Having it discussed in the class and from my previous reading on Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma plus other readings, makes it clearer for me about Capitalism system. Before this, i had heard about Capitalism but not in detail. All I know is that it is one type of economic system that emphasize on making profits. Nowadays, most country in the world apply this system for their economy. Some country refuses to apply Capitalism as they find that this system has more disadvantages than advantages. When we look through the history, many had failed when using other system. This is because Capitalism, one of the systems that had been applied long time ago, in nature, dominates the world today. Yes, they have pros but there are more cons than the pros when we look deep inside what Capitalism is.
In general, there are two formula that are used in the world of business. One of the formula, C-M-C is a formula that is used in common market. The concept of this formula is use-value where it "satisfies a definite need". There are a qualitative differences in this formula. Before that, C means commodities while M means money.This means in the equation C is being made in order to get M. The M that we get is used to buy another C for our definite need. Likewise, a farmer yielded corns. He sells it to get money so that he can buy new clothes. On the other hand, another formula, M-C-M', is totally different story. The concept for this formula is surplus-value where it "satisfies an indefinite needs". This formula are commonly used in capitalist market or what we call a company. C means commodity, M means money and in addition from the previous formula, M' is more money. Yeah, it seems tempting, right? This is the case where there are quantitative difference as the money is still the same but the amount we use and the amount that we get is different. Commodities in this formula does not only carry the meaning of solid things but also labor power as means of production.
Lets focus on M-C-M' formula a bit more. This is the formula that is used in Capitalist country or we say profit-making country. The thing about Capitalism is when we have started to apply it, we have no choice but to continue working on it as it is required in order to compete with another company. In order for a company to stay survive in the market, the company have to make profits continuously. Competition is a good thing but sometimes it can lead to bad things. When people compete for the company, they will only think about how to get the profit more easily or more faster. They will eventually be blinded with money and forget about other important things such as health. That is why in Francis Wheen's interview in Talk of the Nation: "Marx's Das Capital Lives on in Capitalist Age", Wheen describes Capitalism as Frankenstein or a vampire. Why is he making the analogy? He said that in the case of Frankenstein, human creates and controls it but at some point, Frankenstein became destructive and out of control. At first, human is controlling it, but then after a period, Frankenstein controls them. This is also true for Capitalism. Capitalism is made by humans and eventually now, it became destructive and controls the human. Wheen also said that Capitalism can be analogous to vampire. Vampire is a dead thing or a past labor. It lives by feeding off living or the present labor. This is also true for Capitalism as they take away something important to us like health but at the same time gives us profits.
Profit-making is also an endless and compulsory things. A German Sociologist, Max Weber, describes that profit-making is endless. He points out that it is endless because economic acquisition in capitalist societies is not "subordinated to man as the means for the satisfaction of his material needs". This actually means that this process of profit-making is a non-stop process as when we make more money out of money, we will have to use the some of the money to be used for making more and more money.
Profit-making is also compulsory. Weber points out that within "a wholly capitalistic order of society, and individual capitalistic enterprise which did not take advantage on its opportunities for profit-making would be doomed for extinction". What he actually mean is that if a company does not do profit-making, they will not survive in the market and in order to survive, the company must apply profit-making. That is why profit-making is endless and compulsory. From Pollan's example, we see that there are examples of Capitalism. Some of it is in order to produce meat faster, the government make a policy about corns. Surplus corn will go to feedlot to feed the cows. This is done in order to reduce wastage. Other than that, cows were made to eat corn as it makes the growth of cows to become faster. Moreover, corns are cheap food.
We can see from the examples above that Capitalism is an economic system that emphasize in making profit and neglecting other things in order to get profits.
1 comment:
Having learned more and more about the way capitalism really works in our society concerns me. Personally, I think it is pitiful that we have let ourselves come to this situation, myself included. I never realized the "problems" that I have mainly because in the real world they seem like solutions. The government designs the goods we consume to break or go out of style within a short period of just six months. In the documentary, "The Story of Stuff" it states that one percent of the goods we buy are still in posession six months after we buy the good. The reason for this is very simple but yet has sort of a shield over it due to the fact the government and corporations design perceived obselete goods. What is in style now changes within a very short period of time and then maybe after a few years that same good comes back in style. Why? This is all due to the M-C-M strategy discussed in class. Capitalism bases its who structure on making money. This means any way necessary. We have extracted so many natural resources its crazy to think about, and the United States is the leading country in wasting our products.
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