Ending the Crisis of Capitalism or Ending Capitalism?

Samir Amin

With his usual verve and sharpness Samir Amin examines the factors that brought about the 2008 financial collapse and explores the systemic crisis of capitalism after two decades of neoliberal globalisation. He lays bare the relationship between dominating oligopolies and the globalisation of the world economy. The current crisis, he argues, is a profound crisis of the capitalist system itself, bringing forward an era in which wars, and perhaps revolutions, will once again shake the world.

Amin examines the threat to the plutocracies of the US, Europe and Japan from decisions of recent G20 meetings. He analyses the attempts by these powers to get back to the pre-2008 system, and to impose their domination on the peoples of the South through intensifying military intervention by using institutions such as NATO.

Amin presents original proposals for the way forward: an alternative strategy which, by building on the advances made by progressive forces in Latin America, would allow for a more humane society through both the North and the South working together.

Contents

1. Introduction
2. The financial collapse of liberal globalization
3. Two paths of historical development: The Europe/China contrast: origins and tracks
4. Historical capitalism: accumulation through dispossession
5. Revolutionary advance followed by catastrophic setbacks
6. Peasant agriculture and modern family agriculture
7. Capitalist agricultures or agricultures in capitalism
8. Necessary land reforms in Asia and Africa
9. Humanitarianism or internationalism of peoples
10. Being Marxist today
11. Being communist today
12. Being internationalist today

About the Author

Samir Amin is an economist currently based in Dakar, Senegal, where he is the director of Forum du Tiers Monde (Third World Forum). Amin is also the chair of the World Forum for Alternatives. He is one of the best-known thinkers of his generation, both in development theory as well as in the relativistic–cultural critique of the social sciences. He is widely published, with titles including Spectres of Capitalism: A Critique of Current Intellectual Fashions, Beyond US Hegemony: Assessing the Prospects for a Multipolar World, A Life Looking Forward: Memoirs of an Independent Marxist and Capitalism in the Age of Globalization: The Management of Contemporary Society.