Russian Social Movement “Alternatives”: Awakened Sense of Dignity

By Andrey Kolganov and Aleksandr Buzgalin, reporting from Bolotnaya Square

Why, after many years when street politics in Russia were deep-frozen, have citizens again acquired a taste for street actions? After a public rally near Chistie Prudy metro station in inner Moscow drew six or seven thousand people, what caused ten times as many to then gather on Bolotnaya Square?

Can it be the crisis? The fall in living standards? When the crisis first hit, nothing took place to remotely match the recent meetings.

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New Book: The Failure of Capitalist Production

The Failure of Capitalist Production: Underlying Causes of the Great Recession

by Andrew Kliman

Published by Pluto Press, November 2011

Paperback / 256pp. / ISBN-13: 978-0745332390

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“Clear, rigorous and combative. Kliman demonstrates that the current economic crisis is a consequence of the fundamental dynamic of capitalism, unlike the vast bulk of superficial contemporary commentary that passes for economic analysis.”
. – Rick Kuhn, Deutscher Prize winner, Reader in Politics at the Australian National University

“Among the myriad publications on the present day crisis, this work stands out as something unusual. Kliman cogently argues against the view that the crisis is ultimately rooted in financialization. He is an excellent theorist, and an equally excellent analyst of empirical data.”
, – Paresh Chattopadhyay, Université du Québec à Montréal

“One of the very best of the rapidly growing series of works seeking to explain our economic crisis. … The scholarship is exemplary and the writing is crystal clear. Highly recommended!”
. – Professor Bertell Ollman, New York University, author of Dance of the Dialectic

The Failure of Capitalist Production is essential reading for all Marxists and lefts interested in what caused the Great Recession.  It debunks the fads and fashionable arguments of neoliberalism, underconsumption and inequality with a battery of facts.  It restores Marx’s law of profitability to the centre of any explanation of capitalist crisis with compelling evidence and searching analysis.  It must be read.
. – Michael Roberts, Michael Roberts Blog (full review here)

The thesis presented in the book stands out in a number of ways from many contemporary radical interpretations (notably the financialised-underconsumptionist thesis advanced by the influential Monthly Review … and that of the Marxist political geographer David Harvey). … Kliman provides far more compelling empirical evidence that American corporations’ rate of profit did not recover in a sustained manner after the early 1980s. …  A crucial finding undermining the financialisation thesis is that Kliman demonstrates how American corporations have not, as is often claimed, invested a smaller share of their profit in production.
. – Socialist Voice (full review here)

UPCOMING EVENTS ON THE BOOK:

…..Feb. 6, 2012. NEW YORK CITY. 7 PM. Bluestockings Books, 172 Allen St., Manhattan. (212) 777-6028.

…..Feb. 10. TORONTO. 1:30 PM. York University Dept. of Political Science; Verney Room, Ross Building South, 6th Floor.

…..Week of Feb. 12. WINNIPEG. Multiple events being planned.

…..Feb. 29. TAMPERE, Finland.

…..March 1. HELSINKI, Finland.

…..March 5. LONDON. 6:30 PM. Bookmarks Bookshop. 1 Bloomsbury Street, WC1B3QE. Introduction by Joseph Choonara, talk by Kliman, discussion, wine.

…..weekend of March 17-18. NEW YORK CITY. Pace University, 1 Pace Plaza, Manhattan. Left Forum panel on book. Speakers: Brendan Cooney, Barry Finger, Alan Freeman, Anne Jaclard, and Mike West. Comments by Kliman.

Check this space again for additional events and additional details, or contact Marxist-Humanist Initiative.

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DESCRIPTION OF BOOK, AUDIO/VIDEO INTERVIEWS, AND SYNOPSIS FOLLOW.

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Video: “Marx’s Capital and the Economic Crisis”

A video recording of the panel “Marx’s Capital and the Economic Crisis” at the 2009 Left Forum in NYC is available at Brendan Cooney’s Kapitalism101 website. The panel featured Radhika Desai (chair), Brendan Cooney, Michael Egoavil, Alan Freeman, and Andrew Kliman.

Click here to view the video.

Please click here for the original announcement of this panel.

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