(Not that I’m necessarily a fan of the heirarchical organisation of Ancient Egypt, but sharing cuz shows ur point)
how did they build this without agentic ai workflows
I mean, they built a… thing that benefited absolutely nobody, so it doesn’t help the (still obviously true) point that you can do big and useful things without capitalism.
well ancient egypt did have payrolls and quarterly reports because that’s kind of just a necessary function for a civilization of that scale. I know everybody hates payroll and doing quarterly reports but that isn’t because sharing and / or having that type of information sucks, it’s because it’s all to do more nickel and dime shit
They used slaves, so not too far off from capitalism.
I think “technically” it wasn’t slavery, atleast as envisioned in modernity. But there was definitely coercion involved so it probably amounts to what anarchists would call slavery. So yeah not something to take inspiration from. But an easy “gotcha” for people saying without capitalism there is no progress.
From The Dawn of Everything- A New History of Humanity by the anarchist anthropologist and archaeologist team Graeber and David Wengrow explaining about how people began to be used as labor for Egyptian pyramid construction:
What preceded the First Dynasty, then, was not so much a lack of sovereign power as a superfluity of it: a surfeit of tiny kingdoms and miniature courts, always with a core of blood relatives and a motley collection of henchmen, wives, servants and assorted hangers-on. Some of these courts appear to have been quite magnificent in their own way, leaving behind large tombs and the bodies of sacrificed retainers. The most spectacular, at Hierakonpolis, includes not only a male dwarf (they seem to have become a fixture of courtly society very early on), but a significant number of teenage girls, and what seem to be the remains of a private zoo: a menagerie of exotic animals including two baboons and an African elephant. These kings give every sign of making grandiose, absolute, cosmological claims; but little sign of maintaining administrative or military control over their respective territories.
How do we get from here to the massive agrarian bureaucracy of later, dynastic times in Egypt? Part of the answer lies in a parallel process of change that archaeology also allows us to untangle, around the middle of the fourth millennium BC – we might imagine it as a kind of extended argument or debate about the responsibilities of the living to the dead. Do dead kings, like live ones, still need us to take care of them? Is this care different from the care accorded ordinary ancestors? Do ancestors get hungry? And if so, what exactly do they eat? For whatever reasons, the answer that gained traction across the Nile valley around 3500 BC was that ancestors do indeed get hungry, and what they required was something which, at that time, can only have been considered a rather exotic and perhaps luxurious form of food: leavened bread and fermented wheat beer, the pot-containers for which now start to become standard fixtures of well-appointed grave assemblages. It is no coincidence that arable wheat-farming – though long familiar in the valley and delta of the Nile – was only refined and intensified around this time, at least partly in response to the new demands of the dead.
The two processes – agronomic and ceremonial – were mutually reinforcing, and the social effects epochal. In effect, they led to the creation of what might be considered the world’s first peasantry. As in so many parts of the world initially favoured by Neolithic populations, the periodic flooding of the Nile had at first made permanent division of lands difficult; quite likely, it was not ecological circumstances but the social requirement to provide bread and beer on ceremonial occasions that allowed such divisions to become entrenched. This was not just a matter of access to sufficient quantities of arable land, but also the means to maintain ploughs and oxen – another introduction of the late fourth millennium BC. Families who found themselves unable to command such resources had to obtain beer and loaves elsewhere, creating networks of obligation and debt. Hence important class distinctions and dependencies did, in fact, begin to emerge, as a sizeable sector of Egypt’s population found itself deprived of the means to care independently for ancestors.
You list Wengrow twice, accidentally leaving out David Graeber.Great post! I wish I could upvote DoE quotes 100 times! One of my favorite books and required reading IMHO.
Thanks, that’s what I get for writing a comment and coming back later to finish it. Corrected.
It really is a remarkable book.
Even if the actual guys that moved it weren’t slaves, calling the other people involved not slaves is crazy. The society existed on the backs of slaves
There were still classes back in the day, serfdom, slavery, guilds that had similar exploitation to wage labor. There was plenty of coercion to get labor done.
Yeah, the famous neolithic serfs.
Jokes aside, coercion was always a thing, but naturalizing it as inevitable or even desirable stumps any kind of radical thought for a differenti way of things. The world is something we make, and we can make it differently
We can make it different, but it doesn’t mean that we’ll be able to abolish coercion entirely.
If instead of commodity production we moved past it, abolished current means of coercion (money) and instead pushed for planned economy that focuses on meeting everyone’s needs, there would still be a need for some pressure to fill all the needed positions to meet all the production quotas.
It’d still be kilometers better than “get any job so capitalist extracts money from you or starve”, and is radical but still coersive nonetheless.
I mean, go back and read up on The Inclosure Acts and you’re going to see the real bedrock of modern capitalism.
The relationship between aristocrats and serfs was materially different than capitalists and wage laborers. The former was more a method of formalized raiding and looting, while the later never lets labor have their hands on the goods to begin with.
In the same vein, Guilds were - at their heart - a system of professionalizing a craft and passing that knowledge on generation to generation. The modern academic institutions simply don’t do that. Academic students have to demonstrate a broad competency in academic skills, but they have very little exposure to the commercial applications of their labor until the start their careers. A guild apprentice or journeyman is already building a client network as part of their training, while a college student only cultivates these relationships extra-curricularly (via internships or fellowships outside of the classroom).
These are radically different systems in practice, even if you can draw some vague parallels between instances of labor exploitation.
Never said that the relationship was the same, only that exploitation still existed back then, though I must admit I worded my sentence poorly.
Granted, you’re painting the guild relationships as if they were merely teaching devices, while that’s far from the truth and just falls to medieval ideological propaganda. In reality, they were an early form of “capitalist exploitation” for the lack of a better term in a pre-capitalistic society, it’s very similar to the surplus value extraction that we see today. The master owned the tools, workshop, guild membership, etc which constituted as means of production of that time. The apprentice sold their labor power and essentially themselves thanks to the contracts in exchange for subsistence which is literally what wages are designed to do also.
The other forms were different though, yes, but they were still exploitative. Marx didn’t write “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.” for no reason.
That very much depends on when and where you look in history. Many people didn’t live that way at all and still lived in large communities and built things with the only coercion being the ties of community for hundreds to thousands of years.
Being a serf was apparently a lot less work and less miserable than you might think from pop culture. They worked for another, yes, but they also were looked after in return, and they didn’t have to work the whole year. They also could just leave if they wanted to find a new place to live, which was a lot easier then than it is now. It wasn’t the false choice of today where you work or starve.
Slavery, also, depended on the culture. In some cultures slaves were typically people who were captured or traded in compensation for a killing. But rather than be forced labor, they were treated as a sort of trial family member, and once the debt was seen as paid they would often be fully adopted as part of the community.
I recommend a book by David Graeber and David Wengrow called The Dawn of Everything, if you’re interested in this sort of thing. It challenges the foundations of what we assume history was like using historical evidence, then reimagines foggy parts and builds an at least as probable image of the past in it’s place.
They (serfs) also could just leave if they wanted to find a new place to live, which was a lot easier then than it is now. It wasn’t the false choice of today where you work or starve.
That’s literally false - serfs were legally tied to their land and lord, and the only way out was if they were either let go or escaped to some town offering freedom. This obligation was hereditary too, and getting your own land/home was pretty much impossible given how ingrained in aristocrat culture owning land was, with the sale of land being a great dishonor on your lineage and family.
Are we literally falsifying feudalism now, is that what’s happening
That varied by country and a lot of places either never had serfdom or it only lasted a short time.
Weren’t serfs basically tied to the land? They jad to get permission from the lord to go anywhere
it’s such a pity that the first humans to invent the wheel or writing didn’t patent it
Ok, capitalism bad, but are we actually pretending that feudalism isn’t worse?
we also created farms and art before feudalism. feudalism is also a capitalist structured society. capitalism did not come into existence when adam smith described it, he was just discussing how feudalism gates access to the commons through access to power. capitalism has existed for 12000 years, at least, we only started calling it capitalism in the 1700s. the key features of capitalism are owners of wealth generating resources, and workers who are paid to generate wealth using these wealth generating resources. in the age of feudalism, the wealth generating resource was the land itself, and how the ownership class acquired it was through their access to violence.
I don’t think c/flippanarchy is advocating for feudalism in their critique of capitalism, but I could be wrong!
There’s not much else to choose from if you are looking at cities, etc, built before modern capitalism.
You are missing the point.
Here it is again: Capitalism is not a requirement for human advancement.
If that’s the point, then stop pointing to the past as an example of it. All that’s proving is that there are worse options we have tried.
Is it?
Admittedly we don’t know loads about but Mohen Darjo and early Uruk look pretty good, and some Mayan cities and American Indian nations seem like they had very good standards of life pre-Europeans too.
Feudalism isn’t particularly far removed from capitalism. Even its natural shift to what is often called cronyism is a basically feudalism without the titles.
Nobody is pretending that. Get real.
Can I link this post next time I run into someone saying exactly that?
Holy fuck bud. You know what the post was about. Nobody, with any real credibility, is making an anti-capitalist argument that is also pro-feudalism. This post can only be construed as pro-feudalism if you squint, turn your head sideways, and shove it up your own ass.
Holy fuck bud, this post doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
Wow, so profound. Should we have to consider every argument some dipshit makes/might make every time we open our mouths? Is that what context means? Of course it doesn’t. Ridiculous. Back to the context of this post, there is no stretch of the imagination where OP was making a pro-feudalist argument.
Does anyone think capitalism is getting anything done? Construction is pretty much non existent in the US and we have a housing crisis with no signs of it getting better. People profit more off of not producing housing, keeping it scarce. It feels like we’re at the stage of artificial scarcity for profit
Capitalism is getting plenty done! Just look at the climate!
Look at the global rise of fascism!
Do you think this shit just happens?
So your theory is that home builders are deliberately sitting on their hands? Are you mad?!
I’ve worked adjacent to their industry, known a great many one-man contractors and a couple of big home builders. Believe it, they will build as fast as they can get permits and capital.
The housing problem is mainly corporate ownership monopolizing homes. That can happen under any system. Look at China for the opposite extreme. They built too many homes! This requires legislation no matter the system.
Second, our populations have exploded. America’s population has increased 59% since I was born and the world population has gone from 3.7B to 8.2B. That’s a lot of bodies to house!
as fast as they can get permits and capital
You think maybe this could be related?
our populations have exploded
So the labor force has also exploded
Look at China for the opposite extreme. They built too many homes!
You started off asking if I’m crazy but it seems you’re agreeing with me? I don’t know what point you’re trying to make
Kind of reminds me of when people are like “If you don’t believe in hell why aren’t you raping and murdering people?”. It says a lot about the speaker
The pyramids were paid for in part by a stipend of beer. I think that’s a
goodbetter system.Imagine 5000 years in the future and archeologists state that workers today were paid in part by a stipend of pizza and coffee, based entirely off reports documenting the expenses of companies throwing pizza parties and having free coffee in break rooms.
This is a reasonable argument and made me pause to think about it. However the ancient Egyptians kept records on clay tablets and our paper receipts and digital data will all be gone, so no one will have a record of the pizza parties. That doesn’t stop you from buying me beer if you like. :)
Okay no but see how would you play tetris on the internet with your ARM based phone without capitalism?
Checkmate commies.
So I recently learned my… Inclination to reject authority based on authority alone is related to ASD and I’m way more neurospicier than I understood (though everyone around me knew)
But I know I can respect authority when there is reason to do so.
Was wage-dependance created as a way to squish bugs like me who would otherwise laugh at authority for preposterous demands?
No, thats what cops are for.
Wage dependence is there to gaslight and isolate (all of) us.
Don’t get me wrong I’m all for a better system but it’s not that simple.
Like communism sounds nice, but if you don’t do it on a global scale you still have the problem of other countries trying to influence elections or referendums, wars would still be started etc.
Capitalism with a lot or guard rails seems like the most realistic option. Maybe a mix of systems could work, where people that work for a company automatically become part owner or something.
A system where the government has full control over everything is going to lead to authoritarianism.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We can probably make some positive changes with better democratic systems. For example no 2 party system, but a combination of coalitions and ranked voting.
I’m not an expert in any way, but just saying capitalism bad, without any real alternative isn’t going to do anything.
We have a real alternative. Check which comm yore in and the rules in the sidebar
I knew what community this was, but what real alternative do you suggest? How is anarchy going to actually work?
Hmm I just found this https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-anarchy-works
I’ll give it a read tomorrow as my kids will wake me up in 6 hours…
People were coexisting and making shit long before capitalism. If you took away capitalism id still be buidling shit. Itd just be better shit because i wouldnt have to do other stupid shit for money.
People who wanted to grow shit would grow shit, and people who wanted to be doctors would still be doctors.
When people ask how anarchy would work, they’re almost never really asking the question they think their asking.
Anarchy essentially requires you to understand your talking about association by choice in order to get things done.as a group. Which happens every day all the time.
America itself is a mixed economy (or at least used to be)…
Compare North Korea and Cuba after years without capitalism.
And remember that theres still an embargo against Cuba preventing a lot of stuff coming into it from other countries.
Compare Haiti and Yemen after years without communism. shrug
It might be worth recalling that North Korea was the industrial end of the country, prior to the Japanese occupation and subsequent post-war division. Following the Bodo League Massacre, Northern Communists flooded across the border to aid their comrades to the south. Their industrial advantage made short work of the Southern capitalist-backed military, which was quickly rolled back almost to the sea. Only UN intervention prevented the South Korean Capitalists from suffering the same fate as the Chinese KMT.
US intervention in Korea came via the overwhelming superiority of air support. The Korean Peninsula suffered more bombs dropped in the next three years than all of Europe endured during WW2. North Korea - Pyongyang in particular - was flattened.
Even then, following the Chinese entering the war with MacArthur’s ill conceived invasion, and the border being reset to the 53 parallel, the peace dividend favored the North. Communist economic planning with the benefit of support from the USSR gave North Koreans a significantly better quality of life than South Koreans living under the Rhea/Park dictatorship and subsisting on aid from Japan/US.
It wasn’t until the collapse of the Park regime and the introduction of the tech industry in the 1980s that South Korean quality of life surged. That, combined with the collapse of the USSR cut North Korea off from at-cost agricultural supplies. The North spiraled into a horrible depression in the 1990s while the South rapidly accrued wealth from its US export businesses.
There’s a ton of history you can absorb if you don’t just take the propaganda at face value. The isolationism of Northern politics came with costs, relative to the benefits of being an occupied country in a tech boom. But the book is far from closed on where these two countries end up.
If the US can’t keep its shit together into the next century, countries like South Korea could be faced with similar economic pitfalls while NK and Cuba are no longer locked out of global trade through a Wall Street blacklist.
So a minority of countries in capitalism and 100% of socialist counties had massacres, famine, death and failed miserably.
a minority of countries in capitalism and 100% of socialist counties
Where were feeding these statistics? Conservapedia?
Firstly, you’ve got it backwards. 100% of Capitalist nations had massacres, famine, death and failed miserably.
Modern socialist states are some of the most peaceful and prosperous in the world.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say that, who says that?
This is pretty disingenuous. Go to any discussion of any economic system that isn’t capitalism on any open forum anywhere.
bEst EcOnoMiC sySTeM eVERrrr!
I never go to those forums. I’ve never heard anyone who openly defends capitalism because I don’t know anyone who isn’t being fucked by it. Dunno what circles you’re running in where people are telling you how awesome capitalism is over and over but I don’t know people like that
There is nothing wrong with capitalism. There is something wrong with unbridled unchecked all dictating capitalism.
Capitalism works fine with a healthy dose of socialism and a government that sets proper boundaries for capitalism.
But if you keep thinking that socialism is communism and you don’t want government regulations…
Well you get what you asked for, don’t complain now, this is what you wanted and now you have it.
There’s nothing wrong with capitalism he says and then goes on to talk about how capitalism is inherently so wrong it has to be bridled controlled and limited. This Pitbull is perfectly gentle, sure I have to keep a muzzle on him and always has to be on a very strong tight leash or in a cage securely and if he’s not he’ll go on a killing spree but he’s perfectly gentle.
No one system will work you dumbass. Every system on its own will fail, you need to cherry pick from several systems.
Is it really that hard to understand, but if you think your Pitbull analogy is even remotely correct then yes it’s obvious you went through the American educational system.
Capitalism has fundamental contradictions that lead it to crisis, contradictions that government intervention can’t handle.
You have monopolies naturally occurring due to snowball effect that get recreated even after government break ups, inherent overproduction that happens due to the nature of commodity production, wage labor and surplus value extracting ensuring that it’s physically impossible to buy everything that we make, and so on. This shit causes wars, crises, etc
I can’t tell if this is a bit.
You telling the wrong crowd. But yeah, capitalism works with appropriate government restraint over things like monopolies, which is a thing we used to do.
