ABSTRACT
Mr. Sombart’s Kapitalismus is the most considerable essay in economic theory yet made on lines independent of the classical English political economy, by an economist affiliated to the historical school. As is well known, the adherents of the historical method have not until recently entered the theoretical field, except by way of adaptation or criticism of doctrines already in vogue; and where they have made the attempt it has commonly not had substantial results. Mr. Sombart is not a Historiker, although his work shows the training of
the “historical method.” In standpoint and animus his work blends the historical outlook with Marxist materialism. But his Marxism is very appreciably modified by the spirit of modern, post-Darwinian scientific inquiry; so that the latter element may perhaps be said to predominate. At least no preconceptions of Historismus or Materialismus are allowed to divert the inquiry from scientific theory, as that phrase is understood in the latterday work of the material sciences. More than once (as e.g., Vol. I, p. xxxii) he cautions the reader that the inquiry which he has in hand aims at an explanation of the economic situation in causal terms; although the caution is scarcely necessary for any one who will follow the discussion attentively, which is no difficult or tedious task, since Mr. Sombart is a master of a lucid and cogent style. The work is as ambitious as anyone could desire. Indeed, it has an air
of conviction and self-sufficiency at times quite cavalier. It condemns the work of predecessors and contemporaries in such harsh and flippant terms as sometimes to remind one of Marx’s vituperative outbreaks. But, again like Marx, a large and ready command of the materials and a tenacious grasp of the many converging lines of his argument save Mr. Sombart’s work from the damage which it would otherwise suffer on account of his jaunty selfcomplacency and his discourteous treatment of those who have the fortune to differ with him. While the work is theoretical throughout, it brings in much of the [301] material used in a somewhat comprehensive manner. So much
so, indeed, as to make these two volumes the most available general guide to the materials of the subject. At times the argument comes near losing itself in an excess of illustrative detail, such as had better been dealt with in monographic form apart from the theoretical development. A more serious weakness of the book is an excess of terminological innovation. There is throughout an uncontrolled penchant for discarding definitions and distinctions already familiar to economic students and substituting for them new terms and distinctions that are not always more serviceable than those which they displace. And new distinctions are also multiplied with unnecessary alacrity; so that the new categories are not always useful to Mr. Sombart, and it is very doubtful if many of them will be of service to anyone else. No doubt, some, perhaps most, of the new categories that are of a general character and a broad bearing are necessary to the argument and constitute a substantial theoretical advance; but, also no doubt, a great part of the finedrawn distinctions elaborately worked out and designated without apparently serving any theoretical end might advantageously have been left out. It is within the mark to say that if excessive detail of classification and such materials as are of the nature of collateral only had been omitted, the substance of the two volumes might conveniently have been brought within the compass of one. The two volumes already published are but the beginning of a comprehen-
sive systematic work, eventually to be completed in some three or four additional volumes. So that any present appraisement of the work as a whole must be taken as provisional only, so far as regards its adequacy for the theoretical purpose at which it aims. But as regards its scope and character these two volumes afford a sufficiently unequivocal indication. It is a genetic account of modern capitalism; that is to say, of modern business enterprise, as an English writer might phrase it. Vol. I, on “The Genesis of Capitalism,” traces the origin of modern business enterprise from the small beginnings of the Middle Ages, through the handicraft and petty trade of early modern times, down to the full-grown capitalistic enterprise as it came to prevail in industrial business in the course of the nineteenth century. Vol. II, on “The Theory of Capitalistic Development,” is occupied with “The Modern Foundations of Business” (Book I), “The Reorganization of Business Traffic” (Book II), and “The Theory of Business Competition” (Book III). These three books of Vol. II deal with the present situation, that is to say, the [302] situation as it stands since capitalistic enterprise has come to dominate industrial business. Characteristic of Mr. Sombart’s point of view and significant of the aim of
his inquiry is the careful distinction with which he sets out (chap. i), between business (Wirtschaft) and industry (Betrieb).
