Capitalism: A Very Short Introduction

Citation

Fulcher, J. (2015). Capitalism: A Very Short Introduction (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press.

Chapter Summary

The book belongs to Oxford's Very Short Introductions series and is a pocket-sized paperback of roughly 160 pages in six chapters, followed by references, further reading and an index. The publisher describes it as combining sociological and historical approaches, and the chapter titles are phrased as questions that lead the reader from definition to history, comparison, globalisation and alternatives. The second edition adds a case study of the global financial crisis that began in 2007-08.

Chapter 1: What is capitalism?

The opening chapter takes up the question the publisher poses first: what is capital, and therefore what makes an economy capitalist? It sets the vocabulary for the later case studies.

Chapter 2: Where did it come from?

The origins of capitalism. The publisher's description says the history is told through detailed case studies, and names the seventeenth-century Dutch tulip mania among them.

Chapter 3: How did we get here?

The development of capitalism over later centuries. Among the episodes the publisher names is the Great Depression of the 1930s, so this chapter is the place to look for how capitalist economies broke down and were reshaped.

Chapter 4: Is capitalism the same everywhere?

A comparison of the forms capitalism takes. The publisher lists Britain, Japan, Sweden and the United States as the national cases examined.

Chapter 5: Has capitalism gone global?

The question of whether capitalism has escaped the nation-state, which the description raises directly after the national comparisons.

Chapter 6: Crisis? What crisis?

The closing chapter. The description places the 2007-08 financial crisis, the new material of this edition, in the book, and says the book ends by asking whether there is an alternative to capitalism, considering socialism, communal and cooperative experiments, and the alternatives proposed by environmentalists. The publisher's summary does not say which chapter carries which of these discussions, so the exact split between Chapters 5 and 6 is best checked in the book itself.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1-2: Definition and origins

• Capital: the book's starting question, "what is capital?", on which its definition of capitalism rests.
• Case-study history: capitalism's development is presented through detailed episodes rather than a single abstract model.

Chapters 3-4: History and national variety

• The Great Depression: one of the historical cases the description names.
• Forms of capitalism: the claim, signalled by the title of Chapter 4, that capitalism differs between countries, illustrated with Britain, Japan, Sweden and the United States.

Chapters 5-6: Globalisation, crisis and alternatives

• Capitalism beyond the nation-state: the question of whether capitalism has outgrown national boundaries.
• The 2007-08 financial crisis: the new case study of the second edition.
• Alternatives to capitalism: socialism, communal and cooperative experiments, and environmentalist proposals, as the description lists them.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• Questions as chapter titles. All six chapters are framed as questions, which makes the book easy to use as an argument to follow or to dip into for one question, such as whether capitalism looks the same in different countries.
• History and comparison, not only definition. The publisher stresses detailed case studies and a four-country comparison. A reader gets cases to think with, not just a definition, and the second edition extends them to the crisis that began in 2007-08.
• A sociologist's angle for non-specialists. The author is a sociologist rather than an economist, and the series is designed as a quick way into an unfamiliar subject for general readers.
• Short. At about 160 pages it can be read in a few sittings, which suits a first look before a course in political economy.

Limitations

• Little room for technique. In a book of this length each of six chapters has to cover a great deal. There is no sign in the contents of formal economic models, data analysis or exercises, so it will not prepare a reader for the quantitative work of an economics or international political economy course.
• Four national cases. The comparison is limited to Britain, Japan, Sweden and the United States, as the publisher describes it. Readers interested in developing or emerging economies, or in the comparative frameworks of the research literature, will need a longer book.
• No independent scholarly review of this edition was found. The assessment above rests on the publisher's description and the table of contents; readers who want a critical evaluation should consult reviews of the first edition and of the series.

Where It Fits in the Course

Within the political economy course list, this is the shortest and most general starting point. It asks what capitalism is and how it came about, before the other books apply more specific frameworks. Oatley's International Political Economy is the natural next step for readers who want an introductory textbook on trade, money and development; it pairs basic economic models with political analysis. Ben Clift's Comparative Political Economy is a textbook that picks up the question of how national capitalisms differ and change, in much more detail than Fulcher's Chapter 4.

For readers who want the original arguments, Hall and Soskice's edited volume Varieties of Capitalism sets out the framework distinguishing liberal and coordinated market economies, and Olson's The Logic of Collective Action is a classic study of why shared interests do not automatically produce organisation. Persson and Tabellini's Political Economics is a graduate-level text that applies economic theory to political institutions and is far from where this book starts. The sensible order is Fulcher first, then Oatley or Clift, and only then the monographs and the graduate text.

How to Use This Book

The book is for readers who have no background in economics or politics, such as first-year students, those considering a political economy or sociology course, and general readers who want a map of the debate before reading more. Nothing in the contents suggests that prior knowledge is needed.

A practical plan:

• First pass. Read all six chapters in order in a single week. Because the chapters are short and built as a sequence of questions, the order matters: the definition in Chapter 1 and the history in Chapters 2-3 are used throughout.
• Core. Chapters 1, 4 and 5 give the concept, the idea that capitalisms differ, and the globalisation question. These are the three to reread before a seminar on varieties of capitalism or globalisation.
• Use the end matter. The further-reading section is the most efficient route into longer work; pick one title per chapter that interests you rather than reading all of it.
• Alongside the book. After each chapter, write down in two sentences how the author answers the question in its title, then compare your notes with one chapter of a course textbook such as Oatley or Clift. If you read the 2015 second edition, notice how the crisis of 2007-08 changes the earlier arguments.
• Edition. The first edition appeared in 2004, so the second edition is the one to use if you want the financial-crisis material.