Capitalism and Its Critics. A Long-Term View

The concept “capitalism” is much younger than the historical reality it denotes. While “capital” and “capitalist” are older, the noun “capitalism” did not emerge until after the second half of the nineteenth century. The French socialist Louis Blanc used it in 1850, and defined it critically as “appropriation of capital by some, to the exclusion of others.” In 1872, the German socialist Wilhelm Liebknecht railed against capitalism as a “juggernaut on the battlefields of industry.” And in Britain, the Fabian John A. Hobson, a critic of imperialism, was one of the first to use the concept in the 1890s. However, it did not take long before “capitalism” moved beyond its initially critical and polemical use, becoming a central concept in the social sciences. German authors such as Albert Schäffle, Werner Sombart, Max Weber, and—in a Marxist tradition—Rudolf Hilferding, contributed much to this. Karl Marx had written a great deal about the “capitalist mode of production” and “capitalist accumulation,” but he rarely used the noun “capitalism,” and if so, somewhat marginally. Presently the concept is “in,” particularly among historians, and particularly in the English-speaking world. In the American Historical Association’s state-of-the-field volume American History now, “History of capitalism” stands alongside established subfields such as “women’s history” and “cultural history.” A recent front-page article in the New York Times carried the headline, “In History Class(es), Capitalism Sees Its Stock Soar.” Some authors have started to speak of a “New History of Capitalism” they see emerging. In public debates, capitalism remains controversial. As Sven Beckert recently observed: