Capitalism, the Absurd System - Monthly Review

Capitalism, the Absurd System - Monthly Review:

"A few years ago, in a class one of us taught, a discussion arose about how capitalism works as a system in which the need for the few to maximize profit drives the entire political-economic structure. The students appeared to grasp how the capital accumulation process has a strong effect, often negative, on the course of a society’s development. The discussion then turned to Salvador Allende’s Chile of the early 1970s, where the goal was to develop a socialist political economy. “Knowing what you do about how capitalism functions,” the students were asked, “what would a socialist system look like?” They were unusually quiet. Finally, one of them blurted out: “I don’t know how it could work. I guess the government would have to kill everybody.”

The question of how a socialist society would operate raised a horrible, dystopian image in this student’s mind. Such libertarian fears of a totalitarian state imposing socialism by force, even to the point of annihilation, on an unwilling people, who are presumed to be capitalist by nature, are all too common. This brings to mind Fredric Jameson’s comment: “Someone once said that it is easier [for most people in today’s society] to imagine the end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism.”2

Perhaps nothing points so clearly to the alienated nature of politics in the present day United States as the fact that capitalism, the economic system that drives the society, is effectively off-limits to critical review or discussion. To the extent that capitalism is mentioned by politicians or pundits, it is regarded in hushed tones of reverence for the genius of the market, its unquestioned efficiency, and its providential authority. One might quibble with a corrupt and greedy CEO or a regrettable loss of jobs, but the superiority and necessity of capitalism—or, more likely, its euphemism, the so-called “free market system”—is simply beyond debate or even consideration. There are, of course, those who believe that the system needs more regulation and that there is room for all sorts of fine-tuning. Nevertheless, there is no questioning of the basics.

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