Capitalism in The Jungle Upton Sinclair

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“The Jungle” novel was written by an American journalist/ novelist name Upton Sinclair in 1906. “The Jungle” made a big hit and became his best-selling novel because it revealed so well about the economical and social reality during that time. The book mainly described about how unsanitary the meat packing industry was operated in Chicago and the miserable life of the immigrants going along with the industry. Through the story around the life and family of Jurgis Rudjus, a Lithuanian immigrant who comes to America with the belief to change their life and live in a better condition, Sinclair expresses that “The Jungle” is a symbol of capitalism. Sinclair’s contempt for capitalist society is present throughout the novel, demonstrated in the eagerness of Jurgis to work, the constant struggle for survival of the workers in Packing town and the corruption of the man at all levels of the society. Also, the author promotes socialism as a standard political society to replace capitalism. First, what is capitalism? And why it is good and why it is bad. Capitalism is all about efficiency and get things done. “Capital” by itself means own, operation and trade for making benefits with the most efficient way. Capitalism focuses more on emphasizing on individual profits rather than on workers or society as a whole. Capitalism provides free-market that produces the best economic outcome for society. Furthermore, capitalism is not friendly for lazy and laid back people because in order to live in the capitalist society, people need to work very hard in order to survive. However, capitalism will compensate well for people who are working hard and give contributions to the society. That is its good side. Capitalism is a form of political society ... ... middle of paper ... ...before, destroys the wholesome values previously exhibited by the family. Jurgis and Ona drift further and further apart as times get worse, and when this is culminated by Jurgis' discover of Ona's rape and his consequent beating of her boss, Jurgis goes to jail. There is constant events happened one after each other to this family because of the struggle of getting more money in order to keep life sustainable. There is indeede no mercy given to this family. Sinclair shows this family suffering as much as possible in order to show the complete negligence of capitalist society toward the people that it controls. Money has so much powerful that makes human’s value turns down to the level of animal. The pressure of life makes them destroy the hope and happiness from each other; take advantage to each other In order to gain their own benefit and to protect themselves.

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