System in Crisis: The Dynamics of Free Market Capitalism

By Henry Veltmeyer and James F. Petras

Book Overview

In the late 1960s the operating world capitalist system hit a snag, exposing cracks that went to its very foundations. At first, this crisis was viewed as part of a normal business cycle of capital accumulation in which markets become saturated. The reaction created a mass of unemployed workers, reduced purchasing power and consumption capacity which initiated a further downward cycle of disinvestment and recession. The efforts to revitalize the capitalist system included the restructuring of world production, new information-based technologies designed to revolutionize the structure of production, a new mode of capital accumulation and regulatory regime, and a program of policy reforms and structural adjustments.

By discussing the very cracks that neo-liberalism tries to disguise, James Petras and Henry Veltmeyer explain how these reactions attempt to prop up a system that continues to fail the global community. System in Crisis also examines the nature of the class divisions and the political repercussions of the anti-globalization movement. This analysis provides readers with a more general perspective on the broader anti-globalization movement and the possibilities for unifying the diverse forces of resistance and opposition to neo-liberalism, capitalism and imperialism-and the prospects for an alternative, more human, socialist form of development.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1552661156
• ISBN13: 9781552661154
• Release Date: January 2003
• Publisher: Fernwood Publishing
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.9" x 8.9"