Death To Capitalism

 Well, this is a progressive blog, right? It was only a matter of time before I would post a title like this.

This is less about economics, of whose guild I am not a member, than economic mythology--and I am a fully-paid-up member of the mythographer's guild.

There is a corner of the Right that idolizes Capitalism. They not only ascribe everything that is good about America to laissez-faire capitalism, they confidently assert that eliminating regulation and minimizing taxes will bring about a Golden Age, and extol the personal behaviors of the ruthless, the selfish, and the Objectivist. They have their heroic narrative, and decry all attempts to tarnish it, and defy others to tear it down, so they can crush them with unassailable logic. Debunk Howard Roark, my friend, and you jut show your alliance with the mutualist hordes.

Their heroic narrative is in fact compelling: the self-made man, the ordinary Joe who, with his idea, his dream, and his incorruptible character, creates and innovates, and builds a company, and makes his  fortune and improves the world at the same time.

There's no denying it: it happens, it works in the manner described, and has done great good in the world. And those enemies of these touts are led into error by attacking this myth in precisely the way they had hoped. They obviously believe in the State, the Collective as the source of good, and desire the flat uniform harmony of the unheroic. They are just the demons we are dedicated to fighting!

It's stupid to work against this myth: I believe in it myself. Artists in general live this myth, with or without the happy ending. No, the problem that I have is--what does this have to do with Capitalism, and further, what does it have to do with our current state of affairs?

The connections, to our friends on the Right, is clear: the heroic action only finds its rewards in a free market; the free market flourishes under Capitalism; and Capitalism (adulterated and polluted by filthy liberalism) is what currently drives America. 

The first step  is just about as unassailable as the core myth: only with a free marketplace does the heroic individual have a chance to gain from his ideas and abilities. Barriers to that marketplace are evil and should be abhorred. No argument from me.

But here's the first chasm: they tend, from that position to say that because those restrictions are bad, all restrictions are bad. And it's clear that they believe that because they believe that the world as a whole is no different from a free market. It's reminiscent of Rousseau, and pretty damn romantic, to believe that the Free Market is the State of Nature, and everywhere economic man is in chains.

I think it really takes a modern American to hold with any seriousness to this belief, who have waked and breathed the air of that free marketplace for so long that it seems as natural as turning on the TV or driving around in the car. The enemies of the State of Nature are evil foreign influences like Marxism and strange intellectual constructs by coastal intellectuals. It's identified with what passes for prehistory in America: mysterious wholesome pioneers.

This is emotionally naïve and intellectually dishonest. The truth of the matter is that a free market, far from being a state of nature is a construct fiercely fought for, laboriously arrived at, and diligently maintained. And the enemies are not strange importations but domestic and ancient.

The Right tends to equate the free market with Social Darwinism, allowing Heroic Success to arise in a natural way. The Race is advanced. Now, I believe that Social Darwinism is inherently fallacious and pragmatically dangerous. To believe that success in one arena implies success in another is superstitious--and is often little more than a self-serving excuse to the powerful. 

The economic free marker requires a) a living and active system of justice; b) equal access; and c) a commitment to the truth. None of these have much to do with any state of nature. While the Right touts the free market as the justification for competition and combat, a free market can only exist by the dedicated exclusion of most of the competition and combat that flesh is heir to.

The fact that a car will take you where you want to go does not mean that standing in a gasoline fire is a  good idea.

It's perfectly possible to envision a system without property that nonetheless rewards initiative, hard work, and creativity, because money, to coin a phrase, isn't everything. In the artistic model, there's nothing inherently economic in performing before a stadium of thousands of people, or having people lined up around the block (at the library) to tell you how much they love your book. However, the best system has turned out to a propertied system in which people are rewarded with money for innovation, cleverness or hard work, and an elegant solution is that of the free market. 

Right-wing theoreticians tend to think they've made  a point when they show that a free market will generate inequality, winners and losers, the powerful and the powerless, and that therefore this is a refutation of the idea of equality. This is true only if you're talking about a state of nature. If you see the free market s a meticulous construct that must be constantly maintained, there's no contradiction: equality is not 'natural' but something that must be supported so that the Free Market will work; equality of  access and a concern with the truth--both  of which are completely contrary to the laws of Power, must be maintained so that the free market works, and continues to serve its positive social function. 

And that leads to another question: what the hell does any of that have to do with Capital?

After all the mythologizing about heroic effort, talent, effort, pluck and purity, of innovation and improvement, what is enshrined in the name of the system? Banking? The woman who contributes the idea, the man who slaves night and day for years, the experts and craftsmen who apply their hard-won skills and knowledge--who is the capstone of this array of heroes?

The banker who makes the loan?

It may not be exactly fair--just because the company is called Peerless Fasteners doesn't mean they are (or that there are no upper nobility working at the firm)--but it seems unfair that all the parts of a free market economy that resonate with people are given second place to those who invest. But if you look closely, why, sure enough, the details of the system as we have it is set up not to protect and reward creativity or hard work or even moral integrity--but to make the world safe for investment.

Not that that's a bad thing: quite the contrary, increased safety of investment tends to encourage more risk-taking and more openness to new ideas--but by ordinary human perception, it seems to sit behind all those other virtues. 

Excepting, of course, if it's your moolah being invested.

And this is where it becomes problematic. The fact of the matter is that throughout history, the powerful have been the enemy of the free market. Power distorts a free marketplace: it can impede free access, it can obscure the truth, it can commit injustice in a thousand different ways. There are two reasons why someone who loves the free market are in favor of that distortion: 1) they view the market as a state of nature, and then get positively Ptolemaic in showing that all these reprehensible epicycles really are, if you look at it the right way, still the Free Market--or 2) they are more in favor of Power than the Free Market.

The powerful will gravitate to the competition in the free market in the same way that they gravitated to Social Darwinism, and in exactly the same way they gravitated to the idea of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat in Marxism: any justification for acting like T. Rex's, they'll find oddly compelling. (and if all else fails, there's the divine right of kings...) Ultimately, any excuse for acting badly, greedily and cruelly will do.

And of course every bit as important to the powerful is a system that has them keeping their power--maybe more so. This, of course, is decidedly not in the interest of any racial, societal, or evolutionary progress--and so is something of a critical test for whether you're a 1) or a 2) wingnut.

The interesting thing about much of the right wing pushing of the free market is that they believe that the reward for market success is not just that they receive money, but that they get to keep it. In other words, that what they should get--and what they really hope for as potential heroes--is to become Powerful. Taxation is wrong because it penalizes success! Success is therefore not an outcome but a status. It is not getting some money: it's gaining place as an aristocrat. And while that might seem to be a Pretty nifty reward, it booth removes a lot of incentive to be creative or industrious again, but more important, creates more powerful people to distort that free market. Overall, in consequence, impeding the market and thereby discouraging heroism.

For a most vivid example, we have the Net. It's almost a textbook example of the free market: near-universality of access[ a competitive arena in which the able are rewarded,; and powerful tools to get at the truth. And, true enough, writers become recognized and lionized simply because they're good, specialized providers can pretty easily find their specific clientele--and everything is disintermediated. Heroes are rewarded, huge companies grow, and society progresses.

Something to warm the heart of both progressives and conservatives, it seems--and truth to tell, the satisfaction and readiness to fight for this free market comes from wingnut, moonbat and netpotato alike. 

But now, when net neutrality is under attack by the telcos, there are some who feel that it's wrong to support it. It seems incredible that people so passionately and publicly devoted to the idea of the free market would let an actual one die or at least be damaged, saying that, but but but, the telcos are corporations, and therefore part of the free market, and we shouldn't get in the way of the Glorious Process! It's conceivable to have your head up your ass so far as to abandon an actual treasure for a more wonderful but imaginary one--but another explanation is that the free market is attractive only as a justification for the bad actions of the powerful, and that it's either the speaker's job, or his wish, to stump; for the powerful, to make the world safe, not for heroes, but for powerful investors. 

And so I say, upon due consideration: death to capitalism--and three cheers for the free market.