Thorstein Veblen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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"... the luxuries of civilization satisfy only those wants which they themselves create." (Apsley Cherry-Garrard, The Worst Journey in the World)
Back in the day, people looked forward to the 21st century as a time when problems like starvation and poverty would be ancient history. They assumed that those problems existed only because of natural scarcity and would soon be solved by advancing technology. Obviously, they were wrong. They forgot that the people who control the technology have better things to do than help billions of suffering human beings. They have money to make, and that means maintaining scarcity even in the midst of the most fabulous abundance.
Later on, but still back in the day, people looked forward to the 21st century as a time when poor workers would solve the problems of starvation and poverty by rising up against those who did no work themselves but claimed to own the things needed for work (land, factories, etc.). They assumed that the working class would realize they were being exploited by the "owning" class, and that they wouldn't tolerate a social system designed to protect and glorify the exploiters. Obviously, they too were wrong. But why? Why didn't the workers overthrow and abolish the "owners" for good?
Thorstein Veblen answered this question in The Theory of the Leisure Class by making a critical observation about societies in which some members parasitize others: "... these societies were not only rich enough to be able to afford a nonproductive class, but aggressive enough to admire them; far from being regarded as wasters or spoilers, those who rose to the leisured ranks were looked up to as the strong and the able. As a consequence, a fundamental change in attitudes toward work took place. The activities of the leisure class--the winning of wealth by force--came to be regarded as honorific and dignified. Hence, by contrast, pure labor became tainted with indignity....
"The lower classes are not at swords' points with the upper; they are bound up with them by the intangible but steely bonds of common attitudes. The workers do not seek to displace their managers; they seek to emulate them. They themselves acquiesce in the general judgment that the work they do is somehow less 'dignified' than the work of their masters, and their goal is not to rid themselves of a superior class but to climb up to it. In the theory of the leisure class lies the kernel of a theory of social stability." (Robert L. Heilbroner, The Worldly Philosophers)
As long as the poor aspire to be just like the rich--just as pampered, just as wasteful, just as materialistic--there can never be a true revolution against economic injustice.
Back in the day, people looked forward to the 21st century as a time when problems like starvation and poverty would be ancient history. They assumed that those problems existed only because of natural scarcity and would soon be solved by advancing technology. Obviously, they were wrong. They forgot that the people who control the technology have better things to do than help billions of suffering human beings. They have money to make, and that means maintaining scarcity even in the midst of the most fabulous abundance.
Later on, but still back in the day, people looked forward to the 21st century as a time when poor workers would solve the problems of starvation and poverty by rising up against those who did no work themselves but claimed to own the things needed for work (land, factories, etc.). They assumed that the working class would realize they were being exploited by the "owning" class, and that they wouldn't tolerate a social system designed to protect and glorify the exploiters. Obviously, they too were wrong. But why? Why didn't the workers overthrow and abolish the "owners" for good?
Thorstein Veblen answered this question in The Theory of the Leisure Class by making a critical observation about societies in which some members parasitize others: "... these societies were not only rich enough to be able to afford a nonproductive class, but aggressive enough to admire them; far from being regarded as wasters or spoilers, those who rose to the leisured ranks were looked up to as the strong and the able. As a consequence, a fundamental change in attitudes toward work took place. The activities of the leisure class--the winning of wealth by force--came to be regarded as honorific and dignified. Hence, by contrast, pure labor became tainted with indignity....
"The lower classes are not at swords' points with the upper; they are bound up with them by the intangible but steely bonds of common attitudes. The workers do not seek to displace their managers; they seek to emulate them. They themselves acquiesce in the general judgment that the work they do is somehow less 'dignified' than the work of their masters, and their goal is not to rid themselves of a superior class but to climb up to it. In the theory of the leisure class lies the kernel of a theory of social stability." (Robert L. Heilbroner, The Worldly Philosophers)
As long as the poor aspire to be just like the rich--just as pampered, just as wasteful, just as materialistic--there can never be a true revolution against economic injustice.
