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Crises of Imagination, Crises of Power: Capitalism, Creativity and the Commons
Today, when it seems like everything has been privatized, when austerity is too often seen as an economic or political problem that can be solved through better policy, and when the idea of moral values has been commandeered by the right, how can we re-imagine the forces used as weapons against community, solidarity, ecology and life itself?
In this stirring call to arms, Max Haiven argues that capitalism has colonized how we all imagine and express what is valuable. Looking at the decline of the public sphere, the corporatization of education, the privatization of creativity, and the power of finance capital in opposition to the power of the imagination and the growth of contemporary social movements, Haiven provides a powerful argument for creating an anti-capitalist commons. Capitalism is not in crisis, it is the crisis, and moving beyond it is the only key to survival.
Crucial reading for all those questioning the imposition of austerity and hoping for a fairer future beyond it.
In this stirring call to arms, Max Haiven argues that capitalism has colonized how we all imagine and express what is valuable. Looking at the decline of the public sphere, the corporatization of education, the privatization of creativity, and the power of finance capital in opposition to the power of the imagination and the growth of contemporary social movements, Haiven provides a powerful argument for creating an anti-capitalist commons. Capitalism is not in crisis, it is the crisis, and moving beyond it is the only key to survival.
Crucial reading for all those questioning the imposition of austerity and hoping for a fairer future beyond it.
- GenresNonfiction
320 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2014
6 people are currently reading
201 people want to read
About the author
Max Haiven
20 books45 followersMax Haiven is Canada Research Chair in Culture, Media and Social Justice at Lakehead University in Northwest Ontario and co-director of the ReImagining Value Action Lab (RiVAL).
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
June 8, 2014
Seven laments from the dispossessed middle class
[Through my ratings, reviews and edits I'm providing intellectual property and labor to Amazon.com Inc., listed on Nasdaq, which fully owns Goodreads.com and in 2013 posted revenues for $74 billion and $274 million profits. Intellectual property and labor require compensation. Amazon.com Inc. is also requested to provide assurance that its employees and contractors' work conditions meet the highest health and safety standards at all the company's sites.]
A collection of previously published essays, loosely stitched together ex post by the introduction and the conclusions, and in sum an exercise in autonomist orthodoxy, where the author shows he believes the right beliefs and quotes the right authors, carefully avoiding the non-approved ones (I do not stand the idea of orthodoxy, at any point on the ideological spectrum). But the title was good and promising.
The most original contribution of the book is the application of the notion of 'enclosure' - straight from Marx's archaeological genius - to our present modes of 'production and reproduction', that is to our society. We do live in an enclosing society, which systematically breaks down its manifestations into sub-components putting an etiquette on each of them made sticky by funding, honours, governance bodies and regulation. For example, the author teaches "cultural studies". What's that? A sub-discipline of a sub-discipline? Never heard of it in continental Europe. In a different society, the author might just have been a philosopher. But a philosopher is potentially unpredictable, whereas the specialized writer who will quote the mandatory Negri, Federici, De Angelis etc. moves forward along his railway tracks, and will have his decent market and appropriate marketing strategies. Enclosures lead to professionalization and predictability.
Is it too late to break away from the mental enclosures? The book is often discouraging. For example, as a case of fruitful development from the Occupy movement, the author offers the "Occupy your house" movement (people resisting foreclosures). Isn't it a result of the enclosure of minds that people cannot give up the idea of owning things, house included? Why should we own houses in the first place? To compete with one another and keep the prices rising? The important thing is to occupy, and an "occupy the body of the girl you like" movement might be welcome as well provided that a collective and a committee are set up. As the author points out, our values are signalled by what we do and how we behave. Occupying your own property means valuing private exclusive property, which does not sound particularly non-capitalist.
If I could suggest re-imagination efforts, I think they should be around the way we think of capitalism or of our capitalistic society. How big is capitalism, for example? The author says that people do non-capitalistic things all the time. We might discover that capitalism is not so huge (Marx was bought into this) and the resistants not so weak. There is an "outside" and a conspicuous one (probably "Cultural studies" is the descipline dedicated to the study of the outside of capitalism, alas). What is the relationship of the 99% with capitalism and finance? We might think of ourselves as the masters and not the victims, to put an end to the show (the "principals" in the principal-agent relationship).
[Through my ratings, reviews and edits I'm providing intellectual property and labor to Amazon.com Inc., listed on Nasdaq, which fully owns Goodreads.com and in 2013 posted revenues for $74 billion and $274 million profits. Intellectual property and labor require compensation. Amazon.com Inc. is also requested to provide assurance that its employees and contractors' work conditions meet the highest health and safety standards at all the company's sites.]
A collection of previously published essays, loosely stitched together ex post by the introduction and the conclusions, and in sum an exercise in autonomist orthodoxy, where the author shows he believes the right beliefs and quotes the right authors, carefully avoiding the non-approved ones (I do not stand the idea of orthodoxy, at any point on the ideological spectrum). But the title was good and promising.
The most original contribution of the book is the application of the notion of 'enclosure' - straight from Marx's archaeological genius - to our present modes of 'production and reproduction', that is to our society. We do live in an enclosing society, which systematically breaks down its manifestations into sub-components putting an etiquette on each of them made sticky by funding, honours, governance bodies and regulation. For example, the author teaches "cultural studies". What's that? A sub-discipline of a sub-discipline? Never heard of it in continental Europe. In a different society, the author might just have been a philosopher. But a philosopher is potentially unpredictable, whereas the specialized writer who will quote the mandatory Negri, Federici, De Angelis etc. moves forward along his railway tracks, and will have his decent market and appropriate marketing strategies. Enclosures lead to professionalization and predictability.
Is it too late to break away from the mental enclosures? The book is often discouraging. For example, as a case of fruitful development from the Occupy movement, the author offers the "Occupy your house" movement (people resisting foreclosures). Isn't it a result of the enclosure of minds that people cannot give up the idea of owning things, house included? Why should we own houses in the first place? To compete with one another and keep the prices rising? The important thing is to occupy, and an "occupy the body of the girl you like" movement might be welcome as well provided that a collective and a committee are set up. As the author points out, our values are signalled by what we do and how we behave. Occupying your own property means valuing private exclusive property, which does not sound particularly non-capitalist.
If I could suggest re-imagination efforts, I think they should be around the way we think of capitalism or of our capitalistic society. How big is capitalism, for example? The author says that people do non-capitalistic things all the time. We might discover that capitalism is not so huge (Marx was bought into this) and the resistants not so weak. There is an "outside" and a conspicuous one (probably "Cultural studies" is the descipline dedicated to the study of the outside of capitalism, alas). What is the relationship of the 99% with capitalism and finance? We might think of ourselves as the masters and not the victims, to put an end to the show (the "principals" in the principal-agent relationship).
June 25, 2017
A compelling account of how capitalism has enclosed not only our material reality but also our imagination and limited the horizons of dissent to meagre attempts of trying to "fix" the system as opposed to changing it. This is achieved by the articulation of capitalism as intrinsic and indespinsable to our nature which forecloses our capacity to imagine a reality that has not been "financialized". It also invites a discussion on debt and credit and how the accumulation of debt at a young age (student loans) is an enclosure of the future and how individual creativity is championed as a filtered personal achievement rather than a fruit of the communal web of shared knowledge and support we exist in.
It draws on the different ways capitalism has pierced into our moral paradigm and social behaviour as well as how it serves as a backbone of different systems of oppression. This warrants a need for a "radical imagination" that serves as a collective practice to re-invent a reality in which our value is not attached to our monetary status.
"As such, we as individuals forged within that society, and as social movements built within it, are also haunted by the ghosts of past struggles, even though we may not know or recognize them. In this sense, we inherit, whether we want to or not, whether we acknowledge it or not, the dreams, hopes, angers and passions of past struggles: they are there amidst the bricks and mortar, the stories, the images, the social norms of our world."- Max Haiven
It draws on the different ways capitalism has pierced into our moral paradigm and social behaviour as well as how it serves as a backbone of different systems of oppression. This warrants a need for a "radical imagination" that serves as a collective practice to re-invent a reality in which our value is not attached to our monetary status.
"As such, we as individuals forged within that society, and as social movements built within it, are also haunted by the ghosts of past struggles, even though we may not know or recognize them. In this sense, we inherit, whether we want to or not, whether we acknowledge it or not, the dreams, hopes, angers and passions of past struggles: they are there amidst the bricks and mortar, the stories, the images, the social norms of our world."- Max Haiven
August 14, 2015
A very refreshing book. Introduced me to Castoriadis and the idea of the imaginary, it also made me re-think a lot of thoughts around finance and what Haiven calls 'financialised imagination.'
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April 19, 2014Reviewed here.
April 18, 2017
A well written and easy to read intro/overview of a variety of concepts and movements. Well referenced. 3.5 stars.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews