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Capitalism as a world system
From the Summer 1986 issue of the World Socialist
Capitalism is basically an economic system, one in which production is oriented towards the accumulation of capital out of monetary profits realised on the market, the source of these profits being the unpaid labour of those who produce the goods that are sold. Production for a market, the accumulation of wealth having a monetary value, and even the exploitation of wage-labour had existed since ancient times but as more or less isolated practices rather than as a complete economic system. It was only in the 16th century that what Marx called “the capitalist era” began with the emergence of the world market, i. e., a pattern of trade and a division of labour involving a number of different countries and geographical areas.
What Marx Should Have Said To Kropotkin
The following is the transcript of a talk given by Adam Buick.
I once read a book which contained a sentence which began
“As Marx said to Lenin…” This would not have been a physical impossibility, as Marx’s life and Lenin’s life did overlap for 13 years. But quite why – and how – Marx would have confided his political views to a schoolboy in provincial Russia was not explained. In short, it never happened nor was it plausible to imagine it could have happened.
Marx-Kropotkin meeting on the other hand, though it never did happen, could well have. Kropotkin was born in 1842, Marx in 1818 so, although Marx was a generation older, they could have met and discussed (just as Marx had in fact met and discussed with the three founding fathers of modern anarchism, Proudhon, Bakunin and Max Stirner).