Capitalism – the new divide.
Capitalism in a sense exists in a gulf between future and present. Capitalism trimpuhants because of one thing – and one thing ounly it offers a ‘better future’. By a better future I understands itself to mean that it offers a moiré rich and complex future. This it talks of in the languge of coice. Cpaitalism and choice are synomous. We are free to choose- of at least gaup at endless almost identical products – ad can choose the one we want to suite our precess needs, Now of course anyone who has tried to buy shoes – or not lycra pants will know that this is nev3er quite so simple. But the point remains: What captialsim offers u- what it sells us is very much an enriched – a perpetually enriched present.Our presens are carefully constructed things = managed by advertising companies which make money in desing colourful presents – and uncovering those presents we will like and those we will reject. Everything conspires to make – over grown babaies that we at (we are even starting to look like perpetu; babies) – the present of our deepest desire.
The effects of this complex present – is that activities such as shopping that almost by definition should be abut acquairingfor use in another time will become itself a hobby. We dpo not pshop to use- but because we enjoy with greedy antipication the presents so carewfully constructed for us in the shopping experience. In shoping we get to glut ousekves in the perpetual present of choice that we have carefully manufactured.
Of course the exten of this present has to be carefully controlled. Product only sll as long as this present can be given as just that – a present. That is as something that can be delightfully held within the mind and thought of in one glance. One glorious rich present- alive with possibility and hope. A prexent in which and through which we can endless renew our possibilities and ap[parently enrich our soul. If then the present is too complex- if theiur are too many chipoces- or he images are too confusing – we real back – and become dazed and confused. Shopping in no way can be sublime. It I not about disruption – but rather choice and indulgence. Its power lies in the fact that it appeals directly to us now – and gives us in the present something apparently worth having_ that is a deep and rich experience – in which we can locate ourselves – and find value in that location.
The entire mechaniis is then designed around the selling of presents. This is of ourse what makes it quite such a powerful force in the world. The present is afterall what we live in and across. What we are through – and what we immediately recognize. It is in a sense everything that is least difficult in us and for us. To have a system geared around it – to have it desires pampered in every degree – is utter relaxation (well almost comotisation –but never mind). To be in a catilaist strate is too relax – under the banner of freedom –and democracy. It is to assume that one must bethe end of democracy- they moement of stillness – the moement the real present is finally created. No wonder then the image sells.
And yet there is a certain flipside to this enmriched present – something absolutely hidden – and yet absolutely real – a over complexified future. To enrich the present is to change the world. To demand endless enriched presents is to crate endless more complexity in the world – and thereby up the possible number of future. I mean what is really scary about our current situation ( I mean global warmimng) is not so much that we know we are all going to die in ten years time – that would actually be strangely unterrifying. – and is not the problem., What is really worrying is niot that we know what will happen but rather that we do not. I mean the point is in then years time – as the planet warms up – the weather we get will increasingly change – and oimplell us to new futures – new ways of bing as yet unthought by us. The effect then of enriching the of present is to complexify the future – and challenge all the assumptions about ourelves and here we are in the world.
And yet of course captialsim by its very nature is unaware of this enriching. How could it be aware of it – as it only inhabits the enriched present? The upshot of this of course is that it is utterly unable to deal with a future until it manifests itself. Now this is all very well (and of course inevitable – the worse governments are always those that ar trying to ancticapte the future acions of its citizens). But the problem of course is that cpaialism then not only ignores that future – but it also makes that future utterly more problematic- and in a way that it cannot prossibly imagine – or at last not until it is forced to. Now this situation is not unique to us at all. In a sense as Marx noted it is really something inherent within the capialism system. Capitalism works by enriching one time and compleixifying another- and comes under very great strain when the latter finally erupts across the former. For example in 1929 – the over complex capital markets (that is the elbourate systems of never never on which the system was bsed) suddenly were questioned – were understood just for what they were – un proved futures. With the result that the glittering present of the 1920’s dissvolvd nito the absolutely future- of the 30’s – people lost faith in the present- and in enriching it – and demanded then a polit6ics of the future. And this of course they got. In Amreica first and then in britian this p[oilticis was that of a state that careed for its individuals – and worried about then from cradle to grave. That tis capitalism was forced to enrich its present – or rather tograft onto that present another quite separate orld – the world of welfare and worry – the world of the future. The alternative politic- a pl;oticis that utterly forgoit the present at all – that dissolved everything into the future was of course also tried- with the obvious barbaric results.
Wjat then can nnone learn from this? In s esne nothing – one can never learn about the future from th past. The one thing that we can be sure about it that when the over copmplexified future does indeed emerge again – it will do so in a way that we cannot anticipate. The elesson of Auswitzsch is not the Balir lesson (though God he needs to learn it) that all predjudice is bad – of course it is bad – but that does not mean it necessarily lealds to the concentration camp. No the lesson we need to learn is two fold. Furstly that captialsim had a problem with the future., That it enriches the present at the cost of creating as disjointed future- a future that eventually engulfs us – unless that is when modifies capotialsim first. And secobndly and equally importantly (though it is a toipic for another essay) that when that future does eventually emerge – when a politics of the future is defined. It will (whene defined in its pure state) cease of some lillte act – some lillte unplesantess of which we are capapble and tranfigure tthat making it the central point around which the world must turn (the war against terror is a beautiful potential example of just such a tranfuiguration – although we know not where it will lead). Leading on from this – it is also clear that capial;sim itself goes not forcast its own demise. It cannot. It has in a sense no politics of the future – until; that future engulfs it – and then it can graft a new order into itelf – and create within its modified future the possibility for a different system.
I eman the lesson of this history – is the lesson of just how hard it is for captialsm to think the future, It does not ever do i. It can be made to allow for it – and to create it within itelf – and enforced to engulf it- but only when it is forced to by other alternative. Pure capitalism is bnoxious – and absolutely about the present. Unable to think the future in itself – while the alternative-0 tha is a politicis based on the fuure is of course simopky terrifying.
S what canb we learn from this? That is a sense history is reapeting itself, The beguiloing present is undermining all the safe guards all the elements that were installed in captialsim to make it think about the tfuiture. We are increasingly in the present- and actively denying the reality of any other world. That is – we demand that saving the environement must most hurt own own economic situation. We must not suffer now to he;lpt the world then – seems to be the mantra. The best we appear to be will iing to do I to some how ‘prenicfiy’ that future – that is to trade carbon imitations – that is to trade in the present the right to destroy the future. Such a trading is of course inherently paradoxical .The point of the future as we are busy creating it for ourselves –0 is that we can no longer qquite know the effet of our actions. We simply do not know what we are trading. Buying the right to destroy the environment is equalivalent to selling in the present the right to create absolute and pereptual uncertainity into the future – and acriss all the future. W cannot know what we are buying – or what we are sellig – and save that it has the advantage (fior us0 that we a effectively bribing the third world to stay poor- or rather compensating them in the their poverty) – it seems of little advantage – and certainly it is unlikely to be able to prevent the current crisis – that is the moement when we disover exactly what we have been trading all this time. That is the damage the entire interealtes ystem has done to us.
So then should we desapair. Definitely not. Despaurung is absolutely the worse thing one can do,. The point is not that a;ll things are miuserable – but rather that in a deperate desire to nrich our present that we are creating just what tha6 p[resent cannot coope within – an absolutely complicated future. Our task then has nit to second guess the nature of that future – as we simply cannot know what it is – and will not know unitl it erupts ( if we could trading carbn would not be as idotic as all tht). Rather our task is to fac up to the uncerntainity – to modify as far as we can our own actions – our own over ricxh presents – to reduce our oart in making it – and to think and endlessly rethink out the possiblitieis for this hidden future. With the hope that ehn it does emerge we have made ourselves flexible enough that we can ciope within it – a create within it a vialble politics that unties present and future.