------ 2.2 From Capitalism to the Anticipated New Era ------
From now-on due to the information technological development, including both the internet and the artificial intelligence (AI), which has widen the market entrance of both the real-market (dealing with the goods and services) and the financial market (dealing with money and other forms of capital assets). It used to require a high volume of capital investment to open a new business so that those who were already wealthy to own enough capital had a much stronger advantage. By contrast, the current technology enables individuals to gather efficient tools and investment resources from a far bigger information resource than few decades ago.
This leads to the situation where it does not longer matter to seek a heavy volume of capital investment from banks and private investors for starting up a new business as long as any individual has an attractive idea of a new business. In another word, the cost of capital investment has become substantially low. This is one of the reason why the interest rate set by central banks in developed countries is close to zero or even minus. The supply of entrepreneurs will become far more abundant and the market competition among business owners will become far more competitive than it has been.
The traditional bourgeoisie such as the owners of big enterprises are going to face the severe difficulty in maintaining their dominance. These bourgeoisie owning huge enterprises with a high volume of capital are not flexible to change their policies and their organisational structure in comparison to the newly emerging entrepreneurs having started their business with a low volume of capital investment. These new entrepreneurs are far more flexible to adjust their business structure to the market demand and requirement even though their economies of scale is not big as much as the traditional capitalistic enterprises.
The economies of scale are also predicted to be smaller than they have been due to the technological development such as newly invented AI and 3D printers. Furthermore, the division of labour will be more emphasised in this coming era so that it seems to be the case that the industries had better include various independent small enterprises competing and often cooperated together instead of allowing one or few monopolistic big corporations controlling it.
The development of the cloud data base and the close-based administration system also devalue the importance of these big corporations because industries no longer need a big organisation constantly administrating and monitoring the business activities as well as their data-management. These administration tools will be organised by decentralised platforms such as a set of the remotely located hard-drive centres connected via online. The outsourcing will be more popular as there will be more small enterprises offering flexible services with good-quality. Therefore, companies no longer need to marge various departments and divisions inside their company, and these tasks can be easily outsourced.
This decentralisation process will also lead not only the previously mentioned traditional bourgeoisie owning private enterprises but also government-bureaucrats administrating public sectors and the market regulations, who can be called the new bourgeoisie, will also struggle to maintain their dominance. Not only the previously mentioned technological development and the market decentralisation but also the decline of nation-states caused by the globalisation are devaluing the necessity of the bureaucracy. Some of the public sector projects will be outsourced and the communication tool and the administration tools of public sectors will be so efficient that it will require less man-power.
In addition, both the already developed information technology and the newly developed AI will replace many tasks of these bureaucrats. Also, the diversification of this entire world will require anyone including the tasks of the bureaucracy to constantly change enough to frequently requires their skill sets to be always updated or even replaced by a completely new ones. Therefore, the structured static structure of the bureaucracy will be simply inefficient, and it will devalue the level of intelligence, wisdom, and hard-works of these elite bureaucrats.
At the same time, this transformation of the market structure will cause a hardship for the citizens who are already accustomed with their traditional way of living by being employed by a private company, public sector, or any structured organisation. The market becomes far more capital intensive owing to the technological development and the popularlised entrepreneurship owing to the information technology and networks. Then, the number of labour employed will become far smaller than it has been. Therefore, unless they find any new means of living such as starting their own business or any alternative way of sustaining their life, they will struggle to find their means of living. This may result in an increasing social problem of anomie (Normlessness or Meaninglessness) predicted by Emile Durkheim.
Overall, owing capital will become less important meanwhile people will be employed less and market competition becomes more competitive. Because owing (physical and financial capital) will become far less significant to become successful in the market competition, the name called capitalism may be going to be old fashioned. This newly emerging era should no longer be called capitalism although the market competition becomes much complex and intense and the social stratification still remains (It is far from the utopia for all individuals).
- 3. Diversified Education System
As the market becomes far more competitive as well as diverse, the skill sets required for succeeding in this market competition frequently change all the time. In this situation, there is no definitive skill guaranteeing individuals' job security. Then, the compulsory education will be more diversified unlike the current homogeneous plane style of education. As the change of the required skill sets becomes more frequent, individuals will rather prefer learning multiple skills in various methods to spending several years for obtaining one degree.
These organised educational institutes used to be valuable for children to gain an access to the basic educational information and the social skill with the others. By contrast, the primary education system is diversified nowadays and the remarkable development of the information technology enables anyone to gain the access to the education, the essential information required for life, and various diverse social networks. Therefore, compulsory education is no longer essential for individuals to obtain.
Nonetheless, education and nurturing will still be the key critical factors for succeeding to become the dominant class more than it has been. Those who can access to the flexible choice of education and nurturing and be brought up in an emotional stable environment while their childhood are more likely to succeed in the survival in this new era. Then, the family background, the chance to have a right mentor, the relationship with friends and acquaintances, and the living environment endowing individuals with innate abilities will become unavoidable variables to acquire the higher social status.
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