Economics Commons^™

My Radical Dad, Thai Jones

Fast Capitalism

No abstract provided.

Information Technology And Participatory Democracy: Some Considerations, Dick Flacks

Fast Capitalism

Please read the following in light of the following biographical context: I was one of the several dozen students who met together at Port Huron, Michigan in June 1962 to found the Students for a Democratic Society and draft the Port Huron Statement. That experience marked me for life. For me, the phrase ‘participatory democracy’, despite its awkwardness, encapsulates what’s essential for defining the good society and for criticizing established institutions and practices, and for formulating a political agenda. And my goal as a teacher for these 43 years has been to inspire students with that vision and help empower …

Two Wars, Two Movements: Iraq In Light Of Vietnam, Tom Wells

Fast Capitalism

No abstract provided.

From Participatory Democracy To Digital Democracy, Mark Kann

Fast Capitalism

Tom Hayden posted on his website, http://www.tomhayden.com, an article he coauthored with Dick Flacks to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the Port Huron Statement. The two SDS founders concluded, “Perhaps the most important legacy of the Port Huron Statement is the fact that it introduced the concept of participatory democracy to popular discourse and practice.” The concept of participatory democracy encompassed values such as equality, decentralization, and consensus decision-making. It provided direction for “all those trying to create a world where each person has a voice in the decisions affecting his or her life.” [1] In this article, I suggest …

Where In The World Are We? Elections, The Color Line, The Decline Of Empire And Fireflies, Bernardine Dohrn

Fast Capitalism

No abstract provided.

Killing The Field Of Dreams: George W. Bush, Empire And Politics Of Misrecognition, Jeremy Varon

Fast Capitalism

No abstract provided.

The Antinomies Of Brexit, Paul Smith

Fast Capitalism

Author Biography

Paul Smith, George Mason University

Paul Smith was educated at Cambridge and at the University of Kent in the UK and has a PhD in American Studies. Most of his working life has been spent in the US, including posts at Miami University OH, and Carnegie Mellon before his appointment to George Mason University in 1996. Between 1999 and 2002 he was chaired Professor and department head of Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Sussex in the UK. At Mason he has been director of the Center for the Study of the Americas and currently teaches …

Taking Back Control Of Nothing: Elites Denouncing Elites To Mobilize Populism In The Service Of Power - From Nafta To Trump, Brexit And The Eu, Christian Garland

Fast Capitalism

Author Biography

Christian Garland

Christian Garland teaches precariously at Queen Mary, University of London and has degrees in Philosophy and Politics from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and Social and Political Thought from the University of Sussex. He has research interests include Marx and Frankfurt School Critical Theory especially applying this to the rapidly changing nature of work and how this can be said to embody social relations of atomization and individualization: the re-composition and restructuring of the Capital-labor relation itself.

Abject Futures: The (Re)Negotiation Of Nafta And The Canadian Power Elite, Dean Ray

Fast Capitalism

This paper draws upon the critical political economy tradition in Canada to examine the renegotiation of NAFTA and the class interests at work in the final agreement. It draws on a range of ethnographic and media sources in its argumentation. The paper provides a comprehensive review of Canadian Political Economy before it turns to the negotiation and the actions of Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland. It is argued that Freeland was adept at appearance management and manipulating media presentations of herself to make the negotiation seem more laboured then it was. In the end, the agreement protected Canada's crown jewel, …

Twenty-Five Years And Still Recovering: A Brief Reflection On Nafta's Impact On Southside, Virginia, Sandra Via

Fast Capitalism

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has had a detrimental effect on Southside, Virginia. Southside, Virginia, particularly Martinsville, VA and Henry County, VA served as a hub for the furniture and textile industries, such as Bassett Furniture and Bassett-Walker Apparel, in the United States. After NAFTA's implementation, these companies eliminated jobs and moved manufacturing overseas to China or across the border to Mexico where they could exploit low wage workers. Neglecting the social responsibility that these corporations had to the workers that had built their companies and made their products world renown, manufacturers closed their doors leaving workers without …

Neoliberalism, Nafta, And Dehumanization: The Case Of Femicides In Ciudad Juárez, Denisa Krasna, Sagar Deva

Fast Capitalism

The overarching focus of this paper is on the way in which the neoliberalism inherent in the international institutional order produces dehumanisation in the third world and the way in which this dehumanisation manifests itself in direct loss of human life through exploitation and even murder. This paper is split into two main parts, the first of which gives a theoretical and general overview of how neoliberalism has both dominated and dehumanised the international institutional order and the second part of the paper gives a more in-depth case study of this phenomena, focusing on how NAFTA has engendered femicides in …

Introduction: The Contradictions Of Opposition To Free Trade, David M. Arditi

Fast Capitalism

Author Biography

David M. Arditi, University of Texas Arlington

David Arditi is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of the Center for Theory at the University of Texas at Arlington. He holds a PhD in Cultural Studies from George Mason University. His research addresses the impact of digital technology on society and culture with a specific focus on music. Arditi is author of iTake-Over: The Recording Industry in the digital era. Arditi serves as Editor of Fast Capitalism. In 2016, he developed MusicDetour, a local music archive available for everyone to stream free music.

Neoliberal Fascism As The Endpoint Of Casino Capitalism, Henry Giroux

Fast Capitalism

This article explores neoliberal fascism as a distinctive political formation within the current historical moment. In doing so, it first analyzes neoliberalism as a project that has since the 1970s destroyed all the commanding institutions of democracy while consolidating power in the hands of a financial elite. In addition, it analyzes neoliberalism as a movement, that produces and legitimates massive economic inequality and suffering, privatizes public goods, dismantles essential government agencies, and individualizes all social problems. Under such circumstances, neoliberalism creates the conditions for right wing extremists to mobilize the anger of white disenfranchised working class populations by both appealing …

The Modern-World System: Europe Or Asia? Fernand Braudel & André Gunder Frank, Charles Lemert

Fast Capitalism

Author Biography

Charles Lemert, Wesleyan University

Charles Lemert is an Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Wesleyan University and will soon publish: Americans Thinking America; The Bottom Turtle: Silence and Society; and. with Immanuel Wallerstein: Living Progressively in a Transitional Time.

Minding Machines: A Note On Alienation, Sascha Engel

Fast Capitalism

This paper discusses an underrepresented dimension of contemporary alienation: that of machines, and particularly of computing machines. The term 'machine' is understood here in the broadest sense, spanning anything from agricultural harvesters to cars and planes. Likewise, 'computing machine' is understood broadly, from homeostatic machines, such as thermostats, to algorithmic universal machines, such as smartphones. I suggest that a form of alienation manifests in the functionalist use and description of machines in general; that is, in descriptions of machines as mere tools or testaments to human ingenuity. Such descriptions ignore the real and often capricious existence of machines as everyday …

The Solace Of The Sojourn: Towards A Praxis-Oriented Phenomenological Methodology And Ethics Of Deep Travel In Martin Heidegger's Sojourns

Fast Capitalism

This article focuses on Martin Heidegger's little read travel journal, Sojourns (1962), and explores how it yields surprisingly fruitful insights into our contemporary era of neoliberal globalization via its implicit exploration of the complex interconnections between travel, phenomenology, and ethics. Specifically, I posit that Sojourns contains an implicit praxis-oriented phenomenological methodology and ethics of global travel that together gesture towards a coherent practice of "deep travel," which American literature scholar Cinzia Schiavini aptly defines as "a vertical movement in a closed space which starts from the surface of the land and goes backward in time, searching for the hidden social …

Bound To Capitalism: The Pursuit Of Profit And Pleasure In Digital Pornography, Jennifer Miller

Fast Capitalism

This paper explores digital pornography dialectically through a case study of Kink.com, an online BDSM subscription service. It considers the tension between discourses of authenticity that seek to obscure profit motive and shifts in content prompted by market considerations.

Author Biography

Jennifer Miller, University of Texas at Arlington

Jennifer Miller is an interdisciplinary scholar and cultural theorist who researches children's picture books. She has published in the Journal of Homosexuality, the edited collection Heroes, Heroines, and Everything in Between, and is currently working on a book length project under contract with the University Press of Mississippi.

The Twilight Of Automation, Mario Khreiche

Fast Capitalism

The future of work has come under renewed scrutiny amidst growing concerns about automation threatening widespread joblessness and precarity. While some researchers rush to declare new machine ages and industrial revolutions, others proceed with business as usual, suggesting that specialized job training and prudent reform will sufficiently equip workers for future employment. Among the points of contention are the scope and rate whereby human labor will be replaced by machines. Inflated predictions in this regard not only entice certified technologists and neoclassical economists, but also increasingly sway leftist commentators who echo the experts' cases for ramping up the proliferation of …

Max Weber's Odyssey: The Wild West, The Frontier, And The Capitalist Spirit, David Norman Smith

Fast Capitalism

This article examines one aspect of Weber's thinking with respect to the United States: his view of frontier regions as new horizons for capitalism. This was not an incidental or side issue for Weber, whose famed analysis of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism was only half-finished when he traveled through the United States in 1904. Nor is Weber's outlook on this topic immaterial for contemporary historians, many of whom now affirm quasi-Weberian views under such rubrics as "the New Western" history. A full account of Weber's notion of the frontier would exceed the limits of a journal …

Divining Domination: Steve Bannon As A Political Mystagogue, Tony Allen Feldmann

Fast Capitalism

Right-wing commentators (on tv, radio, newspapers, documentaries, or the internet) are often considered a source of misinformation and radicalization in American politics. Understanding the role of such commentators in the political sphere has taken on new significance since the election of Trump, who regularly takes talking points as well as political advice from prominent figures in right-wing media. The purpose of these political "shock jocks" also extends beyond mere political commentary: They offer their audience a framework for understanding the world. This framework contains certain reified perceptions of society and history. Durkheim and those working in his tradition have long …