
Capitalism and Slavery - benbreen
http://www.thenation.com/blog/206025/capitalism-and-slavery
======
webXL
> Despite all this scholarly work, each generation—from W.E.B. Du Bois to
> Robin Blackburn, from Eric Williams to Walter Johnson—seems condemned to
> have to prove the obvious anew: Slavery created the modern world, and the
> modern world’s divisions (both abstract and concrete) are the product of
> slavery. Slavery is both the thing that can’t be transcended but also what
> can never be remembered. That Catch-22—can’t forget, can’t remember—is the
> motor contradiction of public discourse, from exalted discussions of
> American Exceptionalism to the everyday idiocy found on cable, in its
> coverage, for example, of Baltimore and Ferguson.

The sins of our fathers... Just because racism and violence still exist today
does not mean we're all ignorant of the sins our ancestors committed and
should abolish an economic system that _tangentially_ benefitted. And this is
not a modern phenomenon, as he seems to imply. This country was one of the
first to abolish slavery. What occurred in this country's brief history pales
in comparison to the brutality that came before it.

Slavery is institutionalized theft, organized crime. It is the opposite of
free trade and capitalism. Sure, self-proclaimed "capitalists" owned slaves,
but that shouldn't impugn the whole system. Please tell me, what other
economic system has lifted billions out of poverty?

~~~
danbruc
Capitalism is still a form of slavery were the capitalists benefit from the
workforce disproportionally with regard to their investment. And what lifts
people out of poverty is work, not an economic system. Capitalism is of course
very effective at organizing the environment in a way to enable highly
productive work but suggesting that this is a unique feature of capitalism
seems hardly justified, we just didn't explore many alternatives. Finally
judging capitalism by the number of people it lifted out of poverty seems also
misguided to me, there are a lot of people that were negatively affected by
capitalism. And a fair comparison should of course not compare the result
achieved by capitalism with the situation before capitalism but with the -
unfortunately mostly counterfactual - result achieved by an alternative system
that started from the same initial conditions.

Fun fact: I always get my share of down votes for being critical of capitalism
but no one attacks my position in a response. Do you have no arguments?
(provocative face)

~~~
brianfitz
Dan, I'll chime in. I don't know your circumstances, but when I read a
critique like this my first question is always "where has the person
travelled?". It's very difficult to spend time in places devoid of capitalism
and not notice the differences. Due to my past work, I travelled all over the
globe to both established and emerging markets -- and work simply can't
explain the levels of disparity. What repeatedly made a difference was
ownership. For example, the poverty in Addis Ababa is overwhelming. Once you
get past that, the second thing you'll likely notice is that the government
has a tight grip over business there. There are no McDonalds, Starbucks, or
any recognizable brands there. This is for the "benefit of the people", but
really is just there to protect government interests (the coffee place nearly
has the exact same Starbucks logo). In one area where there were nice homes, a
single individual owned the entire lot of them. Unlike the US where you might
be able to acquire property or make free choices about a new business, your
choices are restricted there. There is much talk in the US about the top 1%,
but this defines the "99%" by limiting the sample size to only those living
within capitalism. On a global scale, the top 1% is anyone making over $34k a
year.

------
yummyfajitas
I'm confused by the argument made here. An economic system fairly different
from the modern world, which was not called capitalism at the time
("capitalism" is mainly an 1880's+ idea), used slaves. Slavery was abolished
and later that system evolved into capitalism.

I'm not sure what the conclusion is. The author seems to think someone forgot
about slavery, though it's unclear who.

As a counterpoint to the mood affiliation, I'll just remind everyone here that
the term "dismal science" was coined by Thomas Carlyle, who favored slavery
rather than "find[ing] the secret of this Universe in 'supply and demand,' and
reducing the duty of human governors to that of letting men alone".
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dismal_science](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dismal_science)

~~~
dragonwriter
> I'm confused by the argument made here. An economic system fairly different
> from the modern world, which was not called capitalism at the time
> ("capitalism" is mainly an 1880's+ idea), used slaves. Slavery was abolished
> and later that system evolved into capitalism.

Capitalism was a term coined in the late 19th Century to refer to the post-
feudal economic system that developed through several centuries and was in
full swing by the mid-19th century, and overlapped considerably with the use
of chattel slavery.

While its critics hadn't yet _called_ it "capitalism", the system which they
did get around to calling "capitalism" did not evolve only after the abolition
of slavery as you claim.

~~~
yummyfajitas
I don't dispute that old-school market economies involved the use of slavery.
I just don't know what the point of the article is, beyond perhaps attempting
to affiliate "slavery" and "capitalist" moods in our mind.

------
nickff
There is a great deal of evidence that slavery was related to cotton, sugar,
and rice plantations (as well as some other crops to a lesser extent). One
could also make a very convincing, if not definitive argument that imperialism
enabled slavery (at the intercontinental scale), and that mercantilism
supported it. Politics, as played by wealthy landowners and slave-traders also
perpetuated slavery, as can most easily be seen from the (abominable) actions
of the American House of Burgesses.[1]

There is very little evidence for the argument that capitalism or free trade
was responsible for slavery. Economics was called "the dismal science"
precisely because its critics thought the proponents of free markets were not
taking a (racist) vision of 'social justice' seriously.[2] Later on in the
American South, the bus and streetcar companies tried to segregate busses on
the basis of smoking and non-smoking sections, but politicians and racist
groups forced them to segregate based on race. In South Africa during the
aparteid, businesses were taken to task for not discriminating strongly enough
against the Africans, and many groups such as socialists and unions held
racist policies as a tentpole of their platforms. There are innumberable cases
of the market acting against slavery, and even Smith described markets as
notable for their lack of nationalism or discrimination.[3]

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_codes](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_codes)

[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dismal_science](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dismal_science)

[3]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wealth_of_Nations](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wealth_of_Nations)

~~~
bobcostas55
>There is very little evidence for the argument that capitalism or free trade
was responsible for slavery.

Not only that; they were and are diametrically opposed. The Beckert quote
implies a connection between slavery and industrialization when in fact the
relationship was an inverse one.

A comparison between the confederacy and the north is illuminating. The
concentration of wealth in slaves and land prevented industrialization during
the 19th century, and the south fell very far behind economically. I think
it's worth nothing that the vast majority of white people in the south were
worse off because of slavery, because the system prevented capital from being
allocated efficiently. And while the two areas have converged, differences
still remain today.

~~~
danbruc
What? Having slaves pick cotton is as capitalist as it can get. You own the
land, they do the work, you get the profit. That slaves are not as effective
as tractors really doesn't matter for that.

Fun fact: I always get my share of down votes for being critical of capitalism
but no one attacks my position in a response. Do you have no arguments?
(provocative face)

~~~
grinnbearit
I got into a long discussion with eli_gottlieb here but I don't think either
of us got the answers we were looking for
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9335125](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9335125)

~~~
danbruc
I read your discussion there, let me pick one of your early comments.

 _It does this (in general) by giving points to people who satisfy other
people 's values and proportional to how much they satisfy them. These points
can be used to satisfy their own values after and this creates a feedback loop
of value satisfaction. IMO a very good thing._

If I understand you correctly, you think that what Adam Smith explained with
the invisible hand, that all individuals pursuing their best interests will
usually result in a beneficial situation for society as a whole, is true. If
that is the case I have to disagree, otherwise just ignore the rest of the
comment.

There is nothing that justifies this assumption, if everyone just tries to
maximize its individual gain there is no force that will ensure that gains for
society as a whole are simultaneously maximized. Let's just stick with the
topic of the article, slavery. If a few people exploit the workforce of a
large number of slaves they surly maximize their personal gains but you can
hardly argue that it leads to a good overall situation.

By the way, I want to avoid the moral discussion and will just take it for
granted that we agree that a world in which the slaves are not slaves but
receive a fair compensation for their work is a better world.

~~~
grinnbearit
> that all individuals pursuing their best interests will usually result in a
> beneficial situation for society as a whole,

The very next sentence I wrote disagrees.

> Of course there are problems, every system has winners and losers and thats
> why we have taxation and welfare, to smooth out some of the issues.

The choice of capitalism depends on moral subjectivity, its a necessary part
of the discussion. As I said before, capitalism is a type 2 system.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9338441](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9338441)

At the end of the discussion I asked a question that eli_gottlieb didn't get
around to answering.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9345477](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9345477)

This was specific to economic democracy but you can replace that with any
other alternative system, the question would still apply and be interesting.

~~~
danbruc
I am not sure if I don't understand your reasoning with regard to subjective
or objective morality or if I disagree. I don't think it matters. We want an
economic system that honours some moral objectives. To come up with such an
system we have to first establish our moral values, but I don't see in which
way it matters if those values are based on subjective or objective morality.
Especially because there is no proof that moral objectivism is true it is at
least for the moment also just a subjective position. So how could we even
think about choosing an economic system based on that distinction if we don't
know which is true? For the records, I am heavily on the subjective side but
think that only very few values or assumptions are required to build an entire
system of moral values upon them.

Let me pick an example, all humans are equal. This might be an objective truth
or a society might just agree on that as a foundational value. But in both
cases you can build the exactly same society or economic system that honours
this value independent of its origin. But I guess I missed a crucial point of
your argument, maybe our understanding of subjective and objective morality
differs. Are you talking about the distinction between a society where
everybody lives by his own moral values as opposed to a society where all
people share more or less the same moral values?

~~~
grinnbearit
I should define my terms better.

For this discussion, I'll initially restrict it to just "value subjectivity",
i.e. a person's desires are dependent on their state of mind and that state of
mind is personal and varying. For example, ranking your preference for a cool
glass of water and a delicious sandwich depends on how thirsty you are.

Scale this up to millions of people and you find that there is no objective
ordering of "things" that can satisfy everybody
b[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow%27s_impossibility_theorem](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow%27s_impossibility_theorem)

Capitalism, as a system, recognises this and is effectively a distributed
consensus mechanism. Allocating "points" to people who provide the most value
to the system. BUT like any system, it has winners and losers (not necessarily
evil, just benefitting) and without checks and balances would lead to a state
of the world that I'm unhappy with. Which is why taxation and welfare.

For any proposed alternative/update, I'm interested in the new winners and
losers as well as how this distributed consensus is achieved.

~~~
danbruc
I am fine with the market mechanism to establish prices and production
volumes, it is a pretty efficient mechanism for this. But I also see no
fundamental difference to say a planned economy. Whenever the Soviet Union
created their five-year plan they still tried - at least to some extend - to
align demand and production, but this is of course hugely inefficient compared
to a market because of the long planning interval and because it is impossible
to capture the demand in detail or predict what it will be in five years.

There are also some advantages in a planned economy, you can for example
penalize environmentally unfriendly products directly in the plan while
controlling a market is only possible indirectly via laws and regulations and
their enforcement which might be less efficient. But all in all market and
price mechanism with some added planning, i.e. regulations where market forces
are not aligned with goals agreed on by the society, seems at the very least a
reasonable choice for an economy.

I take issues with capitalism in other places, for example with the ownership
of the means of production. Let's again take an example. You found a company,
your workers produce goods or services sold for 10 millions per year. You pay
8 millions for consumed raw materials and in salaries and invest 2 millions
into the growth of the company, say a new offices, a new production floors or
new machines. For the moment this is all good and even necessary for the
growth of the company. But when you decide to sell your company you alone get
all the money your workers worked for. This is of course unfair and leads to
inequality because one or a few owners are able to capture a share of the
value created by a lot of workers.

~~~
grinnbearit
> But I also see no fundamental difference to say a planned economy

Unfortunately from Arrow's impossibility theorem (linked above), there is no
objectively "best" ranking for allocating resources so all plans will be sub
optimal (provided values are subjective). Because of this, any
system/allocation will always produce winners and losers, the only difference
being who they are.

In a planned economy you can prevent those products from being made entirely
or at least kept to a minimum but again, who decides the trade off. Subjective
morality is always an issue. Democracy, btw, is based on a principle of
subjective morality, if a majority of voters feel that their plastic toy is
more important than an endangered fish then isn't that the way it should be?
If not, why not? Of course, the real issue is that people have a hard time
predicting the consequences of their decisions. (see
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futarchy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futarchy)
for a possible fix).

\-----

As far as the means of production go, I'd like to set aside the moral argument
(for now) and just talk about incentives. A country (with any political
structure you choose) has a natural gold source somewhere in an area, they
don't know exactly where.

0\. Who predicts a market for gold and how are they incentivised?

1\. Who searches for the mine and how are they incentivised?

2\. Who develops the mine and how are they incentivised?

3\. Who discovers and researches new mining tech and how are they
incentivised?

4\. Who organises and hires miners, craftsmen, support and how are they
incentivised?

5\. Who pays these employees and other operating costs and how are they
incentivised?

6\. Who markets, ships, advertises the finished gold and how are they
incentivised?

And the big question, what if the venture fails? does everyone above get paid?
If any loans are taken to start this venture and can't be paid back who takes
the liability?

It is not that I don't believe there isn't an alternative but capitalism, as a
system, has answers to all of these questions and the list isn't exhaustive by
any means. Any upgrade/fix/replacement should have answers to questions like
this before it can be seriously considered.

edit: formatting

------
pnut
Thank god for robots and computers, 'cuz capitalism isn't going anywhere,
anytime soon.

~~~
danbruc
Well, robots and computers did nothing to prevent capitalism from enslaving
its workforce, they might actually have made the situation worse.

Fun fact: I always get my share of down votes for being critical of capitalism
but no one attacks my position in a response. Do you have no arguments?
(provocative face)

