@Robkearney1981 @Empty_America Acting as the bulwark of feudalism for 1800 years and then criticizing its replacement (in many cases for things that were worse under feudalism) is not exactly “woke”.
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Unironic Fukuyamaist
2.3K posts
Unironic Fukuyamaist
@Reterritorialz
Dilettante. Here for the witty repartee *and* the enduring questions.
Katılım Aralık 2022
457 Takip Edilen176 Takipçiler
@Empty_America The Church has been critical of capitalism since it first emerged on the scene. Below are excerpts from a papal encyclical from 1932 which, had it been written today, would likely have blown more than a few minds and raised cries of having a "woke pope."
x.com/i/status/19159…
Robert Kearney@Robkearney1981
While not supporting communism, the Catholic Church has always given criticism of the capitalistic system as well (although not condemning all of it outright). Below are newspaper highlights from the 1931 encyclical of Pope Pius XI "Quadragesimo Anno", which promoted a "corporatist" social order as an alternative to both capitalism and socialism. HIGH LIGHTS OF THE ADDRESS Vatican City, May 15—[UP]—Significant phrases from the new pronouncement of the Pope on labor follow: “It is absolutely necessary to reconstruct the whole economic system by bringing it back to the requirements of social justice so as to ensure more equitable distribution of the united profits of capital and labor.” “The differences in social conditions of the human family which have been wisely decreed by the Creator, must not and cannot ever be abolished, but on the other hand, the condition of the proletariat cannot forever be the normal condition of the bulk of mankind.” “Wages must be such as to satisfy the legitimate requirements of the honest workman, not only for his person but for his family.” “Work is not any kind of saleable commodity but one wherein the human dignity of the workingman must always be respected.” “All opposition between classes must cease.” “Free and unbridled competition has been succeeded by an exaggerated concentration in the hands of a few of the whole economic power, not only of a single nation but of the entire world. Thus the concentration of this power degenerates into tyrannical despotism.” “It is well-known that its teachings (communism) can in nowise be reconciled with the doctrine of the church.” “It is not possible to be simultaneously a good Catholic and a true socialist.” Pope Francis was simply reiterating what his predicessors had said on the subject.
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The Catholic Church does not and never has idolized "The Market."
And does not conflate earning money with virtue.
American converts sometimes have trouble with this concept, "Wait the Pope sounds like a COMMUNIST!"
Mark W.@DurhamWASP
“The free market destroys most of the things conservatives value; it destroys traditions, family life, societies, cultures, & established ways of doing things…" Phillip Blond
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@NewLeftEViews He’s actually an integrator and systematizer more than anything.
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@NewLeftEViews Read Political Order and Political Decay or the Origins of Political Order. He is a very erudite and broad thinker. Just because only one of his ideas has become universally known does not mean that’s his only good point.
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The reason Fukuyama is so noteworthy is because he’s an utter simpleton who made one very interesting and generative point he seems to have accidentally stumbled upon and has said nothing of note since.
Ian Welsh@iwelsh
Fukuyama got everything significant wrong. The world is not filled up with liberal democracies & they are struggling in a misguided attempt to maintain an Empire they already lost because China is now the tech/industrial leader and is not a liberal democracy.
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome I mean tbh I don’t know if the Ming could have lived no matter what they did. The question ultimately comes down to extremely unfortunate military dynamics for “juicy target” countries like China and India that were close to the steppe, but struggled with their own cavalry.
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome If they do that, you would still say the southern merchants were given too much power. The key point is there is no free lunch. If the state wants to use a soft currency it must place credible constraints on its own monetary policy. Or people will just use silver in practice.
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The Qing was an astoundingly successful Chinese dynasty. They expanded the borders and also had a long period of peace and stability in the high Qing era. If they had the right structural conditions (the same as Japan), they would have industrialized IMO.
Know Both Sides@KnowBothSides
@PAstynome You only know what happened in Japan. How can you say he is wrong abt China?
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome Song did not have a weak military. The military consumed the vast majority of state expenditure, and Song state revenues were quite high by Chinese standards. They had to face a once-in-history “black swan” threat. Would any dynasty before the Qing have survived the Mongols?
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@Reterritorialz @PAstynome And Song famously did not succumb to a foreign power because of its weak military, despite the immense wealth disparity between it and its enemies…
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome The whole Ming project was like King Cnut fighting the waves. The wealth and commercial dynamism of Jiangnan and the South was never the villain. In fact PRC itself has grown using Guangdong and Shanghai-Hangzhai corridor as its bootstraps (plus Manchurian industry).
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome So I think you’re seeing the causality the other way. By making oversea trade (which could have been China’s golden ticket like it was in the Song) onerous and destroying the legitimacy of their own currency, the Ming laid the seeds of their own fiscal collapse, sooner or later.
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome In fact before silver, between the hyperinflation caused by money printing (1425) to silver rush (1525) paper notes had already been abandoned, people already switched to copper.
And most importantly, again, the Ming state did not even accept paper notes as tax. That killed it.
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome 3. The state even had to turn to silver currency in the first place because they hyperinflated the paper currency and made it in untrustworthy in the first place! So your whole point about silver is fundamentally a condemnation of the Ming admin and not Jiangnan merchants
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@marcatosempre @PAstynome Obvious Ming failures to build state capacity:
1. Haijin laws prevented economic dynamism in coastal China and ultimately were scrapped anyway because they were unworkable and wrongheaded
2. Terrible attempts to “control the commercial elites” led to Donglin movement
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