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59 Chapter 4 Economic Systems As Institutionalized Selfishness By economic systems is meant the structure of ownership and control of important resources in a given economy. The owner of important resources determines what is to be produced in the economy, how it is to be produced and for whom it is to be produced. Because they have all these powers, the owners of the important resources in the economy tend to be domineering and selfish. Economic systems therefore are ways in which selfishness is institutionalized in societies. To know the economic system of any given society is to know how selfishness is institutionalized in that society. In other words, the selfishness within a given society is revealed by the way important resources are owned, controlled and used within that society. Every society has an economic system at any given time. However, as societies evolve, they change from one economic system to another and because of this evolution economic systems can also be called economic regimes. Most economic regimes are characterised by selfishness or even solipsism. Primitive Economic Systems Subsistence Economics Subsistence economics is the economic system that pertains to a world which is still very primitive. The primitive world is mainly characterised by rudimentary technology and a very low population density. There are no organized leadership structures, markets or industries. People live either as individuals or as nuclear families and there is hardly any interaction among them because of the poor means of communication. People depend on natural resources for their livelihood, for example, forests, bushes, rivers, lakes, and swamps. These resources belong to no one; they are still in their natural state and so nobody possesses them except may be God. Primitive activities such as hunting, fishing and fruit gathering are the main economic activities and they are carried out using simple tools such as stones, arrows, spears, hooks, and sticks. Subsistence economies are what sociologists usually refer to as foraging societies, for example, the pygmies of Central Africa.72 72 Andersen and Howard F. Taylor, Sociology: Understanding a Diverse Society, 137. 60 Certainly, all human societies have been primitive at one time or another and they have therefore practiced subsistence economics. In his Politics, Aristotle describes how the ancient Greeks used to depend on activities such as hunting, fishing and fruit gathering for their survival. In any subsistence economy, economic activities are carried out for the sole purpose of household consumption. Actually, the word economics is derived from a Greek word oikonomia which means ‘household management’. The telos of Oikonomia is to provide household members with basic needs.73 Nothing is taken to the market since there are no markets and other infrastructures in very primitive societies. Every household is able to meet the basic needs of its members without buying anything from anybody. The aim is to satisfy needs but not wants. Because of the poor means of transport and communication, no family is aware of other families’ existence. Each family utilizes only the resources that surround it. However, the family does not and indeed it cannot amass more resources than it needs for its basic necessities. This can be attributed to several factors. First of all, the technology used is very rudimentary; with a spear the hunter can only kill one animal at a time and with a hook the fisherman can only catch one fish at a time. At this rate, it is very difficult to kill more than five animals or to catch more than five fish in a single day. Second, reliable storage facilities and preservation mechanisms are not available. Even if it were possible for a family to catch a lot of fish or to kill many animals or to gather a lot of fruits, it would find it impossible to preserve the surplus. Nobody in such a world is able to imagine that fruits, fish or meat can be stored for longer periods. Moreover, there are no markets to which the surplus can be taken in order for it to be sold. Families are therefore forced to operate at the subsistence level of economics. They gather as much fruits or kill as many animals as they need for survival. The desire to accumulate resources is frustrated by poor technology and the lack of a vent for the surplus. There is hardly any selfishness in the primitive world. Although families exist in isolation, none of them is able to amass more resources than it needs. Each family acquires resources to meet its...

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