Capitalism’s resilience comes from its plasticity in adopting new social forms

Evidence

Capitalism has survived the longue durée less because of any specific capability and more because of its plasticity. It survives and thrives by periodically renewing its roots in the social, finding new ways to generate new wealth by meeting new needs. Its evolution has been marked by a convergence of basic principles—private property, the profit motive, and growth—but with new forms, norms, and practices in each era. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1647

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: Central to the book’s argument that surveillance capitalism is yet another adaptive form, which reframes how to contest it — not abolishing capitalism but reshaping its social rootedness.
• XREF: connects to: Abstracting value from life processes enables new commodified social relations; Cognitive capitalism blurs the work-play divide by investing in minds and social relations — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 366; Creative destruction, not peace, causes capitalism’s endemic crises — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 428 (+21 more)

Broader Connections

• Capitalism periodically renews itself through new organizational forms rather than fixed ones #corroborates (0.92) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1647
• Capitalism is a singular economic-institutional ensemble that can be reinvented #expands (0.85) — Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolitics, 904
• Sustained capitalist mutation requires new institutional forms, not merely destruction #expands (0.85) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 156
• Late capitalism survives crises by incorporating whatever previously stood outside it #expands (0.75) — Grant Bollmer, Katherine Guinness, The Influencer Factory, 102