Six forms of hierarchy for a theoretical analysis of capitalism

Abstract

The paper develops a conceptual analysis, which aims at refining the general concept of capitalism through an inquiry about the forms of hierarchy it involves. It is argued that the capitalist regime exhibits a series of specific attributes that have been so far underinvestigated together and are here comprehensively elucidated via the deepening of the concept of hierarchy. Qualitatively, the capitalist social structure is ambivalent, as it is neither the strict arborescent hierarchy exhibited by the feudal society, nor the flat partition displayed by the pure market economy; and the complex structure of the capitalist firm is an encompassing hierarchy, capital and labor being associated in a production process ruled by capital. Quantitatively, the capitalist pyramidal hierarchies of income and of wealth are essentially mobile, through the dynamics of market sanction and asset evaluation; and the relationship between capital bets and profit gains draws a tangled hierarchy as these returns are reinvested. All these capitalist hierarchies are typically economic, situational hierarchies arising when capitalists do not dominate the political order of power or in the social order of prestige. Finally, echoing post Keynesian perspectives, the conception of capitalism as a hierarchical phenomenon underlines its monetary structure and its self-transforming nature.