Capitalism- a socio-economic formation in which private ownership of factors of production is widespread, and the distribution of the produced product, goods and services is carried out through market mechanisms. Capitalism is characterized by: free enterprise, competition, the desire of producers and sellers of goods to make a profit. Capitalism, being a socio-economic system, is closely connected with the socio-political system of the state and, in many respects, predetermines the latter. Capitalism replaced the feudal-serf system at the end of the Middle Ages, while changing its original appearance. At the initial stage, capitalism was characterized by harsh exploitation of labor, the desire to obtain maximum profit. At the present stage of the development of civilization, capitalism is oriented towards social goals, the achievement of scientific and technological progress, and relies on achieving the interest of producers in the results of labor. In modern political economy, the main features of capitalism are: private ownership of the means of production; wage labor system; freedom of enterprise and choice; free competition; profit; limiting the role of the state
In the capitalist system of free competition, material production resources and significant funds are owned by capitalists and capitalist enterprises. Private property allows capitalists to acquire, control and dispose of material and financial resources at their own discretion. The wage labor system is a key element of the capitalist economic system and involves the involvement in the process of capitalist production of goods and services of a wide category of the population that does not own the means of production and financial resources enough to start your own business. Freedom of enterprise and choice has a close relationship with private property. Free enterprise means that under capitalism, private enterprises can freely buy resources (labor, means of production, land) organize the process of production and sale of goods or services at their own discretion. Free competition means a kind of competition between economic entities, in which commodity producers do not have a decisive influence on the market price, and the additional income received from the sale of each additional unit is the market price.
The present stage of capitalism is called monopoly capitalism. monopoly capitalism- this is capitalism, in which large enterprises and their unions occupy a dominant position in the markets, in order to obtain monopoly profits. Under conditions of monopoly capitalism, free competition between dozens and hundreds of relatively equal enterprises gives way to the domination of a few enterprises and their various associations, unions or agreements, which make it possible to concentrate a significant part of social wealth and production resources. The desire of the capitalists to obtain the maximum profit under conditions of free competition leads to the concentration and centralization of capital, and an increase in the size of enterprises.
monopoly profit- profit received due to the monopoly position of the seller in the market, which is characterized by a high rate of return.
The main ideologist of monopoly capitalism is Karl Marx, who proved that capitalism is focused on creating monopolies and maintaining empires. He called this stage in the development of capitalism imperialism. The concentration of capital in the hands of large enterprises expands the possibilities of applying the achievements of science and technology in production. AT real life monopoly is power over the market. The seller has monopoly power if he can raise the price of his products by limiting the volume of output, goods or services produced. In monopoly markets, there are barriers to entry that make it impossible for a new entity to enter its limits. In the process of transition to the formation of large enterprises and their associations, an important role belongs to the active use of the joint-stock form of capital organization and capitalist management. A joint-stock company is formed on the basis of combining many individual capitals and personal savings of households by issuing shares.
Cartel- an association of several enterprises of the same industry, the participants of which retain ownership of the means of production and the product produced, production and commercial activities.
Syndicate- an association of several enterprises of the same industry, the participants of which retain ownership of the means of production, but do not have ownership of the product produced. Sales within the syndicate are carried out by a common sales company.
Trust- an association of enterprises, firms, the participants of which lose their production and trade independence and carry out their activities taking into account the decisions of the management center.
Concern- a large association of enterprises connected by common interests, contracts, capital, participation in joint activities. International concerns are called transnational corporations. Banks and other lending institutions actively provide loans on favorable terms, assist corporations in the distribution of new issues valuable papers. All these trends are evidence of the formation of financial monopoly capital.
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The conditions for the emergence of capitalism in Russia (an economic system based on private property and freedom of enterprise) developed only in the second half of the 19th century. As in other countries, it did not appear out of nowhere. Signs of birth are perfect new system can be traced back to the Petrine era, when, for example, in the Demidov Ural mines, in addition to serfs, civilian workers also worked.
However, no capitalism in Russia was possible until a huge and bad developed country there was an enslaved peasantry. The liberation of the villagers from the slave position in relation to the landlords became the main signal for the beginning of new economic relations.
Russian serfdom was abolished by Emperor Alexander II in 1861. The Former Peasantry Was a Class The transition to capitalism in the countryside could take place only after the stratification of the rural inhabitants into the bourgeoisie (kulaks) and the proletariat (labor labourers). This process was natural, it took place in all countries. However, capitalism in Russia and all the processes accompanying its emergence had many peculiar features. In the countryside, they were to preserve the rural community.
According to the manifesto of Alexander II, the peasants were declared legally free and received the rights to own property, engage in crafts and trade, conclude deals, etc. Nevertheless, the transition to a new society could not take place overnight. Therefore, following the reform of 1861, communities began to appear in the villages, the basis for the functioning of which was communal land ownership. The team monitored the equal division into individual plots and the three-field system of arable land, in which one part of it was sown with winter crops, the second with spring crops, and the third was left fallow.
The community leveled the peasants and hindered capitalism in Russia, although it could not stop it. Some of the villagers became poor. One-horse peasants became such a layer (two horses were required for a full-fledged economy). These rural proletarians subsisted by earning money on the side. The community did not let such peasants go to the city and did not allow them to sell allotments that formally belonged to them. Free de jure status did not correspond to de facto status.
In the 1860s, when Russia embarked on the path capitalist development, the community delayed this evolution due to its adherence to traditional farming. Peasants within the collective did not need to take the initiative and take risks for their own enterprise and desire to improve agriculture. Compliance with the norm was acceptable and important to conservative villagers. In this, the then Russian peasants were very different from the Western ones, who had long ago become entrepreneurial farmers with their own commodity economy and marketing of products. For the most part, the native villagers were collectivists, which is why the revolutionary ideas of socialism spread so easily among them.
After 1861 on market methods landlords began to rebuild. As in the case of the peasants, the process of gradual stratification started in this milieu. Even many inert and inert landlords had to learn from their own experience what capitalism is. The definition of the history of this term necessarily includes a mention of freelance labor. However, in practice, such a configuration was only a cherished goal, and not the original state of affairs. At first, after the reform, the farms of the landowners depended on the work of the peasants, who took rented land in exchange for their labor.
Capitalism in Russia took root gradually. The newly liberated peasants, who were going to work with their former owners, worked with their implements and livestock. Thus, the landlords were not yet capitalists in the full sense of the word, since they did not invest their own capital in production. The then working off can be considered a continuation of the dying feudal relations.
The agricultural development of capitalism in Russia consisted in the transition from archaic natural to more efficient commodity production. However, the old feudal features can also be noted in this process. The peasants of the new era sold only part of their products, consuming the rest on their own. Capitalist marketability suggested the opposite. All products had to be sold, while the peasant family in this case bought their own food with funds from their own profits. Nevertheless, already in its first decade, the development of capitalism in Russia led to an increase in demand for dairy products and fresh vegetables in cities. Around them, new complexes of private gardening and animal husbandry began to form.
An important result, which led to the emergence of capitalism in Russia, was that it engulfed the country. It was fueled by the gradual stratification of the peasant community. Handicraft production and handicraft production developed.
For feudalism, handicraft was a characteristic form of industry. Becoming in the new economic and social conditions mass, it turned into At the same time there were resellers who connected consumers of goods and producers. These buyers exploited the handicraftsmen and lived off the trading profits. It was they who gradually formed a layer of industrial entrepreneurs.
In the 1860s, when Russia embarked on the path of capitalist development, the first stage of capitalist relations began - cooperation. At the same time, the process of a difficult transition to wage labor in the sectors big industry where for a long time only cheap and disenfranchised serf labor was used. The modernization of production was complicated by the disinterest of the owners. Industrialists paid workers low wages. Poor working conditions noticeably radicalized the proletariat.
In total, capitalism in Russia in the 19th century experienced several waves of rapid industrial growth. One of them was in the 1890s. In that decade, the gradual improvement of economic organization and the development of production techniques led to a significant growth of the market. Industrial capitalism entered a new developed phase, which was embodied by numerous joint-stock companies. The economic growth figures of the late 19th century speak for themselves. In the 1890s industrial output has doubled.
Any capitalism goes through a crisis when it degenerates into monopoly capitalism with bloated corporations owning a certain economic sphere. In imperial Russia, this did not happen to the full extent, including thanks to versatile foreign investments. Especially a lot of foreign money flowed into transport, metallurgy, oil and coal industries. It was at the end of the 19th century that foreigners switched to direct investment, while previously they preferred loans. Such deposits were explained by greater profits and the desire of merchants to earn money.
Russia, without becoming advanced, did not have time to start the mass export of its own capital before the revolution. The domestic economy, on the contrary, willingly accepted injections from more developed countries. Just at this time, "surplus capital" accumulated in Europe, which were looking for their own application in promising foreign markets.
Conditions for export Russian capital it just wasn't. It was hampered by numerous feudal remnants, huge colonial outskirts, and relatively unimportant development of production. If capital was exported, it was mainly in Eastern countries. This was done in the form of production or in the form of loans. Significant funds settled in Manchuria and China (about 750 million rubles in total). Transport was a popular area for them. About 600 million rubles were invested in the Chinese Eastern Railway.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Russian industrial production was already the fifth largest in the world. Wherein domestic economy ranked first in terms of growth. The beginning of capitalism in Russia was left behind, now the country was hastily catching up with the most advanced competitors. The empire also occupied a leading position in terms of concentration of production. Its large enterprises were places of work for more than half of the entire proletariat.
The key features of capitalism in Russia can be described in a few paragraphs. The monarchy was the country of the young market. Industrialization began here later than in others. European countries. As a result, a significant part of industrial enterprises was built quite recently. These facilities are equipped with the most modern technology. Basically, such enterprises belonged to large joint-stock companies. In the West, the situation remained exactly the opposite. European enterprises were smaller and their equipment less perfect.
With significant foreign investment the initial period of capitalism in Russia was distinguished by the triumph of domestic, and not foreign, products. It was simply unprofitable to import foreign goods, but investing money was considered a profitable business. Therefore, in the 1890s. citizens of other states in Russia owned about a third of the share capital.
A serious impetus to the development of private industry was given by the construction of the Great Siberian Railway from European Russia to the Pacific Ocean. This project was state-owned, but the raw materials for it were purchased from entrepreneurs. The Trans-Siberian Railway provided many manufacturers with orders for coal, metal and steam locomotives for years to come. On the example of the highway, one can trace how the formation of capitalism in Russia created a sales market for various sectors of the economy.
As production grew, so did the market. The main items of Russian exports were sugar and oil (Russia provided about half of the world's oil production). Cars were imported in bulk. The share of imported cotton decreased (the domestic economy began to focus on its Central Asian raw materials).
Folding inner national market occurred in conditions when labor power became the most important commodity. The new distribution of income turned out to be in favor of industry and cities, but it infringed on the interests of the countryside. Therefore, the backlog of agricultural areas in socio-economic development in comparison with industrial areas followed. This pattern was characteristic of many young capitalist countries.
The development of the domestic market was facilitated by all the same railways. In 1861-1885. 24 thousand kilometers of tracks were built, which amounted to about a third of the length of the tracks on the eve of the First World War. Moscow became the central transport hub. It was she who connected all regions of a huge country. Of course, such a status could not but accelerate the economic development of the second city. Russian Empire. The improvement of communication routes facilitated the connection between the outskirts and the center. New interregional trade relations arose.
It is significant that throughout the second half of the 19th century, bread production remained approximately at the same level, while industry developed everywhere and increased the volume of output. Another unpleasant trend was the anarchy in railroad tariffs. Their reform took place in 1889. The government is in charge of regulating tariffs. New order significantly helped the development of the capitalist economy and the domestic market.
In the 1880s Monopoly capitalism began to take shape in Russia. Its first shoots appeared in the railway industry. In 1882, the "Union of Rail Manufacturers" appeared, and in 1884 - the "Union of Manufacturers of Rail Fasteners" and the "Union of Bridge Building Plants".
The industrial bourgeoisie was formed. Its ranks included large merchants, former tax-farmers, tenants of estates. Many of them received financial incentives from the government. Merchants were actively involved in capitalist entrepreneurship. The Jewish bourgeoisie was formed. Because of the Pale of Settlement, some outlying provinces of the southern and western strip of European Russia were overflowing with merchant capital.
In 1860 the government founded National Bank. He became the foundation of a young credit system, without which the history of capitalism in Russia cannot be imagined. She stimulated the accumulation financial resources at entrepreneurs. However, there were circumstances that seriously hindered the increase in capital. In the 1860s Russia survived the “cotton famine”, economic crises occurred in 1873 and 1882. But even these fluctuations could not stop the accumulation.
Encouraging the development of capitalism and industry in the country, the state inevitably embarked on the path of mercantilism and protectionism. Engels compared Russia at the end of the 19th century with the France of the era of Louis XIV, where the protection of the interests of domestic producers also created all the conditions for the growth of manufactories.
Any in Russia would not make any sense if a full-fledged working class had not been generated in the country. The impetus for its appearance was the industrial revolution of the 1850-1880s. The proletariat is the class of a mature capitalist society. Its emergence was the most important event social life Russian Empire. The birth of the working masses changed the entire socio-political agenda of a huge country.
The Russian transition from feudalism to capitalism, and consequently the emergence of the proletariat, were swift and radical processes. In their specificity, there were other unique features that arose due to the preservation of the remnants of the former society, landownership and the protective policy of the tsarist government.
In the period from 1865 to 1980, the increase in the proletariat in the factory sector of the economy was 65%, in the mining sector - 107%, in the railway - an incredible 686%. At the end of the 19th century, there were about 10 million workers in the country. Without analyzing the process of formation of a new class, it is impossible to understand what capitalism is. The historical definition gives us a dry formulation, but behind the laconic words and figures stood the fate of millions and millions of people who completely changed their way of life. Labor migration of huge masses has led to a significant increase in the urban population.
Workers existed in Russia before industrial revolution. These were serfs who worked at manufactories, the most famous of which were the Ural enterprises. Nevertheless, the liberated peasants became the main source of growth for the new proletariat. The process of class transformation was often painful. The peasants, who had become impoverished and lost their horses, became workers. The most extensive departure from the village was observed in the central provinces: Yaroslavl, Moscow, Vladimir, Tver. This process affected the southern steppe regions least of all. Also, there was a small retreat in Belarus and Lithuania, although it was there that agrarian overpopulation was observed. Another paradox was that industrial centers people from the outskirts, and not from the nearest provinces, aspired. Many features of the formation of the proletariat in the country were noted by Vladimir Lenin in his works. "The Development of Capitalism in Russia", dedicated to this topic, hit the press in 1899.
The low wages of the proletarians were especially characteristic of small-scale industry. It was there that the most merciless exploitation of workers was traced. The proletarians tried to change these difficult conditions with the help of difficult retraining. Peasants engaged in small-scale crafts became distant otkhodniks. Transitional economic forms activities.
The domestic stages of capitalism associated with the tsarist era can today be regarded only as something remote and infinitely cut off from the modern country. The reason for this was the October Revolution of 1917. The Bolsheviks who came to power began to build socialism and communism. Capitalism with its private property and freedom of enterprise is a thing of the past.
The revival of the market economy became possible only after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The transition from planned production to capitalist production was abrupt, and its main embodiment was the liberal reforms of the 1990s. It was they who built the economic foundations of the modern Russian Federation.
The transition to the market was announced at the end of 1991. In December, the resulting hyperinflation was carried out. At the same time, voucher privatization began, which was necessary for the transfer state property into private hands. In January 1992, the Free Trade Ordinance was issued, opening up new business opportunities. The Soviet ruble was soon abolished, and the Russian National currency survived the default, the collapse of the exchange rate and the denomination. Through the storms of the 1990s, the country built a new capitalism. It is in his conditions that modern Russian society lives.
It arose and functions on the basis of private ownership of the means of production, the market of free competition, a certain level of technology, money circulation, the rational organization of the production process, entrepreneurship and the activities of the entrepreneur as the owner and organizer of production in order to make a profit. The genesis of capitalism is the overcoming of traditionalism and the assertion of the principle of rationality (comparison of utility and costs) in all spheres of public life (religion, science, law, public administration, enterprise organizations). The tendency to rationalize socio-economic life is the basis for the development of capitalism. It always has a specific historical characteristic (commercial, bourgeois-industrial, which was formed in Northwestern Europe in the 16th-15th centuries, and the like). In the development of capitalism, the relationship between religious ideas and economic organization society. Protestantism (Lutheranism, especially Calvinism), which proclaimed as a virtue a labor ascetic lifestyle, thrift and accumulation of capital, the desire to obtain legitimate profit as a result of high professionalism, decency, fidelity to the word and efficiency, stimulated the transformation of religious ethics into a business entrepreneurial type of economic behavior and the emergence new capitalist system.
It is an integral historical and cultural phenomenon or type that has arisen on the basis of a territorial, ethnic, linguistic, political, psychological community. The economic system is a part of society, its driving force is the "spirit of the people", or mentality.
At the turn of the XIX-XX centuries. in terms of growth economic importance large corporations are delimiting ownership and management, the formation of management structures in business. The state bureaucracy that regulates the economy is growing. M. Weber noted that power is the possibility of subordinating other subjects to one's will. The desire for power is an important behavioral factor. The scientist linked the hope of preventing the development of bureaucracy with the emergence of new public institutions capable of combining creative activity and managerial abilities in a form specific to a particular person.
Werner Sombart
(1863-1941) - professor at the Breslav and Berlin universities, author of the works: "Modern capitalism" (1902), "Bourgeois. Studies on the history of the spiritual development of modern economic man"(1913), "Three Political Economies" (1929), "German Socialism" (1934), etc.
Views. Sombart evolved from a commitment to Marxism to conservative nationalism. The work "On the Critique of the Economic System of Karl Marx" was evaluated by F. Engels as a successful presentation of Marxist ideas. Later in the works "Socialism and the social movement in the XIX century." (1896), "The Proletariat. Essays and Etudes" (1906), "Why is there no socialism in the United States?" (1906), the scientist acted as a supporter of liberal reformism, positions of "katheder-socialism". Recognition to the scientist brought fundamental research"Modern capitalism. Historical and systematic study of European economic life from its origin to the present" (1902), which attempts to comprehend the genesis, periodization and forms of development of capitalism.
The main provisions of the doctrine. Sombart:
o Used the concept of "economic system" and "economic era". The economic system is an abstract-theoretical construction, devoid of historical specifics and designed to systematize empirical facts, the organization of economic life, within which a certain economic thinking dominates and a certain technique is used. The economic era is a real-life economic system.
The scientist identified:
The structure of the economic system, covered three groups of elements: 1) technological method of production (substance); 2) form or social relations (a set of social, legal, political); 3) economic spirit (an incentive for development);
Factors of the evolution of the economic system: technical and economic, socio-organizational (institutional) and socio-psychological (public consciousness, types of thinking and ideology);
Elements of the system of the capitalist economy: a) the desire to obtain maximum profit; b) institutional organization (dominance of private property, free sale of labor, the central role of the entrepreneur in the production and distribution of income, an insignificant role of the state); c) progressive technical basis (means of production).
o The evolution of the economic system is multifactorial and integral. He considered the "economic spirit *9, which consists of the "spirit of entrepreneurship" and the "burgher spirit", to be the driving force for development. The first is the synthesis of risk-taking, the thirst for money and adventure, adventurism. The basis of the burgher (petty-bourgeois) spirit is thrift, thriftiness, caution , the ability to count.
Sombart characterized entrepreneurship as a desire for "infinite", for self-determination and power. He singled out six main types of capitalist entrepreneurs: robbers (participants in military campaigns and overseas expeditions for gold and exotic goods), feudal lords (engaged in commerce, mining, etc.), statesmen (who contribute to the development of commercial and industrial companies), speculators (usurers , bankers, stock market players, founders joint-stock companies), merchants (who invest trading capital in the process of producing goods), artisans (they combine a craftsman and a merchant in one person). The scientist considered the functions of entrepreneurs: organizational, based on the ability to select and combine factors of production into a workable whole; marketing, which provides for the ability to negotiate, gain trust and encourage the purchase of the proposed goods; accounting, associated with accurate quantitative calculation and comparison of costs and results.
o Using the concept of "economic spirit" as a criterion for the periodization of the development of capitalism, W. Sombart analyzed three stages: early capitalism (and youth), when economic activity is aimed at accumulating wealth in cash and the first three types of entrepreneurs prevailed; mature (developed) capitalism as an economic system subordinated to production solely for the sake of profit; late capitalism (old age). In the last two stages, speculators, merchants and artisans are typical. Thanks to W. Sombart, the term "capitalism" became commonly used.
At the same time, the scientist did not deny such factors of the genesis of capitalism as the migration of peoples, colonization, the discovery of gold and silver deposits, the development of technology and technology.
In the theory of organized capitalism, the concept of the evolutionary development of capitalism into socialism and social pluralism was laid, according to which the development of society occurs not by changing economic systems, but by their coexistence, the addition of the main elements of a new way of life to the previous ones. The future of capitalism is a "mixed" economic system in which private, cooperative, public, collective, large and small, peasant and handicraft farms will be harmoniously combined. The development of various structures and the strengthening of the influence of the state will contribute to the transformation of capitalism into a stable and highly efficient society of the future.
o Developing the theory of crises, he introduced the concept of economic conjuncture into economic theory, with which he connected the cyclical nature of the capitalist economy, depending on the dynamics of the development of entrepreneurship and income expectations, which causes the deployment of speculation and the consolidation of production. The expansion of production predetermines disproportions between the extractive and processing industries, the volumes of fixed and monetary capital, which inevitably leads to a recession in the economy. The alternation of periods of ups and downs is a necessary precondition for the development of the "capitalist spirit," since the upswing promotes the development of innovation and risk, and during the downturn, the importance of calculation and improvement of organization, aimed at internal improvement of the capitalist system, increases. The factor reducing the cyclical fluctuations of the capitalist economy are the processes of concentration of production and centralization of capital, monopolization of the economy.
Artur Shpithof
(1873-1957) was a leading researcher of the economic situation in Germany. He argued that not only the national economy, but also each stage of its development must be studied from the point of view of a separate economic theory.
The works of scientists of the historical school is an important contribution to the development of economic theory. They contributed to the study of the moral and ethical nature of socio-historical processes, the mentality of the nation as a determining factor in economic behavior, the institutional framework economic activity and factors of their change, economic history.
The outstanding scientist I.A. Schumpeter, analyzing the achievements of the historical school, cites their ideas as follows:
1. Relativistic approach. Detailed historical research teaches how untenable the idea of the existence of generally accepted rules of thumb in the field of economic policy. Moreover, the possibility of the existence of general laws is refuted by the proposition about the historical causality of social events.
2. The position of the unity of social life and the inextricable link between its elements. A tendency to go beyond mere social doctrines.
3. Anti-rational approach. Plurality of motives and little importance of purely logical motives of human actions. This position was put forward in the form of ethical arguments and in the psychological analysis of the behavior of individuals and masses.
4. Evolutionary approach. Evolutionary theories are designed to use historical material.
5. Position on the role of interests in the interaction of individuals. What is important is how specific events develop and specific conditions are formed, as well as what specifically causes them, and not the general causes of all social events.
6. Organic approach. Analogy between social and physical organisms. The original organic concept, according to which National economy exists outside and above various individuals, later replaced by the concept that individual economies, which make up the national, are closely dependent on each other.
Social direction in political economy.
throughout the 1980s and 1990s. - In the 30s of the XX century, in Germany and Austria, an economic doctrine arose and developed, which was called the "social school" (social direction in political economy, socio-legal school). The social school is considered the heir to the new historical school, but, unlike it, did not deny the importance of economic theory, but tried to create an economic theory with an ethical-legal approach to economic phenomena. its representatives aim economic activity determined by law, politics and ideology, explored economic life society as a joint activity of people bound by the rules of law.
The beginning of the social direction economic research was due to the formation of a new system of organization of a market economy (the processes of monopolization, corporatization and corporatization, the growing role of the state and workers' associations), the aggravation of the problems of social inequality and social protection, the need for ideological opposition to Marxism.
The social school was not a holistic economic doctrine, it covered the following trends:
o socio-legal, or socio-ethical, which is characterized by the works of Rudolf Stoltzmann (1852-1930) "Social categories" (1896) and "The goal in the national economy", Rudolf Stammler (1856-1938) "Economy and law from the point of view of materialistic understanding of history" (1896), Alfred Amonne (1883-1962) "The subject and basic concepts of political economy" (1911), Karla Dolja (1864 - 1943) "Theoretical political economy" (1916), Franz Petri "The social content of Marx's theory of value " (1916);
o the theory of liberal socialism, set forth in the work of Franz Oppenheimer (1864-1943) "Marx's Teachings on the Basic Law of Social Development" (1903);
o the theory of universalism by Otmar Spann (1878-1950), who led the social movement in Austria.
The representatives of the social direction in political economy are united by the following methodological principles:
o denial of objective economic laws, the assertion that social laws are the laws of human behavior;
o interpretation of production as a purely technical eternal process of interaction between factors of production, which is not associated with a specific social structure;
o social approach to the analysis of economic phenomena, their study from the standpoint of sociology - the science of society as an integral system. The determining influence of economic factors on social, political, legal, spiritual processes of social development was denied. The economy was considered as a component of the social system, economic processes were analyzed as a result of the interaction of economic, political, legal, ideological and social factors. The primacy of the legal and ethical aspects of evolution was recognized economic phenomena and processes. This testified to the institutional nature of the ideas of scientists;
o protection of private property, denial of the exploitation of hired labor, justification of the need social reforms and state-legal regulation of production;
o the application of the principle of historicism and a systematic approach to the analysis of economic life, the rationale for the evolutionary development of capitalism.
The social school has made significant contributions to economic theory.
Economic development was seen as a joint activity of people bound by the rule of law. Own legal regulation determines the form of social structure. Legal factors determine ethical standards. A new method of cognition of economic processes was proposed - teleological1, according to which the task of economics is to study the relationship between goals and means to achieve them. The main goals were considered to be the desire to meet the needs, to ensure a "worthy existence" of citizens. A. Spann in the work "Foundation National economy"(1918) outlined the concept of universalism, in which he substantiated the need to strengthen state-legal regulation economic development.
Most representatives of the social school rejected the theory of value.
Yes-A. Amonn analyzed the theory of value of the representatives of the mathematical school, he identified value with the price, which was considered as a resultant subjective assessments certain goods by buyers and sellers. G. Stolzman processed the "sociological19 version of the theory of marginal utility, combining the theory of marginal utility with the "social theory of distribution." value, believed that price formation is a purely empirical random process, devoid of patterns.
Representatives of the social school paid much attention to distribution relations. They interpreted them from socio-legal and socio-ethical approaches, analyzed them independently of the theory of value or opposed the latter (Col. Diehl), considered the theory of distribution as the original theory of value (G. Stolzman). Class contradictions between workers and entrepreneurs were studied by analyzing their share in the social product. Contradictions were perceived as normal phenomena associated with the desire of each of the classes to get more income. Supporters of the social direction emphasized the importance of the functions of entrepreneurs as organizers of production, their right to receive remuneration to ensure a socially determined subsistence level ("a unit of income"). Likewise, the employee must be provided living wage according to his social position. A. Spann in the theory of reverse surplus value noted that the capitalist exploits the workers, but vice versa, therefore the Marxist concept of surplus value is erroneous. F. Oppenheimer idealized the capitalism of free competition, which he identified with simple commodity production and private property, considered natural and interpreted as liberal socialism - free from exploitation social order based on private property and market exchange.
The basis of a new socially just social order, according to scientists, should be market economy with a joint-stock form of ownership and a corporate organization of production, which are capable of ensuring the unity of interests of workers and entrepreneurs.
The methodology and traditions of the latest historical and social schools influenced the further development of economic theory, primarily the development of the institutional one directly.
Capitalism is an economic productive order of division, created on private property, legal equality and independence of entrepreneurship. The most important criterion for acceptance economic issues is the desire to increase capital and profit.
Something passed into capitalism from previous eras of feudalism, and some of the restrictions were purely born in “capitalism” itself.
In today's world, the word "capitalism" is observed quite often. This word obliges a single social system in which we currently live. In addition, many do not even realize that "capitalism" is relatively new concept of social systems in the modern world and literally a couple of centuries ago world history humanity was formed differently.
Capitalism is not only economic system, and also a form of society that combines morality and norms of life.
Evolutionary capitalism proposes:
Capitalism as a social the system on which most of the countries of the world live, according to the laws of this system for productivity and the division of trade, refers to a small percentage of the population, in other words, specifically defined people, and they belong to the “capitalist class”.
Economic capitalism is based on the production of goods and the provision of services, commercial activity, the main part of the goods is produced solely for the sale and accumulation of capital.
The bulk of the population sells their physical labor or mental labor in return wages or any other encouragement, representatives of this segment of the population belong to the "working class" group. This proletarian class needs to develop a product or provide other services, which are later sold with the direct goal of enriching income, in this order the working sections of the population are exploited by mutually beneficial, mutual agreement.
The means of production can be at the disposal of private individuals, the costs in the process of production of a particular product also fall on private individuals.
capitalist social activity arises spontaneously, individuals can make decisions on their own and take the risk.
The configuration of economic unwinding, which is characterized by the following main features:
Even the modern Capitalist system can be viewed as a combination of private entrepreneurs and state control, but capitalism at such an ideal level cannot be found in any country in the world, there will always be free competition.
In our modern world there is a clear division into classes.
This statement is easily explained by the reality of the world in which we live: there will be an exploiter, there will also be a hired person - this is called capitalism and this is its essential feature.
Some may say that modern world divided into a lot of classes, for example, the middle class, in fact, this is not at all the case! There is a chain in the key to understanding capitalism. This is when there is a boss and a subordinate, and it doesn't matter how many classes there are. By definition, there is only one result - everyone will be subordinate to the superior, and this is the same one with us. small percentage population of the "capitalist class"
As practice shows, capitalism does not have the right to solve certain problems of mankind, does not solve the problem of inequality, poverty in general, racism and much more, but the free market gives a chance to win the biggest win, albeit a small number of players.
Capitalism is only one of the socio-economic formations that existed in the world. The history of its formation is connected with such phenomena as colonial expansion and the exploitation of workers, for whom the 80-hour work week was becoming the norm. T&P publishes an excerpt from Cambridge economist Ha-Jun Chang's How Does the Economy Work? , which was recently published by the MIF publishing house.
The economy of Western Europe is indeed
growing slowly...
Capitalism originated in Western Europe, in particular in Great Britain and the Benelux countries (which today include Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg), in the 16th and 17th centuries. Why it originated there, and not, say, in China or India, which were then comparable to Western Europe in terms of economic development, is the subject of intense and lengthy discussions. Everything has been offered as an explanation, from the contempt felt by the Chinese elite for practical pursuits (such as trade and industry), to a map of the British coalfields and the fact of the discovery of America. We will not dwell on this discussion for a long time. Let us take it for granted that capitalism began to develop in Western Europe.
Before his appearance, Western European societies, like all others in the pre-capitalist era, changed very slowly. People were mostly organized around agriculture, which for many centuries used almost the same technology with a limited degree of commerce and craft production.
Between the 10th and 15th centuries, that is, during the Middle Ages, per capita income increased by 0.12 percent per year. Therefore, incomes in 1500 were only 82 percent higher than in 1000. By comparison, this is the amount that China, with its 11 percent annual growth, achieved in the six years between 2002 and 2008. It follows that from the point of view of material progress, one year in China today is equivalent to 83 years in medieval Western Europe (three people could be born and die during this time - in the Middle Ages, the average life expectancy was only 24 years).
…but still faster than the economy
any other country in the world
Notwithstanding the above, economic growth in Western Europe still far outpaced that of Asia and Eastern Europe (including Russia), which are estimated to have grown three times slower (0.04 percent). This means that over 500 years the income local population rose by only 22 percent. If a Western Europe moved like a turtle, other countries were more like snails.
Capitalism emerged 'in slow motion'
Capitalism appeared in the 16th century. But its spread was so slow that it is impossible to pinpoint the exact date of his birth. Between 1500 and 1820, Western Europe's per capita income growth rate was still 0.14 percent—essentially the same as in the Middle Ages (0.12 percent). In Great Britain and the Netherlands, an acceleration in this indicator was observed at the end of the 18th century, especially in the sectors of the production of cotton fabrics and ferrous metals. As a result, from 1500 to 1820, Great Britain and the Netherlands achieved per capita economic growth rates of 0.27 and 0.28 percent, respectively. And although these figures are very small by modern standards, they were twice the average Western European figure. This has led to a number of changes.
Beginning of colonial expansion
From the beginning of the 15th century, the countries of Western Europe began to expand rapidly. Appropriately referred to as the Age of Discovery, this expansion included the expropriation of land and resources and the enslavement of the indigenous population through the establishment of a colonial regime.
Starting with Portugal in Asia, and Spain in the Americas, from the end of the 15th century, the peoples of Western Europe began to ruthlessly seize new lands. By the middle of the 18th century, North America was divided between England, France and Spain. Most of the South American countries were ruled by Spain and Portugal until the 1810s and 1820s. Parts of India were ruled by the British (mainly Bengal and Bihar), the French (southeast coast) and the Portuguese (various coastal regions, notably Goa). Around this time, the settlement of Australia begins (the first penal colony appeared there in 1788). Africa at that time was not “mastered” so well, there were only small settlements of the Portuguese (the previously uninhabited islands of Cape Verde, Sao Tome and Principe) and the Dutch (Cape Town, founded in the 17th century).
Francis Hayman. Robert Clive meets with Mir Jafar after the Battle of Plassey. 1757
Colonialism was based on capitalist principles. Symbolically, until 1858, British rule in India was carried out by a corporation (the East India Company) and not by the government. These colonies brought new resources to Europe. At first, the expansion was motivated by the search for precious metals to use as money (gold and silver), as well as spices (especially black pepper). Over time, plantations were established in the new colonies - especially in the United States, Brazil and the Caribbean - where the labor of slaves, mainly exported from Africa, was used. Plantations were established to grow and supply Europe with new crops such as cane sugar, rubber, cotton and tobacco. It is impossible to imagine a time when Britain did not have traditional chips, Italy did not have tomatoes and polenta (made from corn), and India, Thailand and Korea did not know what chili is.
Colonialism leaves deep scars
Debates have been going on for many years about whether capitalism would have developed in the 16th and 18th centuries without colonial resources: precious metals used as money, new foodstuffs such as potatoes and sugar, and raw materials for industrial production such as cotton. Although there is no doubt that the colonialists benefited greatly from their sale, most likely capitalism would have developed in European countries without them. In doing so, colonialism has no doubt ruined colonized societies.
The indigenous population was exterminated or brought to the brink of extinction, and its land with all its resources was taken away. The marginalization of indigenous peoples has been so profound that Evo Morales, the current president of Bolivia, elected in 2006, is only the second head of state in the Americas to have been an indigenous person since the Europeans arrived there in 1492. (the first was Benito Juarez, President of Mexico in 1858-1872).
Many Africans - estimated at about 12 million - were captured and taken to Europe and the Arab countries. Not only was this a tragedy for those who lost their freedom (even if they did manage to survive the arduous journey), but it also debilitated many African societies and destroyed their social structure. Territories acquired arbitrary borders - this fact affects the domestic and international policies of a number of countries to this day. The fact that so many interstate borders in Africa are in the form of a straight line is a clear confirmation of this, since natural borders are never straight, they usually follow rivers, mountain ranges and other geographical features.
Colonialism often involved the deliberate cessation of existing productive activities in economically developed regions. For example, in 1700, Great Britain banned the import of Indian calico (we mentioned this in chapter 2) to promote its own production, thereby dealing a heavy blow to the Indian cotton industry. This industry was completely destroyed in the middle of the 19th century by the flow of imported fabrics, which at that time were already being produced in Britain by mechanization. As a colony, India could not apply tariffs and other policies to protect its producers from British imports. In 1835, Lord Bentinck, Governor-General of the East India Company, famously said: "The plains of India turn white with the bones of weavers."
Start of the industrial revolution
Capitalism really took off around 1820 throughout Western Europe and later in the European colonies in North America and Oceania. The acceleration of economic growth was so dramatic that the next half century after 1820 became known as the Industrial Revolution. Over those fifty years, per capita income in Western Europe grew by 1 percent, which is very small by today's standards (Japan saw such an increase in income during the so-called lost decade of the 1990s), and compared with a growth rate of 0. The 14 percent observed between 1500 and 1820 was true turbojet acceleration.
The 80-Hour Workweek: The Suffering of Some
people only got stronger
However, this acceleration in the growth of per capita income was initially accompanied by a decline in living standards for many. Many people whose skills have become obsolete, such as textile artisans, have lost their jobs because they have been replaced by machines driven by cheaper, unskilled workers, many of them children. Some machines were even designed for the growth of the child. People employed in factories or small workshops that supplied raw materials for them worked very hard: 70-80 hours a week were considered the norm, someone worked more than 100 hours a week, and usually only half a day was allocated for rest on Sunday.
Working conditions were extremely dangerous. Many British workers in the cotton industry died of lung diseases due to the dust generated during the production process. The urban working class lived very cramped, sometimes 15-20 people huddled in a room. It was considered quite normal that hundreds of people use the same toilet. People were dying like flies. In the poor areas of Manchester, life expectancy was 17 years, which is 30 per cent lower than in the whole of Great Britain before the Norman Conquest in 1066 (then life expectancy was 24 years).
The myth of the free market and free trade:
How did capitalism really develop?
The development of capitalism in the countries of Western Europe and their colonies in the 19th century is often associated with the spread of free trade and the free market. It is generally accepted that the governments of these states did not tax and did not restrict international trade(called free trade) and did not interfere with the functioning of the market (free market) at all. This state of affairs led to the fact that these countries managed to develop capitalism. It is also commonly believed that the United Kingdom and the United States led the way because they were the first to adopt the free market and free trade.
Free trade is propagated mainly by means far from free
While free trade was not the cause of capitalism, it did spread throughout the 19th century. It manifested itself, in part, in the heart of the capitalist world of the 1860s, when Great Britain accepted this principle and signed bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs), in which both sides eliminated import restrictions and export customs duties for each other, with a number of states Western Europe. However, it has spread most of all on the periphery of capitalism - in the countries of Latin America and Asia, moreover, as a result of the fact that no one usually associates with the word "free" - the use of force or, in any case, the threat of its use.
Colonization was the most obvious route for "unfree free trade" to spread, but even the many countries fortunate enough not to become colonies had to accept it too. They were forced by gunboat diplomacy to sign unequal treaties that deprived them, among other things, of tariff autonomy (the right to set their own tariffs). They were only allowed to use the low uniform tariff rate(3-5 per cent) - enough to raise some government revenue, but too small to protect fragile industries. The most shameful of these facts is the Treaty of Nanjing, which China had to sign in 1842 after the defeat in the First Opium War. But unequal treaties also began to be signed with Latin American countries until they gained independence in the 1810s and 1820s. Between 1820 and 1850, a number of other states were also forced to sign similar treaties: the Ottoman Empire (the predecessor of Turkey), Persia (today's Iran), Siam (today's Thailand), and even Japan. The Latin American unequal treaties expired in the 1870s and 1880s, while the treaties with Asian countries continued into the 20th century.
This statement is too far from the truth. The government played a leading role at the initial stage of development of capitalism both in Great Britain and in the USA and other countries of Western Europe.
The inability to protect and defend young industries of their industries, whether as a result of direct colonial domination or unequal treaties, significantly contributed to the economic regression of the countries of Asia and Latin America during that period: there was a negative growth in per capita income (at a rate of -0.1 and - 0.04 percent per year, respectively).
Capitalism shifts into a higher gear: the beginning of mass production
The development of capitalism began to accelerate around 1870. Between 1860 and 1910, clusters of new technological innovations appeared, resulting in the rise of the so-called heavy and chemical industries: the production of electrical equipment, internal combustion engines, synthetic dyes, artificial fertilizers and other products. Unlike the technologies of the Industrial Revolution, which were invented by practical men with good intuition, new technologies were developed through the systematic application of scientific and engineering principles. Thus, any invention could be reproduced and improved very quickly.
In addition, the organization of the production process in many industries has been revolutionized by the invention of the mass production system. Thanks to the introduction of a moving assembly line (belt conveyor) and interchangeable parts, costs have dropped dramatically. This is the main (almost universally used) system in our time, despite frequent claims of its demise since 1908.
New economic institutions emerged to manage the growing scale of production
At its peak, capitalism acquired the basic institutional structure that still exists today; it includes limited liability companies, bankruptcy law, the central bank, social security, labor law, and more. These institutional shifts have occurred mainly due to changes in underlying technologies and policies.
Due to the growing need for large-scale investments, the principle of limited liability, which was previously applied only to preferred companies, has become widespread. Therefore, it could now be used by any company that met certain minimum conditions. With access to an unprecedented scale of investment, limited liability companies have become the most powerful vehicle for the development of capitalism. Karl Marx, who recognized their great potential before any ardent supporter of capitalism, called them "capitalist production in its highest development."
Before the British reform of 1849, the essence of bankruptcy law was to punish an insolvent businessman, in the worst case, debtor's prison. New laws introduced in the second half of the 19th century gave failed entrepreneurs a second chance by allowing them to avoid paying interest to creditors while they reorganized their business (according to chapter 11 federal law on bankruptcy of the United States, introduced in 1898) and forcing the latter to write off part of their debts. Now doing business is not so risky.
The Rhodes ColossusStriding from Cape Town to Cairo, 1892
As companies grew in size, so did banks. At that time, there was a danger that the failure of one bank could destabilize the entire financial system Therefore, to combat this problem, central banks were created to act as lenders of last resort - and the first in 1844 was the Bank of England.
Due to the widespread socialist agitation and increased pressure on the government from reformists regarding the position of the working class, a number of laws on social security and labor were introduced starting in the 1870s: accident insurance appeared, health insurance, old-age pensions and unemployment insurance. Many countries banned the work of young children (usually under the age of 10-12) and limited the number of working hours for older children (initially to only 12 hours). The new laws also regulated the conditions and hours of work for women. Unfortunately, this was not done out of chivalrous motives, but because of an arrogant attitude towards the weaker sex. It was believed that, unlike men, women lacked mental abilities, so they could sign an unfavorable labor contract for them - in other words, women needed to be protected from themselves. These welfare and labor laws smoothed out the rough edges of capitalism and made the lives of many poor people better, if only a little at first.
Institutional changes have contributed economic growth. Limited liability companies and debtor-friendly bankruptcy laws have reduced the risk associated with doing business, thereby encouraging wealth creation. Activity central bank, on the one hand, and the welfare and labor laws on the other, have also contributed to growth by increasing economic and political stability, respectively, which has allowed for greater investment and hence further acceleration of the economy. The growth rate of per capita income in Western Europe rose from 1 percent a year during the peak period 1820–1870 to 1.3 percent during 1870–1913.
