Awesome Essay. A lot of us moderns forget about how many streams of thought there have been within socialist thought over the years. And then how many civil wars within those camps, especially within the Marxist, revolutionary camps out for blood. And the fights, as you show, still rage.
People might enjoy the Revolutions podcast episodes on the Russian Revolution. The author spends several episodes laying out the developments of socialism within European thought, obviously including Marx and Engels.
I will say, as you've made the claim several times that Marx was the first to coin the term Capitalism, that this isn't true according to the historian that does podcast linked. If I have time, I'll try and track down the episode (no promise, but I do want to re-listen to the developments of socialism in European thought anyways), and get the original author of the term to you. I believe he was still a socialist if memory serves me correctly, be he definitely came pre-Marx.
Thanks! I’ll happily await that source, BTW. I have come across multiple sources saying that Marx coined the term, some that say it was Engels, and one or two saying that it was from another unnamed socialist. Nonetheless, I’ve been going with Marx since the term entered the English language in 1848 from everything that I’ve been able to find on my own, but I’ll correct it in a future article next time it comes up.
I think that, no matter what the source, philosophically it's interesting to note that the change in the stance on property happened in the Enlightenment from what I can tell. As such, the Mercantilists and Free Traders (in my opinion) made much more of the change in outlook leading up to Marx in terms of how property was viewed and handled. Instead of it being a combination of what humanity had thought previously in the Scholastic era back to the Romans and Greeks - that the community had claims on property for the common good, but the individual had prior just claims and took care of it first and foremost (and everything belonged to God during the Scholastics), it was only individuals during the Enlightenment.
Then, Marx onwards began the debate between schools of thought on Who - Individual, Community, or State. Essentially, with the socialist's schools of thought from what I can tell, he became the big Chief due to his weaponized autism, brought back all the prior claims, and everyone has been arguing about which has the 'right' answer ever since - never merging them into a complete whole. Every school says either the State, the Community, or the Individual. Fascism, Communism, or Capitalism.
At least, that's my take on the history of economic philosophy from what I've read.
The more I look at various -isms of the early 20th century, the more I see that (to paraphrase CEO Nwabudike Morgan): «Party behavior is centralizing behavior. The particulars may vary, but the drive to centralize limited resources remains a constant.»
Corporatism is hardly anything more than replacement of territorial autonomies with centralized government along industry lines. Nationalism, language reforms (see e.g. Greece) — all point to centralization.
The point, of course, is to be able to fight off rival gangs — because the party knows it is a gang, and projects its reasoning to other countries — and they aren't even wrong in that.
Awesome Essay. A lot of us moderns forget about how many streams of thought there have been within socialist thought over the years. And then how many civil wars within those camps, especially within the Marxist, revolutionary camps out for blood. And the fights, as you show, still rage.
People might enjoy the Revolutions podcast episodes on the Russian Revolution. The author spends several episodes laying out the developments of socialism within European thought, obviously including Marx and Engels.
https://open.spotify.com/show/05lvdf9T77KE6y4gyMGEsD
I will say, as you've made the claim several times that Marx was the first to coin the term Capitalism, that this isn't true according to the historian that does podcast linked. If I have time, I'll try and track down the episode (no promise, but I do want to re-listen to the developments of socialism in European thought anyways), and get the original author of the term to you. I believe he was still a socialist if memory serves me correctly, be he definitely came pre-Marx.
Thanks! I’ll happily await that source, BTW. I have come across multiple sources saying that Marx coined the term, some that say it was Engels, and one or two saying that it was from another unnamed socialist. Nonetheless, I’ve been going with Marx since the term entered the English language in 1848 from everything that I’ve been able to find on my own, but I’ll correct it in a future article next time it comes up.
Sounds good!
I think that, no matter what the source, philosophically it's interesting to note that the change in the stance on property happened in the Enlightenment from what I can tell. As such, the Mercantilists and Free Traders (in my opinion) made much more of the change in outlook leading up to Marx in terms of how property was viewed and handled. Instead of it being a combination of what humanity had thought previously in the Scholastic era back to the Romans and Greeks - that the community had claims on property for the common good, but the individual had prior just claims and took care of it first and foremost (and everything belonged to God during the Scholastics), it was only individuals during the Enlightenment.
Then, Marx onwards began the debate between schools of thought on Who - Individual, Community, or State. Essentially, with the socialist's schools of thought from what I can tell, he became the big Chief due to his weaponized autism, brought back all the prior claims, and everyone has been arguing about which has the 'right' answer ever since - never merging them into a complete whole. Every school says either the State, the Community, or the Individual. Fascism, Communism, or Capitalism.
At least, that's my take on the history of economic philosophy from what I've read.
The more I look at various -isms of the early 20th century, the more I see that (to paraphrase CEO Nwabudike Morgan): «Party behavior is centralizing behavior. The particulars may vary, but the drive to centralize limited resources remains a constant.»
Corporatism is hardly anything more than replacement of territorial autonomies with centralized government along industry lines. Nationalism, language reforms (see e.g. Greece) — all point to centralization.
The point, of course, is to be able to fight off rival gangs — because the party knows it is a gang, and projects its reasoning to other countries — and they aren't even wrong in that.