An economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and organised to accumulate profits within a market system is called :
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → Capitalism
Option (1) Feudalism — Incorrect. Under feudalism the land is held by lords, and peasants work it and owe the lord a share of the produce or labour. Production is for the lord and for the peasant’s own use, not organised to make profits in a market.
Option (2) Slavery — Incorrect. Under slavery the workers themselves are owned as property by their masters, who take what they produce. Work is forced on the slave; it is not organised as free, paid labour to make profits in a market.
Option (3) Capitalism — Correct. Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and organised to accumulate profits within a market system. Colonialism carried this system from the West to countries such as India.
Option (4) Socialism — Incorrect. Under socialism the means of production are owned by society or the state, and production is planned to meet social needs rather than to make private profit.
Note: The economic systems in Option (1), ‘Feudalism’, Option (2), ‘Slavery’, and Option (4), ‘Socialism’, are not explained in NCERT (2025-26); explained here for the benefit of the students.
NCERT (2025-26): “1.1 Understanding Colonialism … This magnitude and depth of the structural changes that colonialism unleashed can be better grasped if we try and understand some basic features of capitalism. Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and organised to accumulate profits within a market system. (We have already discussed the capitalist market in the first book – Indian Society.) Capitalism in the west emerged out of a complex process of European exploration of the rest of the world, its plunder of wealth and resources, an unprecedented growth of science and technology, its harnessing to industries and agriculture. What marked capitalism from the very beginning was its dynamism, its potential to grow, expand, innovate, use technology and labour in a way best assured to ensure greatest profit. What marked it too was its global nature. Western colonialism was inextricably connected to the growth of western capitalism.…” |