Does Capitalism Lead To Democracy?

[Sunstone]

It has often been said that Capitalism leads to Democracy. But is this true? If so, why? If not, why not?

Bare Bones Background: Modern Capitalism slowly emerged in Europe beginning circa 900 A.D. It's greatest boost, however, occurred with the rise of the Industrial Revolution, which originated in Britain circa 1725 A.D. Perhaps coincidentally, the American Revolution, which began in 1776, ushered in an age of political revolutions that eventually led to representative government becoming the predominant political system world wide. So, are these events linked in some essential way? Or is it mere historical accident that capitalism seems to have preceded democracy and perhaps led to it?

 

[standing_on_one_foot]

I can't see why it would, except that it did in our case. Well, maybe there's the fact that capitalism on some level requires more freedom and self-reliance, which ties in to democracy. But I'm making that up.

 

[standing_alone]

Well, I don't know if this is at all relevant, but I opened up a program (albeit, a simplistic program for analysis, not the best for serious analysis, for sure) I had to use for my comparative politics class first semester last year and created a graph using the type of government as a dependent variable (which ranged from established multi-party democracies, recenly established multi-party democracies in transition, one party regimes, autocratic regimes, and disordered states) and economic freedom (which ranged from capitalist, regulated, and statist) as the independent variable and ended up with statistically significant results (Prob. = 0.00) that type of government a nation-state has is related to the level of economic freedom - and the countries with capitalistic economies tended to have democratic governments. At least I think that's how it could be read (I'm also not quite sure if I set it up right, either) - I'm a little rusty with this program and reading the graphs and charts, not having used it in months.

However, then again, I'm not sure if this answers your question, as you are asking more about historical implications, other than that capitalism may create more democratic attitudes (more accurately, there's a relationship between a nation-state having a capitalistic economy and, thus, having a democratic government). This may be perhaps that capitalism itself best thrives under a democratic government or may be due to the strong influence of classical liberalism in the West during those historical periods.

 

[Mr. Hair]

It often does, as the freer exchange of goods, wealth and information tends to lead towards a gradual erosion of power held by the traditional elite, the landed gentry and nobility, in favour of a more cosmopolitan and less exclusive class of urban merchants and tradesmen; causing significant change to the structure and dynamics within society and thus creating a larger base for the established political system to conform to and, after a limited fashion, share power with.

EDIT* I'm quite pleased with the fact I pulled that entirely out of fat air whilst only needing one full stop!

 

[kateyes]

Well NordicBearSkin said it more nicely--I was going to say Capitalism leads to Democracy because Capitalism seems to lead to the creation of a middle class rather than just the 2 extremes. I think a middle class is necessary to democracy. Although China should be an interesting example to keep an eye on for the next several years. As China becomes more and more Capitalistic will there be a demand for more individual rights and less support for the the communal good?