Capitalism has not always existed. By defining it as a "market economy",
characterized by market exchange, money and its accumulation, liberalsand Marxists have long agreed on the fact that since Antiquity, with the
rise of trade, money and an urban bourgeoisie, there have been
"embryonic" forms of capitalism. Their common idea is that from these
embryos, capitalism would have gradually been born in the modern era in
Western Europe in the "interstices" of feudalism (the cities), carried
by a merchant "bourgeoisie" that would have triumphed over the feudal
aristocracy in a series of "bourgeois revolutions", allowing these
embryos to flourish without restriction.
This consensual vision has been the subject of much criticism, notably
by a heterodox Marxist current, "political Marxism", founded by Robert
Brenner, a Marxist historian of the economy, and Ellen Meiksins Wood, a
Marxist theorist and historian of ideas[1]. Political Marxists oppose
orthodox Marxists like Stalin by refusing to think of history as a
linear process going from "primitive communism" to communism via
slavery, feudalism and capitalism due to the increase in productive forces.
On the contrary, they think that history is the product of the
contingency of the class struggle and make capitalism a unique economic
system. It is characterized first and foremost by a generalized
dependence on the market of the dominant classes, dependent on the
profitability of their investments, and of the dominated classes,
dependent on their wages. Moreover, this generalized dependence is no
longer on the legally and geographically segmented and very strongly
regulated markets of the Ancien Régime, but on a weakly regulated
national - and increasingly international - market, thus leading to
generalized competition between economic actors. Finally, both a
condition and a result of this transformation, the State becomes less a
means of personal enrichment through the absolutist fiscal exploitation
of the peasantry, and more an "impersonal" guarantor of the national
capitalist order and its growth.
Conditions and consequences
The first condition for the emergence of capitalism is the dispossession
of the means of production of a majority of the dominated classes,
starting with the dispossession of peasants of their land and their
transformation into proletarians dependent on the labor market for their
survival. This implies a shift towards the market of ruling classes that
can no longer rely on feudal rent and taxes levied on a peasantry that
owns property to enrich themselves, since the latter disappears and,
with it, feudal and absolutist exploitation. The second condition is the
legal and geographical unification by a State of the pre-existing
markets, as well as their deregulation. The third condition is the
existence of a strong State, capable of creating these conditions and
enduring the negative consequences of this transformation.
The first consequence of capitalism is that the exploitation of the
classes dominated by the ruling classes is now carried out exclusively
through the market, a market that is now only weakly regulated and
highly competitive. Capitalism therefore presents itself not as a form
of direct class exploitation, like feudalism, but as an impersonal
domination of the market, which it is in part since the capitalists are
also subject to this impersonal domination. The second consequence is
that, in order to remain competitive and therefore profitable, economic
actors must constantly increase their productivity and production volume
to lower their unit costs and increase their sales. They are forced by
their dependence on a competitive unified market to obey its
imperatives, which results in a "growth compulsion" and therefore in
recurring economic crises of overproduction and an unprecedented climate
and ecological crisis. The third consequence is that this forced
economic growth offers unprecedented financial means to States allowing
them to strengthen their domination on a national and international
scale, hence the exceptional growth of their power, particularly police
and military.
If we define capitalism based on its conditions of emergence and
historically specific characteristics leading to historically specific
consequences, we can see more clearly what is unique about our
contemporary society. Indeed, if there has been class exploitation,
markets, money, investments and states for thousands of years, it has
been less than two centuries since there has been this impersonal
domination of the market and its political counterpart, the capitalist
state, and their forced growth leads from crisis to crisis, towards a
global ecological catastrophe. How did we get here?
"The pyramid of the capitalist system" represents the different
oppressors of the capitalist system. At the top, 5th and last floor, a
huge money bag with dollars, symbolizing Capitalism. Just below,
representatives of power, State and monarchy: this 4th floor is
captioned "We govern you". On the third floor, there are three religious
men (a priest, a priest and a cardinal) who correspond to the legend "We
deceive you". Below them, the armies, "We shoot you". And finally, the
bourgeoisie who feast around a banquet where champagne flows freely ("We
eat for you"). At the base of the pyramid, the people bend their backs
("We work for you all. We feed you[sic]all"). But from the suffering
people emerges hope, symbolized by the red flag on the left, the hammer
and the shovel on the right, in order to bring down and bury capitalism.
Nedeljkovich, Brashich, and Kuharich in 1911. Published by The
International Pub. Co. , Cleveland OH
Class Violence and Imperialism
According to political Marxists, the emergence of capitalism is not a
natural and universal process resulting from the quantitative increase
in market exchanges in Western Europe in the modern era, since at this
time, the peasants of Europe (and the Americas) remained exploited in a
feudal or absolutist manner by dominant classes who enriched themselves
mainly through this means. Even the great merchant cities of Italy and
the Netherlands did not base their prosperity on their superior
competitiveness in a (non-existent) unified and deregulated market, but
on the contrary thanks to their military power which assured them
incomes drawn from peasantries exploited in a feudal or colonial manner
and from commercial monopolies in segmented and highly regulated markets[2].
It is this non-capitalist character which explains the relative decline
in the modern era of Italian cities such as Genoa, Florence and Venice
and in the 18th century for the Netherlands. One exception: England,
where capitalism emerged contingently in the modern era. Thanks to its
unique and early emergence of capitalism, ensuring strong economic and
fiscal growth, England became the world's greatest military power in the
18th and 19th centuries. Facing it, its rivals were gradually forced to
adopt reforms to increase their economic, fiscal and military power,
leading to the emergence of capitalism in Germany, Japan and France in
the second half of the 19th century (see the sub-article). Elsewhere,
capitalism emerged during the 19th century and especially the 20th
century through colonial conquest or capital exports.
Far from being the result of a natural and universal development,
capitalism emerged contingently, through class violence at home and
imperialist violence abroad, until it spread across the entire globe. If
capitalism is an accident of history, this is also true for libertarian
communism, which can consequently only come about in the same way: in
the contingency of the class and (anti-)imperialist struggle.
Armand Paris de Sortir du capitalisme
Chronology
1066 Norman conquest of England
MID-14TH CENTURY Great Plague and crisis of feudalism.
1381 Peasant revolt in England.
END OF THE 14TH CENTURY Gradual reduction of serfdom, commercial turn of
the aristocracy in England.
1488-1517 Massive wave of forced expulsions of peasants, a process that
ends with the parliamentary enclosures (the privatization of the
commons) of the 18th century in England.
16th-18th CENTURY period in France known as the Ancien Régime,
characterized by a class compromise between monarchy, aristocracy and
bourgeoisie to share the fruits of the feudal and absolutist
exploitation of the peasantry and the colonies.
1688-1815 English geopolitical rise and a cycle of wars between England
and France, all lost with one exception (the American War of
Independence) by France.
1763-1789 cycle of economic and liberal reforms of the Ancien Régime,
ultimately aborted.
1789-1793 French Revolution and a cycle of liberal-inspired reforms.
1850s-1860s beginning of the major reforms that would lead to the
emergence of industrial capitalism in France (creation of a vast railway
network, signing of free trade treaties and the beginning of the
dismantling of artisanal customs).
Validate
[1]Ellen Meiksins Wood, The Origin of Capitalism, Quebec, Lux, 2013;
François Allisson and Nicolas Brisset (eds.), The Origins of Capitalism:
Robert Brenner and Political Marxism, ENS Éditions, 2023.
[2]Ellen Meiksins Wood, The Origins of Capitalism, op. Cit.
https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Contre-histoire-L-emergence-historique-du-capitalisme
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