Means and Ends: The Idea of Capital in the West, 1500–1970 PDF
Preview Means and Ends: The Idea of Capital in the West, 1500–1970
Means and Ends The Idea of Capital in the West, 1500–1970 Francesco Boldizzoni Means and Ends This page intentionally left blank Means and Ends The Idea of Capital in the West, 1500–1970 Francesco Boldizzoni ©FrancescoBoldizzoni2008 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-0-230-57257-7 Allrightsreserved.Noreproduction,copyortransmissionofthis publicationmaybemadewithoutwrittenpermission. Noparagraphofthispublicationmaybereproduced,copiedortransmitted savewithwrittenpermissionorinaccordancewiththeprovisionsofthe Copyright,DesignsandPatentsAct1988,orunderthetermsofanylicence permittinglimitedcopyingissuedbytheCopyrightLicensingAgency, 90TottenhamCourtRoad,LondonW1T4LP. Anypersonwhodoesanyunauthorizedactinrelationtothispublication maybeliabletocriminalprosecutionandcivilclaimsfordamages. Theauthorhasassertedhisrighttobeidentified astheauthorofthisworkinaccordancewiththeCopyright, DesignsandPatentsAct1988. Firstpublished2008by PALGRAVEMACMILLAN Houndmills,Basingstoke,HampshireRG216XSand 175FifthAvenue,NewYork,N.Y.10010 Companiesandrepresentativesthroughouttheworld PALGRAVEMACMILLANistheglobalacademicimprintofthePalgrave MacmillandivisionofSt.Martin’sPress,LLCandofPalgraveMacmillanLtd. Macmillan®isaregisteredtrademarkintheUnitedStates,UnitedKingdom andothercountries.PalgraveisaregisteredtrademarkintheEuropean Unionandothercountries. ISBN 978-1-349-36432-9 ISBN 978-0-230-58414-3 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9780230584143 Thisbookisprintedonpapersuitableforrecyclingandmadefromfully managedandsustainedforestsources.Logging,pulpingandmanufacturing processesareexpectedtoconformtotheenvironmentalregulationsofthe countryoforigin. AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary. AcatalogrecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheLibraryofCongress. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 Contents Preface vii Introduction 1 1 CapitalasMoney:TheEmergenceofModernity 8 Beforecapitalism:Theprehistoryofaword 10 MiddleAgesandRenaissance 11 Amoderndisenchantment 13 Economicsandtheology:Thelongsixteenthcentury 17 Theyearsofhightheory 21 2 LandandLabour,1650−1800 25 ‘Moneyisthefatofthebody-politick’ 26 Themaieuticsofproduction 27 Agricultureasprincipleofwealth 29 TheprimacyofnatureinFrance 31 ‘Art’and‘industry’:TheincubationoftheEnglishspirit 35 Thescienceofproductivity 37 3 ReproductionandTransition 40 Onericheconomybutwithnodrive,anotherconstantlyon themove:FranceandBritainintheeighteenthcentury 40 MoneyandthePhysiocrats 45 Asystembasedonavances 47 Thejobofthecapitalist 50 Aeulogyoffinance 52 Earningsoncapital 53 Progressandpoverty:Britishthoughtatthestartofthe IndustrialRevolution 54 A(limited)visionofdevelopment 56 Agricultureandmanufacturing 58 CirculatingcapitalinSmithandRicardo 61 4 IndustrialMaturity 65 Anewideaofcapital 66 Technologyandaccumulation 68 v vi Contents Towardsself-expansionofthesystem 72 Ideasandreality:Aquantitativeview 80 5 TheRevoltof1867 84 Thesocialnatureofcapital 85 Theformofcapital:Aphylogeneticapproach 87 TheageofmachineryI.Manufacturingandindustry: Differenceofkind,notofdegree 89 TheageofmachineryII.Thedestructionofthesocialfabric 93 Primitiveaccumulation 96 Revisionsandself-interpretations:MarxandAnglo-Marxism 98 6 TheAtlanticReaction 108 TheeconomicvirtuesofVictorianBritain 109 ThesentimentaleducationofMarshall 111 Accumulationofcapitalandcivilprogress 112 ThedefenceofcapitalinAmerica 116 Thespectreofcommunismtakesform 117 SocialDarwinismandpredestination 119 Distributionasafactofnature:J.B.Clark 121 7 TheContinent,1870−1938 126 Thelegacyofthe‘Austrias’ 128 Germansocialism 133 ItalyandFrance:Anexcursus 138 ThereturnofthePopes 143 TheEasternborder 146 8 KeynesandAfter:CrisisandContinuity 150 Britain’sdeclineandthechallengeofaffluence 151 KeynesandtheGreatDepression:Aneweconomicethics? 153 ThegenerationdivideatCambridge 155 Accumulationasamoralduty:JoanRobinson 158 Beginningandendofacontroversy 163 Whereareweheading? 167 Notes 170 Index 211 Preface Capital dominated the imagination of Western society during the strongest phase of economic development, from the Industrial Revo- lution to the energy crisis, and in our own time it is present in many aspects of everyday life, fuelling debates and forming prejudices. One onlyneedstoswitchontheTV,openanynewspaperorsurftheInternet to realize this. Yet, there is a lack of an overall history of this concept. Thereareseveralworksonthehistoryofcapitalism,reflectingthewidest range of views, but an infinitely smaller number of investigations into thehistoryofcapital.Itisasifthesubjectbeingstudiedwasdeliberately tryingtoescapetheattentionoftheinvestigator.WhenIbecameaware ofthiscuriousphenomenonsometimeago,itwasimpossibleformeto resistthetemptationoftakingupthechallenge. The work of an author undoubtedly reflects his view of the world, but it is rarely accomplished in a state of withdrawal from the world. ThereforeIwishtothankallthosewhocontributedtothefinalresultin variousways. My first thought goes to Franco Amatori, whose unfailing support gavemethenecessarypeaceofmindforcarryingouttheresearch,and whocloselyfollowedthisbookduringthedifferentphasesofitsmaking. Manypeoplereadallorpartofthemanuscriptanddiscussedrelatedtop- icswithme.AtCambridge:PeterBurke,MartinDaunton,Elizabethand PeterGarnsey,GeoffreyHarcourt,RobertoScazzieriandGarethStedman Jones. In Italy and elsewhere: Maurice Aymard, Marco Bianchini, Piero Bini,PietroCorsi,AntonioDiVittorio,PierLuigiPorta,MarzioRomani andStefanoZamagni. Iwouldalsoliketothankthestudentsandcolleagueswhotookpart intheseminarthatwasheldatBocconiUniversityon6February2007, oneofthefirstoccasionswhenIlaybarethegeneraloutlineofthework. Finally,theexchangeofideasIhadondifferentoccasionswithTerenguto Aitoru, Eugenio Biagini, Stefan Collini, Eric Hobsbawm, Harold James, Douglas Moggach, Michael Nedo and Amartya Sen on a varied range oftopics(fromtheBritishintellectualsofthenineteenthandtwentieth centuriestoglobalwarming,fromWittgensteinandSraffatothefuture ofcapitalism)hasbeenhugelybeneficial. Thepreliminaryresearchwouldhavebeenverydifficult,ifnotimpos- sible,withoutrepeatedvisitstoanumberoflibrariesandaccesstotheir vii viii Preface huge stocks: in the first place the rare books collections of the Uni- versity of Pavia and the Cambridge University Library, as well as the periodicalscollectionofBocconiUniversity.AtCambridge,thearchives ofKing’sCollege,TrinityCollegeandtheMarshallLibraryattheFaculty of Economics were no less important. I am grateful to the respective governing bodies for permission to quote from the Dobb and Marshall papers.IamalsoindebtedtothearchivistsRosMoad,JonathanSmith, Rowland Thomas and to the assistant librarian Boyd Spradbury for the helptheygavemeduringmyresearch.Quotationsfromthecorrespon- dence of F.A. Hayek appear by courtesy of the Estate of F.A. Hayek. I would like to thank its literary executor, Bruce Caldwell of the Uni- versity of North Carolina at Greensboro, for his great kindness. Every efforthasbeenmadetotracerightsholders,butifanyhavebeeninadver- tentlyoverlookedthepublisherswouldbepleasedtomakethenecessary arrangementsatthefirstopportunity. NeithercanIforgetMaxBeber,whorescuedmefromBritishbureau- cracy when I first arrived in Cambridge in August 2005, nor John Hatcher, who went out of his way to make the facilities of the Faculty of History available to me during 2006 and 2007. Katharine Hunt has been extraordinarily helpful in translating the Italian manuscript into English,andwehavehadgenerousfinancialsupportfromtheBocconi University Research Committee for our efforts. My publisher Michael Strang,togetherwithRuthIrelandandthestaffofPalgraveMacmillan, havebeenundauntedinpursuingthisproject,attendingtoeverydetail withgreatcompetence.MyfamilypatientlyputupwithmewhileIwas carryingoutthefirstdraft,andthecompanyofmycolleaguesatClare Hall, especially Tomoko Fujita and Sir Brian Pippard, provided a touch ofhumouronthedaysIwasrevisingthesepages. Apartfromallthesemanyacknowledgementsthereisoneotherper- sontowhomIoweadebtofgratitude,whichcannotbepaidbackdueto itsnature.ItistowardsMarcoCattini,fromwhomIlearntthehistorian’s craft.Thisbookisdedicatedtohim. Cambridge,September2007 Introduction Thisbookhingesonthreemainthemes:thedichotomybetweenmeans andendsintheacquisitionofwealth;thetransformationofaneconomic concept with regard to the profound changes that at times broke the continuity of social processes; and the eternal rivalry between cultures andvisions,asnationsroseanddeclined.Suchdifferentplanes,having continually interwoven with each other throughout history, must be includedinournarrativeaccount. As any etymological dictionary will tell us, the term ‘capital’ derives from Latin caput, which has given various meanings. One in particu- lar indicates the ‘stock’, or ‘principal part’, the outcome of which, by antithesis, is its ‘yield’. At first, capital had been, therefore, a purely monetaryandfinancialphenomenon.Itoriginatedasacommodity(or an end in itself) and not as a factor of production, at a time – the early modernperiod–whentheonlyfactorsofproduction,landandlabour were not commodities. Land was subject to the paramount rights of sovereigns and aristocracies, and the process of the enclosures was still onlybeginning.Labour,whichinEuropewestoftheElbehadrecently been freed from serfdom, was under the control of the guilds and far removed from any form of market bargaining. The two factors com- binedjustaboutproducedwhatwassufficienttoguaranteesubsistence, and sometimes not even that. The frequent crises of under-production indicatehowvulnerablepopulationsweretonaturalcalamities,disease and the lack of sound technical knowledge; the result was a continual fluctuationinpricesduetounpredictablesupplies,anditwasimpossi- ble to produce any profit. About 80–90 per cent of the social product came from agriculture. In a subsistence economy manufacturing could nottakeoff,anditwasthusrestrictedtothetransformationofwealth. Moreover,thetrendtowardsself-sufficiency,andtheself-productionof primarygoodsthatprevailedinthecountryareas,greatlylimitedoutlets forit. 1
The list of books you might like
