In July of this year Michael Matheson Miller of the Acton Institute published on the Intercollegiate Review online an article entitled “Does Capitalism Destroy Culture?”
He begins his article by stating: “One of the most enduring critiques of capitalism is that it is morally and culturally corrosive.” And he confesses that since this critique is made not just by Marxists but also “from political observers at almost every point on the political spectrum…the criticism is worth attending to seriously.” One who, like myself, has been a critic of capitalism for many years must voice appreciation for Miller’s honest acknowledgement of this widespread criticism of capitalism.
If capitalism, however, is “morally and culturally corrosive,” what exactly is capitalism? This is something that Miller never says. Nor, as I have written elsewhere, is he unusual, for attempts to provide an exact definition of capitalism are surprisingly rare. People perhaps assume they can point to the economic system around us and say, “Well, that’s capitalism.”
But in fact, that is not sufficient. For there are many facets of our economy, some of which are peculiar to capitalism, others not. Private property, for example, which is sometimes held to be the defining note of capitalism, has been around for millennia, long before anything that can coherently be called capitalism existed.
In an effort to provide a more exact understanding of capitalism, I will use the definition that Pope Pius XI gave. It is the most accurate that I have seen and it expresses the specific note that distinguishes capitalism from all other ways of organizing economic activity. Capitalism according to Pope Pius is “that economic system in which were provided by different people the capital and labor jointly needed for production” (Quadragesimo Anno, no. 100). In other words, in a capitalist systemby and large some people own the means of production and hire others to do the work for them. Throughout this article this and only this is what I mean by capitalism.
Now, is capitalism in this sense “morally and culturally corrosive”? Although any form of capitalism does tend in that direction, Miller rightly notes that capitalism “comes in a variety of forms and can mean many things.” Capitalism, when it is restrained by a complex of legal and other institutional forms—as for example the West German social market economy that allowed labor unions considerable say in the running of corporations and otherwise tempered the forces of free competition—can operate in a manner that mitigates its socially harmful effects.
But this is unusual. The capitalism we have in this country tends toward the free-market variety, with latterly an increasing mix of pure crony manipulation and chicanery. And it is this sort of capitalism, free-market capitalism or anything that approximates it, that I especially charge with being “morally and culturally corrosive.”
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Read more: ethikapolitika.org
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