Saving Capitalism from Itself

I used to think I was an anti-capitalist. From the Rage Against the Machine posters on my bedroom wall, the Che Guevara tattoo I almost bought myself for my 21st birthday, to my continued dislike of speculative finance and its exotic instruments; the notion that our lives should be in service of the market sat uneasily with me. But I also like nice things, and have for a decade and a half have made a career out of playing games with value and culture in the marketing services industry; so I have always wrestled with dissonance.

But it’s this dissonance that is at the heart of what makes us human, and what has made humans so successful. We possess both the urge to compete and to co-opt. Both of them were – are – vital to our success. It’s why despite the obvious bloody brutality and aching banality of warfare, there is still a certain glamour that comes with the whiff of cordite and cold steel. It’s why we still venerate and decorate our war heroes. It’s also why self-sacrifice is as often praised as victory. Its almost certainly why the most lucrative sports; those most watched, most written about, most fervently followed are team sports that combine both belonging and rivalry. Despite respectable audiences, its why there will never be any golf riots or tennis ‘Ultras’. It’s why the Olympics is the one time when individual sports are most likely to spark the collective imagination; when they are in the context of an ‘us’. Cooperation within competition.

In its most elemental form, capitalism is simply ‘the market’. The market is both competition and co-operation. As soon as humanity moved beyond basic subsistence, it was this mechanism of exchange that allowed fair co-operation and fair competition when it came to things; assets, resources, time. This meant division of labour, exchangeable surpluses, efforts that could be re-deployed elsewhere; in language, in literature, in philosophy and religion and the stories that allowed us to progress along our zig-zagging but ultimately upward trajectory.

But markets have never been without rules, because they were always defined by and designed for, specific socio-political goals. There are countless examples. The guilds of the mercantile age aiming to keep limits on certain professions, medieval zoning keeping theatres and brothels out of the City of London, tariffs to tilt the tables for key industries at countless points in the history of trade; consumer protection, regulations and child labour laws; they have all been part of the ongoing negotiation of the ‘moral limits of markets’. And these have always shifted, based on our times. I mean, we used to trade humans – including I would presume some of my forebears – until we decided that was ‘not cool’. The proscribed footprint of the market and its rules of engagement have constantly evolved to meet the needs of societies that they served.

This is why ‘Capitalism’ – with a capital C – is so problematic in the 21st Century. In its purest, Marxist, sense it is incredibly useful to understand the industrial capitalism of the 19th Century; Marx was always a better historian and analyst than theorist; As a framework for understanding a period of time when the mass populace was seen primarily as a labour force it is invaluable, but does it work if we project it backwards into pre-industrial mercantile capitalism of the 16th, or forward into the 20th Century’s consumption-driven society, where we the people were primarily seen as drivers of demand? The Market – capitalism – evolves according to the society which it serves.

The problem I had – have – is with the Neoliberal Capitalism that I grew up under, the only capitalism I have personally know; the one where we are all incentivised to be mini ‘Capitalists’, privileging competition over co-operation, in order to serve the market itself. The reason why the market, why capitalism, has become so unappealing for so many now is because this neoliberal market lacks any idealogical prefix. For better or for worse – and in the big scheme of things it has ultimately been for better – the market had always been a means serving a society’s ends, but now the market is now the ends and our socio-political lives are the means.

Without understanding the fundamental role that the market, in its most elemental sense serves; to mediate between our urge to compete and our need to co-operate, it has been allowed to run amok. Neoliberal Capitalism is placing brick on the accelerator and then jumping out of the car. The market is a tool and we are responsible as a society, as a polity for how it is used. There is no such thing as a ‘Capitalist Society’.

No wonder we are rebelling in all directions. In the face of increasing wealth and decreasing worth, empty economic growth and chasmic inequality we turn wherever we can see an alternative. Nationalism, nativism, economic Luddism. Orban, Corbyn, Bolsanaro. They all diagnose the problem. And more frighteningly, for those of us of the left, all of us who could loosely be termed progressives the Right may be closer to getting it right when it comes to providing a direction and a solution. Illiberal Capitalism at least begins to provide a purpose for the market, a direction. It makes the market once again the means to an ends. It’s just that this ends leads towards the border wall and the purge, the lynching, the internment camp, perhaps war. But it may succeed because is is a vision for shaping the market, not simply the desire to burn it down.

The issue with anti-capitalism in the 21st century is that it is fighting the previous war. The classic Marxist rhetoric is designed for overthrowing industrial capitalist world that no longer exists. The sentiment is admirable, but times have changed.

But there are similarities. Much like industrial capitalism was for the few, neoliberal capitalism has been for even fewer. Current upheavals may well represent its death spasm. It can’t come soon enough. We are in a time of flux, but we must not mistake the gross unfairness of this version of capitalism with a fundamental flaw with the market itself. This is the time to radically reimagine what the purpose of the market itself is. What are the rules of engagement? What are the behaviours we want to incentivise? Changing the world to be as we would wish it is Judo, not boxing; we must work with natural momentum not against it, we must work with the seemingly contradictory angels of our nature. And this does not mean I believe there is not a role for the state. But where we allow competition and where we do not should be decided with an eye firmly fixed on the future. Many experiments in privatisation have not worked because the incentives have been wrong. Railways and utilities should probably be renationalised, so they can be greened and subsidised with road charging nationwide; we subsidise the internal combustion engine by building highways, yet we privatise clean mass transit. A carbon tax on every item bought that reflects its true cost to the planet. Monetary policy that targets the Gini coefficient rather than GDP growth. I am not a policymaker, but these are the places I would start.

The path to this Damascene moment has been a long one for me.
I am not against Capitalism.
I am against this Capitalism.

Is the Guardian making you Stupid?

I was having a cup of tea and re-watching the night before’s Newsnight with an old university friend last week- the rock and roll lifestyle I lead. He’s a Labour party activist and an investment banker, which in itself is an interesting piece of cognitive dissonance to possess (…perhaps for another time), but he is critical of much of the grass roots of his party. Though aims are admirable, what he sees amongst the party rank-and-file is a failure to engage with the public at large. Of course the provision of welfare is important for the most vulnerable in society and should be safeguarded by government, so the party faithful take it as read; despite the reality being that much of the British population do not. Simply put, they fail to explain why an idea that they take for granted, should be taken for granted, or taken at all in fact. His point got me thinking because this phenomenon isn’t just true of leftwing party politics.
Recently I have been struck by the extent to which the debate that I am engaged in, at work, at home, amongst my friends there seem to be a certain set of truths which we hold apparent, beliefs that are seen as universal and doctrinal. But time and again these are proved not to be the case.
Racism is wrong. John Terry and Luis Suarez clearly didn’t get the memo…or the Met…
Capital punishment is bad. Not according to most ‘state-of-the nation’ surveys
Multicultural Britain brings vibrancy to our nation. Bradford Riots, remember those? And all of the EDLs recent marche
And these are just the most obvious ones that spring to mind while I tap away at the keyboard. Just because  #creepingshariah can start trending doesn’t mean there is some kind of triumphant consensus of reason in this country. But so many of us who work in the civil service, or the ‘cultural industries’ those that influence the ‘national agenda‘ believe these things to be set in stone. Even if we look back over our recent history, these have been hard fought and hard won victories for liberalism- with a very small L- (the Equalities Act went on the statute books in….drumroll please… 2010) and as such are, in the big scheme of things, young, fragile and growing saplings, not great-trunked trees in the forest of this country’s uncodified constitution. I don’t want to get into that conversation in detail here- @jacksimsoncaird is the person to get in touch with for matters politico-legal- but the point here is that these new positions need to be challenged and then defended vigorously, nurtured and propagated. If they are not reaffirmed in the face of questioning then they wither. The whole nation is not the 217k-odd people who read the Guardian, who in turn set an agenda that is attuned only to views such as their own.
Simply put, I am consistently exposed to a chorus of general agreement. Abu Qatada has been found to be a criminal, and should be treated as such, but over grilled vegetables or a quick halloumi panini the chatter is one of variations on a theme, rather than actual debate. Its those so-called self-evident truths again. Only once have I heard a topical conversation where someone has cited a paper other than the Guardian or the Observer, and it was the FT. If you are reading this post, when was the last time you picked up a red-top? When was the last time you had a conversation in a pub with someone in a ‘working-class’ job (city-boy turned Plumber doesn’t count)? When was the last time you took yourself outside of that liberal monoculture of cycle-commuting, flat-whites and upcycling that you inhabit and engaged with views totally alien to yours, that start from first principles other than your own? When was the last time you considered that people even start from first principles other than the ones you hold true?
After asking myself this, I decided that enough is enough, to do a job in which I have to understand the relationship between Housewives from Hull and their sandwich spreads, or kids from estates in Camden and their relationship with trainers, I can’t live in that same bubble that is surprised when confronted with a view radically different from theirs, who see discimination as shocking, rather than a sad fact of life that needs to be addressed and changed and who rarely have their own bloviated opinions challenged by testing them in the crucible of real difference. So I am giving up the Guardian, kicking the habit; I breathe in enough second hand hoke anyway.