Postcapitalism

In a new book, entitled ANOTHER NOW: Dispatches from an alternative present (London: The Bodley Head), Yanis Varoufakis gives us a glimpse of what a truly democratised world might look like, and how we might get there. Duration: 33min 47sec, Broadcast: Thu 15 Oct 2020, 10:20pm. ABC website  See also: ANOTHER NOW: An intimate introduction (video […]

Watch the closing arguments in Bloomberg’s debate where Bob Reich and I supported the motion ‘It’s time to redistribute the wealth’ against Larry Summers and Allison Schrager who argued against.

Why did I write ANOTHER NOW? As a critic of capitalism, I have long been painfully aware that critics of capitalism have no real answer to the hard question: “If you don’t like capitalism mate, what’s the alternative?” So, I decided it was time to take on two hard but pressing tasks: First, to describe […]

Our era will be remembered for the triumphant march of authoritarianism in whose wake the vast majority of humanity have experienced unnecessary hardship and the planet’s ecosystem has suffered avoidable climate destruction. For a brief period – a period the British historian Eric Hobsbawm described as “the short 20th century”  – establishment forces  were united in dealing with challenges […]

Reading the newspapers last Monday, I was reminded that negotiations with Brussels are always an occasion for second-rate theatre. Ultimatums are usually issued by EU negotiators facing UK governments that talk enthusiastically of red lines and sovereignty. But now, if the Telegraph is to be believed, it is Boris Johnson who has given the EU […]

In this episode of COVIDcast, Lowy Institute Research Fellow Alexandre Dayant sat down with Professor Yanis Varoufakis to discuss Europe and the future of capitalism. Yanis is currently a member of the Hellenic Parliament and served as Greece’s minister of finance during the government debt crisis. ALEXANDRE DAYANT COVIDcast is a Lowy Institute pop-up podcast […]

Our era will be remembered for the triumphant march of a Twin Authoritarianism in whose wake the vast majority of humanity experience unnecessary hardship and the planet’s ecosystem suffers avoidable climate destruction.

When Margaret Thatcher coined “Tina” – her 1980s dictum that “There is no alternative” – I was incensed because, deep down, I felt she had a point: the left had neither a credible nor a desirable alternative to capitalism.

Two days ago, something extraordinary happened. Something that has never happened before in the history of capitalism. In Britain, the news came out that the economy had suffered its greatest slump ever – more than 22% down during the first 7 months of 2020. Remarkably, on the same day, the London Stock Exchange, the FTSE100 index, rose by more than 2%. On the same day, during a time America has ground to a halt and is beginning to look like not just as an economy in deep trouble but also, ominously, as a failed state, Wall Street’s SP500 index hit an all-time record.