Timothy DiMuzio

Capitalizing a future unsustainable: Finance, energy and the fate of market civilization

ABSTRACT Liberal capitalist polities are being held up as the ultimate civilizational achievement precisely at a point in time when the energy-demanding built environments and growth imperatives of these societies are threatened by global climate change and the coming end of cheap and abundant carbon energy. Throughout the twentieth century, this pattern of energy-intensive social reproduction was largely shaped by the oil and gas sector creating what I call a petro-market civilization. However, given the challenges presented by peak oil and global warming, transitioning to a low-carbon or green energy future has gathered increasing attention and investment. In this paper, I use a power theory of value approach to offer a preliminary assessment of whether this transition is likely given the entrenched power of the oil and gas sector in the economy. Although the twenty-first century may bear witness to a renewable and sustainable energy paradigm, current evidence suggests that investors are continuing to capitalize an unsustainable future premised upon non-renewable fossil fuels.

Book review: The End of Laissez-Faire? On the Durability of Embedded Neoliberalism

On the heels of the global financial crisis, many on the left of the political spectrum anticipated the end of neoliberalism. The financial and economic crisis—global in scope—had supposedly discredited over two decades of neoliberal rule. The massive state interventions required to curtail the worst vagaries of the crisis demonstrated to everyone paying even the remotest attention that deregulated markets are unstable, that bankers cannot be trusted with increasing the money supply and that government intervention could help steer the economy in a more positive direction should politicians be willing. Moreover, the aftermath of the crisis spawned the worldwide Occupy movement, with The Guardian recording at least 750 Occupy events across the world. These protests drew ever greater attention to the fact that neoliberal policies have been an abject failure for the non-owning classes of the world. However, at the same time, the policies in question have been highly profitable for dominant owners around the world—what Occupy called the 1%. This may be one of the major reasons why neoliberal policies continue to be pursued despite their consequences for popular social forces.