Capitalism
Capitalism is a mode of production in which the wage relation is the most important or most prevalent productive relationship. Karl Marx pioneered the study of capitalist society when he began to materially analyze the social system which had spread from its origin in Europe to become the first world system. Capitalism is a central concept in Marxist economic, philosophical, historiographic, and political thought.
Although wage labor and markets have existed around the world for thousands of years, these forms of social interaction remained dependent on other productive relationships—usually peasant farming, slave labor, or simple hunting and gathering. For example, the Roman Empire was not a capitalist system because its developed network of trade was dependent on slave agriculture and almost disappeared when the slave economy collapsed. In contrast, the American slave system of the 19th century produced goods such as cotton and rice which were destined for industrial wage laborers in Britain and New England to turn them into cheap finished goods. Europe had a unique combination of factors, including the colonization of the New World and a high degree of political fragmentation, which allowed for the rapid growth of capitalist elements and, in turn, a release of unprecedented productive capacity that secured European domination of the globe.
Other factors which define capitalist society include factory production, market exchange by the use of money, private ownership of the means of production, profit as the prevalent form of surplus value, and production for the sake of exchange. Standardizations of Marx's theory of history typically place capitalism in a sequence between feudalism and socialism, but this can be misleading, generalizing Marx's study of European history into global categories rather than focusing on the real history of capitalism's spread into tribal, clan-based, and monarchist societies across the world. The rise of capitalism has brought about mass poverty, exploitation, and later ecological destruction.[1]
See also
- Bourgeoisie, the ruling class under capitalism.
References
- ↑ Dylan Sullivan, Jason Hickel (2023).Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century. Human Development, vol. 161.