Why Do We Still Believe Capitalism Is So Great?
Looking at (former) communist countries, the limited amount of freedom those people posses is in sharp contrast with our world. Russia’s elections have been rigged for longer than I can remember, and China’s social credit system would even make George Orwell uncomfortable. The average Chinese citizen is constantly being watched, and, by 2020, will face severe penalties when he or she misbehaves. Walking through a red light already puts your face upon several billboards, as a way of “shaming”. Soon it will prevent you from getting a good insurance, or might even prevent your kids from going to a decent school. If there’s any freedom in China, it’s hard to find.
Clearly, liberalism is much better than this long-feared adversary. It’s only evident that we continue to hold free-market-values, and that we look at many growing Eastern countries with fear and discomfort. If that’s the alternative, who wouldn’t vouch for our way of living? At least we have freedom: freedom to choose our own work, our own house, the school we send our children to, and whether you are willing to pay a fine when crossing the street. It’s a kind of freedom the Chinese citizen can only dream of. We’re very lucky to be born in this part of the globe. And yet, certain cracks are appearing in our Western way of thinking.
What Is Freedom, Anyway?
Freedom is the potential to do what you want to do. It’s a bit blurry, as I briefly mentioned in my previous article about free will. Are you free when a clever advertisement convinced you to buy a product you didn’t realise you needed till then? As a child, are you free when all you can do to support your parents is sifting through waste dumps in order to find some valuable goods? Those are the questions that got me thinking.
People aren’t born free, they have to set themselves free. From the moment you are born, you are subjected to influences you have little to no control over. People will tell you everything’s possible in America and that Europe is just, while others will tell you the Great Republic of China is there to protect you. The only way out is to think critically about everything you receive. If everything’s possible in America, why are so many in debt? If China’s there to protect me, why don’t my leaders care the slightest about me as a creative individual? In due time, you will come to realise that many things you took for granted are not as evident as they first were.
Infinite Growth
One of the first things that was mentioned in a book about capitalism I read a while ago was the growth model. Capitalism is about making investments, in the assumption this will return profit after some due time. It doesn’t make sense to give your money away if you don’t get rewarded for it. The more money that is being invested, the more money is made, like a farmer planting seeds. Technological innovations and scientific progress boost this kind of reward. Increasingly more valuable products are produced using less resources, making it attractive for investors to loan more money. This mechanism led to a tremendous economic growth in the past two centuries, which creates the illusion that there’s no limit at all.
Another major cause of the staggering economic growth comes from nature itself. As pointed out by some journalists, the influx oil had on the production of goods cannot be underestimated. Drilling for oil was already common practice in the 19th century, but only became a major influence in the 20th century. Since oil basically is sunlight that has been trapped for millions of years under the ground, it provided an almost unlimited amount of cheap energy that does not need to rely on the sun itself. Nobody can blame the ones who initially found this majestic source of energy for exploiting it the way they did.
Capitalism presupposes growth, but the soil the Earth is made of cannot grow.
It is only now, 100 years later, that we realise that our continuous hunger for growth is wearing down the planet. There’s a limited amount of space available to us to live on, and a limited amount of sunlight available to reach it. Even techno-optimists have to admit that the progress of science and technology cannot continue indefinitely. Some day, all things that can be known will be known. Will we still be rallying into the supermarkets to buy that new gadget that finally makes us look “cool” again?
The Uncontrolled System
Capitalism is an uncontrolled system. Novelist and historian Yuval Noah Harrari compares it to a set of parallel processors: each “individual” (each processor in the array) takes care of calculating its own supply and demand, optimising the system as whole. The net result is an economy growing evermore efficient with little to no intervention, which is almost like magic if you compare it with other economies. However, a bit like an AI that has gone haywire, humanity has little to no control over what it actually does.
Each individual is mainly concerned with its own survival, no matter how that works out in practice. Weapons are traded like it is just an “asset” that is impossible to actually kill people. If people are killed, some wonder how it will impact the exchange market. Even though scientists are screaming the Earth is about to end, the world leaders only reluctantly begin taking measures, carefully evading all economic penalties that could harm big business. The carbon tax? It’s just a way to exchange emissions with countries that are so poor they don’t produce the amount of emissions rich countries do. If that’s not enough, advertisers constantly feed us the message we’re not good enough or that we’re missing out while taking away our privacy.
Empathy or Apathy
If we care a bit about ourselves (and if we want to save a dying planet while at it), capitalism will have to go. There’s just no way around it. I believe that the question of how the system should look that replaces it is one of the most important questions of our time. Even Jørgen Randers, author of the best-selling book 2052, said as much 40 years ago. We have little time to waste, and much to be settled. Who gets what income? Do we distribute wealth evenly or do some people deserve more of it? Who is in control of the distribution? What products should be prioritised?
To me personally, though, it all boils down to a single question: do you show empathy or apathy towards your fellow human being? Are you empathic or apathetic towards yourself? Because there’s no planet that is going to magically appear where we can all jump to when things go bad. This is it. This life, these friends, family, and neighbours, are all there is. “In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.”, physicist Carl Sagan once said, and he’s right. I see a lot of confusion happening in the world while each of us tries to address this one question at a different level.
This life is precious. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.
We, the people alive today, are the ones that will have to make some tough decisions. It is true that as lone individuals we cannot change much about the way things are, but by thinking critically and by working together, I believe a better world is possible. Empathy and collaboration should be the driving factor. Using those two, we can make the world a better and safer place for everyone, no matter where you live or how young you are.
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