What, if not capitalism?

I, like a rapidly growing portion of the population, am more than unimpressed by capitalism. Before tackling the headline question I'd like to express some of the problems, both ethical and practical, that I see with capitalism as a socio-economic system.

Profit is the the prime motivating factor in capitalism. This ought to immediately raise concern, as it places profit above all other human aspirations. If profit is not your principle objective in a capitalist system then you are going to fail, unless you are very lucky, because capitalism sets everyone in the world in competition with each other, competing for profit. So any egalitarian principles such as equality, fairness, environmental concern, caring and so forth have to be at best subservient to the principle of profit. If you are not profiting then at best you are breaking even, which to maintain is akin to balancing a plate on the end of a pencil, or you are heading into bankruptcy and failure. We also should note that in a fair and equitable exchange of goods or services, there is no profit, just mutual benefit. Profit only arises when people or the environment, but not the profiteer of course, are being exploited. This is more than apparent in almost any business you can point to. Businesses are owned privately. The workforce and consumers of the business's output are exploited for the profit of the owners. This system therefore inherently favours profiteers at the cost of all else, namely humanity and the planet. We ought then to be considering what kind of society and future we are creating by rewarding greed and ruthlessness above all else.

Private ownership is another core principle of capitalism. This is another element of capitalism that deserves our attention. In a pure capitalist system everything must be privately owned, from the means of production to the planet itself.  Given that profit guarantees an unfair distribution of wealth, based on ones' propensity to exploit and therefore profit, it follows that there will be an unfair distribution of ownership of the planet, which of course is already the case, and has been since long before we were born. I often liken this to joining a game of Monopoly long after it has already been won, which is the position that the vast majority of us find ourselves born into. We should also note that given the competitive nature of capitalism we are all set up in perpetual conflict, struggling for control of portions of the planet, no matter how big or small. There is no inherent levelling factor here, merely an arms race of one sort or another. An interesting departure from the game of Monopoly in capitalism should also be considered here. The game has a fixed set of rules, which players generally adhere to. However, in the real world, the more capital you have the more power you have, and given that the principle is profit, all else be damned, the most effective profiteers, selected by capitalism for their lack of ethical principle, will use their power to change the rules in their favour, and that is precisely what we see happening.


Many proponents of capitalism frequently argue that we do not live in a capitalist system, citing government regulation as the principle reason for this, as it distorts the idealised 'free market'. Capitalists argue also that the 'free market' (in quotes because it is fictional, an ideal not a reality), is the levelling factor I previously claimed not to exist. This levelling factor is often referred to as the 'invisible hand', which has rather religious implications as I'm sure you can see. Thus critics of capitalism often talk about the religion of the 'free market'. There are many reasons to dispute the possibility of such a levelling factor, some of which I have already expressed in this article. The idea that the principle of greed in the dedicated capitalist is countered by the ethical intuitions of the consumer, making choices about which of the greedy should profit most by buying their products or services is absolutely absurd. The greedy win, every time. There is no choice. Furthermore the uneven distribution of wealth also infers an uneven distribution of marketing, a naturally self distorting effect of free market ideology, thus the most greedy command the most favourable attention in the consumer population. So it is not a negative feedback system naturally controlling itself, it is a positive feedback system spiralling out of control. Some capitalists even advocate something they call anarcho-capitalism, which to me is nothing more than an oxymoron, just as anarcho-fascism or anarcho-totalitarianism are.

So what, if not capitalism? What kind of system should we be trying to operate? Many anti-capitalists call for socialism, communism or even anarcho-syndicalism. Whilst I am not, in principle, against any of these alternatives I would just like folks to think about some of the problems that conspire to poison any system. We live in a world of a hugely uneven distribution of power, legal or otherwise, and those that have such power will fight to defend if not expand that power. Generally speaking we call this group the ruling class, the establishment or the elite. They will always seek to take the levers of power in any system and control society to serve their ideologies and aspirations. This was very much the case in soviet Russia and led in no small part to the collapse of the Russian socialist revolution, aided and abetted of course by capitalist powers in the rich West, as Chomsky explains so lucidly here:

 Chomsky on Lenin, Trotsky, Socialism & the Soviet Union

So for me, what is far more important than picking some idealised system is to struggle and to build movements to counter and dismantle concentrations of power. This, aside from decentralised democracy, is a core component of anarchism (please be sceptical about the description of anarchism in the link. It is but one description of anarchism, but at least presents some anarchist ideas. It may be better pursue descriptions presented by anarchist communities such as those at libcom.org). To my thinking we must apply such anarchist principles to whatever system we have and aspire to have. Capitalism inherently favours concentrations of power, not democracy, not fairness or anything else, and thus is possibly the worst of all systems because of where it inevitably leads, and anarchism is to me the only antidote, lest we all become slaves to those that accumulate the most. If anarchism is the only antidote then surely it applies equally if not more effectively to systems other than capitalism.

I would very much like to hear your views on capitalism and any alternatives, and how you see them being maintained. As always please comment below.