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Capitalism conventionally is represented from the Right and Left by a discourse that is devoid of issues of emotion and ethics and their materialization in caring, emotional practices. I take as axiomatic that avoidance of empirics, as in mainstream normative economics, is problematic, and I develop a sympathetic critique of, and alternative to, the dominant Leftist perspective that does recognize actions of the heart, but situates them outside capitalism. The critique is sympathetic because the ethical sensibilities are the same. However, ontologically I argue that rationality and emotion are interrelated, not separate. Further, I refuse the location of emotional practices outside capitalism. These ontological differences derive from different epistemological approaches. I advocate a relational approach that accounts for how practices can diverge from expected behavior given by discourse, as well as a mode of accounting that gives voice to those who lack capital yet figure in capitalist life. Identifying the relation between actions of the heart and the mean discourse of capitalism helps explain social relations and offers a framework towards the construction of political projects to enact transformational change.

For a long time, scholars (including those of the political left) have closely scrutinized the nature of the transformation of Capitalism. In this process, many have developed or invented a rich de...

The influential marketing analyst Peter Drucker's idea of post-capitalism has attracted considerable attention in recent years in the People's Republic of China. One of its proponents is Professor Li Huibin of the Contemporary Marxism Institute of the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau of the Communist Party of China, who has written extensively on questions of economics and philosophy. The dialogue was initiated at the invitation of Professor Li when Professor Arif Dirlik of the Chinese University of Hong Kong was a visiting scholar with the Contemporary Marxism Institute during the summer of 2006. The dialogue takes up questions of the relationship between Drucker's theory and Marxist theories of capitalism, the intellectual usefulness of “post-capitalism” in understanding contemporary developments in capitalism, and its possible relevance to the developmental strategy of “socialism with Chinese characteristics.”

Theorists of post capitalism have recently argued for a more or less inevitable end to capitalism. They assume that private accumulation is systematically blocked by the inability of capitalist corporations to create revenues by setting prices as they lose control over the reproduction of their commodities and that in this process, capitalist labour will eventually disappear. Drawing on a case study of Amazon and thoughts on the policies of other leading digital corporations, we challenge these assumptions. Key corporate players of digitization are trying to become powerful monopolies and have partly succeeded in doing so, using the network effects and scaling opportunities of digital goods and building socio-technical ecosystems. These strategies have led to the development of in part isomorphic structures, hence creating a situation of oligopolistic market competition. We draw on basic assumptions of monopoly capital theory to argue that in this situation labour process rationalization becomes key to the corporation’s competitive strategies. We see the expansion of digital control and the organizational structures applied by key corporate players of the digital economy as evidence for the expansion of capitalist labour, not its reduction.

This essay proposes that those seeking to build counter-power institutions and communities learn to think in terms of what I call “recursivity.” Recursivity is an anti-authoritarian metric that helps bring about a sensitivity to feedback loops at multiple levels of organization. I begin by describing how technological systems and the socio-economic order co-constitute one-another around efficiency metrics. I then go on to define recursivity as social conditions that contain within them all of the parts and practices for their maturation and expansion, and show how organizations that demonstrate recursivity, like the historical English commons, have been marginalized or destroyed all together. Finally, I show how the ownership of property is inherently antithetical to the closed loops of recursivity. All of this is bookended by a study of urban planning’s recursive beginnings. Esse ensaio propõe que aqueles que buscam construir instituições e comunidades contra-poder aprendam a pensar em termos do que eu chamo de “recursividade” (“recursivity”). Recursividade é uma métrica anti-autoritária que ajuda a trazer uma sensibilidade aos laços de retro-alimentação (feedback loops) em níveis múltiplos de organização. Eu começo por descrever como sistemas tecnológicos e a ordem sócio-econômica co-constituem uma a outra em torno de métricas de eficiência. Passo então a definir recursividade como as condições sociais que contém em seu interior todas as partes e práticas para a sua maturação e expansão, e mostro como as organizações que apresentam recursividade, como o histórico English commons, tem sido marginalizadas e destruídas. Finalmente, demonstro como a posse da propriedade é inerentemente anti-ética aos laços fechados da recursividade. Todo o artigo está baseado por um estudo de recursos iniciais para planejamento urbano.

En este artículo se presentan los fundamentos teórico-normativos del Buen Vivir, entendido este como una propuesta de transformación para los sistemas socioeconómicos latinoamericanos que pretende superar los problemas del maldesarrollo (alienación, inequidad e insostenibilidad). Para ello, se plantean como objetivos la identidad, la equidad y la sostenibilidad, que se alcanzarían por medio de una estrategia política de conformación de una sociedad plurinacional, postcapitalista y biocéntrica., In this article we show the theoretical-regulatory basis of Good Living, understood as a transformation proposal of Latin American socioeconomic systems that aims to overcome the problems of bad development (alienation, inequality and unsustainability). So to achieve the objectives of identity, equity and sustainability, we propose a political strategy of the creation of a plurinational, post-capitalist and biocentric society.

The last decade has witnessed a remarkable growth of non-state, not-for-profit monetary systems known as community currencies. The Red del Trueque, or'Barter Network', in Argentina is the first of such systems to grow to a size which encroaches on the state monopoly over the money supply. This article begins with a basic primer on the functioning of the network and offers an explanation for its unprecedented growth in the Argentinean context. The central question addressed is whether the network can be described as petty capitalism, perfecting capitalism or post-capitalism. A socialized theory of economic relations is developed which argues for the existence of a reciprocal relationship between the behavioural norms governing monetary networks and the practices of those networks. Analysis suggests that the RT contains tendencies both supportive of and alternative to capitalist modes of organization, consistent with the history of Utopian experiments. To succeed in its goal of creating an'economy of solida...

In a recent essay Michael Hardt gives voice to a widespread discontent with the left-academic project of critique, stemming from its failure to deliver on its emancipatory promises. Scholarship, in geography and many other social science disciplines is dominated by a pre-occupation with charting the intricate connections between neoliberal governance and an expansive capitalism. As Hardt and many others have observed, the process of critical exposure fails to incite a political response from broader publics. As an alternative to the failed politics of critique, Hardt — inspired by Foucault's engagement with the cynics—argues for a practice of militant biopolitics—an autonomous mode of reflecting, thinking and acting together that eschews expert knowledge. In this paper I argue that the pioneering work of Gibson-Graham and scholars inspired by their work can be seen as a form of militant biopolitics. Collaborative and participatory forms of research and working with others, become the basis for engaging with and transforming economies and human interactions with ecologies. Beyond generating critical awareness, this scholarship aims at producing a post-capitalist politics. Keywords: Gibson-Graham, diverse economies, biopolitics, critique, post-capitalism

By exploring the cliché that socialist cities are ‘grey’, this paper seeks to employ the anthropology of colour for unravelling the peculiarities of the East European urban experience. By analyzing the oeuvre of Władysław Reymont, I show that greyness in Eastern Europe has a distinct lineage. It is not, like in the West, a colour poised between black and white, but the very opposite of red. I show how greyness emerged as the central trope for narrating Polish agrarian capitalism, and how after 1945 it was moved onto the urban turf. Greyness became salient because it captured the very essence of the contradictions of nascent urban Poland: a blend of freedom and oppression, equality and hierarchy, solemnity and joy. I describe these conflicting meanings of greyness and show how colour suddenly became the fulcrum of the struggle to generate an urban experience beyond capitalism and socialism that would be East European and cosmopolitan at the same time.

Locating itself amidst current debates on post-modern analyses of mysticism, particularly academic debates on the Bauls of Bengal, this article discusses issues of cultural transformation as a result of gentrification and globalisation. It combines the author’s ethnographic research and a methodology mainly derived from Italian Marxist critique (Antonio Gramsci, Ernesto de Martino, Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno). The article examines the reification of mysticism and the process of ‘rehab’, as imposed by Bengali bourgeoisie via the Tagorian archetype and the Western show business on the Bauls, to cleanse their image from inconvenient traits. Suggesting an interpretation of radical materialist mystics as ‘multitude’ and viewing professional Bauls as ‘people’, this research explores how the construction of a myth has ultimately penetrated contemporary society at all levels, including academic circles.

El fenómeno de la internacionalización evoluciona, al terminar la Guerra Fría, hacia una globalización en la sociedad poscapitalista, en la cual el conocimiento es el recurso fundamental para generar riqueza. Al entender la globalización como un proceso de interconexión financiera, económica, social, política y cultural se abre la oportunidad para el progreso de los pueblos que desarrollen su economía al abrirse hacia el exterior. Ya no es momento para teorizar sobre la conveniencia o no de la globalización, ésta es una realidad irreversible que en Colombia debemos aprovechar. After the Cold War, the process of internationalization evolves towards globalization in the post-capitalistic society, where knowledge is considered the most critical resource to create wealth. Understanding globalization as an interconnected process among financial, economic, social, political, and cultural elements provides the opportunity to any country to develop itself by eliminating its geographic boundaries. It is no longer the time to theorize over the pertinence of globalization, since it has become a reality that we should take advantage in Colombia.

El fenómeno de la internacionalización evoluciona, al terminar la Guerra Fría, hacia una globalización en la sociedad poscapitalista, en la cual el conocimiento es el recurso fundamental para generar riqueza. Al entender la globalización como un proceso de interconexión financiera, económica, social, política y cultural se abre la oportunidad para el progreso de los pueblos que desarrollen su economía al abrirse hacia el exterior. Ya no es momento para teorizar sobre la conveniencia o no de la globalización, ésta es una realidad irreversible que en Colombia debemos aprovechar. After the Cold War, the process of internationalization evolves towards globalization in the post-capitalistic society, where knowledge is considered the most critical resource to create wealth. Understanding globalization as an interconnected process among financial, economic, social, political, and cultural elements provides the opportunity to any country to develop itself by eliminating its geographic boundaries. It is no longer the time to theorize over the pertinence of globalization, since it has become a reality that we should take advantage in Colombia.