What Threatens Capitalism Now?
765 views · Published 23 October 2014 · 1:23:58 · Indexed 25 October 2026
Channel: Trinity College Dublin · 2014 · Education
Global capitalism has not yet fully emerged from a period of serious fragility and stalled growth signaled by the financial crisis of 2008-9. Still it did not collapse in crisis nor did it face successful or evenwidespread movements in favor of a systemic alternative. It may be that capitalism is threatened less by collapse due to internal contradictions, or direct opposition than by external factors. Arguably the biggest risksbefore the world include not just systemic risk in the capitalist system but the potential for war, problems of the environment, the loss or casualization of employment, the rise of illicit capitalism, and the dissolution of social solidarity. These are not, however, entirely separate factors. They are caused, shaped, or exacerbated by capitalism’s externalities – the ways capitalist enterprises create costs that are borne not on the balance sheets offirms but by others. Creating strong social institutions to mitigate the damage of capitalism’s externalities is a critical challenge globally and nationally. Karl Polanyi described this as a ‘double movement’ in which economic growth destabilises social life and states try to mitigate damage and restore solidarity. Today, relevant state institutions themselves face serious challenges. Philanthropy may help. The informal sector provides partial but not scalable solutions. Entrepreneurship may bring market solutions to some problems. But the questions of how to achieve solidarity, mitigate conflict, and manage global challenges like climate change are as basic as the question of how to achieve capitalist growth. Speaker: Professor Craig Calhoun, Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science (with introductory remarks from Dr Andreas Hess, School of Sociology, UCD) http://www.tcd.ie/ http://www.tcd.ie/sociology/events/public-lecture-series/
