This Week's "The Calling"

Steven Horwitz

My Freeman column is now weekly and this week's entry asks whether we should abandon the name "capitalism" a description of the unhampered market.  It comes complete with a cliff-hanger because it's a two-parter.

Comments

[Steve Horwitz]

And a perfect example of why we should abandon the term "capitalism" comes from one of its supposed defenders. See Larry Kudlow's column today: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MmEzZTAxODdlN2QxZTAxNDEzMTAzNWNiOGQ4ZDIwYTU= .

It's a hymn to "free market capitalism," by which he's referring to the current system in place. And when the good stuff he predicts doesn't happen, what possible objection could he have to others saying "free market capitalism" failed yet again?

[Mario Rizzo]

I am sympathetic. I almost never use the term "capitalism." I usually say simply "free market." But the problem of the current system being equated with an ideal system applies to almost any term except perhaps laissez-faire. Oh, wait. Journalists call all sorts of interventionist systems "laissez-faire" if they think that there is less intervention than they would like. So ultimately people need to listen and think about what you are saying. But then, of course, they won't. Maybe we should say, paraphrasing Ayn Rand, "free market and we mean it!"

[Dan Klein]

"Capitalism" should be strictly avoided.

Collectivists hatched the following semantic system:

Socialism: The system that advances the interests of society.

Capitalism: The system that advances the interests of capitalists.

It's as simple as that.

Friedman, Riesman, Rand, Mises, and many, many others erred in embracing "capitalism."

Hayek, characteristically, was much, much better, but he did edit Capitalism and the Historians. But "capitalism" was there understood in a specifically historical sense. Also, he was editor, not in complete control of words the various authors used.

[Steve Horwitz]

Dan,

Click through to the article as I make that exact point about the names reflecting whose interests the system supposedly represents.

[Jim Hlavac]

I've been arguing against using the word capitalism for decades. The word capitalism was more or less coined by Karl Marx to describe anything wrong in the world created by the landed aristocracy that filled his lifetime. He wrote the book. By using the word we agree with Marx, and that can't be good.
It's a free market -- vs. a controlled market. That's the way it should put all the time.

[Dave Prychitko]

I agree. I haven't used the word capitalism outside of the Marxist critique in many, many years.

Happy New Year to all. We are going to witness a big change here next year.

[Rafe Champion]

Yes. Talk about free trade, the market order, the classical liberal agenda. And stop talking about "left" and "right" as well, that typology was promoted by the Fabians to link laissez fair liberalism with conservatism (of the kind that Hayek rejected) and more recently, with images of jackboots and death camps.

Respected colleagues over here have rejected this argument about giving up the terms "left" and "right", saying "but everyone knows what it means". How can it mean anything when the label "right" covers a bundle that includes zero state anarchists, classical liberals, authoritarian conservatives, the Religous Right and genuine fascists.

[Russell Nelson]

Okaybut let me argue against "free market". There is no such thing as a free market! There are only markets controlled by customers and markets controlled by governments.

[Russell Nelson]

Hmmmm.... Whatever new name you're going to suggest, think about how it works with "anarcho-capitalism", or do we need a completely new name there also?