Capitalism has changed the meaning of labor and formulated entirely new motivation to work. In capitalist system labor transformed into the inner human need. The essence of capitalism is the cooperation of people in order to create value, not only for themselves but also for others. It generates a variety of productive activities as the needs and desires of the people are very diverse. In an authoritarian state some group considers that she has the ultimate truth can impose all their valuables. They can dictate its will on others. In capitalist society, the space for the manifestation of personality much more (Hoppe 2). Capitalism is a great benefit. Formation of the market as a free exchange of space would have been impossible if not for the moral framework established for it, which is expressed in the general spirit of life. An important consequence of the emergence of a new work ethic of capitalism was the increase of wealth in population.
Capitalism not only creates inequality as helping people to achieve well-being, we can see it especially in the last twenty years: as China and India are rooted capitalist relations, literally hundreds of millions of people in these countries are knocked out of poverty. Genuine free enterprise capitalism presupposes and requires a strict reporting of business as strict internal discipline. For over a century the US economy has demonstrated to the world that free enterprise capitalism can bring countless benefits to all mankind. Large and prosperous middle class has been created that denies vain assertions of critics that free enterprise capitalism by its very nature is concentrating wealth in the hands of a privileged elite at the expense of everyone else. “The combination of capitalism and industrialism has resulted in the most productive economies ever” (Ikerd 14). The possibility of existence and successful establishment of capitalism due the creation of a system of moral values based on pluralism and the constant accumulation of moral alternatives imposed on social groups that are, basically, are critical in relation to the specific nature of the status quo. Adaptation of a variety of products on the basis of the valuable contextual control processes of social life (moral relativism in the course of history, the time-space continuum) combines capitalism with moral rigor of core values, which are subject to re-evaluation of semantic, but not the elimination of the general direction of human existence.
However, one of the most disturbing and destructive tendencies of the modern capitalist world appears a sharp drop in the spiritual and moral principles in the development of individual countries and the international community as a whole. “Despite the great economic advantage of capitalism-that it is an efficient system of production and distribution-capitalist societies struggle with its by-products of poverty, exclusion, corruption, and environmental destruction” (Bishop 5). The current deep crisis shows that a liberal market economy, especially one that is represented by the Chicago School of Economics has suffered a complete failure. At the core of its ideology is the image of man, which is a homo economicus. Capitalism limited human activity only rational extraction for themselves the benefits (utilitarianism). The image of homo economicus reduces man to a creature that seeks only to ensure that multiply their own gain and profit. Economic and political structure are in disarray. The development of the world economy was not accompanied by the development of the world community. The basic unit of political and public life remains the nation-state. The relationship between the center and the periphery is also very uneven. Capitalism is reproduced on the basis of its own, but through the exploitation of the working class of their own as part of their country and the colonies. Since the second half of the twentieth century, these colonies that is, all the countries of the "periphery" are economic colonies, dominated by the dictatorship of the global financial capitalocracy. A large proportion of the money capital, exported via offshore companies, kept in foreign banks. Corruption in this area becomes part of the law of the functioning of a colonial capitalocracy. "The Panama Papers have proved an embarrassment for Argentina's new president Mauricio Macri - whose name appears in the leaked files - but have also exposed a broader problem of alleged corruption in South America's second-largest economy" (Mander).
In capitalism, morals, and all other values pushed aside or even into oblivion as unnecessary. Moral consider only what serves their own consumer interests and the achievement of their political goals. Morality is based on a sense of community affiliation of family, friends, tribe, nation or humanity. The economic system must include honesty, fairness, respect for contracts, property of others, the desire to help those who find themselves in a difficult position. Capitalism needs to develop new social values that could become a new ethical standard of the current stage of development of capitalist society. Capitalism does not notice the most important needs of workers, consumers, and that of the environment on which they depend for their own well-being for years to come. Globalization, which from the point of view of the theory to be correct the prevailing international economic and social order, on the other hand, demonstrates the violation of basic ethical requirements of honesty and fairness in relations between the countries. The unequal distribution of wealth inevitably leads to violence. While the problems of the poor are not solved radically by abandoning the absolute autonomy of markets, the failure of financial speculation, as well as by an attack on the structural causes of inequality, there will be no one solution of international problems.
The base for the capitalist system implies the idea of freedom that implemented by means of individual rights. Democracy and the market economy are essential elements of capitalism as well as the mechanism of regulation of the markets, especially financial ones, along with specific measures to protect the world of law and the preservation of the rule of law worldwide. Capital brings a lot of benefits, not only growth of production capacity, but also the improvement of production methods, as well as other innovations. It leads not only to increasing prosperity but also to a greater freedom. Therefore, countries are seeking to attract and retain capital, and the creation of attractive becomes more important for capital conditions than any other social goals. Capitalism is a system of ethics, based on creating value for all stakeholders. Money is one of the ways to measure this value, but definitely not the only one. Freedom of choice on the basis of meetings and public participation was not in the history of non-capitalist system: it could serve as a historical justification of capitalism, which certainly deserves moral reasoning and understanding from the perspective of maintaining / destruction of the moral position of people living in a capitalist society.
Without capitalism will be much harder to find ways to overcome the cultural barriers that are the biggest obstacle to development of poor countries. Since capitalism do not have hierarchical system of a society, authoritarianism, personalization of political and legal relations, morale and low labor paternalism. All possible assistance to underdeveloped countries aimed at structural reform, the educational level of the population, improvement of health care has not brought in the majority of cases the desired results. Only countries where the capitalist values have been introduced (Turkey, East Asia, Spain) perceived radical changes in human well-being. Thus we can say that capitalism implies a cardinal transformation of the socio-psychological and moral climate in society. Poor people are less envious of the rich, and wealth itself serves as an incentive for vertical mobility. Tireless professional work, limit the scope of reasonable consumption, ascetic frugality had the practical result of the accumulation of capital which is used as a productive investment.
Works Cited
Bishop, John Douglas. Ethics and capitalism. University of Toronto Press, 2000.
Hoppe, Hans-Hermann. A theory of socialism and capitalism: economics, politics, and ethics. Springer Science & Business Media, 2013.
Ikerd, John. "Sustainable capitalism: a matter of ethics and morality." Problems of Sustainable Development 3.1 (2008): 13-22.
Mander, Benedict. "Panama Papers Open New Chapter In Argentina Corruption Drama - FT.Com". Financial Times. N.p., 2016. Web. 13 Apr. 2016.
Weber, Max. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism: and other writings. Penguin, 2002.
