The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire

by Andrew Bernstein

Book Overview

The Capitalist Manifesto defends capitalism as the world's most moral and practical social system. This book is written for the rational mind, whether the reader is a professional intellectual or an intelligent layman. It makes the case for individual rights and freedom in terms intelligible to all rational men.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0761832211
• ISBN13: 9780761832218
• Release Date: July 2005
• Publisher: University Press of America
• Length: 500 Pages
• Weight: 1.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Everything you ever wanted to know about Capitalism ...

... but were afraid to ask your liberal economics professors! Dr. Bernstein has written the book which bridges the gap between Ayn Rand's collection, "Capitalism - The Unknown Ideal," and George Reisman's magnum opus, "Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics." This is a book which is both accessible and inspiring to the layman, authoritative enough for the scholar. When Bernstein's "The Capitalist Manifesto" becomes a text at even a small percentage of America's schools, socialism/communism/fascism is done for.

A moral defense of capitalism

In this phenomenal work, Dr. Bernstein not only provides an abundance of factual information demonstrating the economic and moral superiority of capitalism, he also lays out the introductory framework of the philosophical theory that explains it. He begins by putting the advent of capitalism in its proper historical perspective, and includes chapters explaining the economic theory behind its enormous practical success as well as refuting common (yet clearly silly, after Dr. Bernstein is through with them) charges against capitalism (such as that it causes war, imperialism, and slavery). But by far the most interesting and valuable chapters are those at the heart of the book, in which he provides a *moral* defense of capitalism, based on Ayn Rand's ethical theory of rational egoism. Dr. Bernstein understands that the system that promotes individual success and happiness on this earth (and who else's success and happiness is there to promote?) cannot be logically defended on altruistic grounds, and more: that it doesn't need to be, because egoism, as the system that does just that, is the only proper morality for mankind. If any active-minded person reads this book and is not convinced by the wealth of information it provides, the only explanation is that they're suffering from a 'great disconnect' of their own (see Dr. Bernstein's introduction and afterword). Highly recommended.

desperately needed deprogramming for cultural osmosis

Bernstein does an excellent job, and The Capitalist Manifesto is now my favorite book to hand to friends who, most likely due to cultural osmosis, happen to think that the mixed economy is a nice idea. (It is probably too much to handle for those with the authoritarian impulse who gravitate to socialism, communism, and fascism.) His case is fresh, thorough, and delightfully crushing, drawing on diverse sources all through history and all over the planet for the historical and factual evidence, from which he then extracts the important principles to lay out the philosophical case for laissez-faire. Reading The Capitalist Manifesto and coming face-to-face with the facts and their implications, I expect most honest people will be left wondering how the vast majority of intellectuals got it (and continue to get it) so tragically wrong: supporting and defending ideas that have caused the brutal deaths of hundreds of millions of people and held down billions in conflict and grinding poverty -- while evading and maligning what has lifted billions of people out of a truly Hobbesian existence ("poor, nasty, brutish, and short"). That stands as the most outrageous disconnect in human history, and Bernstein makes it viscerally real.

Thorough historical case for Capitalism

The Capitalist Manifesto particularly excels in its historical analyses of various aspects of the pre- and post-capitalist world. For example, it analyzes in detail the idea that the Industrial Revolution led to a decrease in the standard of living of poor people and shows that the opposite is the case. This book is really a must read for anyone who wants to understand the true history of capitalism, including its intellectual origins in the Enlightenment and its materials results. The polemical sections are also a gem, as the idea that capitalism leads to imperialism, war, and slavery is thoroughly debunked. In addition, the book relies on Ayn Rand's Objectivism as a moral and philosophical framework within which to evaluate and understand capitalism. While the moral justification for capitalism will be familiar ground to Objectivists, Dr. Bernstein keeps the reader engaged with numerous concrete examples. Also, don't miss the appendix, in which the lives of the great industrialists are described in exciting detail.

The Mind and Body of Capitalism

What makes The Capitalist Manifesto such a valuable addition to the pro-capitalist literature, is that it targets precisely the existing gap between the practical case for capitalism--provided in abundant detail by historians and economists-and the moral and philosophical case. The goal of the book is to present an integrated case for capitalism, one that connects the economic and historical facts with the wider moral and philosophical case for capitalism. That integration is made possible by Bernstein's identification of the unifying principle that explains all of the virtues of capitalism: "Regarding the enormity of capitalism's success, both morally and practically, in different centuries, on far-flung continents, involving a hundred issues, the explanatory principle that will emerge is: capitalism is par excellence the system of liberated human brain power." Capitalism as "the system of the mind" is a theme that is capable of uniting every element of the case for capitalism: its economic mechanisms, its political principles, its history, its heroes, its moral code-all the way down to the epistemology that capitalism encourages and institutionalizes. Above all, this volume achieves something no other history of capitalism has yet done: it provides the solution to today's cultural and political mind-body dichotomy, showing how the material achievements of capitalism's innovators flow from the highest moral and intellectual ideal: the commitment to the liberation of the individual mind. In doing so, The Capitalist Manifesto makes a valuable addition to the growing foundation for a secular moral case for liberty.