COVID-19 and the Future of Capitalism

"COVID-19 can be considered as a historical turning point for global capitalism. It has indeed revealed the crisis of neoliberal globalization and the ineffectiveness of US-led global governance. However, this crisis does not automatically lead to the ultimate defeat of neoliberalism nor the end of capitalism itself. On the contrary, the pandemic of COVID-19 has great potential to be used by systemic forces to reinvent the capitalist-imperialist system or postpone the collapse of global capitalism by exploiting widespread anxiety and panic. Class exploitation, surveillance capitalism, and the digitalization of the economy may even acquire new dimensions to consolidate the power of right-wing populism and its proto-fascist leanings. Meanwhile, social movements present a historical challenge to global capitalism in reaction to the deepening of the economic crisis and authoritarianism. In this context, we incorporate the cultures of fear approach into the framework of disaster capitalism in order to provide a systematic explanation of how the capitalist world order undergoes profound transformations. We also argue that a new post-capitalist society cannot be built on the values and beliefs of the current day consumer capitalist society. Also central to our argument is that the real battle is not just against the particular neoliberal form of capitalism. One should thus bring into the equation the values and beliefs that could be the bricks in the foundation of a new post-capitalist society."--