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5.1.4 – RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

V. The development and spread of global capitalism led to a variety of responses.

RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

A. In industrialized states, many workers organized themselves to improve working conditions, limit hours, and gain higher wages, while others opposed capitalist exploitation of workers by promoting alternative visions of society.

• Utopian Socialism• Marxism• Luddites• Anarchism

MARXISM

Marxism says that people in the world are organized into different groups or classes based on their relationship to how things are made. Most people are called "workers" because they work in factories or offices or farms for money.

They belong to the "working class" (or "proletariat"). Another group, who are not as big as the working class are "capitalists", because they own the factories, land and buildings that the workers have to work in and also own all of the tools the workers have to use.

Marx calls Capitalists the "Ruling Class" because they live off of the work of all the workers. He also says that the Capitalists own the government, army and courts. In Marxist views, Capital is the "means of production" and money which the Capitalist can invest in different places of business so that they can "profit" or gain more Capital.

MARXISM

• Marxist thinking claims that Capitalists and Workers are in a constant state of struggle, which they call "Materialist Dialectic." Marxism says that in order for Capitalists to generate profit quickly, and to maximize their rate of profit, they have to exploit the workers as much as possible, and lower their wages as much as possible. Workers, on the other hand, have to struggle to keep their wages up, to keep the "rate of exploitation" low, so that they can live more peaceful lives. This is what Marxism calls "Class Struggle" where Workers and their Bosses fight against each other to gain for themselves.

• Marxists think that all of written human history has been divided by economic classes. They think that the progression of history has been pushed forward by class struggle. Marxism says that it is from this struggle that Capitalism was born and that it is from this struggle that Communism (or Socialism) will be born. For example: Feudal Society (a society controlled by feudal Lords and Nobles) rested its Ruling Class on the labor of peasants (farmers). But, as peasants demanded more and more for themselves small shopkeepers and tradespeople began to appear. Many of these people appeared in Guilds as well, and eventually began to employ workers to independently accumulate wealth. It was this historical progression that created Capitalists/Capitalism.

• In the same way, Marxism says that Capitalism will give way to Communism, as the struggle of the workers becomes more and more revolutionary.

OTHER RESPONSES

Luddites

• Feared that the increase of technology would replace human workers with machines. • Encouraged workers

to violently destroy factory machines.

OTHER RESPONSES

• An economic theory based on the premise that the voluntary surrender by capitalists of the means of production would bring about the end of poverty and unemployment.

Utopian Socialists

CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING

Please reword the following definition of Marxism into your own words:

Marxism is a method of socio-economic analysis and worldview based on a materialist interpretation of historical development, a dialectical view of social transformation, and an analysis of class-relations and conflict within society. Marxist methodology informs an economic and sociopolitical enquiry applying to the analysis and critique of the development of capitalism and the role of class struggle in systemic economic change.

RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

B. In Qing China and the Ottoman Empire, some members of the government resisted change and attempted to maintain preindustrial forms of economic production.

RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

C. In a small number of states, governments promoted their own state-sponsored visions of industrialization.

• Economic reforms of Meiji Japan• Development of factories and railroads in Tsarist

Russia.• China’s Self Strengthening Movement• Muhammad Ali’s development of a cotton textile

industry in Egypt.

ECONOMIC REFORMS OF MEIJI JAPAN

• The Meiji period, also known as the Meiji era, is a Japanese era which extended from September 1868 through July 1912.

• The Industrial Revolution in Japan occurred during the Meiji period. The industrial revolution began about 1870 as Meiji period leaders decided to catch up with the West. The government built railroads, improved roads, and inaugurated a land reform program to prepare the country for further development. It inaugurated a new Western-based education system for all young people, sent thousands of students to the United States and Europe, and hired more than 3,000 Westerners to teach modern science, mathematics, technology, and foreign languages in Japan.

• In 1871 a group of Japanese politicians known as the Iwakura Mission toured Europe and the USA to learn western ways. The result was a deliberate state led industrialization policy to enable Japan to quickly catch up. The Bank of Japan, founded in 1877, used taxes to fund model steel and textile factories. Education was expanded and Japanese students were sent to study in the west.

• Modern industry first appeared in textiles, including cotton and especially silk, which was based in home workshops in rural areas.

ECONOMIC REFORMS OF MEIJI JAPAN

Part of the reforms of the Meiji government included the opening up of Japan to western customs. In this case, members of the court wear clothes normally associated with western navel uniforms.

RESPONSES TO CAPITALISM

D. In response to criticisms of industrial global capitalism, some governments mitigated the negative effects of industrial capitalism by promoting various types of reforms.

• State pensions and public health in Germany.• Expansion of suffrage in Britain. • Public education in many states.

EXIT TICKET

Please answer the following question on your Edmodo page:

How has the world changed since the beginning of the current unit and the rise of Industrialization? What has remained the same? Who has benefitted? Who has suffered?