Week 2 Flashcards
Primitive Accumulation Definition:
-The historical process through which certain people came to control resources/means of production, turning them into private property.
Mainstream accounts of capitalism often suggest that the original accumulation of capital was a result of:
-Natural tendencies towards private ownership
-Reward of hard work
-Religious teachings/encouragement
Historical materialist analysis reveals that the Primitive Accumulation:
is less about natural tendencies or moral teaching, and more about the process of
-Dispossession (depriving someone of land)
-Violence
-Colonialism
Feudalism/Tributary mode of Production
5 Statements
Around the 11th century.
In this system, most people worked on land owned by a powerful landowner, called a seigneur.
The workers, who were often peasants, had to do hard labor, sometimes without pay, to support the seigneur.
They gave part of their work/goods as rent in exchange for living on the land.
The seigner also had special legal/political power over the land and its people
The estate or manor was the primary unit of power, the lord of the land owned:
The labourers got to keep:
There were:
The estate and the land
A portion, but most of what they produced went to the landlord
Common areas used by everyone( at one point, not all land was private[yet])
The Crisis of European Feudal Economy
Feudal Estates in Christian Europe were surrounded by:
The center of trade was:
The Crusades (11-13th century) provided:
Italian city-states capitalized on their geographic positions and connection to the Mediterranean trade. becoming:
Nonetheless:
Muslim and Mongolian Empires
Asia
An opportunity to challenge the dominant empires and gain access to eastern trade routes
Hubs for early banking and finance system
Europe is still not the center of global economy (feudal political) facing a number of challenges
Popular Uprising in the 14th-15 Centuries:
14-15th centuries were rocked with:
The rise of —, provided a political challenge to the church and feudal order
These movements denounced:
The root of the problem was:
Relentless class struggles
Heterodox Religious Movements (Movements against religious ideologies)
-Estates, hierarchies, and the church.
God no longer spoke to the clerks as they were overcome with greed and sin.
The Black Death and Demographic Crisis
The black death was an:
This intensified:
Due to:
This is a direct example of:
Epidemic that killed on average 30-40% of the European population
The labor crisis
The decimation of the work-force
History Repeating itself (Spanish flu, covid)
Accumulation Crisis 14-th 15 Century
A major shift in:
The real wage increased by –, prices declined by –, rent also —, the length of work days —, and a tendency towards — appeared.
Unable to expropriate the necessary surplus from the European feudal elites:
This posed a significant threat to:
The Peasantry war took place in – century, in – & – notably.
The Peasantry war stems from:
The power relation between workers and masters
100 %, 33%, decreased, shortened, self sufficiency
The monarchy and clergy found themselves in the accumulation crisis
European elites political and economic powers
15th century, Spain and Germany.
Those in power tried to exploit/force peasants into labour, but most of these attempts failed, leading to peasant wars waged against them.
Columbus’ Discovery of America as a Key Moment in the Formation of a Capitalist world system
It was this period of upheaval and transformation that:
Mainly gaining control over:
Over the course of several centuries, these efforts rehasped the history of the planet, laying the foundation for:
The control of long-distance trade was shifted to:
Later shifting to mostly:
European political/economic elites began expanding their influence on a global scale
Long Distance Trade
A Capitalist World-System
Portugal, Spain, Netherland/Holland
England.
The Gold of Americas and the Early Capitalist Formations
The pillage of existing treasures, aka:
The production of new value through:
—, —, – defined this phase of European expansion.
The –, —-, and the –, were integral to the flow of wealth into Europe during the 16th century.
And the wealth accumulation from these systems fueled the rise of:
Looting these countries provided:
–, and – enslaved indigenous people, enforcing them to work in brutal work conditions.
The same goes for –
Looting
Forced Labor and Slavery
Conquest, pillage, and extermination.
The violent dispossession of Indigenous people,s, the establishment of plantations, and the enslavement of millions of Africans
Banking, finance, and new forms of commerce in cities across Europe.
A mass of wealth to these powerful countries
Gold and Silver mines
Land labor (cotton and others)
The Rise of Merchant Capitalism:
England’s growing dominance in international trade in the – and the role
Emerging control of merchants in overseas trade: — is a forerunner to a capitalist economy/ capitalist mode of production.
They created:
The English ruling elite did not have –
who gained control over these
And thus emerged as:
This is a huge pillar of:
1600s —- of merchants
Mercantilism (Merchant Capitalism)
Trading Post
Power over these English Merchants
Most of these overseas trades
New class in some way
Of capitalism as we know it ‘capital’
From mercantilism and proletarianization to industrial capitalism:
Merchants, enriched by profits from overseas trade, colonization, and plantation economies (based on slave labor) had accumulated:
The proletarianized peasantry, now landless and dependent on wages:
Tech advancements allowed for:
Which dramatically increased:
Leading new waves of: —, —, —
and creating new economies of scale in both —, and —.
Sufficient capital to invest in machines, factories, and infrastructures.
Provided a cheap abundant labor force for emerging industrial enterprises
The Mechanization of Production
Productivity
Colonization, land privatization, proletarianization,
agriculture, and manufacturing.
Mercantilism and Domestic Economy:
England, still a traditional society with a domestic economy based on:
The majority of the population was:
The peasants did not own the land, but they did:
There were also people living in cities which had:
Surplus produced by peasants:
The rise of capitalism is large due to:
Feudal modes of production
Still producing their own foods, goods, handicrafts
Have acess to fast tracts of land that was owned by landlords
Purchase of trade for necessary items in an internal market
Partly, appropriate by landlords as tributes.
Partly kept by peasants for the purchase of a few luxury items made available by merchants and long-distance trade
The presence of a system of power, but once, merchants gained power they started to challenge and push against this.
Formation of Free laborer: Land Grabs and Enclosuers
Systematic privatization of communal lands which ha traditionally been used by peasants (This ones just a statement)
Displacement and dispossession of peasants. Pearson was turned into free labourer. Free of their — and freely
As early at the 16/17th century, merchant capitalists began to:—
means of production (the land)
sell their labor power to emergent capitalists to survive.
Capitalize on the availability of cheap free labor
