The Republic of the 99%

Amador Fernandez-Savater — Tue, 01 May 2012 15:25:15 +0000

"More wood, this is war!" The train in the Marx Brothers’ film is the most accurate picture of present-day capitalism. Running away, fleeing forward, dismantling itself to further fuel the machine: destroying rights, guarantees, life, wealth, resources, care, bonds, the entire building of modern social civilization. The mad rush of capitalism threatens to bring everything down with it. There is neither an overall plan nor a long-term prospect: just take all the wood necessary to keep the machine running. Capitalism has gone completely punk: "no future".

Deep down, something is broken. We act as if nothing has happened, but we know it. The general feeling is that "everything has become possible": for the EU to expel Spain from the euro, a bank run, a ‘corralito’ or an insurrection. Just anything. But we cling to the more remote possibility: that things just stay the same, that we return to "normal." Capitalism is improvising, but so are the movements that oppose it. No compass is of any use now, the maps that we have are falling from our hands and we have no idea where we are heading. The only thing that we can do – or so it seems – is to follow the events of the day: the King’s speech yesterday, Repsol’s troubles today, and tomorrow we'll see. Time is out of joint.

through europe - fernandez-savater-eng

The Republic of the 99%