Re: The Prize by Any Other Name

["Harry Veeder" <eo200@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think Capitalism as an economic system emerged as a
social adaptation to the religious tensions of
the Reformation.

Harry Veeder

----------
>From: Harry L Cook <hlc710@xxxxxxxx>
>To: Clifford Poirot <cpoirot@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: Re: The Prize by Any Other Name
>Date: Thu, Nov 29, 2001, 2:00 AM
>

>Do you think that we can leave out the desire for economic improvement
>as basic in the dynamics of economic processes after the fall of Rome?
>What would be other elements equally fundamental besides population
>increase?
>
>If it can be assumed for all practical purposes that the desire for
>economic betterment is a basic part of human nature for most people,
>then could we not say that consequences that logically follow from that
>are in a sense natural  It seems to me that there is a logical
>connection between the desire for economic betterment and the
>development of money, markets, technology and so on
>
> The naturalness of market society was a conclusion, not an assumption.
>
>     Harry L. Cook
>Clifford Poirot wrote:
>>
>> Well, the problem is beginning with the assumption that economic processes
>> after the fall of Rome are motivated primarily by desire for improvement
>> between the wishes of buyers and sellers. If you begin with the assumption
>> of the "naturalness" of market society, of course you can trace its
>> evolution teleologically. Just as if one begins with the assumption of the
>> "naturalness" or inevitablity of the current human form, one can see modern
>> sapiens sapiens as a natural extension of the earliest hominid, and thus
>> ignore the possibility of different and contingent evolutionary paths.
>>
>> Even Douglas North has entirely abandoned this "hard core" formalist
>> explanation of economic history.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Harry L Cook [mailto:hlc710@xxxxxxxx]
>> Sent: Wednesday, November 28, 2001 1:52 PM
>> To: Bruce McFarling
>> Cc: pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: Re: The Prize by Any Other Name
>>
>> I guess it depends on what we are trying to explain.  I think that it is
>> useful and it makes sense to me for practical policy purposes to see
>> capitalism as a "natural" culmination of a very long period of
>> evolutionary development.  If you begin after the
>> fall of Rome and with nothing much more that the desire for economic
>> betterment for both buyers and sellers and population growth you can, to
>> my satisfaction, analytically trace the development and evolution of
>> money, markets and the development of trade, financial institutions,
>> technology, competition, saving and investment and so on, to the end of
>> the Middle Ages, through the Mercantile period in England and then the
>> Industrial Revolution.  I think that this interpretation  gives some
>> insight into capitalism as a system, both its strengths and weaknesses.
>> The only issue for me is whether or not this is a useful interpretation.
>>                                         Harry L. Cook
>> >
>> > At 09:00 27/11/01 -0800, Harry L Cook wrote:
>> > >My point was that modern capitalism is a system made up of
>> > >several independent institutions - money, banks, markets -
>> > >and long driven by the incentive for economic improvement,
>> > >that developed and evolved quite naturally throughout most
>> > >of the Middle Ages.  They all began to come together as
>> > >the Middle Ages gave way to the modern era and climaxed
>> > >with the Industrial Revolution in England.
>> >
>> > My point was that this story ignores the fact that most
>> > of the commercial institutions evolved outside of the
>> > economic backwater of Europe and was brought in ... but
>> > of course that just changes the range of economic
>> > histories that you have to look at to understand the
>> > process, it is still an evolving process.
>> >
>> > Polyani's point was that the inviability of the system
>> > came about from the extension of commercial logic to
>> > the determination of the major portion of the communities
>> > labour and the major portion of the communities use of
>> > natural resources.  Pointing out that the commercial
>> > practices developed prior to taking over the major
>> > role with respect to those two "fictitious commodities",
>> > and that the adoption of commercial practices for
>> > those fictitious commodities was itself an ongoing process
>> > rather than a single event, doesn't really address
>> > Polyani's argument about why the nineteenth century system
>> > was inviable.  And *of course* there were outpost of
>> > more developed economic systems in Europe, just as there
>> > are outposts of more developed economic systems in almost
>> > any less developed economy today.
>> >
>> > Virtually,
>> >
>> > Bruce McFarling, Shortland, NSW
>> > ecbm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>