The premise of this blog is that we are in the midst of a global crisis of capitalism. Capitalism — which I’m using as shorthand for the social order that combines a market economy animated by consumerism with a large bureaucratic state, organized science, and mass media — has triumphed around the world, bringing material plenty to billions and promising in due course to make such plenty the global norm. But nothing fails like success, and capitalism’s stunning success is no exception. The advent of mass affluence has satisfied basic material needs, but in so doing has brought new needs to the fore — needs that capitalism is much less capable of satisfying. And even as our social system’s alignment with the requirements of human wellbeing has gone askew, its overall vigor is declining — in large part due, in one way or another, to its prior productivity. The food at this place doesn’t taste as good as it used to,
Fantastic article and Substack overall. One question I am trying to dig into is - who is working to address some of these challenges? In other words, for those who want to be part of a positive solution where can we direct our attentions?
Thanks for this. As an innate capitalism fan, I know I will gain some useful perspective along the way. I have a quick question though. You have a quick little dig against factory farming but it seems to me that factory farming has been one of the big success stories of the past century, increasing production at a tremendous scale and enabling us to feed many more people than we would have thought possible.
Wouldn’t we want to keep that? Are you worried about environmental impacts? Or perhaps you’re focused on animal welfare? Just curious.
It would be useful to address the question: is part of the crisis a decline in future orientation, i.e. a decine in our cultural desire, or ability to coordinate, to lay foundations for a much better world for our children? Subquestions would include:
-- How would we measure whether this is occurring?
-- What is known about whether and how future orientation varies across cultures and times?
-- If future orientation is declining, do we have any clues as to why or what would fix it?
-- If future orientation is not declining, how do we explain the extreme difficulty of coordinating on pretty obvious investment areas, e.g. pandemic prevention, pollution reduction, healthspan and cognitive capacity extension, which have very high 50-100 year ROI we are "leaving on the table"? Is it just that these are harder coordination problems somehow than our ancestors faced and we need to up our game?
The Nature of the Crisis
Fantastic article and Substack overall. One question I am trying to dig into is - who is working to address some of these challenges? In other words, for those who want to be part of a positive solution where can we direct our attentions?
Really excellent. Keep recommending books too please.
Thanks for this. As an innate capitalism fan, I know I will gain some useful perspective along the way. I have a quick question though. You have a quick little dig against factory farming but it seems to me that factory farming has been one of the big success stories of the past century, increasing production at a tremendous scale and enabling us to feed many more people than we would have thought possible.
Wouldn’t we want to keep that? Are you worried about environmental impacts? Or perhaps you’re focused on animal welfare? Just curious.
It would be useful to address the question: is part of the crisis a decline in future orientation, i.e. a decine in our cultural desire, or ability to coordinate, to lay foundations for a much better world for our children? Subquestions would include:
-- How would we measure whether this is occurring?
-- What is known about whether and how future orientation varies across cultures and times?
-- If future orientation is declining, do we have any clues as to why or what would fix it?
-- If future orientation is not declining, how do we explain the extreme difficulty of coordinating on pretty obvious investment areas, e.g. pandemic prevention, pollution reduction, healthspan and cognitive capacity extension, which have very high 50-100 year ROI we are "leaving on the table"? Is it just that these are harder coordination problems somehow than our ancestors faced and we need to up our game?