Robert L. Heilbroner, in his The Nature and Logic of Capitalism, struggles with three difficult-to-define words -- "Nature", "Logic", and "Capitalism" -- and often comes to some startling, if not revealing, opinions on capitalism. He is candid concerning the difficulty of dealing with these three terms. On page 19, he states
As a first approximation, then, let us take the nature of capitalism as referring to its behavior-shaping institutions and relationships, and the logic of capitalism as the pattern of configurational change generated and guided by this inner core. Both nature and logic are needed to conceptualize the historic totality of any system (Heilbroner, 1985, 19).
This is a key paragraph in the book, and one that should be marked by any person wishing to digest his arguments, for it is often necessary to return here when Heilbroner drifts from this premise. He begins by pointing out that many wise economists and philosophers have avoided "defining" Capitalism (because of its difficulty) and proposes that he will define it by analyzing capitalism not as a "mere economic system" but as a "regime." A "regime," indicating a ruling power structure empowered to make and enforce change.
Therefore the reader now has a linear development, so to speak, of his argument. "Nature" is the innate ability or power to create relationships, and it wields this ability in a structured "logic", the end result, which is a "regime" known as "capitalism." There is a certain philosophical danger in using highly-charged symbolic words (ignoring the argument that all "words" are highly-charged) in ways and in contexts that are unfamiliar to the general reading public. Heilbroner's is an acceptable form of rhetoric, but one that has inherent problems, for he is asking the reader to become quite flexible in appreciation of the words he uses, and acknowledge their flexibility. (Semanticists call this the multiordinality of language,...