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Jenseits des Neoliberalismus: Ein Plädoyer für soziale Gerechtigkeit
Capitalism is the only complex system known to us that can provide an efficient and innovative economy, but the financial crisis has brought out the pernicious side of capitalism and shown that it remains dependent on the state to rescue it from its own deficiencies. Can capitalism be reshaped so that it is fit for society, or must we acquiesce to the neoliberal view that society will be at its best when markets are given free rein in all areas of life?The aim of this book is to show that the acceptance of capitalism and the market does not require us to accept the full neoliberal agenda of unrestrained markets, insecurity in our working lives, and neglect of the environment and of public services. In particular, it should not mean supporting the growing dominance of public life by corporate wealth. The world's most successful mature economies are those that fully embrace both the discipline of the market and the need for protection against its negative outcomes. Indeed, a continuing, unresolved clash between these two forces is itself a major source of vitality and innovation for economy and society. But maintenance of that tension depends on the enduring strength of trade unions and other critical groups in civil society - a strength that is threatened by neoliberalism's increasingly intolerant onward march.Outlining the principles for a renewed and more assertive social democracy, this timely and important book shows that real possibilities exist to create a better world than that which is being offered by the wealthy elites who dominate our public and private lives.
236 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
December 21, 2015
3.5 stars
In Making Capitalism Fit for Society, Colin Crouch presents the case for an “assertive social democracy” as an alternative or corrective to the neoliberalization of social democratic parties seen throughout the West. Social democratic parties in Europe are either stuck playing defense to protect their past gains or (in some cases) helping to dismantle them. Is there a different path forward, one with renewed vigor? Crouch hopes so.
He points out how “actually existing neoliberalism” is nothing like the textbook economics that its proponents preach—perfect competition is not a natural state of the economy, nor is complete information common. (Although public goods and externalities, positive or negative, are present in such textbook accounts, they are often undervalued and certainly given no moral import.) But what is missing most from this abstract technocratic vision is the workings of power. Rather than some perfect state of competition, “actually existing neoliberalism” often entails no-bid contracts of former government services handed over to politicians’ friends at low cost.
Markets are wonderful tools for coordinating consumer goods, but not everything is a consumer good (education, health care, etc.) Crouch offers the affirmative case for investment and regulation to promote general well-being, reduce inequality, and protect the environment, and he emphasizes how social democracy, rather than being stifling innovation or competitiveness, has often been one of the best systems of governance for them. By investing in people and offering a foundation of economic security, it sets the conditions for the flourishing of individuals as well as the market. As he says—and as many Fabians believed in late nineteenth/early twentieth century Britain, social democracy is the highest form of liberalism. It helps prevent liberalism from degrading into mere administration or from undermining its own professed goals.
There was little that felt particularly novel in this book. Post-Democracy is still my favorite of his books because it offers a sharp and useful analytical framework for understanding contemporary politics. Many of the ideas in Making Capitalism Fit for Society could be found in that work or The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism. As he has in the past, he articulates the need for social democratic/labor parties to re-imagine themselves as a party of the diverse movements working for progressive social change (not just trade unions but also environmentalists, feminists, etc.) Such collaboration and cross-fertilization is essential.
But the book often felt anticlimactic in part because Crouch never fully addresses how to “get from here to there.” Is there a way to reinvigorate not just labor parties but labor unions as well? Their importance as voting base and funding base cannot be understated.
And how does he expect to achieve the democratization of the EU that he alludes to? What we’ve seen in Greece this year in the case of Syriza (I would have liked to see Crouch give more attention to the growth of Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain—and analyze the implications) is that the EU uses monetary policy as a noose with which to strangle democracy, and it is a way to render social democratic parties—or those to their left—impotent. And monetary policy has been used in the same way in the US, such as when Paul Volcker engineered a recession because living standards were “too high” for his taste.
The same questions could be raised of institutions like the WTO, the IMF, and the World Bank, which often work to subvert democracy in the interest of financial elites. Are such institutions reformable? If so, how? And if not, how does one manage to get past their dominance?
I was also disappointed that Crouch didn’t really engage with issues of ownership. He never directly presents a definition of “capitalism” (that I can remember). Capitalism, of course, is not equivalent to markets; markets can exist with or without a capitalist system. Capitalism refers, instead, to the private ownership of the means of production. And if we recognize that having the means of production owned entirely by a centralized state can lead to corruption (in much the same way that capitalism does), and if we want to seek something beyond the garden-variety “mixed economy” concept, then ownership is the place to look. What role can worker cooperatives play in a renewal of a solidarity-oriented economy? Why is external stock ownership something to be defended (given that it leads to a rentier class and divorces decision-making power from those affected by the decisions)?
In Making Capitalism Fit for Society, Colin Crouch presents the case for an “assertive social democracy” as an alternative or corrective to the neoliberalization of social democratic parties seen throughout the West. Social democratic parties in Europe are either stuck playing defense to protect their past gains or (in some cases) helping to dismantle them. Is there a different path forward, one with renewed vigor? Crouch hopes so.
He points out how “actually existing neoliberalism” is nothing like the textbook economics that its proponents preach—perfect competition is not a natural state of the economy, nor is complete information common. (Although public goods and externalities, positive or negative, are present in such textbook accounts, they are often undervalued and certainly given no moral import.) But what is missing most from this abstract technocratic vision is the workings of power. Rather than some perfect state of competition, “actually existing neoliberalism” often entails no-bid contracts of former government services handed over to politicians’ friends at low cost.
Markets are wonderful tools for coordinating consumer goods, but not everything is a consumer good (education, health care, etc.) Crouch offers the affirmative case for investment and regulation to promote general well-being, reduce inequality, and protect the environment, and he emphasizes how social democracy, rather than being stifling innovation or competitiveness, has often been one of the best systems of governance for them. By investing in people and offering a foundation of economic security, it sets the conditions for the flourishing of individuals as well as the market. As he says—and as many Fabians believed in late nineteenth/early twentieth century Britain, social democracy is the highest form of liberalism. It helps prevent liberalism from degrading into mere administration or from undermining its own professed goals.
There was little that felt particularly novel in this book. Post-Democracy is still my favorite of his books because it offers a sharp and useful analytical framework for understanding contemporary politics. Many of the ideas in Making Capitalism Fit for Society could be found in that work or The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism. As he has in the past, he articulates the need for social democratic/labor parties to re-imagine themselves as a party of the diverse movements working for progressive social change (not just trade unions but also environmentalists, feminists, etc.) Such collaboration and cross-fertilization is essential.
But the book often felt anticlimactic in part because Crouch never fully addresses how to “get from here to there.” Is there a way to reinvigorate not just labor parties but labor unions as well? Their importance as voting base and funding base cannot be understated.
And how does he expect to achieve the democratization of the EU that he alludes to? What we’ve seen in Greece this year in the case of Syriza (I would have liked to see Crouch give more attention to the growth of Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain—and analyze the implications) is that the EU uses monetary policy as a noose with which to strangle democracy, and it is a way to render social democratic parties—or those to their left—impotent. And monetary policy has been used in the same way in the US, such as when Paul Volcker engineered a recession because living standards were “too high” for his taste.
The same questions could be raised of institutions like the WTO, the IMF, and the World Bank, which often work to subvert democracy in the interest of financial elites. Are such institutions reformable? If so, how? And if not, how does one manage to get past their dominance?
I was also disappointed that Crouch didn’t really engage with issues of ownership. He never directly presents a definition of “capitalism” (that I can remember). Capitalism, of course, is not equivalent to markets; markets can exist with or without a capitalist system. Capitalism refers, instead, to the private ownership of the means of production. And if we recognize that having the means of production owned entirely by a centralized state can lead to corruption (in much the same way that capitalism does), and if we want to seek something beyond the garden-variety “mixed economy” concept, then ownership is the place to look. What role can worker cooperatives play in a renewal of a solidarity-oriented economy? Why is external stock ownership something to be defended (given that it leads to a rentier class and divorces decision-making power from those affected by the decisions)?
April 15, 2015
I enjoyed reading this book and learned a lot from it. Although it explored real possibilities for creating a different kind of future, I finished the book feeling heavy hearted at the overwhelming enormity of the task of making a humane society in the midst of such powerful capitalist forces.
August 19, 2019
The consumerist in us sees autonomy of choice, distraction by social media, identity politics as paramount to a new normal. But fundamentals of support systems for the employees, for the right to clean and equitable living is missing or held subservient to neoliberalism. Which sees its various interpretations as essentially market forces as ideological in its implements for choices, prices and its supply. What wasn't mentioned was the kill or be killed conditions this imposes on the less informed, less lucky or accessed by the caprociousness of the market. Nations, infrastructures who are increasingly being coerced, threatened to this way of doing business has spread itself inexorably without much consideration for those voiceless or held in contempt to elites who are able to looby for short term benefits. Disregarding the unbalances wrought to its environment, employees and those not directly implicated in its market system.
May 7, 2014
Alperovitz, Gar. What Then Must We Do? Straight Talk about the Next American
Revolution, Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Vt. 2013 (205pp. $27.95)
Crouch, Colin. Making Capitalism Fit for Society, Polity Press, Malden, Massachusetts,
2013 (192 pp ??price)
Something terrible is happening to our country and its people. The share of income
taken by the top 1 percent of Americans has risen from 10 percent to roughly 20 percent in three decades while the bottom 99 percent has seen their income drop by 10 percent. Top tax rates for the wealthy have dropped precipitously while the tax burden on the middle and working classes has risen sharply. People remain mired in poverty, corporate taxes have declined as a share of GDP and Americans are fundamentally unhealthy. We live in a Gun Culture. Prison populations have skyrocketed and the amount of money involved in buying and selling political candidates in presidential elections reached $2 billion in 2012. The Supreme Court is poised to allow the rich to spend what they want in elections anywhere and everywhere.
Two recent books discuss these vital problems, posing solutions designed to save democracy from its steady erosion by money, to balance and harmonize our human needs against free enterprise and its domination by corporations at all levels, and to reorganize American values, all as a way beyond constant fiscal crisis, inequality, poverty and violence.
What Then Must We Do? analyzes the despair felt by progressives who see the dominant corporate culture and political gridlock as unfixable. Professor Alperovitz, a noted political economist at the University of Maryland, provides a long-term historical context for the evolution of activism and change, while proposing (with illustrations) solutions that can slowly alter our system in strategic increments. Alperovitz discusses a checkerboard strategy involving local mixed-solutions using municipal powers, local self-government, worker ownership of business, land-trusts, election reform (beginning locally), the destruction of cable and internet monopolies and many other tactics. Beyond that, Alperovitz proposes new banking approaches to break the stranglehold of Wall Street on our communities as well as a way forward to a new environmental consciousness.
Making Capitalism Fit for Society provides a European perspective on the topic of corporate domination of human life. Professor Crouch of Warwick in England, surveys the way unrestrained markets have expanded the neo-liberal agenda, especially in light of the recent destruction of the labor movement and the collapse of any countervailing power to wealth. He suggests that a countervailing power might arise from the uniting of a green movement with re-energized third parties (or altered platforms of established parties), though his suggestions are more apposite to the parliamentary forms of government that characterize Europe.
In any case, the situation is dire for democracy and for American citizens trapped in a downward spiral towards the dead-end of corporate slavery. There is a long slog ahead and we’d best start now.
Revolution, Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Vt. 2013 (205pp. $27.95)
Crouch, Colin. Making Capitalism Fit for Society, Polity Press, Malden, Massachusetts,
2013 (192 pp ??price)
Something terrible is happening to our country and its people. The share of income
taken by the top 1 percent of Americans has risen from 10 percent to roughly 20 percent in three decades while the bottom 99 percent has seen their income drop by 10 percent. Top tax rates for the wealthy have dropped precipitously while the tax burden on the middle and working classes has risen sharply. People remain mired in poverty, corporate taxes have declined as a share of GDP and Americans are fundamentally unhealthy. We live in a Gun Culture. Prison populations have skyrocketed and the amount of money involved in buying and selling political candidates in presidential elections reached $2 billion in 2012. The Supreme Court is poised to allow the rich to spend what they want in elections anywhere and everywhere.
Two recent books discuss these vital problems, posing solutions designed to save democracy from its steady erosion by money, to balance and harmonize our human needs against free enterprise and its domination by corporations at all levels, and to reorganize American values, all as a way beyond constant fiscal crisis, inequality, poverty and violence.
What Then Must We Do? analyzes the despair felt by progressives who see the dominant corporate culture and political gridlock as unfixable. Professor Alperovitz, a noted political economist at the University of Maryland, provides a long-term historical context for the evolution of activism and change, while proposing (with illustrations) solutions that can slowly alter our system in strategic increments. Alperovitz discusses a checkerboard strategy involving local mixed-solutions using municipal powers, local self-government, worker ownership of business, land-trusts, election reform (beginning locally), the destruction of cable and internet monopolies and many other tactics. Beyond that, Alperovitz proposes new banking approaches to break the stranglehold of Wall Street on our communities as well as a way forward to a new environmental consciousness.
Making Capitalism Fit for Society provides a European perspective on the topic of corporate domination of human life. Professor Crouch of Warwick in England, surveys the way unrestrained markets have expanded the neo-liberal agenda, especially in light of the recent destruction of the labor movement and the collapse of any countervailing power to wealth. He suggests that a countervailing power might arise from the uniting of a green movement with re-energized third parties (or altered platforms of established parties), though his suggestions are more apposite to the parliamentary forms of government that characterize Europe.
In any case, the situation is dire for democracy and for American citizens trapped in a downward spiral towards the dead-end of corporate slavery. There is a long slog ahead and we’d best start now.
February 13, 2016
one of the most upbeat social democratic book i read in a long time it summarises concisely what is wrong with neoliberalism while pointing to a positive model of a social investment welfare state model that embraces markets but also controls them where they need to be. it also lays out well the pure neoliberalism is closer to social democracy as one may think - but nowadays it is corporate neoliberalism which rules the world, spearheaded by corporations and elites that benefit from monopolies, oligopolies, and state hand-outs (think 'too big too fail'). four stars only however because it could be more accessible in parts...
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews