The Triumph of Financial Capital

Paul M. Sweezy

Monthly Review | June 01, 1994

Image credit: “U.S. stocks dive anew on fear of coronavirus,” China Daily, March 6, 2020.

This article was originally a lecture presented at a conference organized by the Association of Graduates of the Faculty of Economics of the University of Istanbul, Turkey, on April 21, 1994.

The announced subject of this conference is “New Trends in Turkey and the World.” I shall not try to say anything about new trends in Turkey, partly because of my ignorance but more importantly because Turkey is very much part of the world, and in this period the mother of all new trends is global in nature. To understand what is happening in any part of the world, one must start from what is happening in the whole world. Never has Hegel’s dictum “The Truth is in the Whole” been as true and relevant as it is today.

In an oft-quoted passage written in 1936, John Maynard Keynes said:

Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a byproduct of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done.

Keynes was presumably alluding to the situation that existed in the late 1920s in the United States, the world’s most advanced capitalist country. Today it has the ominous sound of a prophecy that was to be fully realized more than half a century later, in the 1980s and 1990s—not only in the United States but in the whole world.

Russia-China Should Stand Firm In Rejecting Western Interference: Putin And Xi Agree

Countercurents | December 17, 2021

Presidents Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping agreed in a video call on Wednesday: Russia and China should stand firm in rejecting Western interference and defending each other’s security interests.

The two presidents’ conversation, eight days after Putin spoke to U.S. President Joe Biden in a similar format, underscored how U.S.-Europe hostility to Russia and China is bringing the two powerful countries closer together.

Under The Guise of ‘Democracy’ And ‘Human Rights’

“At present, certain international forces under the guise of ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’ are interfering in the internal affairs of China and Russia, and brutally trampling on international law and recognized norms of international relations,” China’s state-run Xinhua news agency quoted Xi as saying.

“China and Russia should increase their joint efforts to more effectively safeguard the security interests of both parties.”

U.S. And Ukraine, Only Two Countries Vote Against UN Resolution Condemning Nazism

Countercurents | December 17, 2021

The UN General Assembly has adopted a resolution condemning Nazism, neo-Nazism and all forms of racism, and the U.S. and Ukraine voted against it, while a few countries, mainly US allies, abstained. The resolution was co-sponsored by Russia.

On December 16, the UN General Assembly passed its annual resolution on “Combating Glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance” with 130 countries voting in favor and only two in opposition.

Out of a total 193 members countries, 51 countries including all members of the EU, Australia, New Zealand and Canada were among those who abstained from voting on the UN resolution asking members to eliminate all forms of racism and attempts to glorify Nazism. The resolution was passed with overwhelming support from the Third World countries.

USA: “Four Meals from Anarchy”: Rising Food Prices Could Spark Famine, War, and Revolution in 2022

Alan Macleod

MintPress News | December 17, 2021

WASHINGTON – Already dealing with the economic fallout from a protracted pandemic, the rapidly rising prices of food and other key commodities have many fearing that unprecedented political and social instability could be just around the corner next year.

With the clock ticking on student loan and rent debts, the price of a standard cart of food has jumped 6.4% in the past 12 months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, with the cost of eating out in a restaurant similarly spiking, by 5.8% since November 2020.

The most notable change has been in the price of meat, with beef costing 26.2% more than it did last year, pork 19.2% more and chicken 14.8% more. Bacon prices have reached historic levels, and are now 36% higher than in 1980, even after adjusting for inflation. And with new animal welfare laws coming into effect soon regarding the minimum space required for pigs, some have predicted widespread shortages of bacon and a further price increase of up to 60%.

USA: No more workers’ blood for the profits of the bosses!

In Defense of Communism | December 17, 2021

More than 90 people were killed in several states across the U.S. after tornadoes and heavy rains hit the region. Among them are six employees at AMAZON warehouse in St. Louis, Illinois, were roof collapsed and eight workers at a candle factory in Kentucky. 

In a statement, the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) and its militant trade unions across the world pledge “to continue the struggle for all necessary measures to protect workers from natural disasters and extreme weather events, measures that the US do not take because they consider them as a “cost”.