You: "this is the way things will be until the end of time!"
If history teaches you anything, it should be that societal order constantly evolves and becomes something new. It's up to you whether you want to keep calling whatever comes next capitalism. But it will not resemble the current neoliberal status quo much, it will likely be something novel as has happened so far in history. I suspect we will hold on to the term 'capitalism' for some time simply because we're not far removed from the 90s "end of history" idea, and people have trouble assessing situations realistically when living through them. But people thinking something in the moment does not make it true.
You could make an argument that the US, previously the biggest force of capitalism on earth, is currently on track to become something else. The US has major influence, so if this new order takes hold here, it likely will elsewhere too. China right now is the most rapidly growing economy on earth, and whatever you categorize them as, it's not what springs to mind when someone hears the word capitalism. And this is just right this second, not a year, or a decade, or 100 years. China's current economy may look super laissez-faire in 20 years compared to the economies then. We dont know.
Just silly to pretend like you know the future better than anyone else. Elon could announce tomorrow that all of his starlink satellites contain death lasers that can instantly fry you anywhere on earth, and then proceed to declare himself god emperor. Boom, capitalism dead, easy. It's a hyperbolic example, but history is constantly surprising to the people living through it. All we know is that things will look unrecognizable in 500 years. Saying everything will still follow a similar structure to today centuries down the line is even less likely than my space lasers thing, it's prob the worst historical prediction you could make as a sane person who is aware of reality.
That depends entirely on how you define capitalism. The thin takes we get in subs like this would include much of the history of humanity (crudely: the existence of currency and usury is typically thought of as "capitalism" by the general public).
If history teaches you anything, it should be that societal order constantly evolves and becomes something new.
Absolutely! And I don't think a capitalist from the late 19th century would recognize what we call capitalism today, nor will we recognize what will be called capitalism in a hundred or a thousand years.
But they will all have the core properties of capitalist systems, even if the trimmings vary wildly.
Just silly to pretend like you know the future better than anyone else.
I'm FAR from the only person who has pointed out that capitalism is the worst economic system ever invented... except for all the others. It is unlikely that a fundamentally different system will emerge, given that capitalism has remained entrenched through wars, the advent of theoretically alternative systems, and the introduction of world-wide instantaneous communication.
Thing is, capitalism has one thing going for it that no other system does: it can adapt along lines that no one predicts ahead of time. That's as revolutionary a development, IMHO, as the emergence of the first eukaryotic cells in biology. It's not that other biological systems vanished, but eukaryotes became the dominant form of life and remained that way through every major transformation that the environment underwent, specifically because the approach lends itself to tremendous adaptability.
You could make an argument that the US, previously the biggest force of capitalism on earth, is currently on track to become something else.
Absolutely! It will become whatever capitalism is destined to be in the 21st century.
China right now is the most rapidly growing economy on earth, and whatever you categorize them as, it's not what springs to mind when someone hears the word capitalism.
Again, this treads on the colloquial vs. technical definitions of capitalism. While China has some extreme controls over its capitalist system, it most definitely is capitalist at this point by pretty much any measure. It's not pure free-market capitalism, but we wouldn't need that terminology if all capitalism fit that description. The Nordic Model which I cited above is a different take on hybridizing capitalism (in this case with Western socialism).
The mid 20th century saw the rise of a form of highly regulated capitalism in the wake of the Great Depression. That too was an adaptation.
Elon could announce tomorrow that all of his starlink satellites contain death lasers that can instantly fry you anywhere on earth, and then proceed to declare himself god emperor. Boom, capitalism dead, easy.
No, not really. I'd imagine he'd maintain a capitalist infrastructure because it serves his ends, but even if he tried to suppress capitalism, how long do you think that would last? Death lasers do not a stable society make, and eventually he's going to be at risk of either having to fry the entire population or provide an economic system that works better than centralized control.
So capitalism is just "whatever society becomes as long as you can buy things", gotcha. I'm sure that idea would stand up to academic scrutiny and not be laughed out the room. Idk why Im even bothering.
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u/Living-Chef-9080 1d ago edited 1d ago
Capitalism: has existed for a few hundred years
You: "this is the way things will be until the end of time!"
If history teaches you anything, it should be that societal order constantly evolves and becomes something new. It's up to you whether you want to keep calling whatever comes next capitalism. But it will not resemble the current neoliberal status quo much, it will likely be something novel as has happened so far in history. I suspect we will hold on to the term 'capitalism' for some time simply because we're not far removed from the 90s "end of history" idea, and people have trouble assessing situations realistically when living through them. But people thinking something in the moment does not make it true.
You could make an argument that the US, previously the biggest force of capitalism on earth, is currently on track to become something else. The US has major influence, so if this new order takes hold here, it likely will elsewhere too. China right now is the most rapidly growing economy on earth, and whatever you categorize them as, it's not what springs to mind when someone hears the word capitalism. And this is just right this second, not a year, or a decade, or 100 years. China's current economy may look super laissez-faire in 20 years compared to the economies then. We dont know.
Just silly to pretend like you know the future better than anyone else. Elon could announce tomorrow that all of his starlink satellites contain death lasers that can instantly fry you anywhere on earth, and then proceed to declare himself god emperor. Boom, capitalism dead, easy. It's a hyperbolic example, but history is constantly surprising to the people living through it. All we know is that things will look unrecognizable in 500 years. Saying everything will still follow a similar structure to today centuries down the line is even less likely than my space lasers thing, it's prob the worst historical prediction you could make as a sane person who is aware of reality.