How do we know when capitalism has run its course?

[VILemon]

I think the title says it all. The question is meant as a genuinely socialist one, and not one which presupposes any sort of Marxist determinism etc.; taking into account all of capitalism's ills and contradictions, it appears to still be revolutionizing means of production as well as those involved in communication, bio-medicine etc.

We see many countries which have attempted to transition to a socialist mode of production, mostly through feudal or other pre-industrial configurations. Oftentimes, there are many gains but also the legitimacy of the worker's state (so-called or otherwise) is dependent upon the presumption of power over the long-term - allowing the development which would have needed to happen under capitalism in order to transition to socialism to occur - although the longer a socialist state is in power the more likely a revolution must combat opportunism, bureaucracy, coups, corruption...

Is it possible that capitalism is still in a revolutionary stage from mercantilism and feudalism? Socialists have been ready to transition from capitalism for more than 100 years now...were they premature then, and/or are we premature now?

This is not my abandonment from any progressive or revolutionary aims. Rather, a purely theoretical question which has been bothering me and some friends for a while. Thanks, in advance, for your input.

[danny bohy]

Capitalism has run its course. but we will know its completely done when the world is half under water, the other half is full off readioactive fallout we are all dying and the "elite" class have escaped to the moon.

[VILemon]

What a devastatingly interesting argument. Come on...I'm not advocating the continuation of capitalism, I'm asking a theoretical question. If you don't think that there's any interest in it, then don't respond.

In principle, the world could run over with water and we could die of radioactive fallout under any mode of production. These things are dire problems, for sure, and capitalism is a major part of these problems, but saying that we just have to overcome capitalism to solve these issues is dangerously naive.

[Q]

The decline of capitalism as a system has been happening since the mid of the 19th, with the emergence of the workers movement as a class force striving for overcoming it. Today this decline in the west is most apparent with creation not of productive forces, but mostly of useless jobs regarding the creation of new things, or at all.

I recently read an interesting article on the subject, let me quote a bit:

Social orders or forms of class rule - the slave-based urbanism of antiquity, feudalism, capitalism - are over historical time replaced by radically different social orders and forms of class rule. That is to say that each individual social order as such rises and declines. We have no reason to suppose that capitalism will be uniquely persistent.

To say that a social order or form of class rule is rising is to say that it plays an increasing role in organising the society’s productive activity and shaping its structure and self-image, replacing any prior social order. To say that it is declining is - obviously - the reverse: that it is decreasingly able to organise the society’s productive activity, that it decreasingly shapes the society’s structure and self-image, that it begins to be displaced by other forms of social order and to lose its legitimacy.

The phase of decline is characterised by statisation. The Roman empire, which artificially created and subsidised cities to keep them alive and attempted to intervene against the potentes, making the free peasants into private clients, represented the decline of the social order of classical antiquity. European monarchical absolutism and the analogous Tokugawa shogunate were forms of the decline of feudalism.

Like certain sorts of coral atolls, social orders may enter into decline at their historical centres even while they are spreading geographically. This is clearest in the case of feudalism. Feudalism was at its apogee in western Europe in the 11th-12th century, but already facing challenges from the rising proto-bourgeoisie and in decline at its core from the 13th century; but it continued to expand geographically both in eastern Europe and in the last phase when as it were ‘neo-feudal’ societies were created by the Spanish state in Latin America in the early modern period.

To say that capitalism is in decline is to say that it is in an analogous phase: declining at the core, while continuing to expand at the periphery at the expense of subsistence and artisan production, forms of feudalism and other pre-capitalist societies. At the core the decline began in the mid-19th century. The rise of the organised workers’ movement, beginning with Chartism and the early trade unions, led to concessions to the working class which had to be organised by the state. The biggest of these concessions was the extension of the suffrage.

This has involved the rise of a different organising principle of society: that of conscious, collective social decision-making: expressed in a distorted form in the form of the growth of state provision and regulation at the expense of market provision.
Read the rest of the article (http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/799/crisis.php).

[The Red Next Door]

we know when the economy get 100 times worst and the suicide rate internationally fly through the roof.

[LeninistKing]

You know you are not so far from truth. The other day i read in http://www.rense.com/ that the global elites have some sort of space ships parked in space, just in case things get too roudy and rebellious for them here on earth. And you know that this world is ruled by psychopaths by crazy people, I know this is far-fetched but who knows, it might be true

.


Capitalism has run its course. but we will know its completely done when the world is half under water, the other half is full off readioactive fallout we are all dying and the "elite" class have escaped to the moon.

[robbo203]

How do we know when capitalism has run its course? When a substantial majority understand and want a genuine socialist alternative. Until then you are stuck with capitalism

[ROBOTROT]

The problem with capitalism is that it is remarkably dynamic. In the 1930s and 40s, leftists the world over were insisting that the death knell of capitalism had already been rung and that it was the end. This was obviously followed, for a variety of reasons, by 20 odd years of prosperity for the west throughout the post-war era which did much to discredit socialists.

Similarly, last year when the GFC hit many leftists were insisting that it was the end of capitalism, that it would never recover and that the revolution was immanent. Looking at it now, it certainly doesn't seem that way (although we must be cautious about saying whether it is over yet or not).

I'm actually of the opinion now that it is impossible to say right now when capitalism will have its course. Obviously there are still deep structural problems concerning debt, unemployment and profit rates that need to be resolved or postponed (probably by making the working class pay for them). There is also the growing global food crisis which has already begun to cause social instability among the more vulnerable people of the world and global warming is increasingly a threat. But I would hesitate to say that any sort of total collapse is immanent, or even likely in the foreseeable future.

Capitalism has been ready for socialism for a long time now. I guess if you want to overcome it the answer isn't to wait for the cataclysmic end but to work in the here and now in building the socialist movement. I think the actions of revolutionaries are more likely to bring down capitalism than its inherent contradictions.

[therockman]

I think that the occupants of Spaceship Earth will know that Capitalism has runs its course when the President of The United States goes on national television and announces that the US monetary system has been disbanded and that henceforth all food and water will be free.

[革命者]

Capitalism (if you include imperialism) will have run its course when we want what will happen.

I am sorry if its too much like determinism, but that's what I think.

[Jolly Red Giant]

Capitalism has run it's course simply because it is no longer capable of developing the means of production. Any society that can develop the means of production is progressive - once it begins to act as a break it becomes reactionary and has passed its sell-by date. Capitalism actually hit this wall a century ago.

That is however different from what is required to remove capitalism - capitalism will continue to exist (despite being incapable of developing the means of production) - and probably in a more barbaric form - until such time as the development of the class consciousness of the working class and the necessary conditions for a successful socialist revolution.

[Joe_Germinal]

I want to second what Jolly Red Giant said, and articulate fully the argument his is making implicitly. There are two different questions which posters are treating as one. The first is whether capitalism has exhausted its progressive historical role:


Capitalism has run it's course simply because it is no longer capable of developing the means of production. Any society that can develop the means of production is progressive - once it begins to act as a break it becomes reactionary and has passed its sell-by date. Capitalism actually hit this wall a century ago.

Exactly. I would only add that capitalism has socialized production, which was one of its most important tasks, and will because of this will be in a permanent cycle of crises as long as ownership remains private.

The second question is when can we say that capitalism defeated to the point at which it can longer save itself? This is a political not an economic questions. Several posters have rightly pointed out that capital will almost certainly survive the present crisis:


capitalism will continue to exist (despite being incapable of developing the means of production) - and probably in a more barbaric form - until such time as the development of the class consciousness of the working class and the necessary conditions for a successful socialist revolution.

That is to say, although capitalism long ago fulfilled its historic potential, it will limp along ever more destructively until buried by workers power.

As to the OP's point about capitalism's continued ability to revolutionize communications, etc. That has nothing to do with whether or not capitalism has run its course, the development of new technologies and technical practices is not the same as revolutionizing the means of production.

[LeninistKing]

Damn man i can't wait for a socialist system. In a socialist system in USA, the entertainments and pleasures would be more socialized to the society, so people would be able to join gyms, fitness centers, spas, take vacation cruises and enjoy life a lot more than under the current capitalist system of USA, where things like fitness clubs, vacation cruises, plastic surgeries etc. are only enjoyed the the bourgeoise classes

Nationalize Golds Gyms and Disney World !!

.



I think the title says it all. The question is meant as a genuinely socialist one, and not one which presupposes any sort of Marxist determinism etc.; taking into account all of capitalism's ills and contradictions, it appears to still be revolutionizing means of production as well as those involved in communication, bio-medicine etc.

We see many countries which have attempted to transition to a socialist mode of production, mostly through feudal or other pre-industrial configurations. Oftentimes, there are many gains but also the legitimacy of the worker's state (so-called or otherwise) is dependent upon the presumption of power over the long-term - allowing the development which would have needed to happen under capitalism in order to transition to socialism to occur - although the longer a socialist state is in power the more likely a revolution must combat opportunism, bureaucracy, coups, corruption...

Is it possible that capitalism is still in a revolutionary stage from mercantilism and feudalism? Socialists have been ready to transition from capitalism for more than 100 years now...were they premature then, and/or are we premature now?

This is not my abandonment from any progressive or revolutionary aims. Rather, a purely theoretical question which has been bothering me and some friends for a while. Thanks, in advance, for your input.

[Jolly Red Giant]

Nationalize Golds Gyms and Disney World !!
Make Micky Mouse wear Red, Santa Claus wear Green and shoot Ronald McDonald.

[ROBOTROT]

Capitalism has run it's course simply because it is no longer capable of developing the means of production. Any society that can develop the means of production is progressive - once it begins to act as a break it becomes reactionary and has passed its sell-by date. Capitalism actually hit this wall a century ago.
I disagree. Capitalism is revolutionising the means if production constantly. Remember: 'All that's solid melts into air'.

Marx's tendency for the rate of profit to fall (to put it simply) rests on the fact that the means of production develop so fast that capitalists must invest more and more profits into them just to remain competitive.

What holds things back in capitalism are the relations of production. The method with which labour is employed in production, production is controlled, etc.. I.e the wage system and private property. IMHO it is this which will bring capitalism's demise because it creates a working class which is the potential agent of the revolutionary change to socialism.

[La Comédie Noire]

Well as it stands right now we need Infrastructure rehauls in the United States and Great Britain, I cannot speak with authority about anywhere else. In Business Cycle theory entrepreneurs with a fresh attitude and the capital to match it are supposed to come along and meet the demand. But will they? Unemployment in the United States is up, by official statistics, 10 percent with the majority of the potential workforce paying out the ass for degrees that won't even be worth anything when they leave college.

It's not like the technology's not there either. They've already developed electric trucking and small nuclear reactors that have the ability to power 20,000 households. Not to mention the endless list of repairs that could be done on some of the FDR era public works.

So we have a great need and the labor to meet it, but alas capital keeps us waiting.


What holds things back in capitalism are the relations of production. The method with which labour is employed in production, production is controlled, etc.. I.e the wage system and private property. IMHO it is this which will bring capitalism's demise because it creates a working class which is the potential agent of the revolutionary change to socialism.I think this is part of it. Capitalism isn't exactly good at the essentials. Health Care, Housing, Energy, transportation, works projects. If you meet peoples' needs than what's the incentive for them to sell their labor power to you? Building a really well built dam or a really good train system is a one time thing. Where's the profit in fixing something or making someone well? It's much more profitable to make people buy a $30,000 car every 10 years and pay $250 a month to make sure they're covered in the event of an illness. Capitalism is about production for exchange,not for use.

So the Capitalist takes the surplus value he extracts from us and invests it in profitable industries and creates demand for things we don't need or could easily get by with less of. For instance, we privately accumulate massive amounts of stuff we only use a few times in our lives, like DVDs and books. Why don't people give them to their local libraries?

There will come a time when our need outweighs our want for petty crap. Will the Capitalist be up to the task, or will we be compelled to do things for ourselves?

[9x19mm]

I think the title says it all. The question is meant as a genuinely socialist one, and not one which presupposes any sort of Marxist determinism etc.; taking into account all of capitalism's ills and contradictions, it appears to still be revolutionizing means of production as well as those involved in communication, bio-medicine etc.

We see many countries which have attempted to transition to a socialist mode of production, mostly through feudal or other pre-industrial configurations. Oftentimes, there are many gains but also the legitimacy of the worker's state (so-called or otherwise) is dependent upon the presumption of power over the long-term - allowing the development which would have needed to happen under capitalism in order to transition to socialism to occur - although the longer a socialist state is in power the more likely a revolution must combat opportunism, bureaucracy, coups, corruption...

Is it possible that capitalism is still in a revolutionary stage from mercantilism and feudalism? Socialists have been ready to transition from capitalism for more than 100 years now...were they premature then, and/or are we premature now?

This is not my abandonment from any progressive or revolutionary aims. Rather, a purely theoretical question which has been bothering me and some friends for a while. Thanks, in advance, for your input.

What people seem to think is that Capitalism will end due to financial problems and such; Im not saying it is not possible, it is a very likely scenario!

I beleive however, the main fall of Capitalism will be with the rising problem of a thing I call Complex Irregular Warfare [A term coined by Australian Dr Keith Suter, a foreign affairs expert in the Australian breakfast show Sunrise]. Its much more common, yet very innacurate name, is terrorism.

As many of you know, there are lots of countries involved in the 9/11 inspired "War on Terrorism". There are countries involved directly [USA, Australia, UK etc]. They are fighting in Afghanistan against the Taliban and other Islamic Extremists.

Then there are those involved INDIRECTLY [Russia, Serb-Kosovar's and such]. Russia is having problems with Chechnya, Serbian Kosovars are under threat from NATO, Albanian and KLA [Kosovo Liberation Army, an Islamic Extremist group supported by the Albanian and US government].

I personally beleive that Capitalism will begin to fall due to Terrorism. Since 9/11 most major western countries have imposed certain restrictions of the freedom of their citizens. For example, Britain has suggested to impose a national ID card system for all citizens to "help" stop terrorism. Australian police are now granted the ability to search citizens under the age of 18 without a warrant.

These things, obviously, take away the rights of civilians and thus the civilian population gets frustrated and angry.

If terrorism escalates, then more restrictions on liberty will be imposed, and this will thus make people more and more angry towards their government.

I could go on for a bit longer, but I think it seems pretty obvious about where I am going. Restrictions on liberty will reach a ludicrous heigh, and will thus probably spark a rebellion against the current government in favour of a more "freedom" oriented one [i.e probably a leftist government].

[Lodestar]

You know you are not so far from truth. The other day i read in http://www.rense.com/ that the global elites have some sort of space ships parked in space, just in case things get too roudy and rebellious for them here on earth. And you know that this world is ruled by psychopaths by crazy people, I know this is far-fetched but who knows, it might be true

.

Comrade, I mean no offense, but I must point out that this sort of stuff is totally demented. It's mired in conspiracy theorist nonsense that takes away the legitimacy and seriousness of revolutionary socialist struggle, and it is an insult to the intelligence of the people on this board. I mean, when you mention global elites, I'm curious if you're referring to the ruling classes, or, as the website you cited might suggest, Freemasons/Satanists/Reptilians/Freemasons/Jews/Zionists/Marxists/Bankers/Bilderberg Group/Rothschilds/Rockefellers/Psychiatrists. Intelligent political discourse doesn't incorporate the opinions of the certifiably insane.

A cursory glance at the website you just posted, "rense.com" takes me to one of the cheapest websites I've ever seen, decrying Obama's "fascism!" littered with anti-semitic misquotes, ads for ridiculous products, and ramblings about the coming of a "new world order." This is stuff on par with Rapture Ready. I'd expect garbage like this to be cited alongside David Icke and Alex Jones, among other far-right paleo-conservative backwater militia morons. I would not expect an educated, intellectually savvy progressive to ever venture near this sort of sensationalist lunatic journalism. Don't interject shameless, batfuck raving-insane bullshit into serious discussion.

[h9socialist]

SIMPLE ANSWER:

We will know when capitalism has run it's course when the New York Stock Exchange is converted to low cost housing units, and J.P. Morgan & Company is converted into a free clinic.

UNTIL THEN: Capitalism is not dead, it just stinks like a cadaver.

[AlienatedLabor]

First post on this site, so hi. :)

For me, my immediate answer to this question is: capitalism will have run its course when it comes to actively discourage the natural course of humanity. In other words, when it makes the satisfaction of basic human psychological and existential needs, from companionship to social belonging to procreation, an inconvenience, then you know that capitalism has got to go.

imo, we're getting to the beginning part of that right now. People in capitalist societies are having children at later and later ages, some not having any at all, simply because they're considered financial burdens. And as a result, birthrates are plummeting all over Japan, Europe, and the U.S. You know something is REALLY wrong when something as inherent and fundamental to the human experience as procreating, raising and loving children, and, of course, perpetuating the human race, is deemed an undesirable inconvenience.

The biggest cause of divorce/breakups of couples is arguments over money; once again, something as necessary to human happiness as love and companionship is squashed by the needs of living in a capitalist society.

So many people are being denied the chance to have fulfilling secure jobs in which they can find purpose. Corporations in capitalist countries have sent manufacturing jobs overseas so they can exploit poor foreign workers, in the process denying necessary opportunities to workers at home. Now, it's reached the point where not even having a good education is good enough to find secure work; there are so many college graduates now that all the manufacturing jobs are gone, that even they can't even find suitable and fulfilling work anymore! Meaningful, contructive work that supports one's family and community, while also giving the individual a sense of purpose and satisfaction, is a basic human right and necessity that should not be too much to ask for; capitalism has made it so that it is becoming too much to ask for, and so many people are suffering from existential depression and aimlessness because of it.

When capitalism has reached the point when needs like those described above are quite literally impossible, and even undesirable, to acheive, then you can at least know that it has finished digging its own grave.

[ckaihatsu]

First post on this site, so hi. :)


Hi, and welcome!





For me, my immediate answer to this question is: capitalism will have run its course when it comes to actively discourage the natural course of humanity. In other words, when it makes the satisfaction of basic human psychological and existential needs, from companionship to social belonging to procreation, an inconvenience, then you know that capitalism has got to go.

imo, we're getting to the beginning part of that right now. People in capitalist societies are having children at later and later ages, some not having any at all, simply because they're considered financial burdens. And as a result, birthrates are plummeting all over Japan, Europe, and the U.S. You know something is REALLY wrong when something as inherent and fundamental to the human experience as procreating, raising and loving children, and, of course, perpetuating the human race, is deemed an undesirable inconvenience.

The biggest cause of divorce/breakups of couples is arguments over money; once again, something as necessary to human happiness as love and companionship is squashed by the needs of living in a capitalist society.

So many people are being denied the chance to have fulfilling secure jobs in which they can find purpose. Corporations in capitalist countries have sent manufacturing jobs overseas so they can exploit poor foreign workers, in the process denying necessary opportunities to workers at home. Now, it's reached the point where not even having a good education is good enough to find secure work; there are so many college graduates now that all the manufacturing jobs are gone, that even they can't even find suitable and fulfilling work anymore! Meaningful, contructive work that supports one's family and community, while also giving the individual a sense of purpose and satisfaction, is a basic human right and necessity that should not be too much to ask for; capitalism has made it so that it is becoming too much to ask for, and so many people are suffering from existential depression and aimlessness because of it.

When capitalism has reached the point when needs like those described above are quite literally impossible, and even undesirable, to acheive, then you can at least know that it has finished digging its own grave.


I'm sorry to be so contentious here, especially since this is your first post, but I have to point out that the mainstream bourgeois culture (propaganda) will readily bend and flex around to accommodate whatever kind of social privation atmosphere is deemed necessary for the world's population. (A quick example would be England during the WWII bombings or the U.S.' duck-and-cover propaganda during the Red Scare.)

While I agree with your description, there's a new term in the lexicon that's in the best tradition of Orwellian newspeak -- it's called 'funemployment'. Basically they found a way to put the "f.u." into unemployment while making it sound acceptable.

While I agree with you in spirit on what you're saying, I also have to raise something of an *internal* difference with you. Just as the bourgeois regime can have no valid say in how working class people should live their lives -- it can only acquiesce to the mass demands of the proletariat, *at best* -- neither can we, as revolutionary political people, really give anyone a *prescription* for how they should live and/or work.





[P]olitics *is not* life itself -- it is about the *mass management* of life and of the world's resources. How one person lives their life tells us *nothing* about their politics


The lifestyles you're describing should very well be *enabled* for working class people by a revolutionary politics and movement, one that *wins* the means for these lifestyles out of the larders of society's vast surplus -- but at the same time you happen to be using the yardstick of living-life that has been developed by bourgeois culture itself.

Yes, capitalist society causes alienation and disorientation, but, no, *no* set of politics -- even a revolutionary one -- can legitimately address life-y, or existential / lifestyle, issues. These ground-level matters have to be self-organized by ourselves, with as much access to material resources as possible, given the current balance of class forces.





SIMPLE ANSWER:

We will know when capitalism has run it's course when the New York Stock Exchange is converted to low cost housing units, and J.P. Morgan & Company is converted into a free clinic.

UNTIL THEN: Capitalism is not dead, it just stinks like a cadaver.


This is the best summation, because a revolutionary movement would have to *demonstrate* its mass support through a *formal* political act. Certainly the dismantling of the system of commodity trading would be a decisive political formality.


Chris




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[AmericanRed]

Capitalism is definitely in decline. A system that requires this much state intervention in order to keep afloat is definitely past its healthiest days.

As the Marxian economist Hillel Ticktin explains in his essay “The Epoch of Decline,”
…it is in the nature of the development of the forces of production that labour must be socialised and this cannot be changed, except through disaccumulation, i.e. capital ceasing to be capital. …This interpretation is basic to Marxism because it is Marx’s view that the fundamental contradiction of capitalism lies in the relationship between the increasing socialisation of labour and the ever fewer magnates of capital. The contradiction only ends with the demise of capitalism.