Immanent Critical Tendencies and Secular Crisis

The cyclical processes studied in the last chapter emerge from inherent and necessary characteristics of capitalism as a social system of reproduction and accumulation. It is possible to imagine the use of public policy to control and mitigate the effects of cyclical crisis; it is hardly possible, however, to imagine capitalism without cyclical crisis as an immanent reality and potential. Marx’s central insight in this regard is that what economists call ‘the crisis’ is in fact the cure. The actual crisis is the contradictory tension that has built itself up in the boom phase of rapid accumulation; the subsequent downturn, with its bankruptcies, recession, unemployment, destitution and chaos, is the system’s means of restoring conditions for a new round of growth. The crisis removes obstacles to accumulation by, first, imposing a new discipline on the working class — creating conditions in which workers have no choice but to accept higher rates of exploitation and insecurity — and, second, shaking out the weakest capitalist units of control, via a new round of concentration and centralization of capital. In a bear market, so the Wall Street saying goes, the money returns to its rightful owners.