Capitalism is often described as an ever-changing system, one that constantly revolutionizes its productive powers and changes the form of society. This ever-changing nature makes capitalism particularly difficult to describe and theorize. When “history is theory and theory is history”, the only way to draw any consistent model about the behavior of the society is to track down the changes. In this course, we will explore this history of changes in the capitalist societies from the first industrial revolution until the current moment, with a particular emphasis on the change of the productive structure, the economic institutions and the class divisions that have taken place in different moments. We will also explore the theories of progress (developed by Walt Rostow), of spontaneous order (developed by Friedrich Hayek), of the long waves (developed by Joseph Schumpeter and Ernest Mandel), and of the world-systems (developed by Immanuel Wallerstein) as potential descriptions of this ever-changing nature.