21st-Century Capitalism, Austerity, and Black Economic Dispossession

Abstract

The article is an analysis of late capitalism and the nature of Black inequality today given the political economy of late capitalism. As always, the fundamental fact of 21st-century capitalism is profit. Yet the system is in crisis, centered in a crisis of accumulation. Given this, what are the consequences for the Black population in the United States and globally? A number of key questions inform the discussion, centered on the nature of capitalism today. Issues of austerity, neoliberalism, race, gender, and class are interrogated. Then there is the issue of how might the situation be changed. Using the September 2012 Chicago Teachers Union strike as an entry point, an initial set of reflections on how might we resist and struggle are articulated, centering some key lessons from the fight for educational justice in Chicago.

Keywords:

• austerity
• Black economic dispossession
• Brown v. Board
• Chicago Teacher's Union strike
• educational inequality
• finance capital
• Fiscal Cliff
• late capitalism
• neoliberalism
• praxis
• radical political economy

Notes

Analysts such as William Tabb, “After Liberalism,” Monthly Review Press (June 2003), argue that the economic gains of the past few decades have gone to the rich. The current political economy has not reduced poverty. See also William K. Tabb, “After Neoliberalism?” Monthly Review (June 2003): 25–33; Shamus Cooke, “Capitalism's Two Step Survival Plan: Austerity and Structural Reform,” Truth-Out, October 10, 2012, http://truth-out.org/speakout/item/12041-capitalisms-two-step-survival-plan-austerity-and-structural-reform; and Fred Goldstein's “Capitalism and the Roots of Inequality,” reprint from Fred Goldstein, Capitalism at a Dead End addendum, parts I and 2 (New York: World View Forum Publishers, 2012).

Goldstein, “Capitalism and the Roots of Inequality.”

Ashley Smith, “Obama's New Imperialist Strategy,” International Socialist Review 83 (2012): 47. See also William Robinson, “Global Capitalism and 21st Century Fascism,” The New Significance, May 8, 2011, http://www.thenewsignificance.com/2011/05/09/william-i-robinson-global-capitalism-and-21st-century-fascism (accessed November 27, 2012).

Robinson, “Global Capitalism and 21st Century Fascism.”

Lee Sustar, “What are the Roots of the Capitalist Crisis?” International Socialist Review 77 (May–June 2011): 56.

Quoted in ibid., 56.

United for a Fair Economy, “State of the Dream 2011: Austerity for Whom?” http://www.faireconomy.org/files/State_of_the_Dream_2011.pdf (accessed September 24, 2011).

Chris Harman, Zombie Capitalism (Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2009).

UC Berkeley Labor Center, “Black Unemployment Rate was 14.0% in December 2012, an Increase from November 2012,” http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/blackworkers/monthly/bwreport_2013-01-04_56.pdf (accessed January 4, 2013).

Greg Kaufmann, “Welcome to ‘Poverty Day’: The One Time of Year When America Cares About the Poor,” http://www.thenation.com/blog/169900/welcome-poverty-day-one-time-year-when-america-cares-about-poor (accessed November 16, 2012).

Maria Mies, Patriarchy and Accumulation on a World Scale (New York: Macmillan Palgrave, 1998).

Rose M. Brewer, “A Critical Sociology of African Americans, the U.S. Welfare State, and Neoliberalism in the Era of Corporate Globalization,” in Race and Ethnicity-Across Time, Space and Discipline, ed. Rodney Coates (New York: Brill Publishers, 2004), 117.

David Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).

Ibid.

Project South, The Globalization Toolkit (Atlanta: Project South, 2010).

William Robinson, “The Money Mandarins of Global Capitalism,” States, Power and Societies 16, no. 2 (Winter 2011): 4.

World Bank, Press Release No. 2012/297/December, February 29, 2012, http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,contentMDK:23130032~pagePK:64257043~piPK:437376~theSitePK:4607,00.html (accessed November 3, 2012); see also Harry F. Dalms, Transformations of Capitalism, Economy, Society, and the State in Modern Times (New York: New York University Press, 2000).

Kim Moody, Workers in a Lean World: Unions in the International Economy (London: Verso, 1997).

Austerity is a state practice/set of conservative principles that focus on shrinking so-called debt, pensions, and public goods. The political target is public spending for social welfare. Thus austerity is concretely expressed as severe cuts in public spending. It entails the dismantling (or the attempt to) of laws and governmental policies that support the public sphere, labor, and strong welfare states.

Shamus Cooke, “Capitalism's New Era,” http://truth-out.org/news/item/2780:capitalisms-new-era (accessed September 28, 2011).

Dan Georgakas and Marvin Surkin, Detroit I do Mind Dying (Boston: South End Press, 1998).

Michael Eric Dyson, Come Hell or High Water: Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster (New York: Basic Civitas Books, 2005). See also the PEWS study by Rakesh Kochhar, Richard Fry, and Paul Taylor, “Wealth Gaps Rise to Record Highs Between Whites, Blacks, Hispanics: Twenty-to-One,” July 26, 2011, http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/ (accessed October 28, 2011).

UC Berkeley Labor Center, “Black Unemployment Rate was 14.0% in December 2012, an Increase from November 2012.”

Economic Policy Institute, Policy Brief: Unequal Harm (Washington, DC: Economic Policy Institute, 2012).

Angela Davis, Are Prisons Obsolete? (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2003).

Kochhar, Fry, and Taylor, “Wealth Gaps Rise to Record Highs Between Whites, Blacks, Hispanics.”

Manning Marable, How Capitalism Underdeveloped Black America (Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1983).

James P. Patterson, Brown v. Board: A Civil Rights Milestone and Its Troubled Legacy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). See also Paul Street in, “Still Separate, Unequal: Race, Place, Policy, and the State of Black Chicago,” The Black Commentator, June 30, 2005.

Vanessa Siddle Walker, Their Highest Potential (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996).

Brian Jones, “Race, Class and the Attack on Public Education,” www.weareman.org (accessed November 3, 2012).

Robert Barnes, “Divided Court Limits Use of Race by School Districts,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2007/06/28/AR2007062800896.html (accessed November 3, 2012).

Joseph Palermo, “Chicago Teachers Union vs. Mayor Rahm Emanuel (the Democrats' Scott Walker?),” http://www.Japrogressive.com/chicago-teacers-union/ (accessed September 12, 2012).

Rob Bartlett, “Chicago Teachers Strike Back,” http://www.solidarity-us.org/site/node/3/17 (accessed December 8, 2012).

Audre Lorde, “The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action,” http://iambecauseweare.wordpress.com/2007/06/26/the-transformation-of-silence-into-language-and-action-excerpt-by-audre-lorde/ (accessed June 10, 2009).

Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, http://wwwgovtrack.us/congress/bills/110hr1424# (accessed December 4, 2012).