[simonh]

If you can find evidence of a different system that’s come anywhere close to raising living standards of ordinary citizens nearly as much, I’d love to hear about it. And no, China doesn’t have a communist economy, pretty much everything productive about China is capitalist.

[wahnfrieden]

wengrow & graeber's recent research shows plenty of evidence (post discovery of agriculture and well beyond dunbar's number), that's a good place to start with your question. tangentially, mark fisher is also good for unpacking what you've said

[simonh]

Thanks for pointing me to wengrow & graeber. I've not read the book, but went through the summary on wikipedia which seems pretty good. It's interesting and I don't have any problem with the claims or conclusions in the summary, butI don't really see how it critiques capitalism.

It talks about the fact that progress isn't linear and that societies don't inevitably become more hierarchical, and I agree that seems right. In fact I could argue that capitalism is precisely an example of societies becoming more decentralised as Europe moved away from feudal and state monopoly systems, and individual financial, association, labour and property rights became established. At the same time monarchic and imperial systems gave way to democratic forms of government, with a few autocratic bumps along the road.

So to me liberal democratic capitalism is much more similar to the egalitarian societies encountered by European imperialists than it is to those imperial systems of the time. The only difference is that technological advances in transport, communication and the management of complexity have massively scaled up economic activity and the benefits that flow from it.

But then from what I can Tell Mark Fisher denied that there is such a thing as an economy. I'm not sure I rally get what he meant. anyway thanks for the references.

[wahnfrieden]

their book dawn of everything connects the dots to capitalist realism and graeber's earlier books cover related territory. they would disagree with some of your conclusions. it's a great read and the complete opposite of fukuyama's end of history argument

mark fisher doesn't deny economy, he takes a materialist perspective on it. his book 'capitalist realism' is probably a good starting point (i've only read his other works, that one is supposed to be a concise read of his thesis)

cheers for taking the time to broaden your perspective