martes, 16 de febrero de 2010

Political economy, the paper of the State and of the market

Since the beginning of the times until now the chiefs of tribes, monarchs, feudal lords, statesmen and politicians decided the mode of production and the distribution of wealth in all the societies.
The main economic influence has been of the governments and not of the private producers, the farmers, fishermen, craftsmen, industrials, traders nor entrepreneurs. They have played a second place because all them has been controlled by the governments, through laws and administrative decisions.
So that it is a historic lie of the Marxist philosophy assuring that the mode of production and distribution of wealth determine the political and social regime of the society; on the contrary, the politics determine the economic and social system of the society. In consequence, may be assured that the laws of market (supply and demand) have not dominated the economy of the countries. The true is that was the monarchs and now the politicians whose decide the limits of the economy and until where the economics concepts are applicable or not. Moreover, they have decided ever something essential in all the historic stages: the fiscal (tax) and commercial policies. At difference of the laws of the science, the laws of the economy are relative and are linked to the social behavior of the big human groups.
It is obvious that the monarchs and politicians has not been isolated and non permeable people; they are too human beings and like the rest of the people they receive the influence of the social media, the custom and the economic institutions of the society. But, in the reality, they have accumulated the true power; that power, in turn, has been supported in the most important of all the powers: the weapons.
In all the times the common citizens has understood this reality and in the most of the cases they have accepted the authority of whose exert the political power; when this not happened occurred the great revolutions.
The modern world knew two great revolutions: the French Revolution (1789) and the Bolchevique Revolution (1917); they changed the course of history. The first led to the born of a new social class, the bourgeoisie; this class was dominated by many years by the monarchs and the feudal lords but in 1789 the bourgeoisie took the power and began to govern a part of the world. This political revolution was, at the same time, a consequence of other important historic fact: the First Industrial Revolution that began at the middle of the eighteen century with the development of the industrial scale of production and the modern machines.
The effects of the French Revolution are still present in the world; they are the abolition of the monarchy in France and other countries, the creation of the Bourgeois Liberal State that encompasses the representative democracy and the capitalist system of free market.
In 1776, thirteen years before the French Revolution, appeared in London the first edition of the book an Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations of the philosopher Adam Smith; this book would be the economic bible of the new bourgeoisie class.
The second one, the Bolchevique Revolution, destroyed the Russia’s monarch’s power, imposed also a new class ---the proletarian class--- and the communist government in a very important part of the world: Russia, Eastern Europe, China, North Vietnam and North Korea.
The communism received their inspiration from the opposed thesis of the Wealth of Nations of Adam Smith. The new theory was presented in the book The Capital of the philosopher Karl Marx, in the year 1867, ninety one years after the first edition of the Wealth of Nations. The Capital became the new economic bible of the communists.
The effects of the Bolchevique Revolution are also still visible; these are the communist regimes that yet survive in some nations. The Communism demonstrated that is not sustainable in the time and for that reason disappeared in the Former Soviet Union and in Europe in the year 1989.
The capitalist system has passed also by serious and recurrent crisis; in the 20th century the most severe was the Great Depression of 1929 and now, in the 21st century, the international financial system fall in the years 2008 and 2009.
The indifference of the statesmen
It provoked those great economic crises. The lack of control on the financial system was one of the main causes of the economy fallout.
Until where the State must exert control over the economy is an old economic discussion.
The State has had ever the faculty of deciding the essential affairs of the economy but in some moments and circumstances the leaders of the governments has resigned to that prerogative. This caused the big economics problems.
It must have a balance between the State and the market, without this balance neither the economic development nor the business is possible.
In the last decades of the 20th century the monetarist thesis reborn promoted by Milton Friedman and his pupils of the School of Chicago. The principal idea of this conception is the absolute free market, this mean, the non intervention of the State in the economics affairs.
As it is obvious, because of practice and legal restrictions, the thesis of absolute free market was not possible of to apply in all their intensity, but she influenced the political action in some countries, especially in Great Britain and in the United States since the governments of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Regan until the recent government of George Bush Jr.
As consequence of the most recent financial fallout (2008-2009), the authorities have tried of exert a major control on the economy and especially over the financial system; on January 3 2010 in Atlanta, the Federal Reserve chief, Ben Bernanke, declared that “…Regulation must be the first line of defense against speculation…” But the lobbyists of the free market have a great power and influence. They got the bailout for the banks without restrictions. Essential industries, like the automaker and the common citizens did not have the same luck.
The global crisis seems to be permanent. In the last days have appeared the financial problems of Greek and probably Spain, situation that might have an important effect over all the Euro Zone.
Meanwhile, the jobless, the poverty and the environment problem everyday affects a major number of people in the entire world, including the developed industrial nations.
Which will be the future? What do you think?

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