(in Polish) The Great Capitalism Debate 4208-TGCD-OG
The debate on the nature and the origins of capitalism represented one of the central academic (and political) controversies of the 20th century. Since then, the conversation has gone in two, seemingly contradictory, directions.
The first body of research claims that capitalism is practically as old as human society itself. Authors such as Jack Goody or David Graeber, trotting a path laid out by Andre Gunder Frank, argued that capitalism harks back at least 5,000 years to the birth of the great ancient civilizations – or even to yet more archaic recesses of our social past.
The second strand of analysis claims that capitalism is substantially younger than we had previously thought. For decades, the prevailing consensus identified the British-led industrial revolution as the midwife of capitalism. Leading theorists – most notably Immanuel Wallerstein – extended its genealogy to the putative rise of European mercantilism in the 16th century. More recent research, spearheaded by Kenneth Pomeranz and historians of climate change, compels us, however, to acknowledge that the great departure from traditional economies came much later – in the 1830s or even in the 1870s.
This course will present the students with the vast array of voices and theories trying to answer the most elementary of questions: how does capitalism work and how it came about? Was capitalism invented by the Europeans or was it only “stolen” (as Jack Goody put it) by them from other civilizations? We will be reading some of the fundamental texts in the Great Capitalism Debate as well as the some of the most recent interventions.
A detailed (week-by week) syllabus will be provided to the students during the very first class. All the readings will be available in an electronic format.
Type of course
Learning outcomes
In terms of knowledge, the student:
(1) Student knows and understands the paradigm of interdisciplinary of spatial aspects of the history of economy.
In terms of skills, the student:
(1) has English language skills in accordance with the requirements of B2+ level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.
(2) Participates in a scientific discussion based on the knowledge gained from scientific publications.
In terms of social skills, the student:
(1) cooperates and works in a group, assuming various roles.
Assessment criteria
Attendance and active participation in the sessions (20%), one presentation of a prescribed text (30%) and either an oral exam or a term paper (50%)
Bibliography
Basic literature:
1. Janet Abu-Lughod, Before European Hegemony: The World System A.D. 1250-1350, Oxford: Oxford UP, 1991.
2. Giovanni Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century: Money, Power and the Origins of Our Times, London: Verso, 1994.
3. Jairus Banaji, Theory As History: Essays on Modes of Production and Exploitation. New York: Heymarket Books, 2011.
4. The Brenner Debate: Agrarian Class Structure and Economic Development in Pre-industrial Europe, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1987.
5. John L. Brooke, Climate Change and the Course of Global History: A Rough Journey, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2014.
6. Andre Gunder Frank, ReORIENT: Global Economy in the Asian Age, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
7. David Graeber, Debt. The First 5000 Years. New York: Melville House, 2011.
8. Jack Goody, Metals, Culture and Capitalism: An Essay on the Origins of the Modern World, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2012.
9. Andreas Malm, Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming, London: Verso, 2016.
10. Sidney Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History, London: Penguin, 1986.
11. Prasannan Parthasarathi, Why Europe Grew Rich and Asia Did Not: Global Economic Divergence, 1600-1850, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2011.
12. Kenneth Pomeranz, The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy, Princeton: Princeton UP, 2001.
13. James C. Scott, Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, New Haven: Yale UP, 2017.
14. Walter Scheidel, The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century, Princeton: Princeton UP, 2017.
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: