Harry Targ
The Crises of Capitalism Today
“…the
most important contradiction of all [is] that between reality and appearance in
the world in which we live”(David Harvey, Seventeen Contradictions and
the End of Capitalism, Oxford University Press, 2014, 6).
In
David Harvey’s opening chapter “On Contradiction,” the author refers to Karl
Marx’s discussion of narratives about life that are distortions of reality. He
quotes Marx: “If everything were as it appeared on the surface there would be
no need for science.” He interprets Marx’s admonitions as requiring us to “get
behind the surface appearances if we are to act coherently in the world.”
(Harvey, 6).
David
Harvey’s book identifies seventeen contradictions, seven “foundational” ones,
seven “moving contradictions,” and three “dangerous” ones. The foundational
ones address the fundamental economic underpinnings of a capitalist system; the
moving ones represent those features of capitalism that change over time; and
the dangerous ones represent the deepest changes that might cause chaos, pain,
and suffering if not addressed by what he calls “anti-capitalist” movements.
Of
course, most “foundational” to a capitalist system is the dynamic in which
workers produce goods and services for a capitalist who sells them in the
market. Some of the value of the goods and services, above the costs of hiring
the worker, is appropriated by those who own or control capital. This is the
substance of what is called profit. At root the workers do the work and those
who own or control the productive process gain a disproportionate share of the
value of it. Over time the value of the work done is accumulated and capitalist
enterprises expand.
This
process was richly described by Adam Smith and Karl Marx. Today economists tell
us that profit comes from a variety of sources other than the amount of work
time applied to produce goods and services: the skills of the entrepreneur,
risk-taking, market forces, the supply of money in the economy, or
technological advances. The problem with this analysis is not that these
factors do not affect production, distribution, and profit but that the
value of the amount of work that goes into the production of the product
or service is not part of the narrative. In this view, workers, whether in
the private or public sector, constitute a force that stifles the making of
profit and the development of the society. Consequently today state governments
are actively working to destroy the rights of workers--the producers of goods
and services--to join together to secure a greater share of the value of what
they produce.
Harvey
elaborates on this fundamental feature of capitalism by describing the role of
money, the glorification of commodities (or those goods and services produced
by workers), the emphasis on the sale of products while deemphasizing the value
of the work that produced them, the ways in which states support the
accumulation of wealth, and how capitalism and the state expand the
privatization of land, labor, and basic societal services.
In
sum, Harvey argues that the definitions of the basic features of the economic
system that dominate the globe are left out of public and academic discourse.
Media and educational institutions reinforce a distorted view of how the basic
conditions of life are produced and reproduced.
Harvey’s
“moving contradictions” involve aspects of the evolution of capitalism:
technology; transformations in the nature and meaning of work; monopolization;
draconian shifts in the geographic distribution of economic development;
environmental changes; and shifts in wealth and income.
The
immediate and long-term “dangerous contradictions” involve the inexorable logic
of capitalism requiring an unachievable continuation of compound growth; the
privatization of nature; and the complete alienation of humans from themselves,
society, and the environment.
Therefore,
Harvey’s analysis is based on the assertion that the reality of economic
processes, institutions, sources of value, and prospects for economic justice
are not addressed. Publics are presented with “appearances” that are radically
different from the reality of capitalism and people’s lives.
Harvcy’a work mirrors many analysts who address the
deepening crises of capitalism and the spread of human misery everywhere. It is
increasingly clear to vast majorities of people, despite media mystification,
that the primary engine of destruction is global finance and high technology
capitalism and political institutions that have increasingly become its
instrumentality. We find parallel insights in the works of Naomi Klein, Yanis Vaeoufakis, Joseph Stiglitz, Robert Reich,
Noam Chomsky, and a broad array of economists, historians, trade unionists,
peace and justice activists and thousands of bloggers and Facebook
commentators.
Of course, these theorists could not have known the
ways in which the connections between the co-revolutionary theory and practice
would unfold. Most agreed that we are living through a global economic crisis
in which wealth and power is increasingly concentrated in fewer and fewer hands,
even engendering conflict among them.
Human misery, from joblessness, to hunger, to disease, to environmental
devastation, to state violence, to war and genocide, is spreading. And as the
rise of Trump and MAGA have pointed out, the links between class exploitation,
structural racism, and patriarchy are inseparable.
But history has shown that such misery can survive for
long periods of time with little active resistance. Even though activists in
labor, in communities of color, in anti-colonial/anti-neo-colonial settings are
always organizing, their campaigns usually create little traction. Not so since
the second Trump administration came into office and the protest against
Israeli genocide has become global.
In recent years right wing sectors of the ruling class
assumed that working people, youth, women, and various professional groups
would remain quiescent in the United States. They saw the opportunity to radically
transform American society by destroying public institutions and thereby
shifting qualitatively more wealth from the majority to the minority. But since
President Trump assumed office for his second term a broad array of people
began to publicly say “no, enough is enough.”
Where Do Progressives Go From Here?
David Harvey has written about a “co-revolutionary
theory” of change. In this theory Harvey argues that anti-capitalist movements
today must address “mental conceptions;” uses and abuses of nature; how to
build real communities; workers relations to bosses; exploitation, oppression,
and racism; and the relations between capital and the state. While a tall
order, the co-revolutionary theory suggests the breadth of struggles that need
to be embraced to bring about real revolution.
We can identify at least “six pillars of
power” in which organizing and resistance can and should occur. These are corporations,
banks, governmental institutions, media and cultural corporations, the military,
and education, particularly higher education.
Where do progressives go from here? I think
“co-revolutionary theory” would answer “everywhere”. Marxists are right to see
the lives of people as anchored in their ability to produce and reproduce
themselves, their families, and their communities. The right to a job at a
living wage remains central to all the ferment. But in the twenty-first century
this basic motivator for consciousness and action is more comprehensively and
intimately connected to rebuilding trade unions, opposition to racism and sexism,
and support for education, health care, sustainable environments, and peace.
All these motivations are part of the same struggle.
It is fascinating to observe that the reaction to the
efforts of the economic ruling class and political elite to turn back the clock
on reforms gained over the last 75 years have sparked resistance and
mobilization from across an array of movements and campaigns. And
activists are beginning to make the connections between the struggles.
It is too early to tell whether this round of ferment
will lead to victories for the people, even reformist ones. But as Harvey
suggests, “An anti-capitalist political movement can start anywhere…The trick
is to keep the political movement moving from one moment to another in mutually
reinforcing ways.”
