adjective
- existing or occurring before the development of capitalism as an economic system
Usage: historical; economics
Examples
- Many precapitalist societies relied on bartering rather than money.
- The feudal system was a precapitalist economic arrangement.
- Historians study precapitalist trade networks in medieval Europe.
- Agricultural communities often maintained precapitalist social structures.
- The transition from precapitalist to capitalist economies took centuries.
- Precapitalist societies typically had different concepts of private property.