We Can—And Must—Reform Capitalism.

Fred Block says capitalism is not an unchanging monolith—which means we can make it better One of the Right’s greatest successes has been claiming that their definition of capitalism is as radically laissez-faire is fixed. It’s time to challenge that. That’s the argument of Fred Block, Professor of Sociology at UC Davis and author of the forthcoming book, Capitalism: The Future of an Illusion (University of California Press). Block’s book challenges the view on both left and right that capitalism is a fixed system. Instead, he argues, markets are social institutions, which means they can be constructed not just in the current neoliberal mode, but in more social democratic forms. Block’s book shows how the type of capitalism that thrived in the West after World War II can be revived, pointing to the success of the Scandinavian model and the way in which the public sector can help drive private sector innovation.