Andrew's Wiki
Decay Capitalist Society

Bio

• famous by early 20th c
• lecturers, lobbyers, writers
• Beatrice 1858-1943
  • cousin of Charles Booth, Life and Labour of the People of London; she researched for him and had Sydney help
• Sidney
  • Part of Labour Party think tank; then had seats in Parliament as Labour member; was Colonial Secretary
• socialist reformers; both involved w/founding of Fabian Society and London School of Economics; co-founder of The New Statesman magazine 1913; wrote books like History of Trade Unionism
  • wrote tons of books: together in same office, after answering their letters
• They are the ones Wells makes fun of in The New Machiavelli 1911
• they held dinner parties for statesman, the Coefficients dining club, 1902-9 monthly, incl Wells and Russell
• They were supportive of Stalin, poor souls
• Interred in Westminster Abbey
• 1891, she coins “co-operative federalism” and “co-operative individualism” in her book Cooperative Movement in Great Britain 1891
  • She advances the cooperative movement’s theories
  • cooperations: wholesalers, farms, factories
    • not the same think as a worker’s coop
• She advocated centralized planning

Basics

• Why against capitalism: income inequality, inequality of personal freedom, success will be replaced by failure, leads to war
• They say that it’s silly to think that “the social institutions it lives in are, in some peculiar sense, ‘natural’...” “these in their times seem as rooted in human nature and as unchangeable as capitalism does”
  • Even so called successful governments will be changed
  • They are partaking of Darwinian view of governments, the Rise and Fall mentality
• Toleration of English gov for religious freedom just about “the art of getting rich quickly”
• Method and thesis are hist mat: ””there was a moment, roughly placeable at the middle of the nineteenth century, when it could claim that, in a hundred years, it had produced, on balance, a surprising advance in material civilization for greatly increased population” But since then it’s been decaying xiii “receding from defeat to defeat” b/c of “social problems created by the very civilization it has built up and the very fucundity it has encouraged”
  • so that “history will regard capitalism, not as an epoch but as an episode”
• We’re in a class dictatorship, not a democracy
• They also say that each individual capitalist is powerless to change anything…it’s the “institution” that’s wrong
• Socialism’s Gripes with Capitalism
  • bulk of people in penury: they agree there is always poverty, but when “instruments of production” are owned by minority, it’s always much much worse
  • humiliated by the comfort the rest live in
  • inequality in personal freedom: THAT’S THE WORST
    • they must follow the orders of the working class
    • “starvation which is supposed to be optional” the only freedom they have
  • capitalist structure is “scientifically unsound” (not efficient at organizing production and distribution of goods; doesn’t maximize production), AND “fundamentally inconsistent with the spiritual advancement of the race” in two ways: “exclusive reliance on the motive of pecuniary gain” is “inimical to national morality” AND to “international peace”

Specifics

• “The Emergence of Really Good Manners”
  • a new concept of good manners is resulting from democracy b/c it is “socially promiscuous” (everyone mixes, see for example transportation used by all classes)
  • same general standard of courtesy for everyone, no matter the class
  • “treat each others as equals”
  • think about how you act at the dinner table, they urge 46: think about how you give your governess the same quality of wine that you drink, and how you give your servants good-quality meat. This is new good manners, and you need to extend it to working class.
  • upper classes b/c they have “no natural superiority” try to prove they have it by “petulance” and “insolence” to lower orders (and by excessive expenditure: an alternative to Veblen)
    • and says when they act like that, they might as well “Be their own parlor-maids and butlers” who are “often better looking” and have better manners (b/c that’s a requirement of their job)
  • however material inequality keeps manners from truly being good, and we should model our manners after those people who live in equality w/others: university families at university centers, artisan families, religious families serving lower class
• “Inequality in Personal Freedom”
  • the negation of slavery is NOT true freedom, only “the freedom to die” (like Stirner they’re not taking this ideology
  • true freedom is being able to buy all you need and to be able to improve your mind, esp by leisure time: “we cannot regard as a free man any one with none but vegetative experiences, freedom involves the command of some time, of at least some money to spend on holidays and travel, on social intercourse and recreation, on placing one’s self in a position to enjoy nature and art.” 55
    • COOL! Leisure is your fundamental right, man.
    • ultimately freedom is: “possession of opportunity to develop our faculties and satisfy our desires”
  • “equal before the law?” no, b/c you end up having to PAY for access to the courts (hire lawyer), so poor are barred from “legal redress” b/c can’t pay for it
    • also think of bail: lets the rich man go and think about his defense, whereas poor must stew
    • hire of lawyers: only rich get well defended
  • Psychological Personal Freedom
    • “his daily life is dealt with as another’s mean to an end” 58
    • “command” is given to fraction of population
    • rich are “perpetually doing what is pleasant to them…determined by their own reason or will” but the working class “obey orders”
      • clearly there are more people giving orders than the apparent government
    • Some Authority Is Acceptable, but it’s the sheer quantity and terrible quality of commands that irks them
      • it’s irresponsible, unreciprocal, unelected (ie the person wasn’t chosen by the people), not given to maximize well-being of all
      • we’re not anarchists
  • No Freedom in Recreation
    • 66: it’s all directed by captalist
    • brewery, distillery = public house
    • music hall and cinematograph = capitalists
  • “Incessantly Reiterated Advertisements”
  • Newspaper Press Ownership
    • doubly controlled, by millionaire owners and by the advertisers
    • b/c it now costs so much to print daily newspaper and b/c advertisers won’t accept it, working class can’t create its own daily newspaper
    • “Thus, the mass of the population is quite unable to protect itself against the stream of suggestion, biased information, and corruptly selected news that is poured on them by the giant circulation of the press” 67
  • Government Controlled by Financial Concerns
    • “financial, shipping, manufacturing, and trading amalgamations and combinations”
    • both local and national gov
    • executive branch given control over appointing various posts, so open to corruption, allows people to govern via own private interests
  • “The Brain-Workers in Capitalist Service”
    • They are “compelled” to be employed by capitalists
    • they want a livelihood, so they accept jobs that make them handmaidens to capital
    • lawyers, engineers, architects, civil servants, authors, journalists, teachers, managers, inventors, artists, scientists: All Of Them Defend the Status Quo
    • no freedom of thought b/c scared by being fired

Problems of Capitalism

• Ruins Environment, which Harms Health
  • pollution
  • urban slums
  • industrialization of countryside
  • noise and nuisance
  • destruction of flora and fauna
  • Advertisements! “incessantly reiterated”
• Accidents, catastrophes, wear and tear
  • “it is impossible to create an interest in production that is not also an interest in decay and destruction” 109
• Adulteration of necessary commodities
• Creation of commodities “of no social value” 110
• Pernicious commodities created
• Gluts, depressions, crises
• “Hypertrophy of the organization for sale as compared with the organization of production” 110
  • 111: b/c of competition people produce too much of certain things, forcing “arts of advertisements and commercial traveling, and all the political intrigues of the hunt for foreign markets, sometimes poetically called ‘places in the sun’”
• Monopoly prices prevent low prices
• Forced to accept “standardized” products b/c it’s good for profit
• War (b/c international competition for markets)
  • International and between classes within countries
• “Damage and Destruction of the Instruments of Production by Capitalist Profit-Makers”
  • Robert Owen first recognized this (founder of Brit socialism)
  • b/c forced to produce so much, wear out
  • also the living instruments of production: overwork, ill-treatment, starvation: “killing the goose that laid the golden eggs” so that after Factory Acts profits actually went up 115
    • by refusing to pay them adequately, not paying the full price for the human instrument
    • and they don’t care about illness overwork or death of workers b/c they don’t have to pay the full price for a new one at the outset
• “wholesale degradation of the nation” 116
• “ruin of natural resources” 119
• Advertisements make you buy things you don’t need at a higher price, then buy a new one before old one wears out
  • why? b/c of the necessity of increasing production if you are to maintain your profits 143
• Overproduction
  • market overflooded
  • b/c the cost of production goes down when you do it on a larger scale
• Capitalism Increases Costs of Goods
  • b/c you have to find people to find buyers and you have to advertise and transport
• THERE IS NO INVISIBLE HAND
  • 187: people no longer believe that everyone pursuing self-interest will lead to greatest good for the whole (one of the primary assumptions of (P E)
  • the “court of profit” doesn’t work b/c people’s interests do not coincide but rather conflict

Liberalism

• “To the political Liberals, personal freedom actually meant the personal power of the man of property.” 72
• So they can’t understand that the modern worker is unfree: so he doesn’t starve, he MUST obey someone, must serve someone who won’t be “called to account,” can’t choose where to live, doesn’t have real access to government
• They are people like lawyers and doctors who have not one boss but just lots of people who successively hire him, so they don’t see it as tyranny
• Liberal Counterargument: well some unfairness was required for the advances of the Industrial Rev or to provide so many more commodities and services 74
  • They say that inequality of wealth is what made investment possible
  • “immense accumulation….could never have come about in a society where wealth was divided equitably:” They’re quoting Keynes here
    • Keynes: the upper class theoretically allowed to consume but really trained to invest and save… “the growth of the cake the object of true religion” (a la Weber) “but to what end was not contemplated”
    • They say: Keynes and such just capitalist apologia, “candid”...but it’s wrong.
      • Stats show that these people saved less than a quarter of earnings
      • And when they did invest it, it was for what Ruskin called “illth:” “gluttony, extravagance, waste, and demoralization” 77
      • Ooh neat quote: “wealth is counted in a false currency”
      • but then they say yes it did have “initial success” but it will NOT, they say, have ultimate success…and of course we only now are beginning to dream up the alternatives