Saul Silverman's posting about "capitalism as is" and "capitalism as it can
be" got me thinking about "government as is" and "government as it can be".
I would suggest that there is only one kind of capitalism - the kind that
is. It is self-serving, highly rational, exploitative, and, where permitted,
brutal. Its concerns are to cut costs, maximize returns, and grow. Whether
it exists in a democratic or totalitarian setting does not matter. It is
what it is, essentially a growing machine, and it behaves as it does whether
it operates in an individualistic environment or a collectivist one.
The extent to which the machine is under control varies greatly from country
to country. What this depends on is not so much on whether a society is
democratic or authoritarian, but more on the extent to which a government
has bought into the ethics, values and methods of capitalism. On the one
hand, in running the machine, in being the sole capitalist, the Soviet
government bought into capitalism entirely, and in emulating the machine, in
using its methods, Nazi Germany totally embraced capitalism's ethics and
values. On the other, western democracies, aided and abetted by unions and
other popular movements, have acted as a powerful counter force to capital.
I have wondered recently if democracies have not begun to let our guard
down. Democratic governments have begun to feel somewhat cornered. Capital
is now capable of rapid international movement. Wealth can now be relocated
in ways that government cannot control. Governments cannot agree on what
should be allowed and what they might attempt to regulate -- witness the
fate of the MAI. They view capital as both scarce and as globally available,
and, almost like beggars with their hands out, compete with each other for
benefits which foreign investment can bring.
But what I have found even more disturbing is that freely-elected,
democratic governments have bought into many of the ethics and values of
capitalism. Capitalism leads and government follows. Government perceives
itself to have become business, intent on continuing to provide only those
services which cannot be sloughed off to the private sector, and operating
those as cheaply as possible. The "bottom line" has become a major
preoccupation. Providing services of high quality has been displaced by
providing services at the lowest possible cost. Those who cannot make it in
the economy are cast aside much like those who are being "terminated" in a
downsizing corporation.
I have suggested that this is a dangerous confusion of roles in previous
postings. It represents a serious, perhaps fatal, erosion of countervailing
power. It raises the disturbing possibility that even liberal democracies
may soon become little more than giant corporations.
Ed Weick
