by Andrea Zhok

The contemporary era presents a reinforced reconstitution of the system of contradictions which has characterized the capitalist system since its creation. The structural problem associated with the capitalist mode of production is its “monotone growing exponential” character, that is, its intrinsic tendency to fuel processes of “positive feedback”, “compound interest” and unlimited growth. In other words: the mechanism of capital, living from its own increase, tends to push all the factors of production constantly in the same direction, thus creating a systematic imbalance. The system therefore pushes to the top the indefinite growth of production, the indefinite growth of the accumulation of capital, the indefinite growth of the exploitation of people, the indefinite growth of the exploitation of nature.

This is what the old Marxian language called the “contradictions of capitalism”. Each of these tendencies systematically comes into conflict with socially, humanly and ecologically balanced orders: the gap between the top and the bottom of the social pyramid is widening, the consumption and waste of resources are increasing, the liquefaction of collective organisms ( families, communities, states, etc.) and personal identities develops. While the world and life can be designed on the organic model of “negative feedback” systems, which restore and correct imbalances, capitalism functions as unlimited and uncontrolled proliferation, literally like an ontological cancer.

Historically, since the first to understand the nature of the problem was Marx, this awareness is associated with the search for “anti-capitalist”, socialist, communist or similar solutions. The idea is then often that the “people” should be the first relevant subject of these analyses. This view overlooks a real fact: those who take Marxian and post-Marxian analyzes most seriously have long been the holders of power within the system, who are most concerned about what can undermine their position: they are the capitalists, the “masters of steam”, who are the first concerned with the problems of capitalism today.

When we speak generically of “capitalists”, “oligarchies”, “elites”, etc., it is inevitable to arouse suspicions of an excessive imprecision of the referents. Who is it ? We would like to be able to name the subject of power, as we could do in the pre-modern world by naming the king, the pope, the emperor, such feudal lord, such courtier, etc. Today, however, naming names amounts to falsifying reality. As much as people matter, the system has a great capacity to replace its members at all levels, including at the top. Knowing who the CEO of BlackRock or Vanguard is doesn't get us any closer to understanding who wields power, because it's not about how specific individuals perform their duties.

Another mistake not to be made is that – fueled by the ideology of power itself – which consists in assuming that the existence of a plurality of “steam masters” and not of a single “emperor” guarantees in a way a diversification of interests and projects, and therefore a certain “democratization” of the system (for example: “the existence of different capitalists implies different masters of the newspapers and therefore a plurality of information”). This is gross naivety. The day the CEO of BlackRock rediscovers, for example, the revolutionary Zapatista spirit and feels the urge to support the liberation of Chiapas, he will cease to be CEO and will be replaced (with a severance package, of course). The bottom lines cannot change and they have one unwavering goal: the perpetuation of the power of those who hold it. Nor should we fixate ourselves on a specific “capitalist” orthodoxy. The financial oligarchies are not “capitalist” out of the ideal love of capitalism: it is not an alternative religion. It is simply the form in which they hold power. If the abandonment of such and such an ideological aspect favors the preservation and consolidation of power, nothing opposes it.

But in the end, who are these “steam masters”? The contemporary concentration of power is unprecedented in history: a few hundred people hold the reins of the largest (Anglo-American) financial groups in the world and of what Eisenhower called the American “military-industrial complex”. These groups have all the fundamental levers of power, they are able to guide political decisions in their host states (the United States in the first place) and have a cascading effect in all the states that are subordinate to them or who are indebted to them. There are not exactly such counter-powers outside the Western world, insofar as they manage to escape the influence of the first, since elsewhere the power, even the most inflexible, is in any case dominated by politically motivated bodies (nationalism in primis).

These Western elites of the heyday are compacted by the motivation to maintain an economically based power and have coordination capacities immensely superior to any other interest group: they have institutional and non-institutional places and modes of meeting, they have resources that allow a plurality of agreements and communications by multiple means, unofficial or clandestine.

Those who expect to find a list of rulers and heirs to the throne in order to plan an assault on the "Winter Palace", and who, in the absence of this list, prefer to cast the problem on conjecture or conspiracy theories, are unfortunately unwitting accomplices of power.

Few are the subjects of the higher elites who seek to put themselves forward, and those who do are those few people, victims of their own ideologies, who have convinced themselves that they are carrying out operations of "paternal redemption" (the usual names circulating from Schwab, Soros, Gates, etc.). The smartest of them know very well that their power does not come through public consensus, and therefore that coming out does not strengthen them, but exposes and weakens them.

We are therefore confronted with the following picture: a small group of subjects, having obtained an eminent position within contemporary capitalism, hold power with levels of concentration that have never existed before, and move and coordinate ( taking into account personal particularities) with the aim of maintaining and consolidating this power. At the same time, this umbrella and narrow group is perfectly aware of the implicit critical tendencies of the system of which it is the apex. We must stop imagining the capitalist as a lover who indulges in sex toys, yachts and prestigious wines. The people who move on this hedonistic horizon are generally middle class and new rich. Consolidated capital ("old money") forges different human types, who either have the proper education to understand the problems of the system or are accustomed to paying think tanks to do this work for them.

What we must therefore highlight is the hypothesis according to which the lines of contradiction within the system of capital are perfectly known to the “masters of steam”. It is only their liberal sellers who continue to create smokescreens with their “perfect market”, their “general long-term equilibrium” and other nonsense. This richly funded intellectual workforce often holds prestigious academic positions, and its function is to provide a thick ideological fog, which is already at least a hundred years old, upon which to disperse the energies of critics. This is a defense of frontline infantrymen who struggle to prevent their opponents from seeing the real front. Most are too stupid to know that they are simply being used as dummy targets.

That the accelerated replacement of workers by machines creates a structural imbalance in the production system, with a potential surplus of product in relation to consumption, and an excess of impotent demand (consumers without purchasing power) in relation to a supply overflowing, is quite obvious and peaceful.

That this configures the existence of a vast superfluous population, exaggerated to be useful as a "reserve army of capital", a multitude of mouths to feed and malcontents boiling over is equally evident.

It is equally clear that a system of infinite growth ends up undermining the whole system, environmental and social, in which we live.

The main fault lines which hold the attention of the elites are therefore: 1) the social fracture (risk of revolts); 2) the ecological divide (risk of destabilization of environmental balances); 3) the financial fracture (terminal collapse of growth expectations and with that of the assumptions of the system).

The error of the heirs of the first line of critical analysis, the Marxist one, is to think that the recognition of these tendencies implies in itself adherence to a perspective of "overcoming capitalism", with the search for social forms that avoid dehumanization, alienation, which restore a balanced system (“from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs”).

This is another serious naivety. The elites at the top of the contemporary system know the contradictions of the system but that does not mean at all that they intend to abandon it. There is nothing strange about this, no power bloc in history has ever left power spontaneously. The point here is to clearly understand what perspectives this power opens up because it can show us the spectrum of underground risks in contemporary times (those risks that often end up being confusedly expressed, and therefore discredited, in the form of "theories of conspiracy").

The first perspective is the least radical and the weakest, but it is also the one that can be stated apertis verbis without scruples. It's about conveying the idea that for each problem, there is potentially an answer that the technological solutions on the market will be able to provide. This idea is offered by the media quirks as if it were a realistic option, when in fact it only serves to delay certain processes, while allowing a new accumulation of capital. Thus, the saving prospect of electric cars, or nuclear energy, or Euro 7, etc., to solve a unique and carefully selected environmental problem (global warming?) is brandished from time to time in the usual media. This selective focus gives the impression that it is always a question of solving a preeminent problem, which makes the search for technical solutions plausible; it buys time in an area, diverts public attention by giving it hope, and steers public policy to good effect.

Of course, these sectoral operations, sharing the structural desire for sustainable innovation and increased production, continue to fuel the process of systemic destabilization. At best, ad hoc technological solutions can temporarily close one loophole, while at the same time ten others are opened up in the form of systemic externalities.

The second perspective is a classic, more drastic solution line that temporarily contains damage along multiple fault lines. When a war can be fomented, it is, at least as far as the countries concerned are concerned, an effective solution, because it allows both: to contain populations, by blocking social protest; to create a zone of unbridled consumption (and therefore of capital rent) without it being necessary to confer purchasing power on the population; to slow down other social processes, reducing the human 'ecological footprint', and at best to reduce population. This solution works ideally all the better as the number of countries involved is high. If a conflict is circumscribed militarily, it will not impact population numbers, but it will still be effective in other respects (regiment and social discipline + economic drain in a postmodern "potlatch", where vast resources are burned to run the consuming machine).

A long-lasting, low-intensity global war would in fact be a perfect solution: it would ideally: 1) break down any resistance or social revolt in the name of sacred opposition to the external enemy; 2) to concentrate energies in an infinite production aiming at an infinite consumption, which ignores any saturation of the market; 3) gradually reduce the population.

However, this perspective is very unstable and not easy to manipulate, even for elites at the top, however powerful they may be. It is relatively easy to provoke a number of conflicts in regions that are already unstable and politically weak, but a long-lasting, low-intensity global war is not directly orchestrated, and continually risks either dying out or creating an escalation. nuclear, in which even the highest elites would end up being involved to some degree.

The third perspective has been evident for a long time and consists of transforming the liberal ideological model into an authoritarian model, without changing its appearance one iota. Contemporary Western society (but not only) is more regulated, legalistic and policed ​​than any other society in history. Not only are there more laws than in the past, and they are more detailed, on areas of behavior that in the pre-modern world were not the subject of legislative attention, but the technological capacity enhanced enables unprecedented levels of enforcement and control of these standards.

Since all power has an intrinsic incentive to increase its capacity for control, in the liberal world this happens in a paradoxical way, based on the claim to work for a “promotion of freedom”. In order to transform an ideology of freedom into an ideology of control, neoliberalism systematically exploits the idea of ​​the “victimization” or the “vulnerability” of a group. Once a certain group has been identified as potentially offended, violated in their natural or human rights, coercive acts can be carried out on behalf of the “victims”, perhaps to prevent their potential victimization. This mechanism can work both inside and outside a country. We can coercively intervene on freedom of expression under the pretext of "protecting the sensitivities" of such and such a group, we can intervene with forced medicalization (or health passes) to "protect the fragile", just as we can to intervene as "international police" to "defend human rights" in such and such a region of the world. The same logic allows the broadcast of surveillance cameras in any place accessible to the public or the violation of any private communication in the name of "protection of security", etc.

It is important to be aware of the fact that the control technologies available today are extraordinarily sophisticated and that once the barrier of legal justification has been passed, the capacity for monitoring (and sanctioning) is almost unlimited.

The interest of the elites at the top in a total system of surveillance, control and sanction is obvious. It is and always will be presented as an operation in "defence of the vulnerable", when in fact it is a means of blocking at the root the possibility of those without power becoming a threat to those who have it.

While surveillance and control can defuse the danger posed by mass discontent (discontent which, as long as it is at a low level, can be contained by simple systems of distraction and entertainment), the problem posed by the surplus population that is economically "useless and harmful" invokes another temptation, which should not be underestimated simply because it seems "scandalous". Countries that do not have a liberal ideological framework, such as China, can afford to address population control issues explicitly, as was the case with the “one-child policy”. In the liberal West, this possibility of open discussion is excluded because it would require bringing to the fore issues that are embarrassing (starting with “conspicuous consumption”) for the elites. But this does not mean that the temptation to intervene from above is not present.

On this question, it is impossible to go beyond conjectures and deductions, but it would be wrong to underestimate the temptation of clandestine recourse to technological solutions to limit fertility or increase mortality (preferably for those who are no longer of working age).

All the previous “solutions” remain within the capitalist framework, with its internal mechanisms and its contradictions. This means that, in essence, they are always pushing to save time by slowing down certain processes, or by rolling back the hands of the historical clock. A radical exit from the capitalist model by capitalist power is only conceivable with the promise of crystallizing the current power relations (an exit in the direction of a socialist democracy is therefore not particularly popular).

In a framework of financial capitalism such as today, concretizations of power can be tenuous, because some capitalization depends above all on consumption expectations. Those who hold large amounts of liquid assets possess potential purchasing power that is entirely dependent on the outlook for asset availability and public confidence in credit securities. This power is the same as that exercised by a banknote, a virtual object which can become waste paper when it is no longer deemed capable of mediating the supply of goods. This is why, because of the need to take care of appearances and expectations, financial capitalism must pay particular attention to the governance of the media apparatus. But in any case, there are limits to the governance of expectations, because the very mechanisms of economic competition constantly generate destabilizing upheavals.

In the capitalist world, “liquid” power is far more powerful (due to its maximum mobility and transformability) than any “hard” power (the ownership of real goods). However, real assets provide long-term stability that liquid capital does not. Therefore, the prospect of a possible "post-apocalyptic" exit from the capitalist model with its contradictions is only conceivable, for the elites at the top, in terms of a transition to a kind of "neo-feudalism", in which liquid power is transformed back into material property (land, real estate, armaments, technology, etc.).

However, a problem emerges here that completely changes the game. Historical feudalism operated on the basis of a system of legitimation (including the legitimation of property) dependent on tradition and religion. The world today has swept away these two factors conferring legitimacy. So the question is: how can a system of legitimizing power and property work in a “neo-feudalism” devoid of tradition and religion?

In the history of humanity, power has always been, even in the most authoritarian cultures, determined by the average recognition of the legitimacy of power. As long as most recognized or at least did not dispute the legitimacy of a power, it remained functional. This power functions by being transmitted with continuity, through intermediate passages, from the summit to the base (from the king to the vassals, from the feudal lords to the knights, from the peasants to the serfs). This form of power therefore always has a human connection, in the sphere of recognition. But if the very matrix of legitimization is lost, how can power be exercised capillary, from the top down? In a capitalist system, wealth is power without the need for recognition because power is recognized as purchasing power, guaranteed by the economic system. If the system breaks down, this form of recognition of impersonal power breaks down. How could a new power function without recognition of its legitimacy?

Technically, the answer is simple: it would be necessary to replace the power of the “means” represented by money by another external means adapted to the desired goal. Concretely, the most plausible perspective is that this would be done through the manipulation of means aimed at instilling fear, a fear that the few must be able to instill directly in the many.

Such a prospect was inaccessible in the past, but technological progress has not ceased to nurture this possibility for some time now, namely the possibility, by the reinforcement of the effects, of a circumscribed center imposing itself on the multitude. A sword could impose itself on five unarmed persons, a gun on ten, a bomb on a thousand; and with the technical increase in power, the difficulty of use has also decreased: it is easier today to detonate a bomb than it was to wield a sword in the past. But we must not imagine technological power as simply the exercise of brute force. Let's think instead of a current situation such as the existence of genetically modified seeds that do not allow their seeds to be replanted for the next harvest, forcing them to be purchased from a central supplier. The essence of this power mechanism is simple: it is about making a group structurally dependent, for its very existence, on access to a technology that is not autonomously reproducible, but centrally administered. Many such mechanisms can be invented, it suffices to make people dependent on a technologically rare and non-autonomously reproducible commodity (a therapy?). Such a mechanism can in principle allow power to be exercised in a direct, 'neo-feudal' form, without the need for mechanisms of intermediation and legitimation.

A final remark: to speak here of “neo-feudalism” is a misleading expression. We are dealing with a system in which, yes, we would be dealing with a closed hierarchical society, like feudalism, based on real, non-liquid powers and properties, but all the other aspects are profoundly different and certainly not in one ameliorative sense. It would be a world in which an upper caste wields its power through fear, having replaced, as the ultimate source of authority, what in feudalism was God, with Technology. It would be a society of direct command, not mediated by any ideological adherence, a society that reveres technical efficiency and conceives of sub-humanity outside the upper caste as raw material that can be disposed of at will.

This image does not in fact recall feudalism, but an experience much closer to us, namely Nazism. Nazism, in fact, beyond its esoteric and pagan overtones, was essentially a veneration of direct force, attributed to a superior caste, and exercised with rigorous productivist efficiency, conceiving of man himself as a manipulable means (eugenics) or a bonded resource (KZ).

We could thus discover one fine day that the dozen years during which Nazism made its brief and inglorious appearance in history was only the first experimentation with instances and tendencies destined to acquire a completely different solidity a century later.

source: Ide and Azione

Robert Steuckers translation for Geopolitics

READ MORE:

https://en.reseauinternational.net/lere-des-dystopies/

NOTE THAT THE US (AND NATO DEPENDENCIES — INCLUDING CANADA) have fostered the GROWTH OF FASCISM IN UKRAINE TO GET AT RUSSIA. TIME MAGAZINE IS ONCE MORE PRAISING FASCISM ON ITS FRONT COVER.

SEE ALSO: 

https://yourdemocracy.net/drupal/node/45958

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky knows that, if he so desired, the fighting between Moscow and Kiev could end at any moment, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has said during a press call on Thursday.

“You can talk about when all of this will end until you are blue in the face,” Peskov said in response to the Ukrainian president’s recent prediction that the conflict could be over next year. “Zelensky knows when all this can end, it can end tomorrow if desired,” the spokesperson added.

In a recent interview with Politico – which named him ‘the most powerful person in Europe’ – Zelensky stated that Ukrainians “will be the most influential next year, but already in peacetime.”

Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine could turn out to be a “lengthy process” because achieving all of Russia’s objectives could take quite some time. 

The Russian leader also said that it was wrong to talk about the timing of the special operation or try to adjust it. He noted that it was impossible to set an exact date for when the conflict could end because the fighting is still intense. “We are working calmly, the troops are moving, reaching the lines that are set as tasks. Everything is going according to plan,” Putin said back in June.

Russia sent troops into Ukraine in late February, citing Kiev’s failure to implement the Minsk protocols, under which the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk would have been accorded a special status within the Ukrainian state. The Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states, which have since voted to join Russia alongside Kherson and Zaporozhye regions.

Russia also demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked.

READ MORE: 

https://www.rt.com/russia/567891-ukraine-russia-conflict-end-peskov/

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