Global slump and the new normal

[TexasTowelie]

What is the state of the economy, in the U.S. and around the world, seven years into the global crisis--and, more importantly, what is the prospect for further resistance to develop?

David McNally is a Canadian socialist and activist, and the author of numerous books, including Global Slump: The Economics and Politics of Crisis and Resistance and Monsters of the Market: Zombies, Vampires and Global Capitalism. In late June, he was interviewed by Andrew Sernatinger and Tessa Echeverria for their Black Sheep Socialist Podcast. The interview transcript was first published in two parts at New Politics, and is republished here. Part two of the interview will appear at SW tomorrow.

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Tessa: Let's start by talking about the history of the crisis that we're in now, neoliberalism and how capitalist states responded to the meltdown that began around 2007. Could you give us a quick rundown of how the crisis came to be and how that relates to the recent history of capitalism?

I see this as the fourth great slump in the history of global capitalism. The last quarter century or so of the 19th century was the first slump, the original "Great Depression," where the term was first used. It began in 1893 and ran for about 25 years. Then, of course, for most of us raised on 20th century history, there was the Depression of the 1930s, which was actually the second of the great slumps. That was followed by the slump in which I came into political activism--the crisis of the 1970s, running more or less from 1971 to 1982.

And then neoliberalism and the way it reorganized and restructured work, corporate power and so on managed to engineer another wave of capitalist expansion, which really was exhausted by about 2007 when we entered the fourth of these great slumps. We're in year seven or so of this slump, with, I would argue, no end in sight.

That's just to get us situated historically. Now, of course, every great slump has its unique historical features. They show all kinds of different characteristics having to do with the ways in which capitalism has evolved--and in our case, particularly how it has globalized, much more so than in any time in its history. There is also the specific role of the financial sector, and the very esoteric financial kinds of transactions that have been a feature of the neoliberal era of the last 30 years or so.

More at http://socialistworker.org/2014/07/08/global-slump-and-the-new-normal .

[socialist_n_TN]

1. Thanks for posting....

Good interview, even if it was an ISO site . It put a lot of things together.

One of the key points what destroying the Keynesian argument that neo-liberalism is just some sort of RW plot that ignores consumer demand in the workings of the economy. The fact of the matter is neo-liberalism IS working for the owners or they wouldn't be continuing with it.

[TBF]

2. In a way quite similar to the article elleng

posted about Detroit as well.

As you say, this is all working out quite well for the owners. They are transitioning to a global economy and taking their profits. The problem is all the humans that become collateral damage in the transition. In true capitalist fashion they are not concerned about those folks at all. They are on to the next shiny thing and to hell with those who fall by the wayside. These people really are sociopaths (and clearly the result of a sick society).

[socialist_n_TN]

3. Yep. And the only "saving grace" to the entire situation is that.....

it becomes more and more clear to the entire population that this IS what is happening.

Even in these days of woefully lacking class consciousness, the mass of workers I believe would agree that ANY economic system needs to work for the mass of the population. Otherwise it's not a system worth living in. The trick is to convince the masses that situation is EXACTLY what capitalism leads to, a system that does NOT work for everyone. The lack of economic security under capitalism today is exactly what is needed to show this fact.

I'm beginning to advocate for the economic elements of the Transitional program (a transition from capitalism to socialism) because that's exactly what the Transitional program does. It provides for a secure life for workers WITHOUT REGARD TO PROFIT. IOW, workers' economic security comes FIRST, then we can talk about profit. Of course, what this does is put pressure on the capitalist system. It's an aggressive tactic, not just a holding tactic.

And of course the economic demands aren't the whole of the Transitional program, but they are the demands that I think are most easily accessible to the mass of workers. Bring them over to the economic demands of the Transitional program and it's easier to convince them of the other related demands.