History glossary
Capitalism
an economic system based on private ownership, wage labor, markets, investment, and profit.
- Category
- Economic system
What it means
Capitalism organizes production around private property, markets, capital investment, and profit. It helped drive industrialisation and global trade, while also producing conflicts over labor, inequality, empire, regulation, and socialism.
Related terms
Stories using this term
The Cold War
Rivalry between East and West shapes global politics - through proxy wars, propaganda, and nuclear tension.
The Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution began in Britain and spread globally, transforming economies, societies and everyday life through machines, factories and new energy sources.
The Soviets
From revolution to superpower, the Soviet Union rose, struggled internally, and collapsed in 1991.
Weimar Republic
A fragile democracy marked by crisis and innovation, whose collapse paved the way for Nazi rule.
The American Civil War and the Abolition of Slavery
The American Civil War determined the survival of the Union and led to the abolition of slavery, fundamentally reshaping the United States.
The Second World War
From fragile peace to global war, WWII reshaped the world through conflict, genocide, and new power orders.
The Rise of Adolf Hitler
From the ashes of World War I to the Night of the Long Knives, this story traces the political rise of Adolf Hitler and the collapse of the Weimar Republic.
Origins of the Cold War
From the Grand Alliance to the Truman Doctrine, this story traces how the United States and Soviet Union shifted from wartime cooperation to global confrontation.
