Opinion Sur
Global capitalism is in crisis and each region does its best to wiggle within it. The diagnosis and the proposals multiply. It is important to take stock of the different views and ask: What is Latin America’s destiny in this new world? I seek to answer this question by reviewing the latest publication on the subject.The recent publication of a volume (Latin America and Global Capitalism. A Critical Globalization Perspective, by William I. Robinson. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008. 412pp.) which tries to think about the predicament and the options for Latin America “outside the box” allows me to survey the field of interpretations of the world crisis and the region’s position within it.
This large volume is a welcome turn to the classic roots of political economy. “Globalization” here refers to the dynamics of late capitalism, an economic system that now covers the entire planet. “Critical” means that such system must be examined in terms of costs and benefits, potentiality and actuality.
The field of globalization studies is organized around a set of questions about late capitalism and its various articulations in different areas –in this case Latin America. The situation of the field was well stated by Eric Hobsbawm, for whom the paradigm capitalism/socialism is over (Hobsbawm, 2009). Moreover, the failure of socialism preceded the bankruptcy of capitalism. In fact, the socialist collapse may have precipitated the current capitalist crisis by launching an unopposed search for cheap labor, with the consequent migration of industry to hitherto out-of-bounds nations, and the overspecialization of former industrial countries in the service sector, including financial speculation and leveraged consumption. We are now witnessing the rebalancing of this unsustainable dynamic.
The situation presents a paradox for Marxists, for whom socialism will ultimately succeed capitalism. To this reviewer such outcome seems unlikely. Not so to William Robinson, who hopes that the present crisis of world capitalism will usher into a new wave of revolutionary movements. In his view, this new “march towards socialism” is happening in various parts of Latin America and will become a source of international inspiration.
In the analysis of capitalist globalization and its crisis, interpretations from the right quadrant are lacking. Market fundamentalists have remained silent since the crisis started. The few exceptions are to be found in some newsletters circulated by investor gurus.
By and large, the economic establishment has moved to the left. The narrative is as follows. The crisis began in the American real estate market. It rapidly spread over the global financial system largely due to complex debt instruments that mixed good and bad assets and diluted financial responsibility. The system as a whole became opaque. The calculus of risk broke down.
The theoretical bases for this analysis can be found in the work of post-Keynesians for whom monetary systems tend towards financial instability, and produce speculative bubbles. The ensuing disorder requires the intervention of the public sector and the reform of financial institutions. In this view financial crises are recurrent and severe but not terminal. Here the debate centers on the scope of public intervention. Regardless of disagreements as to procedures and velocities, most economists concur in recognizing a need for a massive state intervention to reactivate credit, production and demand.
Further to the left, critics seem to be more in disagreement among themselves than mainline analysts. Some of them come close to the Keynesian school of thought and point to the financialization of the economy as the main source of the crisis. Some go back to Marxist sources for the study of finance capital. Others follow the theses about “overproduction” and “under consumption”. The thesis of the “unmanageable surplus” was once popular in the United States in the radical 60s. Likewise today, the great recession before would be an expression of the “falling rate of profit”.
Finally, postmodern theorists break the productivist mold of conventional analyses and point to what in economic parlance we may call the “internalization of externalities” –ranging from overpopulation to climate change—as the underlying force beneath the crisis. For them, capitalist society solves some of its problems at the cost of generating even bigger ones.
The geopolitical interpretations follow closely the theoretical positions. Some see new capitalist powers emerging to challenge older hegemons, with the ensuing risk of war. Others see instead a less traumatic “passing of the baton” from the West to the East. Others yet envisage new ruling alliances, such as a reformed G-20, a rising G-2, or an evolving “Chimerica.” And there are those who sense the dawn of a world order in which a major shift will take place towards public action, prodded by a looming environmental catastrophe.
The calls for action are also varied. Some propose a radicalized set of Keynesian policies to tame capitalism. Others believe that socialism has found its second wind, and there are those who think modernity itself will be replaced by a different type of civilization.
Where does Latin America and Global Capitalism fit in this field of positions and proposals? In my view, somewhere between Marxism and post-modern anti-globalism as abridged above. In his interpretation of global capitalism, and in his treatment of Latin America the author tends to over-generalize. He gives short shrift to the varieties of capitalism –a subject with a rich scholarship. Likewise, he glosses over the striking diversity of national experiences, at a time when most experts refuse to define a single Latin American problematique, as was done earlier around concepts such as “development,” “revolution,” “dependency,” “modernization,” and “democratization.” In both instances –globalization and Latin America—Robinson seems to uphold the notion that a single paradigm of causal relationships exists.
Prefatory disclaimers notwithstanding, Robinson is a resolute determinist. The concepts of expanded reproduction, commoditization, phases of accumulation, and stages of development are culled from standard Marxism. Robinson’s contribution is to bring the analysis forward in time.
The grand narrative is familiar: capitalism is driven by underlying “laws of motion” which lead to periodic crises, at which points the ruling elites re-design the system for further bouts of growth. Robinson dwells on the last experiment in capitalist re-design, neo-liberalism, which he portrays in Spenglerian tones.
Here Marxist materialism lapses into idealism. Neo-liberalism becomes a Zeitgeist that wreaks havoc on the planet. With the exception of Cuba, all regimes in the region –military and civilian alike- were presumably streamlined to the requirements of transnational companies and elites.
The account is too much of a gloss. Robinson’s methodological problem has been described as a “historical Doppler effect”, which, similar to acoustics, creates a more homogeneous interpretation for distant eras and sharper, more complex interpretations in periods closer to the present. The Doppler effect leads to the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc –the illusion that what has happened necessarily had to happen, when in fact, upon closer examination, all action faces algorithmic forks. The most interesting research on Latin America separates political, social, and economic processes and maps their combinations in variable matrices without assuming a single line of causation.
Robinson modulates his determinism. In the past, he sees actors as agents of structure; in the present, a counterpoint of domination and resistance. In the future, he sees a number of conflicts and mobilizations –ranging from indigenous Andean movements to the struggles of unemployed blue-collar workers in greater Buenos Aires– coming together under a Single Social Movement that would supersede capitalism. Diversity is reduced to unity, and disparate historical trajectories are boiled down to an all-or-nothing option– as in the old slogan socialisme ou barbarie.
I beg to disagree. The past is less over determined and the future less dire. Latin America will continue to consume more history than it can produce. As during the Great Depression, the response in the region is pragmatic and sometimes innovative, but not world-shaking. Brazil, the largest country in the area and one with a sizeable new middle class, will surge ahead and become a player on the great international chessboard. Its challenge will be the reduction of inequality. Mexico, on the other hand, will reboot development on the coat tails of an American recovery. It will continue to be ‘too far from God and too close to the United States.’ Argentina, as always, will muddle through more thanks to the bounty of nature than to the wisdom of its leadership. Chile will continue on its path of steady growth and good governance, with closer links to the Asia-Pacific region than to its immediate neighborhood. The Andean countries will pursue the inclusion of the long-marginalized native majorities, but without any significant spillover on the rest of the continent. Only Venezuela will follow a path to “twenty-first century socialism.” The question here is: will the Bolivarian revolution succumb to the natural resource curse and a self-destructive dynamic?
This sample illustrates the diversity of experiences. Just as neo-liberalism has had different interpretations, so will the roads out of the world crisis differ from each other. Like the River Plate, continental solidarity is wide but also shallow.
Robinson proposes a different view. Not only is Venezuela’s revolution seen as sustainable but also as a superior model –thanks to a dialectic of permanent popular mobilization. Robinson acknowledges the many inconsistencies of the Bolivarian transformation but thinks they can be overcome. Yet why call this process “twenty-first century socialism” and not “plebiscitary leader democracy” (following Max Weber) which involves charisma, cumulative radicalization –and crash? To think that the experiment can be replicated in places like Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, or Chile is a fantasy. Much as Robinson castigates those who propose a distinction between a “well behaved” and a “bad” left in Latin America, he proposes a similar Manichean dichotomy between a reformist and a revolutionary left.
Yet Robinson manages to pour new wine in old bottles. The book contains admirable analyses of new globalization processes in Latin America. The middle chapters on industrial subcontracting, transnational services, tourism, the export of labor, and migration are excellent and will reward the reader who is eager for data on ongoing social processes.
Robinson’s grand finale, on the other hand, places unwarranted hopes on a single continent that will shine upon the world the light of a brighter future. When seen from the South, this attitude appears as one more unsolicited kindness from the North. To skeptics like myself, Latin America is a garden of forking paths. To Robinson, it is a projective Eden that redeems the disappointments of history.
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References
Hobsbawm, Eric. 2009. “Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. What Next?” http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/apr/10/financial-crisis-capitalism-socialism-alternatives
