- Hannah Arendt
The origins of capitalism are often traced back to their agrarian birthplace in England in the 16th and 17th centuries. Whereas the various growing kingdoms of continental Europe still had these weaker-but-centralizing monarchies that existed side by side with powerful oligarchic landlords, with these sort of traditional mercantilist economies, England had an even stronger central government that worked closely with an unusually powerful oligarchic group of landlords, who in turn held a vast proportion of the land. So most of the peasants were tenants that lived under these powerful oligarchs and were subjected to intense pressures to increase productivity. Tenancy became tied to a single centralized market: landlords could post rents to occupy a certain patch of land, and peasants had to compete vigorously for those tenancies lest they become landless. Production itself became increasingly unmoored from survival or even the administration of a regular society, becoming a competition, a means to power. This process was accelerated by the enclosures of the 16th and 18th centuries; the peasants were forced off of the land, which forced them to be utterly dependent on the landlords, and thus, the market, for their very survival.
Accumulation and competitive expansion became a dominating national, and eventually international ethos. This process was intensified by almost literally lighting a fire underneath the productive classes. They no longer could secure their own subsistence by working the land. They depended on landlords, and thus markets that were constantly expanding. These are supposedly the initial conditions that gave birth to the motor of capitalist accumulation.
Accumulation and competitive expansion became a dominating national, and eventually international ethos. This process was intensified by almost literally lighting a fire underneath the productive classes. They no longer could secure their own subsistence by working the land. They depended on landlords, and thus markets that were constantly expanding. These are supposedly the initial conditions that gave birth to the motor of capitalist accumulation.
Now the article linked provides a narrative for this birth, but it is somewhat unclear about the exact causal relationships within this process, so more digging will be necessary. But let's try a little early speculation.
Why does capitalism possess the characteristics it has? Does a centralized capitalist market have to expand into every aspect of people's lives? Does it have to expand beyond the borders of its originating nation? Is the endless accumulation associated with capitalism a result of structural peculiarities with the system, or a consequence of strong psychological motivations possessed by participants in the system, or maybe a little bit of both?
Consider the dynamics of competitive growth: a large body seems to need to grow to sustain itself. Why is this? Let's think about the social psychology for a minute, though this is might not be entirely adequate of an explanation. It seems like large things themselves give birth to strong competitive pressures due to structural stresses involved. Egalitarian societies are more manageable the smaller they are. Within smaller groups, each member of the group has a chance to be powerful - at least relatively speaking - as individuals can be both dominant and submissive within more intimate settings. Plus there is less pressure. There is not a large set of observers judging on any individual's power.
However the larger a society grows, the more hierarchical and controlled it has to become in order to move in any given direction, in order to be responsive to its environment. Otherwise there are simply too many interests proceeding in too many directions for anything to get done. Where there are hierarchies, there are leaders, and individuals generally perceived to be in higher esteem, or in higher power. For the ambitious, there is a pressure to ascend to such positions. Plus, there is a greater amount of observers judging these powerful positions that are more socially exposed. There becomes an imperative to maintain an air of dominance, lest one fall in power.
Power absorbs lesser power to grow, which antagonizes lesser power, but lesser power must be absorbed if it cannot fight back. Everyone is growing in power, and so for security, everyone needs to keep growing lest someone fall behind and be subjugated or destroyed. There is a tremendous pressure to grow in power. Everyone knows everyone else is going for it all. There is a mutual fear and distrust of one another among the power climbers.
As everyone grows in power, there is more taken away from everyone else. Everyone wants to climb everyone and everyone treats each other - and especially the powerless - like shit, so there is this exponential growth of antipathy and trauma, coarsening the most and least powerful alike, though some find empathy.
So during the course of this process, everyone becomes alienated to one another and everyone becomes jaded and apathetic to genuine human connection, out of defense.This leads to a greater pursuit of power. There is nothing else to enjoy. There is nothing else that generates meaning.
Within a delimited body, power reaches its limits when it can no longer grow fast enough, and there is not enough energy to absorb. If power cannot grow anymore, it has to begin feeding on the national body itself, absorbing more and more power from the less powerful, until social, political, and economic instabilities reach a certain threshold and there is a crash. With such polarities, there are antagonisms throughout the body. There is infighting between great powers, and fighting between the actual classes. There is a great antipathy between great power and lesser power. However this is also a matter of proportion. There is a portion of power which is sympathetic to the powerless, and a portion of the powerless sympathetic to power, and so on all along the spectrum of power. Nevertheless, these polarities, as stated above, necessarily lead to antagonisms which grow as the polarities grow.
To maintain stability, constant growth is required. Everyone needs to be gaining power. To avoid total collapse within this delimited body, power seeks outside power to absorb, hence imperialism. This process creates an even greater delimited body, which is to collapse upon reaching total limits.
Why does capitalism possess the characteristics it has? Does a centralized capitalist market have to expand into every aspect of people's lives? Does it have to expand beyond the borders of its originating nation? Is the endless accumulation associated with capitalism a result of structural peculiarities with the system, or a consequence of strong psychological motivations possessed by participants in the system, or maybe a little bit of both?
Consider the dynamics of competitive growth: a large body seems to need to grow to sustain itself. Why is this? Let's think about the social psychology for a minute, though this is might not be entirely adequate of an explanation. It seems like large things themselves give birth to strong competitive pressures due to structural stresses involved. Egalitarian societies are more manageable the smaller they are. Within smaller groups, each member of the group has a chance to be powerful - at least relatively speaking - as individuals can be both dominant and submissive within more intimate settings. Plus there is less pressure. There is not a large set of observers judging on any individual's power.
However the larger a society grows, the more hierarchical and controlled it has to become in order to move in any given direction, in order to be responsive to its environment. Otherwise there are simply too many interests proceeding in too many directions for anything to get done. Where there are hierarchies, there are leaders, and individuals generally perceived to be in higher esteem, or in higher power. For the ambitious, there is a pressure to ascend to such positions. Plus, there is a greater amount of observers judging these powerful positions that are more socially exposed. There becomes an imperative to maintain an air of dominance, lest one fall in power.
Power absorbs lesser power to grow, which antagonizes lesser power, but lesser power must be absorbed if it cannot fight back. Everyone is growing in power, and so for security, everyone needs to keep growing lest someone fall behind and be subjugated or destroyed. There is a tremendous pressure to grow in power. Everyone knows everyone else is going for it all. There is a mutual fear and distrust of one another among the power climbers.
As everyone grows in power, there is more taken away from everyone else. Everyone wants to climb everyone and everyone treats each other - and especially the powerless - like shit, so there is this exponential growth of antipathy and trauma, coarsening the most and least powerful alike, though some find empathy.
So during the course of this process, everyone becomes alienated to one another and everyone becomes jaded and apathetic to genuine human connection, out of defense.This leads to a greater pursuit of power. There is nothing else to enjoy. There is nothing else that generates meaning.
Within a delimited body, power reaches its limits when it can no longer grow fast enough, and there is not enough energy to absorb. If power cannot grow anymore, it has to begin feeding on the national body itself, absorbing more and more power from the less powerful, until social, political, and economic instabilities reach a certain threshold and there is a crash. With such polarities, there are antagonisms throughout the body. There is infighting between great powers, and fighting between the actual classes. There is a great antipathy between great power and lesser power. However this is also a matter of proportion. There is a portion of power which is sympathetic to the powerless, and a portion of the powerless sympathetic to power, and so on all along the spectrum of power. Nevertheless, these polarities, as stated above, necessarily lead to antagonisms which grow as the polarities grow.
To maintain stability, constant growth is required. Everyone needs to be gaining power. To avoid total collapse within this delimited body, power seeks outside power to absorb, hence imperialism. This process creates an even greater delimited body, which is to collapse upon reaching total limits.
So what exactly is capitalism? It is hard to get a precise handle on it. The system is characterized by private ownership of the means of production, and is driven by the profit motive, the overarching impulse to use wealth to get more wealth. However as a theory it is hard to define. Theoretical concepts never translate completely in the material world, and the system, as birthed out of theory, changes in time due to the necessities of maintaining it. Capitalism as a theory seemed to be birthed out of this egalitarian vision of self-interested actors interacting in the market as equals. However the theory when put into practice was completely skewed towards the powerful.
Behind the historical arc of capitalism is a tendency towards expansion and the acquisition of power through competition and domination, which is a tendency that is shared by more ancient structures. Capitalism sees profit begetting profit, but really profit is a proxy for power. Other societies have seen the power begetting power dynamic. There are other ancient structures in history that grew to their limits and collapsed, and were characterized by similar impulses.
Capitalism seems to have to reinvent itself after almost collapsing every 50 years or even less. However other systems have seen this too. Take the divine right of kings concept that emerged after the Protestant Reformation which was an attempt to solve the endless factional strife in the old monarchies. And then the attempt by monarchies to adopt parliamentary governments until revolutions around the world virtually abolished monarchies in the major nations. Or further back, take the Roman acquisition of Greek mythology and then the eventual implementation of Christian ideology. It seems these ancient power structures reinvented themselves too, frequently even.
Nevertheless, capitalism is unique due to its scope and material power. It is an entirely new set of social relations as well, one that really hasn't been around for a long time. Due to intense expansionary pressures and powerful technologies, capitalism has become a truly global power structure, which has never really happened in history until now.
At the end of an era, it seems a ruling ideology goes bad, and there is this necessity of regressing to the original trauma. The more you think about regressing, following the causal chains back to their origin, the further back they go, on into infinity. It is hard to think this way if you are attempting a solution; the exercise becomes absurd, so a limited construct, a new ideology is generated, which describes in delineated and intelligible terms what has gone wrong and what needs to be done. Ideologies do work, but they expire, often very quickly.
The abstract and limited quality of ideology allows it to be hijacked. Ideology is exposed to conflicting interpretations, and oftentimes the interpretation of the most powerful becomes the established form, guiding the direction of future progress.
Expansion generates its own ideology, while contraction and collapse generates its ideological antithesis. Ideology is an expression of an age, a state, a widespread way in which individuals relate to each other, to the environment, and ultimately to the cosmos.
There is a chilling phenomenon that occurs throughout history: there are these egalitarian awakenings, which upon being birthed in a time of great corruption and perversion of power, are themselves subverted by the power-hungry. The hunger for power introduces an antagonizing logic which disrupts stability, forcing a new process of expansion. What's more, this new power utilizes the egalitarian ideology to make stable the new growing empire, making it more powerful in turn.
Like addicts, the power-hungry permeate the social fabric. It seems it is a problem peculiar to apex predators. A powerful group grows to dominate and the accumulation of power becomes an end in itself, whose logic leads inexorably to a population collapse.
I'm not so sure this has to be a necessary condition of our social nature, but it is a problem whose complex roots extend far into history, resulting in powerful social forces that are difficult to reverse. Successful expansion leads to a power struggle, the peak of which generates the power-starved, who in turn possess the relentless drive to accumulate compensatory power, which in turn drives a new expansionary process. And the cycle repeats, and repeats, and repeats.
Upon witnessing these power-hungry Western powers, indigenous groups in the Americas remarked that what they were seeing were profoundly sick societies. These societies were predicated on the machinations of the mentally ill; they spread a virus in which their constituents sucked the life force out of other people, and themselves. From where does it come? And is it necessary?
