Capitalism

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss capitalism throughout the last two centuries. In 1848 Karl Marx in The Communist Manifesto described the dynamic force of capitalism as it swept through the 19th century: Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation. ‘All that is solid melts into air’. Was Karl Marx, in criticizing capitalism, actually responsible for defining it? From Marx’s critique of capitalism in the 19th Century through to the collapse of Communism at the end of the twentieth century, have we witnessed the triumph of capitalism? Or are we only now learning the full costs and the social impact of unfettered capitalism?

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Guests

• Anatole Kaletsky No other episodes
  Economics commentator and Associate Editor of The Times
• Edward Luttwak No other episodes
  Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC

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Programme ID: p00545kv

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00545kv

Auto-category: 330 (Economics)