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From Feudalism to Capitalism | Part VI A further step in the transition came in the 1530s and 40s.  Under Henry VIII, the assumption of absolute power over church and state enabled him to order the destruction of the monasteries, which in turn broke the power of the third leg of the feudal triumvirate – the bishops and clergy – and made vast tracts of land available to the crown for sale and taxation, often to the rising merchant and gentry class.    Which brings us to the influence of the Reformation in nurturing market-driven capitalism.  In opposing the Roman Catholic church, Luther, Calvin, Knox and Henry VIII were taking on the ideological center of feudalism and drawing in not only the urban and rural poor, but the new layer of untitled rich.  The appeal of a flatter hierarchy, a simpler, more democratic infrastructure, church services in each nation’s mother tongue and, as Weber points out, salvation by hard, earnest work, aligned Protestantism far better...

From Feudalism to Capitalism | Part I The first question is, “Why should socialists even study the transition?” After all, it happened centuries ago.  The answer is that there are many aspects of that now completed dialectical process that parallel the one we are presently in the midst of – aspects that provide vital insights into how far along we are in the next stage of economic evolution.  And how rough and uneven such massive transitions are when they involve the total reorganization of society.   The second question, “What actually happened back then?” has many parts, all of them hotly debated among Marxist historians, sociologists and economists since WWII.  The chief issues are: When did the transition to capitalism happen? Where did it take place first? In towns and cities or in the countryside?  In England or on the continent? How long did it take to complete? What were the contributing factors? And finally, was Marx right or does his interpretatio...