The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism

Historians studying the utopian Oneida Community have often located its demise in rising internal dissent and failing consensus among its members, with special emphasis on the personal jealousies and generational tensions that its practice of group marriage may have produced. Those studies step past...

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Main Author: Kevin Coffee
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: UCL Press 2019-10-01
Series:Radical Americas
Online Access:https://ucl.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14324/111.444.ra.2019.v3.1.003
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spelling doaj-03ea28877b824deca7b632452e3476c92020-12-15T17:22:27ZengUCL PressRadical Americas2399-46062019-10-0110.14324/111.444.ra.2019.v3.1.003The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalismKevin CoffeeHistorians studying the utopian Oneida Community have often located its demise in rising internal dissent and failing consensus among its members, with special emphasis on the personal jealousies and generational tensions that its practice of group marriage may have produced. Those studies step past the essential place of work and industry in communal life and especially the community’s theology, which equated economic prosperity with Christian virtue. This essay reframes our understanding of the political economy of the Oneida Community, with specific attention to their last decade, and the social tensions stoked by their reliance upon market capitalism and waged labour. While acknowledging the internal dissent that accompanied the structural demise of the commune, the present study asks how such discord arose from business-centred theology within the social environment of competition and a prolonged economic depression. The Community’s dependence upon the surrounding capitalist economy challenged their self-described ‘Bible communism’ and precipitated its demise.https://ucl.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14324/111.444.ra.2019.v3.1.003
collection DOAJ
language English
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Kevin Coffee
spellingShingle Kevin Coffee
The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
Radical Americas
author_facet Kevin Coffee
author_sort Kevin Coffee
title The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
title_short The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
title_full The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
title_fullStr The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
title_full_unstemmed The Oneida Community and the utility of liberal capitalism
title_sort oneida community and the utility of liberal capitalism
publisher UCL Press
series Radical Americas
issn 2399-4606
publishDate 2019-10-01
description Historians studying the utopian Oneida Community have often located its demise in rising internal dissent and failing consensus among its members, with special emphasis on the personal jealousies and generational tensions that its practice of group marriage may have produced. Those studies step past the essential place of work and industry in communal life and especially the community’s theology, which equated economic prosperity with Christian virtue. This essay reframes our understanding of the political economy of the Oneida Community, with specific attention to their last decade, and the social tensions stoked by their reliance upon market capitalism and waged labour. While acknowledging the internal dissent that accompanied the structural demise of the commune, the present study asks how such discord arose from business-centred theology within the social environment of competition and a prolonged economic depression. The Community’s dependence upon the surrounding capitalist economy challenged their self-described ‘Bible communism’ and precipitated its demise.
url https://ucl.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14324/111.444.ra.2019.v3.1.003
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