George Liodakis

Department of Sciences, Technical University of Crete, Chania, Greece

ABSTRACT

This article is an attempt to trace out the historical development of capitalism and the ongoing struggle between capitalist globalization and an emerging socialist/communist globalization as a dialectical counter-tendency. Based on a dialectical materialist methodology, our approach starts with an historical overview of capitalist accumulation and globalization, explaining also the crisis-prone character of capitalism. Within a framework of capitalist world-ecology, we subsequently examine the increasing significance of ecological conditions and the role played by ecological exhaustion in the exacerbated socio-ecological crisis. At the backdrop of recurrent and deepening crisis, we briefly explore the history of class struggle and revolutionary efforts to supersede capitalism. As argued, the revolutionary failures during the twentieth century do not indicate fatal shortcomings of Marx’s theory or disprove the feasibility of communism, but only reflect the problematic conditions and flawed strategies associated with the relevant endeavors. Finally, the strategy to transcend capitalism is placed within a global context, counter-posing the currently dominant capitalist globalization. As suggested, this global strategy and the common transnational struggle towards communism require novel forms of organization from below, an alliance of working classes with broader social movements, and a direct confrontation of capitalist state power. 

KEYWORDS

Capitalism; globalization; ecological conditions; crisis; class struggle