Capitalism Archives - Page 3 of 5

Capitalism

The “K” in the Economy

Private equity and the rise of permanent capital

September 20, 2021 • by Andrew Moon and Janet Roitman

The consensus is that the road to economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic is K-shaped: certain sectors and populations will thrive while others stagnate or decline. Outsized online retailers and digital infrastructure providers, like Amazon, have experienced boom times, while many Main Street small businesses have gone bust. Those with a stake ...

Capitalism

Welcome to the Chip Wars

Intel wants another HQ2 contest, this time for chip manufacturers.

September 15, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____ The Amazon “HQ2” contest—in which hundreds of cities threw everything including the kitchen sink at Amazon in the hopes of landing a new facility—was a national embarrassment showing just how tight corporate America’s grip on economic development policy is (at least until New York said no way). In a recent interview with ...

Capitalism

The Commons versus Capitalism

Can commonality dodge the threat of capitalist exploitation and develop into an organizational principle for complex societies?

August 31, 2021 • by Thijs Lijster

_____ Although every proprietor knows his own, … all things, so long as they will last, are used in common amongst them. Thomas Morton regarding the Five Nations in North America Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, the concept of the ‘commons’ has steadily ascended in significance in activist circles, scientific literature ...

Capitalism

The Communism of Love

How the COVID pandemic has revealed anew the importance of Marx’s Gemeinwesen

May 5, 2021 • by Richard Gilman-Opalsky

_____ Marx was transfixed by the Gemeinwesen, a German word meant to grasp the essence of human community, the state of human relations. Marx did not think a world of exchange built around the relation of labor to capital made for the healthiest Gemeinwesen, and he wanted a different one. He ...

Capitalism

Up To Heaven and Down to Hell

Fracking, freedom, and community in an American town

April 20, 2021 • by Colin Jerolmack

_____ The following excerpt is from Up to Heaven and Down to Hell: Fracking, Freedom, and Community in an American Town: Fracking, Freedom, and Community in an American Town by Colin Jerolmack and was reprinted with permission of Princeton University Press. From page 229, Fig. 10.3b. Fracking in the Tiadaghton State Forest. Photograph ...

Capitalism

Data Cooperatives for Pandemic Times

To avoid ‘co-op whitewashing,’ experiments with data co-ops should be co-developed with communities connected to the long history and analysis of the various forms of cooperatives.

April 19, 2021 • by Trebor Scholz and Igor Calzada

To avoid 'co-op whitewashing,' data cooperatives must be shaped by those who need them most, rooted in cooperative principles and localized data....

Capitalism

The PMC Has Children

Virtue Hoarders: The Case against the Professional Managerial Class

April 8, 2021 • by Catherine Liu

_____ From the very moment of conception, which for professional managerial class (PMC) parents is always a “choice,” the future child and infant possesses “potential” that has to be both optimized and maximized. PMC mothers have to do prenatal yoga while setting up intrauterine Mozart streams on pregnant bellies. Preparing for ...

Capitalism

Bass Pro Shop’s Bait and Switch

How weak anti-trust laws enable a retail behemoth’s predatory behavior and fails communities

April 7, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____Back in 2004, Independence, Missouri issued more than $70 million in bonds in order to finance a new retail development anchored by a Bass Pro Shops, one of those mega-sized outdoors goods stores where you can buy everything from guns and tents to winter coats and hiking boots. But as ...

Capitalism

The World the Suez Canal Made

When the container ship Ever Given became wedged in this Egyptian passage, it highlighted global capitalism but hid its uneven origins and benefits

April 2, 2021 • by Aaron Jakes

_____On Monday afternoon, the Ever Given was floating again. After six days of excavation, dredging, and mounting international panic, the massive container ship finally came unstuck from where it was wedged in the banks of the Suez Canal. Last week, as the number of vessels waiting at either end of ...

Art & Design

Broom Swept

Failure tells a tale about capitalism too

March 2, 2021 • by Mark Hage

_____ What closes and then darkness, what opens and then bright?Before the horn has risen,where hides the lord of light? —Tian Wen, A Chinese Book of Origins How you frame something is a moral decision. —Babette Mangolte On Mercer Street, on the island of Manhattan, and just before the city paused, walking in a southerly direction ...

Activism

Black Swans No More!

When Things Fall Apart, a New Role for Community-Engaged Scholars

February 15, 2021 • by Trebor Scholz

As the pandemic has worn on, I have found myself devoting more and more of my time to conversations with researchers who have one foot in the world of alternative economies. I talked with dozens of Ph.D. students who self-identify as scholar-activists; they don’t want to stop at an analysis ...

Capitalism

Giving Back to the University

The scandal of “Employee-Giving” campaigns at American universities

December 17, 2020 • by Annie Bares

For many, this time of year brings a deluge of fundraising emails, letters, calls, text messages, and social media posts from non-profits asking for donations. Despite the disruptions that the pandemic has posed this year to colleges and universities, they have continued to fundraise. Many of them are using sophisticated, ...