I think the world started to change (at least from the human perspective) when one of our prehistoric ancestors picked up a stick (Strauss's _Also Sprach Zarathustra_ playing in the background) and hit his compatriot over the head with it to get ahead of him in the pecking order. Everything else that followed has been just an ever-escalating cycle of actions and reactions to that first hit. Capital was just one actor in that development, and often did not get what it wanted, as the European welfare state and US New deal illustrate.
Wojtek