this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2026
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Competition is a core part of capitalist theory, that's true. In practice, however capitalists have always sought to limit, neutralize or eliminate competition. In fact, capitalism has a strong tendency toward market concentration, not in spite of competition but because of it. Competition does not result in all competitors sharing the prize equally. Competition is inherently zero sum.
Think of sports competitions: do all teams take equal share of the trophy at the end of the season? No, one team, the team that outcompetes all the others, wins 100% of the trophy at the end. Market competition is no different. Winning companies take all the market share and losing companies go out of business or get taken over. Companies have always known this and that's why they have always tried to rig the competition in their favor whenever possible.
The fact is, the only entity capable of keeping competition fair is the state, but the state is so easily captured by capital. But even when the state is able to maintain open competition, oligopolies, duopolies and monopolies still form, because, again, that's just the nature of competition. Competition is inherently zero sum, winner-take-all. That's why the state has always had to come in and break up monopolies periodically. But if the monopoly powers are able to capture state power, they can prevent that. It's like the championship winning team taking over the league.
It's true that these AI companies are starting to worry about losing. I think OpenAI especially is concerned because they are currently struggling against both Anthropic and some other emerging companies, including some Chinese companies. But I think even Anthropic is worried because while they might be winning, they're winning a race to the bottom. These companies are not profitable, and there's no path to profitability for them in the foreseeable future. So not only can OpenAI not compete, they can't compete in an industry with no clear path to profitability. So, yeah, they're all colluding to stop the game because right now, no one's winning. But that kind of collusion does not exist outside the bounds of normal capitalist operations, it's always been a feature of it.
@TheDemonBuer
Yes good points. There are of course also plenty of other examples of capitalists asking the state to protect them from competitive pressures, for example with tariffs.
Whether capitalism without competition is still capitalism is a matter of decades of debate.
Some scholars have felt the need to add an adjective, like monopoly capitalism. Others, like Varoufakis, are exploring other terms, like technofeudalism.
because the word "capitalism" just doesn't have a coherent definition
Free trading of goods and services on markets has been a thing for pretty much the entire existence of human civilization; so have property rights. If those are the things that define "capitalism", it's extremely difficult to imagine a world without it; if they aren't, then which are?
@schnurrito I made an attempt recently: https://mishathings.org/posts/what-is-capitalism/
https://mishathings.org/posts/what-is-capitalism/
OK, that's an interesting analysis and certainly one possible way to think about historical developments; the parts that are unclear are (1) whether this is trying to argue that the transition from feudalism to capitalism might be a bad thing (not something I've seen argued a lot) and (2) what, then, is socialism/communism?