Democratic capitalism

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Democratic capitalism, also known as capitalist democracy, is a political, economic, and social system and ideology based on a tripartite arrangement of a market-based economy based predominantly on a democratic polity, economic incentives through free markets, and a liberal moral-cultural system which encourages pluralism.

This economic system supports a mainly laissez faire capitalist free market economy.

The United States and Canada are notable in using democratic capitalism as its political-economic system. In the United States, both the Democratic and Republican Parties subscribe to this (little-"d" and "r") democratic-republican philosophy. In Canada, both the Liberal and Conservative Parties subscribe to a belief in the free market, free enterprise, private property, and democratic capitalism. The term is often used to contrast the United States' and Canada's political-economic system, with its emphasis on individual liberties, with that of the more democratic socialist and social democratic economies of other Western countries.

Most liberals and conservatives generally support some form of democratic capitalism in their economic practices.

One of the central areas of dispute revolves around the relationship between capital and labour. In this relationship, the supplier of capital usually holds greater power proportionate to the amount of risk. However, the validity of this argument is questionable because loss of capital (expressed as excess value) is not equivalent with loss of labor.

The loss or more correctly, the transfer of capital (actualized risk) produces a purely economic change while the loss of labor effects human life by reducing the ability for survival.

[edit] See also

• Classical liberalism
• Individualism
• Objectivism (Ayn Rand)
• Liberalism
• Libertarianism

[edit] External links

• The Conceptual Foundations of Democratic Capitalism
• Michael Novak's Portrait of Democratic Capitalism