The Cancer Stage of Capitalism

Bol Partner

In this bold look at the uncontrolled spread of global capitalism, John McMurtry, professor of philosophy at the University of Guelph, develops the metaphor of modern capitalism as a cancer. Its invasive growth, he argues, threatens to break down our society's immune system and--if not soon restrained--could reverse all the progress that has been made toward social equity and stability. John McMurtry traces the causes of this global disorder back to the mutating assumptions of market theory that now govern the world's economy. He diagnoses the malaise as a pathologist would a biological cancer, tracking the delinked circuits of the global system's monetised growth as a carcinogenic disorder at the social level of life-organization. In the wide-lensed tradition of Adam Smith, Marx and Keynes, McMurtry cuts across academic disciplines and boundaries to penetrate the inner logic of the system's problems. Far from pessimistic, he argues that the way out of the global crisis is to be found in an evolving substructure of history which provides a common ground of resolution across ethnic and national divisions.

Bol

New edition of a modern classic of critical philosophy, political economy and anti-capitalism. The Cancer Stage of Capitalism is a modern classic of critical philosophy and political economy, renowned for its depth and comprehensive research. It provides a step-by-step diagnosis of the continuing economic collapse in the US and Europe and has had an enormous influence on new visions of economic alternatives. John McMurtry argues that our world disorder of unending crises is the predictable result of a cancerous economic system multiplying out of all control and destroying ecological, social and organic life - a process he describes as 'global ecogenocide'. In this updated edition he explains the 'social immune response' required to fight this cancer, prescribing developments akin to the Occupy movement and the 'Pink Tide' democratic social transformation occurring in Latin America. In a global cultural orthodoxy that is increasingly hostile to life, this book shows the necessity and possibility of building a sustainable society based on a universal commitment to nature and humanity.