18-04-2012, 01:23 PM
The Distinctive Features of Capitalism
The Distinctive Features of Capitalism (2008).ppt (Size: 290 KB / Downloads: 106)
What different systems of economic organisation are possible?
What is special about capitalism?
What are the common features of capitalist economies, and what are the differences?
Alternative Economic Systems
Economic activity can be organised communally.
In small social clusters, members of the society can gather to decide what they will produce, how the tasks will be shared, and how the fruits of their economic effort will be distributed and used. These decisions may be strongly influenced by custom and convention.
E.g., tribal societies, primitive communalism.
Private ownership of the means of production
Capitalism is based on a distinctive system of property rights. Economic resources are characteristically owned by private individuals and institutions.
The capacity of these property owners to derive income from their control over the means of production identifies them as a distinctive class.
Its existence as a class does not mean that internal conflicts of interests cannot occur, but its defining feature is a common interest in the pursuit of profit.