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You're making a lot of unsupported claims about free market capitalism which really isn't a factor when we're discussing 2000 year old empires. I don't think you can make the argument that the dark ages ushered in a free market, so I don't know how you're connecting these things.

It's a strange take that hyper-focuses on slavery and the economy when slavery was being used by western nations well into the 1800s.


I am not saying there was any free market capitalism in feudalism. I am trying to explain to you the basic economic principle that those that can produce something more efficiently will tend to dominate. I used the example of corporations under capitalism as an example that I hope you would be more familiar with.

If I need to use 90% of my population just to produce enough food to sustain them, I can only use 10% for other things. The society that only needs 50% of the workforce to be in agriculture can easily entertain for example a vastly bigger military even with the same population.

Economics is what wins war. Economics is what allows technological progress.

Yes, slavery existed but the question is what the dominant form of ding agriculture.

I don't understand what time periods you're comparing here. Your explanations don't follow with any sort of historical precedent. You're making assumptions that there were such a thing as a standing army during the middle ages - ironically enough it was Rome with its slaves that had one of those - and that somehow there were less serfs than slaves. The majority of people in Medieval Europe were still peasant farmers.

I feel like you're talking about economic abstractions without understanding the actual historical context.

I am not making any assumption about there being big standing armies. I am just trying to explain to you the basic principle that the economy is the deciding factor that governs everything else. I really just try to explain basic economic stuff.

History doesn't go perfectly linearly. There is always exceptions for every rule. You need to understand the broad stroke and main driving forces before going into the small.

The bigger picture is: Slave holding society -> feudalism -> capitalism

Not everywhere in the world and sometimes steps get skipped but that is the general tendency observed.

Edit: Removed a unnecessary sentence that was not very polite. Sorry about that.

>Are you not even able to understand abstractions and examples?

Your point might be more palatable without the swipes at someones intelligence.

I have a degree in history, I am well aware of the broad strokes, but you need to be able to align your theory with the historical fact. I'm not seeing the connections.

Your "bigger picture" doesn't make sense, as there have been capitalist societies with slave holding, and it's not just an "exception" - you're clearly thinking of things from a western context, and it was the west itself that had this exception. I don't know anywhere in the world that neatly aligns with your progression.

You're trying to explain history via the economy but in ways that don't align with the historical context. I can accept this is your personal belief, but I don't find it compelling.

Capitalist societies are capitalist. I don't get what point you try to make with saying they also have slavery. As a historian you should know the difference between defining features and what is secondary.

Modern slavery is a pretty different phenomenon to antique slave holding anyway.

It is fact that the vast majority of the world is capitalist today, no?

Yes, you can argue they are not purely this or that or whatever but I don't see what purpose that would serve other than muddle the conversation.

It is also historical fact, that the first countries that went through an industrialization where feudalistic, no? England, Germany, France so on.

So how is the progression I showed you not trivially true?

Yes it is eurocentric and the development in Asia was very different and yada, yda. Fair point but the industrialization started in Europe and that was no accident.

I am not even sure what you are actually disagreeing with.

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