Hugo de Camps writes on social theory and political economy. He is currently researching tensions between class, recognition, and material reproduction at Birkbeck, University of London.
Nobody today denies that capitalism exploits nature. The disagreement is over why. Political theorist Alyssa Battistoni spoke to Jacobin about capitalism’s complex relationship to what economists once called nature’s “free gifts.”
Unlike in previous eras, elite reproduction today is now hidden under the veil of meritocracy — creating a need among the rich to present themselves as if they were just like us.
As far back as Aristotle, Western thinkers have been deeply critical of the power that the wealthy hold over society. Historian Guido Alfani sat down with Jacobin to discuss the long history of opposition to elite power in Western politics and religion.
In his new biography of Karl Marx, Bruno Leipold puts his subject in historical context. Marx, he tells Jacobin, was engaged in a political struggle against utopian communists and republicans unable to recognize the incompatibility of freedom and capitalism.