. Or to put it differently capitalism was never envisioned as a critique of socialism, but as a critique of nationalist mercantilism, which is the same system international socialism was supposed to tackle a century after Capitalism had failed. Though by then Imperialism had replaced mercantilism as the common name for a system where one large property owners competed with each other for world supremacy with little regard for mere renters/workers. Once could argue that capitalism was revived after the two wars to end all wars finally managed to wipe out the old feudal order(at least in Europe) but one could also argue that the european disaster merely reset the clock and gave rise to a new (mostly American) aristocracy which is now finally becoming visible as a aristocracy. For a lot of 3rd world the end of European hegemony after world war 2 was perceived more a handover from one set of foreign owners to a new one, then "freedom and democracy", and the us have toppled more democracies then it helped build, giving some credence to the theory of the US as a mercantilist empire rather then capitalist democracy. In a lot of ways the problem is that few modern politicians(and that economist is in practice often a subclass of politician) dare to leave the confines of circular logic where morality can be a simple matter of good vs evil and history is a consistent narrative going from the bad old times to the brave new world. Which gives rise to an extremely toxic debate culture of fractions yelling general insults of each other, using words that have long since lost any resemblance of coherent meaning.
- nickik 8y ago
  Honestly I have no idea what you mean by the words you say. By no strech of the imagination was did capitlaism fail. In fact the strech from 1870 to 1914 was the largest and strongest period of growth thanks to capitlaism and increasing trend, specialisation and so on. Feudalistic order as a system of economics had long stopped in most of western Europe and even in Russia. The feudalistic titles still being around and having some meansing does absoutly not make the economics system feudalistic. I am not defending imperalism, of course those nations that were under fogin occupation did not really participate in this system and therefore could not get the same benefits. However it is equally false to say that capitlaism only worked because of imperalism. In fact, as Adam Smith said, it would be better if everybody were equally capitalistic. The raise of nations like Japan, Taiwan and so many others made us all richer. I wish nations in Africa and Latin America would also manage to adopt a better system.
  - Stranger43 8y ago
    To pretend that 1870 to 1910(also known as the long depression in literature) was some kind of glory period of equality and democracy is only almost plausible because of the complete dissater that follows, and completely at ods with just about every credible history book written about that period. Wars of conquest still happen doing that period, and new colonies are still being formed. Where the myth of the glorious 19th century comes in is that it's fundamental to america's founding myth that it was a democracy(as defined by the modern UN) prior to or even doing the 1st world war, and did not evolve into one almost as gradually as the Europeans empires. Dickens and Rasputin is from the late 19th century, as is the term rubber baron and banana republic and America main foreign policy activity is to topple Latin American states and patrol china in defense of American corporations(in colaboration with Britain, germany and Japan an event that's forgotten in the US but definitely not in china). The traditional agrarian feudal order with serfs and knights are of cause gone, replaced by mercantist national companies like the British east India company targeted by the Boston tea party and the primary subject of Smiths criticism, but the aristocratic system is still in place and it's a low point in terms of economic equality not a high point(for the west equality peaks sometimes between Nixon taking office and Reagan leaving office, where as global equality might actually be increasing). But of cause if you are one of the many who have bought the myth that Smiths wealth of nations is about socialism(the fact is that smith never writes a single word about socialism), and that the long depression never happened we are of cause not even talking the same language but thats of cause the core problem with our political discourse. And the reason that the old ideals about the good king/dictator/chairman keeps reemerging as the lone alternative to the bad power brookers corrupting the system. My point is that both sides is essentially working from a historic narrative thats more myth then reality, and that it's really hard to explain the incredible increase in wealth that we have seen since the last war to end all war ended as a result of anything but technological developments and prolonged peace