When Even Conservatives Hated Capitalism, Part 4

Welcome back for the next installment of “When Even Conservatives Hated Capitalism.” The story so far: once upon a time, conservatives had harsh critiques of the industrial forces that enabled capitalism, and their critiques are still applicable to the exercise of the very forms of late-stage capitalism that conservatives currently endorse; the notion of “progress” is a relatively new idea ushered onto the world stage with the advent of teleological Christianity; Lyle H. Lanier argues that said “progress” in the era of modernity has been co-opted by business interests, revealing that while change certainly happens, “progress” is a myth; and finally the workers stuck in this industrial system are exploited forward, backwards, and sideways.

Here are the links for Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3, if you’d like to read those arguments in full. Now, let’s explore the next piece of the puzzle.

[Original image (sans text) by Dawn Armfield]

Next up:

[2.] The abuses of corporate oligarchy

Leaning on John Dewey’s analysis for a moment, Lanier notes that there is a fundamental disconnect between an individual’s private motivations, which are at odds with his collective efforts in a corporate machine age.

Lanier goes on to criticize socialism and communism (remember, I’m arguing he was anti-capitalist; I didn’t say he was pro-communist). Still tracing Dewey’s thought, Lanier takes issue with the claim that we are destined for some form of socialism. Dewey argued that given this inevitability, we needed to choose between “a socialism that is public and one that is capitalistic” (141). Lanier, however, disagrees.

The “capitalistic” version of socialism, Lanier assures us, “makes possible a scale of exploitation unheard of in history” (141). Please, remember this statement came in the days before we used words like “awesome” to describe things other than omnipotent God or before Donald Trump’s blustering claims of having the historically biggest...well, you all know. So when Lanier makes this sort of claim, I think we should take him at his word; he did not view it as an exaggeration.

In fact, Lanier predicted a “stupendous concentration of wealth and power...along with a corresponding degree of exploitation of human effort” (142). And here’s the real kicker for me:

Centralization of political power and governmental regulation of industrial processes--far from being tendencies toward any real socialism--offer even greater possibilities of economic domination, because of the comparative ease with which control of government agencies is secured by industrial interests. (142)

Damn, Lyle. Way to write our contemporary dystopia for us.

Lanier wasn’t fooled. He understood that industrialism would introduce a capitalist model of economics that would siphon wealth and power to the top such that those of us stuck here underneath would never stand a real chance.

If we turn back to the Great Recession and its aftermath, including contemporary events, we saw all of Lanier’s prognostications come true:

Concentration of wealth and power among the 1%? Check.
Business interests predominating government interests through lobbying? Check.
Bailouts for corporations while the common citizen was ignored? Check.
Soul-crushing, monotonous work? Check.
Government assurance that all is well so long as Wall Street benefits? Check.

At this point, I could see history swinging in one of a few different directions. On days I’m not worried I’m living in a fascist state, I worry that the state has simply become a puppet government really run by corporations.

If that’s the case, then I guess neoliberalism succeeded in detaching markets from state controls, but now the markets control the state, and I don’t believe it’s any more of a benevolent master.

I beseech you not to make gods of your masters.