Late capitalism
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Late capitalism is a term sometimes used to refer to capitalism of the second half of the 20th century, generally with the implication that it is historically limited and will eventually end.
The term came into use in Europe towards the end of the 1930s when many economists believed capitalism was doomed (see, for example, Natalia Moszkowska's Zur Dynamik des Spätkapitalismus. Zurich: Verlag Der Aufbruch, 1943) and it was used in the 1960s particularly in Germany and Austria, among others by Marxists writing in the tradition of the Frankfurt School and Austro-Marxism.
According to the Marxist economist Ernest Mandel, who popularised the term with his 1972 Phd dissertation, late-stage capitalism will be dominated by the machinations - or perhaps better, fluidities - of finance capital.
Among the characteristics of late capitalism (or the 'third age' of capitalism) are said to be:
- the hypertrophy of the state, and systematic attempts by the state to moderate economic fluctuations;
- monopolistic and oligopolistic competition for surplus-profits in world markets;
- the co-optation and integration of trade union and oppositional political movements into the state apparatuses;
- the globalisation of financial capital, commercial capital and production capital;
- a third technological revolution (electronics, synthetics, computerisation, biotechnology) and accelerated technological innovation;
- accelerated turnover of capital and the pressure to engage in comprehensive economic planning of investments;
- a permanent arms economy in which the military industry becomes a significant factor in economic growth;
- neo-colonialism involving unequal exchange and humanitarian imperialism where armed intervention in foreign countries is morally justified by reference to humane concerns;
- the corrosion and breakdown of all traditional social institutions by market forces, leading globally to a succession of continual wars, armed conflicts and unarmed social conflicts;
- (according to Leo Kofler) a belief in the power of technology to solve all problems, or, alternatively, a cultural pessimism. Some writers like Andre Glucksmann extrapolate this as a nihilist stance; others like Elmar Alvater and Tariq Ali have interpreted it as a retreat to fundamentalism; and yet others like Frank Furedi see it as a cult of human vulnerabilities diminishing human potential;
- an ever-increasing gap between the rich and the poor, within and between countries, as strong market actors defeat the weaker ones;
- an ideology of post-modernism which postulates liberal democracy as the end of history, i.e. the summit of what human life can reach.
Late capitalism is an important component of Fredric Jameson's influential analysis of postmodernism. A section of Jameson's analysis (http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/us/jameson.htm) has been reproduced on the Marxists Internet Archive.
The theme of the end of history, recalling an idea from Hegel, is discussed by Francis Fukuyama.
A related term is late bourgeois society as contrasted with early bourgeois society and classical bourgeois society.
See also periodizations of capitalism and state monopoly capitalism.