Op-ed
The Techno-Feudal Method to Musk’s Twitter Madness – Project Syndicate op-ed
, 06/12/2022
Immediately after taking over Twitter and pronouncing himself Chief Twit, Elon Musk affirmed his commitment to safeguarding the platform as the “public square” where anything and everything is debated. It was a smart tactic, because it successfully diverted the public’s attention from what Musk is really up to. ATHENS – Elon Musk had good reasons […]
The New Iranian Revolution as an opportunity for the Internationalist Left – Project Syndicate
, 15/11/2022
Iran’s protesters will neither submit to the fascism hidden behind the regime’s pseudo-anti-imperialism nor surrender their country to the hegemony of the United States or their economy to financialized capital. The Western left should learn from them. ATHENS – Dealing with random, unprovoked abuse is never easy. But dealing with random, unprovoked praise can be […]
Rishi Sunak’s ‘grown-up’ austerity is designed to keep zombie capitalism alive
, 10/11/2022
The demise of Trussonomics was a welcome victory for decency and common sense in a minor battle within a broader class war. Sadly, the class that Liz Truss tried to bolster with copious tax and regulatory gifts will win this war by deploying an even nastier, blunter, dirtier weapon: austerity. Britain’s wealthy owe a debt […]
Iran’s Revolutionary Moment as the Internationalist Left’s Great Challenge – by Shoja Azari
, 24/10/2022
Shoja Azari, is an Iranian visual artist and filmmaker based in New York, working with Sherin Neshat, his life-long partner and comrade, on art projects of note and substance. Their last project is Land of Dreams, a magnificent new film set in the United States but ever so redolent of meaning viz. the New Iranian […]
How the West poisoned its money – Project Syndicate op-ed
, 10/10/2022
ATHENS – Capitalism conquered the world by commodifying almost everything that had a value but not a price, thus driving a sharp wedge between values and prices. It did the same to money. The exchange value of money always reflected people’s readiness to hand over valuable things for given sums of cash. But, under capitalism, […]
Is This the End of ‘Socialism for the Rich’? – The Atlantic
, 10/10/2022
Last Thursday, the International Monetary Fund spooked the markets and surprised the commentariat by chiding the U.K. Conservative government for fiscal irresponsibility. The shock was palpable. For the IMF to criticize the government of a major Western economy was a little like the janitor scolding the landlord for putting the building’s assessed value at risk. That sense […]
Trickle-down Truss is carrying on the dirty work of Thatcher, Blair and Osborne – THE GUARDIAN
, 01/10/2022
If Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget survives the storm it triggered, a banker on a million-pound annual salary stands to receive £50,000 of income tax relief – on top of the extra bonuses the bank can throw in, now that the Liz Truss government has removed the cap on them. Meanwhile, a Deliveroo rider gets a pep […]
Zombie capitalism is unravelling – THE NEW STATESMAN
, 29/09/2022
This is no sterling crisis. It is a crisis of British capitalism caused by 40 years of underinvestment and deindustrialisation, exacerbated by chronic reliance on speculative bubbles and triggered by Liz Truss’s extravagant kindness to Britain’s wealthy. While all eyes are on the fall of the pound, the real drama revolves around the Bank of England’s […]
The Greek Watergate – UNHERD
, 23/09/2022
Nothing surprises me more than politicians professing to be surprised that their phones have been tapped. In the world revealed to us by Edward Snowden almost a decade ago, no phone is beyond the reach of motivated eavesdroppers. This is not to say, however, that phone-tapping political opponents has lost its capacity to poison democracy. […]
Are we Greeks insufferable nationalists? UNHERD
, 18/09/2022
We Greeks have a reputation for being insufferable nationalists, most of whom genuinely believe that Greek culture is superior to that of other nations and peoples. We were even anointed the most culturally chauvinistic Europeans in a recent Pew survey. At the risk of confirming that stereotype, I shall blame it on… foreigners, with their immoderate […]
Time to Blow Up the Electricity Markets – Project Syndicate
, 18/09/2022
The European Union’s power sector is a good example of what market fundamentalism has done to electricity networks the world over. With the end of cheap natural gas, retail consumers and businesses are paying the price for their governments’ embrace of a shoddy theory. ATHENS – The blades of the wind turbines on the mountain […]
Inflation, socialism’ for corporations & austerity for workers: FORTUNE comments on Yanis Varoufakis’ take
, 18/09/2022
Known for sporting a leather jacket in meetings with foreign dignitaries during his brief stint as Greece’s finance minister in 2015, Yanis Varoufakis has become a bit of a rebel in economic circles. A member of Greece’s Hellenic Parliament and founder of the left-wing European Realistic Disobedience Front, or MeRA25 party, Varoufakis hasn’t historically pulled any […]
Inflation as a Political Power Play Gone Wrong – Project Syndicate op-e
, 30/07/2022
The blame game over surging prices is on. Was it too much central-bank money being pumped out for too long that caused inflation to take off? Was it China, where most physical production had moved before the pandemic locked down the country and disrupted global supply chains? Was it Russia, whose invasion of Ukraine took […]
Here is what Central Banks could do to stem inflation without crushing the poor or killing off the Green Transition – The Guardian
, 16/04/2022
Inflation is a disease that disproportionately afflicts the poor. Even before Vladimir Putin unleashed his brutal war on Ukraine, whose byproducts include soaring energy and food prices, inflation was already over 7.5% in the US and above 5% in Europe and the UK. Calls for its taming are, therefore, fully justified – and the interest rate rise in the US, […]
Cloudalists: Our New Cloud-based Ruling Class – Project Syndicate op-ed
, 12/04/2022
Capital is everywhere, yet capitalism is on the wane. In an era when the owners of a new form of “command capital” have gained exorbitant power over everyone else, including traditional capitalists, this is no contradiction. ATHENS – Once upon a time, capital goods were just the manufactured means of production. Robinson Crusoe’s salvaged fishing […]
Why Stop at the Russian Oligarchs? Project Syndicate op-ed
, 12/04/2022
At a time when Russian bombs are destroying Ukrainian cities, there is good reason to focus on the oligarchs supporting the Kremlin. But do American multi-billionaires and Saudi princes enjoy less political clout, stash less money abroad, and use their influence any better? ATHENS – No sooner had Roman Abramovich, newly targeted by the United […]
Putin’s criminal invasion, Europe’s response, America’s role – AVVENIRE interview (English version)
, 05/03/2022
Avvenire wanted to know my opinion of Putin, of his invasion, of Europe’s and America’s role, of what this war means for Europe and, of course, they wanted me to explain my support for a diplomatic solution based on the idea of an independent, free, neutral Ukraine. Here is the original English text. What is […]
How the euro divided Europe, and why countries like Bulgaria should not join – Project Syndicate, Oxford Union video & Keynote audio
, 26/01/2022
This January marked the 20th anniversary of euro notes and coins circulating. In an op-ed published by Project Syndicate I argue that the euro was an unmitigated failure even by the criteria of its architects. This is an updated analysis of a keynote I delivered a few years ago at the Oxford Union – see […]
Why We Must Challenge Zuckerberg’s Ring of Power – Project Syndicate
, 26/01/2022
Learning to appreciate that control is an illusion is hard, especially when we are prepared to sacrifice almost everything, to pay any price, to control others. But if we are to stop others—Mark Zuckerberg, for example—from controlling us, it is a lesson we must learn. Once upon a time, in the ancient kingdom of Lydia, a […]
On Brexit and the task of confronting technofeudalism – Interview in The Morning Star
, 03/01/2022
ONE YEAR since the final deal for Brexit was announced, it remains one of the most divisive political subjects for a generation. Perhaps unknown to most, the incendiary B-word had its genesis in the term “Grexit” — coined during tumultuous years after the 2008 credit crunch when a Greek exit from the EU was speculated, […]
Defining wealth in 65 words for SPEARS magazine
, 27/12/2021
Spears asked me, and three others, to define WEALTH in fewer than 70 words. Their rationale was that, at the time of Spear’s founding, in 2006, there were fewer than 1,000 billionaires world-wide; their combined net worth a little under $3 trillion. Today, there are 2,755 billionaires, according to Forbes, and they have a collective […]
The West’s Wasted Year – Project Syndicate
, 06/12/2021
A year that began hopefully is ending grimly. Western political elites, unable (and perhaps unwilling) to turn a deadly pandemic and climate crisis into a life-preserving opportunity, have only themselves to blame. ATHENS – The silver lining in the gloomy cloud of the pandemic was the opportunity it gave the West to mend its ways. […]
A Progressive Monetary Policy Is the Only Alternative – Project Syndicate
, 06/12/2021
Torn between inflationary jitters and fear of deflation, central bankers in the major advanced economies are taking a potentially costly wait-and-see approach. Only a progressive rethink of their tools and aims can help them play a socially useful post-pandemic role. ATHENS – As the coronavirus pandemic recedes in the advanced economies, their central banks increasingly […]
LA STAMPA interview on the Italian edition of ANOTHER NOW: From Marinnetti & the Sex Pistols to Hephaestus & favourite books
, 17/11/2021
On the occasion of the publication of my ANOTHER NOW in Italian (Un Altro Presente), La Stampa put to me some quirky and irreverent questions. Just in case you wanted to read them, and my answers, in the English original, here they are. Have fun! Marinetti and the Sex Pistols are milestones for Costa: is […]