The Alternative To Capitalism

by Adam Buick, John Crump

Capitalism is an exchange economy in which most wealth, from ordinary consumer goods to vast industrial plants and other producer goods, takes the form of commodities, or items of wealth that have been produced with a view to sale on a market. Although states have intervened in capitalism ever since it came into existence, in so far as the aim was merely to interfere with the operation of world market forces, their intervention was only at the level of the division, not the production, of surplus value. However, over the past 100 or so years, there has been a definite trend in capitalism for states to go beyond merely trying to distort the world market, and to involve themselves in the actual production of wealth by establishing and operating state enterprises. If state capitalism is not socialism, what is? In other words, if state ownership and management of production does not amount to the abolition of capitalism but only to a change in the institutional framework within which it operates, what would be the essential features of a society in which capitalism had been abolished? This new edition contains material omitted from previous versions.

106 pages, Paperback

First published December 17, 2012

Reviews

[Luke · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's hard to imagine on the face of it, but this slim, infinitely readable volume manages to do pretty much exactly what it says on the cover in under 100 pages.

By turning anti-capitalist praxis on its head, Buick and Crump excel in managing to not only elucidate upon a viable socialist alternative to capitalism throughout the text; they wholeheartedly repudiate the idea of "state socialism" (or rather, state capitalism) entirely and instead define libertarian, "non market" forms of do-it-yourself socialism (i.e., anarcho-communism, situationism, council-communism and bordigism et al) as the only viable and authentic actualisations of socialism.

I could go on and on summarising the virtues of reading this text... Instead, all I'll say is that any and every so-called socialist should read this immediately.

[Alexandre Garcia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, but doesn't provide a way forward