 |
CAPITALISM arises and develops historically amidst a non-capitalist
society. In Western Europe-it is found at first in a feudal environment
from which it in fact sprang the system of bondage in rural areas and the
guild system in the towns-and later, after having swallowed up the feudal
system, it exists mainly in an environment of peasants and artisans, that is
to say in a system of simple commodity production both in agriculture and
trade European capitalism is further surrounded by vast territories of non-
European civilisation ranging over all levels of development, from the
primitive communist hordes of nomad herdsmen, hunters and gatherers to
commodity production by peasants and artisans.
This is the setting for the accumulation of capital. We must distinguish three phases: the struggle of capital against natural economy, the struggle against commodity economy, and the competitive struggle of capital on the international stage for the remaining conditions
of accumulation.
On The Web 
Read Publication
|
