Sounds like a deep question, but I believe that when you frame economic models in the context of long-range history, asking whether capitalism has been a positive force is like asking "has the wind had a good effect on the weather vane it pushes around". In other words, a global system has just kind of .. evolved into being, and is happening, is what it is, and it will continue to change over time, there was no real conscious mechanism that led to the way things are. So whether it's been a positive force is irrelevant, because there could have been no other way.
That said, one can look at how the world has worked, analyse it, and make conscious decisions about how it should work in the future, so we can still make a value judgement on how the past has gone.
With that in mind, what do you think? Has our predominant capitalistic model led us down a positive path? Could there have been any other way?
That said, one can look at how the world has worked, analyse it, and make conscious decisions about how it should work in the future, so we can still make a value judgement on how the past has gone.
With that in mind, what do you think? Has our predominant capitalistic model led us down a positive path? Could there have been any other way?