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Theories of Surplus: Mercantilism, Smith & Marx
Fichas del conjunto (8)
- 1What is capitalism?- Econ system based on private ownership of means of production & operation for profit
- Central characteristics:
capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, private property, recognition of property rights, wage labour
- Private ownership of means of production
- Plato: a collective ownership of means of production is necessary to prevent social discord
- Aristotle: collective ownership is inefficient as people won't feel responsible towards stuff - won't try to improve it - 2Hobbes vs Locke- Hobbes: our rel. owning stuff is v complex. Foundation of societal relationships. needs governing to prevent anarchy seeping into community
- Locke https://www.goconqr.com/en-GB- govt/kings cannot be foundation of this rel. Precedes govt. Labour theory of property - products/goods/services ancient - how we interact w environment. It is natural so shouldn't be governed - 3Mercantilism- We all want wealth, power - power is wealth
- How to accumulate wealth - take more money from them than they take from you
- Mercantilism based upon idea that you want to sell to others & not buy from others (only basic - natural resources - add value & sell back)
- Dominated world - 15-19th C
- England banned production from France - no domestic producers competing w France
- At national level, doesn't work - who would buy goods - no trade - bad
- Absolute advantage - France better at producing wine - don't try compete - give them something in return for wine
- Worked well 16-18th C due to colonialism - complementary. Natural resources from colonies - wealth. FRee labour.
- Protect infant industries, subsidise them
- To sell more than buy from world - suppress wages in country - sell more due to lower prices - people cannot afford to buy things - less money out - 4More on mercantilism- - based in private investment - accumulation of capital in certain hands - DEIC
- Mega corporations - could invest in these - own bit of company, sell, make profit
- don't have to produce/own means of production - need credibility for banks to loan you money - countries need credibility
- countries stopped defaulting on debt
-By 18th C had modern, huge corporations already working, that were larger
than countries
– BUT not capitalism bc no competitive markets - monopoly DEIC - 51776- Wealth of Nations written printed - capitalism invented
- Adam Smith as product of capitalism/time
- People started seeing wealth as good thing
- Wealth of nation based not on gold but on child's future
- Wealth of Nations key
- Smith vs slavery bc inefficient - have to enslave, hire guards, feed them, shelter them - extra costs. Instead wages so sustain themselves. Encourages innovation
- Let products fluctuate - people will define real value
- Invisible hand will adjust prices & reach equilibrium point - let things be
- Smith vs central governance, tariffs, decisions made centrally
- Problem: big fish eat small fish in market. Bigger companies, investors, wealthier individuals dominate market - monopolies - inequalities. - 6Marx- Pol econ had achieved a certain comprehensiveness w Adam Smith
- Continuing work of Smith - from bourgeoisie rise to further contradictions within capitalism
- Increased productivity in pin factory if every person does 1 thing - BUT lost rel. w what we produced
- Evolution of Smith ideas - 7Norman, J: How Adam Smith would fix capitalism'- Capitalism failing, rise of populism/nationalism - legitimacy of capitalist market system being q
- Those on right see him as: Author of Wealth of Nations, advocate of free markets, 'invisible hand', individual liberty
- Those on left: apologist for wealth/inequality/human selfishness
- He doesn't oppose all state interventions - advocates specific forms of taxation & regulation of banks - not laissez-faire
- Wealth of Nations - sets out many central intellectual tools of pol. econ: div of labour, market equilibrium, benefits of free trade
- Smith first to put markets at centre of economic itself
- Sees markets as living institutions embedded in specific cultures & mediated by social norms/trust - shaped by participants (dynamic)
- Importance of effective competition - prevent crony capitalism, rent extraction
- markets as socially constructed - exist to serve public good - 8marx's Communist Manifesto- Elements of bourgeoisie developed from: discovery of America, colonisation, trade w
colonies, East Indian & Chinese markets, increase in means of exchange/commodities, commerce, navigation, industry
From manufacture to Modern Industry, from industrial middle class to industrial
millionaires. Modern industry established world market given development to
commerce, navigation communication
Bourgeoisie as product of long course of development each step in development
accompanied by corresponding political advance of that class
- Bourgeoisise exploitative
- Consumerism, expansion of markets, interdependence
- Urbanisation
- Bourgeoisie has concentrated property in few hands, agglomerated production.
- Bourgeois society uncontrolled - crises evidence of this. Too powerful- disorder.
- Resolve crises through destruction & exploitation
- Capital is developed as is modern working class - labourers as commodity in
capitalist system - thus exposed to fluctuations of market. Has become appendage of machine. Low wages, long hour
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- Descripción
- GPE basically always in rel. to Capitalism - Overarching force - dominant ideology - how we live/produce/consumer
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- Isla Duguid
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