The Making of Global Capitalism

In this sweeping, timely, and well-researched study of global capitalism, York University political scientist Panitch and York University visiting social justice scholar Gindin (coauthors, with Greg Albo, of In and Out of Crisis: The Global Financial Meltdown and Left Alternatives) trace economic developments from the 1944 Bretton Woods conference to the present. Panitch and Gindin maintain that after WWII, U.S. officials did not pursue a narrow conventional concept of national self-interest; rather, in pushing for nondiscriminatory international access for capital, “European capitalists forged ties with American capitalists both within Europe and within the US,” strengthening cross-border capitalist powers. If this argument stretches the concept of class unity to a perhaps untenable solidity, it also underscores the evolution of “a truly global financial system based on the internationalization of the U.S. financial system.” However, decades later, global capital mobility led to 72 financial crises in the 1990s among low- and middle-income nations. The authors conclude that “turning the financial institutions that are the life-blood of global capitalism into public utilities” is a “necessary prerequisite for social justice and democracy”; whether this is a desirable, or even plausible, action need not vitiate the merits of the authors’ compelling arguments. (Oct.)