I'd answer this question by asking another: Is it profitable to destroy democracy? If so, someone is going to try it. That doesn't mean capitalism is any less compatible with democracy than socialism or any other system. But if we value democracy we need to defend against economic forces that threaten it.
Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
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Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#52Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
imo, capitalism leads to oligopoly. oligopoly leads to corruption. Capitalism can only ends with corrupted states imo.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#53Capitalism and free market are two things. I wished people would be more specific with words. Many things happened together so things were conflated.
The core idea of capitalism is that ownership of companies is based on invested capital not people.
Also see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company
I think it's better to discuss individual things like private property, capital ownership of companies, monopolies, free markets, consumerism, imperialism (along the lines of Standard Fruit Company) etc. on their own merit, not throwing everything on one pile - even if things interact, influence and lead to each other.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#54Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
This is a bit similar to claiming that communism is great, because all the times when it was tried and there were problems weren't real communism. If capitalism tends to inevitably lead to corruption of government and the undermining of democracy etc in the long run, then that's an interesting critique, which can't just be swatted away with "yes but the result isn't capitalism".
> If capitalism tends to inevitably lead to corruption of government
Everything tends to lead to corruption of government, in fact most forms of government are the corruption we see as the problem here. The key point of liberal democracy is to put mechanisms in place to prevent this from happening.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#55Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
How is that not capitalism? Businesses paying government to achieve their ends. It's both, I suppose.
That's an argument for checks on capitalism and corruption. Your way is just unchecked harmful capitalism without any government controls.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the absence of big government, big corporate will become defacto government even more easily.
Actually, we see this with the social media giants live in action: they may decide to terminate your account at any time for arbitrary (or none at all) reasons for your whole life, and you have no way of legal recourse. There have been way too many stories alone on HN about people losing e.g. their entire mail archives or Youtube deleting evidence videos of war crimes, to let this situation continue for any longer. G…
Telcos can’t cut you off, but ISPs can. I guess dial up is potentially still an option, but internet access is much more relevant than telephone access in 2018.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#57Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#58Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
This is not at all the effect being discussed. The effect being discussed is laid out quite plainly in the subtitle. I'll just quote it here, and save you the effort of right clicking and selecting open in new tab:
"The idea that authoritarianism attracts workers harmed by the free market, which emerged when the Nazis were in power, has been making a comeback."
It's a very simple mechanism. Capitalism produces winners and losers. The losers are eventually an angry majority. An angry majority will vote to maximize change.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#59Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
To your nuanced answer, has there been a time when Capitalism didn't seek to dominate all of it's regulatory bodies? Unions, governments, activists, even other Capitalists as they represent competition. There's a reason leftists call Imperialism the highest form of Capitalism.
Re: Is capitalism a threat to democracy?
#60Simple answer: No. More nuanced answer: not exactly. Not Capitalism per-se anyway. But clearly you can see an unhealthy degree of commingling of big government and big business, in a way that is damaging to society at large. But to my mind: a. that's corruption, not capitalism b. that's an argument against big government, not an argument against capitalism
No. You're confusing the free market economy (a mechanism) vs. capitalism (a political economical system). Competition leads inevitably to monopoly as the best and the winners prevail and entrench in political power, that's the central contradiction built into capitalism. You can't separate one from the other if you want capitalism. This is the classical Marxist critique.
Colloquially, "capitalism" and "free market capitalism" are used interchangeably. I understand the strict distinction, but in this context I don't think descending to that level of pedantry is really necessary.