Past Imperfect Episode 26: John Cassidy on capitalism and its critics

Past Imperfect Episode 26 features Dinyar Patel, Associate Professor of History at SPJIMR, in conversation with John Cassidy, staff writer at the New Yorker and the author of Capitalism and Its Critics: A Battle of Ideas in the Modern World. Although the term “capitalism” only dates from the 1830s, people have been analyzing it—and, quite often, condemning it—for over 250 years. Capitalism and Its Critics provides a sweeping account of over thirty major economic thinkers. These range from well-known names like Adam Smith and Karl Marx to lesser-known—but equally important—figures like Silvia Federici, who demanded wages for housework, and Eric Williams, who laid bare the formative role of slavery in capitalism. Flagrant inequality has been a rallying cry of these critics, but so has empire and imperialism. From eighteenth-century critiques of the East India Company to twenty-first century assaults on American hegemony, we can observe some remarkably consistent arguments about how capitalism has been immoral, inequitable, and exploitative but also remarkably resilient.