And I would use Braudel's formulations by analogy, to argue for a less seamless, more "layered-look" view of capitalist development itself, today. See response to Doug.
> > Brad Mayer wrote:
> > > >Of course, the analogy was invoked mostly as a corrective to Doug's
> > >open-ended skepticism. If capitalism is a historical system, like
> > >feudalism, with a beginning and an end, it should follow at at some
> > >point, the system "passes its zenith", so to speak. What that point
> > >is, though, is certainly open to debate. The (highly abstract)
> > >criterion deployed here is that in which capital attains a scale and
> > >scope of development to the point where capital itself becomes its
> > >own "greatest barrier" to its further development,
>
>The French historian, Fernand Braudel, in his work Civilization and
>Capitalism, suggested that economic systems tend to build upon each other,
>in layers, like a coral reef. One layer does not replace the previous layer,
>it merely becomes the new highest layer of society. He spoke from the
>history he was studying. The early, local, primitive markets of the Middle
>Ages were not replaced by capitalism, he could still find them there,
>operating in France, even in the 1800s. Capitalism was a new layer,
>operating on a much higher level, organizing and, when profitable,
>controlling the activity of lower layers, but leaving much of the low level
>functioning untouched, because there was so little profit in it. Capitalism
>was drawn toward the choke holds of the emerging world economy, areas like
>trade, where one might be able to charge monopoly rents and accumulate vast
>fortunes.
>
>Feudalism was a political system. It was replaced by a different political
>system.