Exploring the Nature of Capitalism
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It is said that the aphorism ‘Know Yourself’ was inscribed in the forecourt of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi — Finding out who we are can be an unsettling experience.
Not only do human beings gild memories of experiences in their own lifetimes, they are extremely adept at reinventing those of their historical past.
It can be an educative experience to strip away what the French philosopher Voltaire called the ‘fable upon which we are all agreed’.
To understand the nature of capitalism, we need to examine the actual practices of Western European colonisation during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Unless we do, not knowing our history, we might well, as Edmund Burke suggested, unwittingly repeat it.
The 19th century was the century in which unregulated capitalism lay at the heart of most Western European public and private policy and practice. It was the century in which ‘The Poor’, long a vexing problem for responsible people — and, of course, a source of cheap labour and profit for capitalist enterprise — were taught to work.
By the end of the century, life was slowly improving for Western Europe’s poor. But, for the responsible middle classes of Western Europe, the job was far from complete!
A new ‘Poor’ had been found, indigent and slothful, in need of discipline and direction, in the extensive colonies for which they had accepted responsibility.
The next century would be the one in which Western working poor slowly gained legal rights and entitlements, enshrined in labour awards. The wealth flowing into Western countries from the rest of the world would bring increasing material prosperity, improved living conditions, healthier diets, and even, for a period, the chance to pursue ‘leisure’ activities. This would not be true for the inhabitants of Europe’s colonial empires.
The 19th was not only the century when The Poor learned to work. It was also the century of Western European colonial expansion. Populations around the world found themselves designated ‘natives’ (the Western European name for ‘The Poor’ of their colonies) and included, whether they liked it or not, in Western European empires. They, like Europe’s Poor before them, would be taught to work!
The consequences for indigenous populations would all-too-often be catastrophic.
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I risk to seem the layman, but nevertheless I will ask, whence it and who in general has written?
Who am I?
See http://www.pilibrary.com/Blog/index.php/about/ for who I am.
I guess if I had to choose a philosophy (May any existent transcendent beings forbid that I should do so unthinkingly!) it might be Pyrrhonic scepticism – but only in the sense of critically questioning those ideas and philosophies around me which are being most strongly and successfully promoted!
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I was just having a conversation over this I am glad I came across this it cleared some of the questions I had.
Awesome post. I so good to see someone taking the time to share this information
The information you provided is quite simple and clear for knowledge seeker. Thanks for your research anyways.
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I loved this article!!! Thanks!