BasicBooks, 1991 (first published in 1986)
Note: Citations are marked in blue; my own comments are preceded by 'EFR'; the rest is a digest of the text, either my own words or paraphrasing the author's.
EFR -- The book straightly follows its subtitle: Fifty Propositions About Prosperity, Equality, and Liberty. Berger proposes fifty hypothesis and encourages empirical research to either falsify or accept them. Being good for itself, the fact that the essay was written in 1986 (long before the collapse of the communist world) highly increases its value. Berger insists in the concept of the 'economic culture', as a key to the understanding of the dynamics of economic systems without incurring in monocausal explanations.
There is no such thing as a 'verdict of history', only the stumbling and often silly interpretations of those who make it their business to judge the past (p. X)
But it is important to understand that the relation between capitalism and democracy is asymmetrical --the latter presupposes the former, but not vice versa. It might be observed that economic success is not necessarily hindered by tyrannical and inhumane governance (p. XV)
The weight of the evidence indicates that the Kuznets effect does indeed hold (increased inequality as a modern economy takes off, with a levelling-off occurring within a reasonable time thereafter), but that it holds regardless of whether economic growth takes place under a capitalist or a socialist system. In other words, the basic choice between capitalism and socialism is irrelevant to the issue of equality, except that capitalism greatly accelerates the growth process, thus accelerating both the inegalitarian and the egalitarian phases of the Kuznets curve. It follows that to opt for capitalism is not to opt for inequality at the price of growth; rather, it is to opt for an accelerating transformation of society (p. XII)
(...) What I'm recommending here is a neo-Weberian enterprise. This does not imply some sort of sectarian allegiance to his heritage --it can easily be seen now that Weber was very wrong in many of his specific propositions (for example, about the modernizing potential of Confucian cultures). It is not Weber's answers but his questions that are most useful to us today. And they continue to have a remarkable timeliness (p. XX)
[...] I would ever more strongly contend that economic culture must be seriously considered as social science tries to unravel the causal constellations that shape the course of human events. This, of course, was the grand intention of the work of Max Weber (though he never used the phrase economic culture) [...] (p. XIX)
EFR: The key concept here is "economic culture", which Berger considers extremely important.
At least in science, one shows the greatest respect for an author by leaving him behind (p. 7)
Capitalism is a historical phenomenon:
The most important implication that enjoys widespread consensus is that capitalism, however defined, was at first only a small part of Western economies and then gradually became the basic organizing principle of these economies as a whole (p. 17)
Through most of human history, economic processes (those processes that deal with the production and distribution of scarce resources and services) were firmly embedded in the overall institutional order of society. Put differently, it would have been difficult until very recently to even conceive of 'economic man' acting on the basis of autonomously functioning economic processes. This also meant that economic processes (what was produced and how it was produced and to whom it was distributed) were largely determined by tradition (p. 19)
[...] it is wise to have an overall bias against unicausal explanations; it is very unlikely that any significant event in history was caused by a single factor (p. 26)
Those who require certitude should not turn to science. They should worship at the ideological shrine of their choice and settle the choice with their conscience (p. 31)
Some PROPOSITIONS (purely hypothetical)
(1) Industrial capitalism has generated the greatest productive power in human history (p. 36)
(2) To date, no other socioeconomic system has been able to generate comparative productive power (p. 36)
(3) Capitalism provides the optimal context for the productive power of modern technology (p. 37)
(4) The early period of industrial capitalism in England, and probably in other Western countries, exacted considerable human costs, if not in an actual decline in material living standards then in social and cultural dislocation (p. 41)
(5) Advanced industrial capitalism has generated, and continues to generate, the highest material standard of living for large masses of people in human history (p. 43)
(6) As technological modernization and economic growth perdure over time, inequalities in income and wealth first increase sharply, then decline sharply, and then remain at a relatively stable plateau (p. 46)
(7) These changes are caused by the interplay of technological and demographic forces and are relatively independent of the forms of socioeconomic organization (p. 47)
(8) The leveling phase of this process can be strengthened and accelerated by political interventions, but if these interventions exceed a certain degree, there will be negative consequences for economic growth and eventually for the standard of living:
However, strong redistributional policies, operating by way of tax and transfer mechanisms, may well serve as a disincentive to productivity. If so, there would be a trade-off between equality and economic efficiency; in the long run, greater equality may lead to a lowering of the standard of living. There may also be noneconomic costs: The strongly redistributional state must become ever more intrusive, and the final trade-off may be between equality and liberty (p. 46-7).
If one wants to improve the material condition of people, especially of the poor, one will do well to opt for capitalism. If one wants to modernize, under anyform of socioeconomic organization (capitalist or socialist), one will probably have to settle for a considerable measure of material inequality. If one wants to intervene politically to bring about greater material equality, one may eventually disrupt the economic engine of plenty and endanger the material living standards of the society (p. 48)
(9) Under industrial capitalism there has been the progressive displacement of all other forms of stratification by class (p. 52)
(10) Ongoing industrialization, regardless of its sociopolitical organization, is the basic determinant of social mobility (p. 60)
(11) In all advanced industrial societies there have been moderate increases, but no dramatic changes, in the rates of upward mobility (p. 60)
(12) In all advanced industrial societies, education has become the single most important vehicle of upward mobility (p. 61)
(13) Industrial capitalism, especially when combined with political democracy, is most likely to maintain openness in the stratification system of a society (p. 62)
(14) Contemporary Western societies are characterized by a protracted conflict between two classes, the old middle class (occupied in the production and distribution of material goods and services) and a new middle class (occupied in the production and distribution of symbolic knowledge) (p. 67)
(15) The new knowledge class in Western societies is a major antagonist of capitalism (p. 68). Berger: two possible explanations: a) Capitalism is open to anyone regardless of education or other extra-economic certification b) A vested interest in the expansion of the welfare state, which is that part of government in which this class finds employment and subsidization (p. 69)
(16) Capitalism is a necessary but not sufficient condition of democracy (p. 81)
(17) If a capitalist economy is subjected to increasing degrees of state control, a point will be reached at which democratic governance becomes impossible (p. 82)
(18) If capitalist development is successful in reaching economic growth from which a sizable proportion of the population benefits, pressures toward democracy are likely to appear (p. 84)
(19) Also relevant to this issue is the distinction between two quite different types of non-democratic regimes in the modern world --between authoritarian and totalitarian regimes. An authoritarian regime is one that does not tolerate political opposition but is prepared to allow institutions and sectors of society to function free of the state provided they do not engage in political activity. A totalitarian regime is one that seeks to impose state control over every institution of society, regardless of whether engages in political activity or not and with the intention, finally, of integrating society as a whole within an all-embracing political design (p. 84)
(20) [Individualism]:
[...] has both a cognitive and a normative aspect: It purports to make a statement about the nature of human beings --they are individuals, over and beyond any collective identifications. But it also proposes that there are moral consequences to this fact --human beings have rights as individuals, not only apart from any collectivity to which they may belong but even (indeed, especially) against this collectivity. Neither the cognitive nor the normative aspect is universally taken for granted; on the contrary, these notions are highly peculiar innovations of Western modernity. For most of human history, most human cultures held that an individual human being is his collective identifications (a member of his clan or tribe or cast and so on), and that morality (say, dharma in the Hindu context) consists precisely in acting out the performances prescribed by these identifications (p. 92)
(21) Thus there is a long history of thought in Western civilization pertaining to the nature of man and to its ethical implications, eventuating in the modern Enlightenment with its emphatic and indeed revolutionary proclamation of the rights of the autonomous individual (p. 92)
(22) Macfarlane's revisionist view of the English Middle Ages: English individualism was a social and psychic reality long before the advent of modernity (p. 94). Macfarlane argues a total reversal of the conventional notion of causality: it is not modernity that has caused individualism, but, on the contrary, the individualistic patterns of medieval England made it possible for modernity to arise there (p. 95)
(23) [Western civilization] ... when contrasted with other great civilizations, notably those of Asia, has always been perceived as having given unusual importance to the individual [...]. What is more, the reasons for this must almost certainly be sought in the very origins of European civilization on the two opposing littorals of the eastern Mediterranean --that is, in the world-transforming experiences of ancient Israel and ancient Greece. Here took place the two great 'leaps in being', as Eric Voegelin called them, that created the civilization of the West. These two ruptures with archaic, mythologically grounded culture were certainly different from each other in very significant ways. The first was grounded in a totally new religious experience, the second in a new discovery of the power of reason. Yet each, in its own way, made for the emergence of sharply profiled individuals. The Israelite experience of the one transcendent and personal God almost inevitably created the counterpoint of a solitary human individual engaged in a strange battle of wills with this God. [...] Socrates before his accusers may serve as a paradigmatic illustration of the other, the Hellenic experience of individual autonomy, based now not on the encounter with a terrible God but on the (perhaps equally terrible) discovery of the autonomous power of human reason. And both paradigmatic figures have much earlier antecedents (p. 96)
(24) It is likely that some of Weber's answers must be discarded; his questions, about the relationship of capitalism and culture, remain as relevant as ever. Equally relevant are his insights to the effect that most historical events are unintended and unforeseen, and that is the vulgar rather than the 'high' versions of ideas that have the most historical efficacy (p. 101)
(25) Bourgeois culture in the West, especially in Protestant societies, produced a type of person strongly marked by both the value and the psychic reality of individual autonomy (p. 103)
(26) Certain components of Western bourgeois culture, notably those of activism, rational innovativeness, and self-discipline, are prerequisites of successful capitalist development anywhere (p. 109)
(27) The critics of capitalist modernity, both from the right and from the left, have nevertheless been quite correct in claiming that this liberation from collective solidarities has been costly. The cost is precisely what Marx called 'alienation' and Durkheim 'anomie'. It is the emergence of individuals severed from communal moorings, thrown upon themselves, interacting with other equally isolated and mobile individuals. If these costs are not somehow minimized, the emerging constellation is the one earlier labeled as 'hyper-individualism' –which, not surprisingly, is perceived as the pathology of contemporary Western societies by both non-Western observers and critics of those societies from within (where we find a curious agreement between Marxists and ultra-conservatives) (p. 110)
(28) Capitalism requires institutions that balance the anonymous aspects of individual autonomy with communal solidarity. Among these institutions are, above all, the family and religion (p. 113)
(29) The development of the capitalist societies of East Asia is the most important empirical falsification of dependence theory (p. 128)
(30) The inclusion of a Third World country within the international capitalist system tends to favor its development (p. 129)
Every development strategy is uncertain, threatened by unforeseen disasters of every kind, and liable to have severe unintended consequences. What this means is that the probabilistic character of all social-scientific prognoses has its logical correlate in the situation of the policymaker, who is constrained to gamble (p. 139).
EFR -- What for a sociologist is a hypothesis, for a policymaker is a gamble. That's a point in the differences between the action-oriented and the theory-oriented person.
(31) The East Asian evidence falsifies the proposition that successful development cannot occur in a condition of dependency upon the international capitalist system (p. 156)
(32) East Asia, to put it bluntly, is bad news for Marxists. But East Asia is also not very comforting to ideologists of capitalism who still adhere to some laissez-faire notions to the effect that state interventionism is bad for economic development. All of these societies are characterized by massive state interventions in economic life. They are heavily dirigiste and have been so from the beginning of their respective modernization processes (p. 157)
(33) There is an intrinsic linkage between socialism and the pervasive bureaucratization of the economy (p. 177)
(34)There is an intrinsic linkage between socialism and economic inefficiency (p. 177)
(35) There is an intrinsic affinity between socialism and authoritarian governance (p. 181)
(36) There is an intrinsic affinity between socialism and the totalitarian project for modern society (p. 181)
(37) [...] Capitalism, as an institutional arrangement, has been singularly devoid of plausible myths; by contrast, socialism, its major alternative under modern conditions, has been singularly blessed with myth-generating potency. No theory of capitalism (and, just so, no theory of socialism) can bypass this, so to speak, mythological inequality between these two modern systems of socioeconomic organization (p. 195)
(38) [...] There are good grounds for saying that in most countries intellectuals have become more stranged from religion and religiously based morality than any other significant population group. Consequently, more than other group, intellectuals suffer from the 'alienation' and the anomie of modernity. They are ipso facto more susceptible to any secular messages of redemption from these ills. The socialist myth, especially in its Marxist version, is unusually well suited to meet these needs. Thus it is very probably an oversimplification to say that intellectuals have flocked to Marxism because they are 'children of the Enlightenment'. There is a correct element in this: Modern intellectuals are indeed 'children of the Enlightenment' --but not very happy children at that. They do aspire to Enlightenment ideals --progress, reason, scientific truth, humanistic values. But they also desire at least some of the traditional virtues that modernity has undermined --collective solidarity, transcendence of individualism, and, last not least, moral certainty and ultimate meaning (p. 199)
(39) [...] religion continues both to legitimate society and to produce very powerful myths in many parts of the world. The most dramatic instance of this today is the rise of Muslim neotraditionalism in virtually all the countries of Islamic civilization, from the North African Maghreb to the southern Philippines. The Iranian Revolution, in and of itself, may serve as a falsification of the thesis that modernization precludes the social efficacy of religious myths (p. 201)
(40) However widespread secularizing influences may be, religion continues worldwide as a major source of legitimation both for the status quo and for various proposed alternatives [...] (p. 202)
(41) Socialism, in addition to being a set of political programs and the source of social-scientific interpretations, is also one of the most powerful myths of the contemporary era; to the extent that socialism retains this mythic quality, it cannot be disconfirmed by empirical evidence in the minds of its adherents (p. 204)
(42) [...] legitimations are most needed when a society or a social institution is in trouble and when, in consequence, there is a need for inspirational symbols. When a society is more or less in a state of tranquillity, or when a social institution is functioning reasonably efficiently, these very facts provide tacit legitimation for the status quo. Put differently (back to Adam Smith, though in a sense not intended by him), what is 'natural' need not be legitimated; 'nature' legitimates itself; when a society is working reasonably well, most people will look upon it as 'natural.' This is what Hans Kelsen had in mind when he spoke of the 'normative power of facticity. (p. 207-8)
(43) Capitalism has a built-in incapacity to generate legitimations of itself, and it is particularly deprived of mythic potency; consequently, it depends upon the legitimating effects of its sheer facticity or upon association with other, noneconomic legitimating symbols (p. 209)
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