
Has Western capitalism failed? - ashishgandhi
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14972015
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Hyena
The answer depends on what is meant by "Western capitalism". There are fairly
credible arguments that it, in the sense of the general structure created in
the 19th and 20th centuries, is ending because of how firms are being operated
and financed (end of the corporation thesis), for example. The free market
pretty clearly hasn't failed yet, given that this severe a shock didn't
actually bring about the downfall of civilization or the general system of
exchange.

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ashishgandhi
Just so I can read up, what do you mean by _how firms are being operated and
financed (end of the corporation thesis)_?

~~~
Hyena
Undermining presence: lack of IPOs or desire to hold one, increasing
prominence of partnerships, prominence of smaller businesses (technology seems
to lead here), private equity shops, the almost complete elimination of
vertical integration (great project of 19th/20th centuries), what looks (to
me) like increasing transience of corporations.

Undermining norms: flattening of formal hierarchies, reduction of corporate-
cum-personal identity in workers, reduction of same in founders (more
businesses operated as "projects" rather than presumed perpetual
institutions), slow abandonment of generic "managers".

A lot of this seems more prevalent in technology, but tech is also where we're
creating lots of genuinely new companies and so the most likely place for
shifting practices.

The "end of the corporation" idea has come up a lot since the 1990s but it may
just be availability bias.

