For the past six hundred years a culture and a society, dedicated for the most part to development

and trade as the ultimate source of well being, began to expand all over the world. In a great

number of ways this development, capitalism, became the most successful culture and society

the world has ever seen.

Capitalism ascended as a successful social means. It was successful as it provided a

more effective means of creating a surplus. This was an important feature for mankind. It

proved to be an easier and more cost effective means of creating a surplus. Capitalism also

allowed for the world system to function with their own states. This system of functioning

encouraged the international market economy, which in turn established the success of

capitalism. Such a market bestowed incentives which increased productivity all over the globe.

Simultaneously a world separation of work made it easy for costs and benefits to be unequally

distributed.

The effects of such a division of labour were profound. It created a multilayered

economic hierarchy. The hierarchies were divided into many sections, with each sector owning

it’s own defining feature, and all were linked to one common feature. This was the exploitation

of social classes. The wealthy employed labourers and often underpaid their labourers so that

they might be able to reap maximum profits. Such racist inequalities and exploitation were used

to justify the hindered commission of the proletariat.

The world system continues to undergo a cycle of expansion. This trend has gained the

support it requires from the notion that all societies, in order to be successful, need to conform to

a western way of life.

Capitalism continues to be increasingly effective. This is largely due to the belief the

workers hold that the harder they work the more the stand to gain. Such workers also affirm

that it is hard work that will grant them such wealth, often this leads tofrustration, once the

worker comes realize they may never reach the status of the elite. Often times myths are used as

a method of erasing such beliefs, as they do not address the real problems at hand. No matter

what is done it seems there will always be a gap between the rich, or the employers, and the

poor, or the employees.

Bibliography

Bodley, John. Cultural Anthropology. Mayfield Publishing, Toronto, 2000

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