Capitalism thrives all around the world (more or less),
from China to Africa.
It is definitely not in crisis –
it is just the people caught in this explosive development that are in crisis.
This tension between overall rapid growth
and local crisis and misery
is part of capitalism’s normal functioning:
capitalism renews itself
through such crisis.

Let’s take slavery.
While capitalism legitimizes itself
as the economic system that implies and furthers personal freedom
(as a condition of market exchange),
it generated slavery on its own,
as a part of its own dynamics:
although slavery became almost extinct
at the end of the Middle Ages,
it emerged in colonies from early modernity
until the American Civil War.
And one can risk the hypothesis that today,
with the new global epoch of capitalism,
a new era of slavery is also arising.

….slavery acquires a multitude of new forms:
millions of migrant workers in the Saudi peninsula
(UAE, Qatar, etc.,) who are deprived of elementary human rights
and freedoms and subject to limited mobility;

The total control over millions of workers
in Asian sweatshops, often consciously organized as concentration camps.

The massive use of forced labor in the exploitation of natural resources
in many central African states (Congo, etc.,)

This new de facto apartheid, this systematic explosion
of a number of forms of contemporary slavery,
is not a deplorable accident
but a structural necessity
of today’s global capitalism.

Excerpt The Courage Of Hopelessness
By Slavoj Zizek p. 29

---

Awakened yesterday morning making myself a more than adequate cup of coffee in my aloft hotel room.  “Life is good” when one can afford a decent room in Manhattan.

So what are my impressions of New York City, a newcomer having my first experience of this world class city?  It’s big, bigger than big.  As my traveling companion commented the skyscrapers in any one of the sections of New York could be considered a substantial downtown center in any number of smaller cities around the country.  The notion of steel and concrete canyons is not just a metaphor.  We are dwarfed in our vehicle as we peered through the windshield at the scene ahead of us.

As to culture, the crystallization of our way of life, New York stands alone.  The city is the front runner in the number and reputation of it’s institutions.  The Metropolitan Museum of Art is an awe inspiring building even from the street.  Standing for a few minutes on the loading dock while making delivery of a donated antique carousel horse, the overheard conversation among the curators taking possession of the work was inspiring.  They love the objects of beauty and reference to past generations of Americans.  Included here is a shot of a donation of a french poodle carousel animal being received by a representative at the Museum of the Dog.  Yes, there are many museums in New York City.

I must also say that New York impressed me with begrimed streets, and unconcealed rancor in the press and jostle of traffic.  The filth of a big dump truck tailgate captured this for me.  I could not have handled our uhaul in that traffic.  I felt relief, gratitude that Tobin was a veteran New Yorker and understood the informal rules of survival on the congested, potholed streets .

I sensed in my bones that the city is an economic and legally violent place to live if one is not well educated, not well-employed with the resources to find a secure niche for oneself in city society.  I suppose that any of the big world-class cities display this characteristic.  Where else would one see a large RV-like vehicle purposed to convey lawyers, legal help throughout the area?  The sight of the legal-help vehicle struck me as a post-modern version of the circus clown car.

How many lawyers can you get in a RV?