Publisher's Synopsis
Capitalism and the liberal approach to markets have been assailed for long, and from several quarters as well, on the grounds of an extensive swathe of topics stretching from globalization through wealth distribution, infighting among groups of interest, unemployment, wide-ranging poverty, class struggles, imperialism and the like. There is no denying that time runs out for both capitalism and liberal markets in representative democracies. On the other hand, authoritarian or populist regimes are intensely trying other political and economic roads by putting on impressive performances as the one China has claimed for the last decades. This book, however, sets forth another standpoint, asserting that capitalism and economic liberalism have fostered and empowered a triad comprising organized crime, corruption and ecocide to an extent not witnessed before in human history. This partnership stemmed from the internal dynamics of capitalism and economic liberalism that failed in strengthening the institutions of representative democracies and neglected the most basic social issues. To add insult to injury, the triad took advantage of the same tool kit of organizational skills and technologies that allowed praiseworthy companies to thrive and develop, but without displaying any moral constraint and with dire contempt of the law instead. In contrast with the conventional approach, this book connects the dots between the bad politics and worse governance that organizations in the triad extensively have carried out so far. For the first time in the literature, the threads of organized crime, corruption and ecocide are borne to light by showing how rotten politics and criminal governances have been intertwined in the end. If capitalism and the liberal economics are doomed to failure, the trappings of the triad put both ideologies on the slippery slope and will bring them to account at last. It is the author's contention that to redress the balance in representative democracies, their underlying political systems must work their way through post capitalism by means of social democracy and social markets, which amounts to a new governance and a better politics. The broad and innovative scope of the book can be surveyed through the titles of its seven chapters: governance and politics; how accountability and transparency become social learning processes; political conflict-systems and dual governance; dysfunctional governance, the capture of the state, and corruption; the governance and politics of organized crime and ecocide; the day of reckoning for capitalism and the liberal market system; social democracy, social markets, and the welfare state will stand for post capitalism.
