no. 51 | january 2009

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$En Estados Unidos: la regresiÃ³n Del igualitarismo a la fractura social$

24 development dialogue january 2009 | postneoliberalism – a beginning debateFundamentally more probable is that at least at the moment this voyageinto barbarism will once again be stopped, just as it was stoppedin the decades before 1914 or before 1933. But precisely in order tostop this tendency, one must be conscious of its real possibility, forneither WWI in its true dimensions, to say nothing of Auschwitz,was thought possible by large sections of the elites. It was precisely forthis reason that they could happen. There was no linear causal connectionbetween the elements of barbarism that emerged in ‘normal’liberal capitalism and the system of barbarism of German NationalSocialism. This system was in no way inevitable. The capitalist classescould have managed the crisis differently in Germany, too, if largesections of the economic and political elites had not been convincedof the advantage of a temporary ‘alliance’ with Hitler’s National Socialistsas a way out of the crisis. Even more importantly: neither before1914 nor after 1933 was a real way out found; the imminent fallinto the abyss was prevented in a way that only made possible an evenworse future. Even if it did not immediately fall into catastrophe, elementsof barbarism nevertheless accumulated under the surface of anincreasingly endangered civilisation.More probable actually is the second scenario – that is, that barbarismwill be stopped. The dominant strategy is currently the continuationof neoliberalism by other means. So long as neoliberalismin the highly developed countries was able to live on the constellationdeveloped after World War II, had access to cheap raw materials,and experienced no threat to its monopoly of violence, the politics ofprivatisation, deregulation, appropriation, weakening or even disempoweringof all oppositional forces, as well as of social and culturalpolarisation, could be realised in a pure form. This era is now over.Structural problems have emerged and forces of resistance are forming.In order to guarantee the ‘achievements’ of this period for thecapitalist class, the global domination complex and the upper middleclasses, the ruling elites are looking for a new balance. Here are twoexamples from the European Union.The balance between the protection of the achievements of neoliberalismfor the rulers and the threats from the five named crises canconsist of a neoconservative strategy of ‘sympathetic conservatism’within the nation state and ‘enlightened’ imperialism abroad. Thisis the second option of postneoliberal politics. The centres of powerwill seek an alliance with the ‘little people’; these centres will continueto be open only selectively for ‘useful’ and cheap labour-power;the market chances for the insiders will be heightened through activestate support (above all in the educational sector) and repressive exclusionof ‘excess’ people of all types and a welfare state policy that forces
ways out of the crisis of neoliberalism 25The balance betweenprotecting achievements andavoiding threats can consistof a neoconservative strategyof ‘sympathetic conservatism’within the nation state and‘enlightened’ imperialismabroad.the individual to transform him- or herself into the ‘entrepreneur ofhis or her own labour power and affective labour’ (Meinhard Miegel).A ‘common foreign and security politics’ should fl ank this with amixture of partial integration and build-up of military interventionpower, division of spheres of influence and coordinated security ofWestern hegemony. Foreign politics will be subordinated to globalcompetition. The Lisbon strategy of the European Union aims in thisdirection. European leaders of this process are currently the Frenchpresident, Sarkozy, and Italy’s’ prime minister, Berlusconi.A third possibility is the revitalisation of new social democracy, whichaccepts finance market capitalism as the basis for negotiation and strivesafter the ‘social organisation’ of neoliberal globalisation. Tony Blair,Gerhard Schröder, Lionel Jospin and José Luis Rodríguez Zapaterohave outlined the limits of such a politics. Finance market capitalismobjectively sets much narrower limits for a politics of social equality,wageworkers’ participation in growth and social integration than thewelfare state capitalism of the period after WWII did. It therefore islargely associated with a libertarian politics for the upper middle classes.This was and is also the reason why the neoconservatives or even theparties of the Right were able to win majorities among wageworkers inan increasing number of states of the European Union.There is a fourth scenario for postneoliberalism – the transition to amode of development of societies based on solidarity. Its foundationwould be a solidarity economy and property order with four sectors,beyond the old dichotomy of private business versus state economy. Anew mode of life and development based on solidarity and participa-
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no. 51 | january 2009

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