Christian Garland | King's College London (original) (raw)
Papers by Christian Garland
In our present early Twenty-First Century epoch, in bold contradistinction with the 1989-91 end o... more In our present early Twenty-First Century epoch, in bold contradistinction with the 1989-91 end of the Cold War and subsequent reassurances of the 90s, that 'The End of History' 1 had arrived, the past decade has seen the rise of populism and authoritarian would-be leaders worldwide. Similarly, both nationalism and outright fascism have once again become credible threats, whilst 'the left' has largely failed to respond or offer feasible answers to multiplying social problems. This belated and misfiring reaction to capitalism in crisis, simply the year: 2008 will give all that is needed to explain what is being referred to. What has occupied the energies of substantial sections of populations angry at elites seemingly operating as usual and the same limited and fatally flawed system continuing as before. Those individuals and institutions who helped it teeter on the brink of terminal failure, were able to profit from this whilst populations suffered as states socialized debt making society pay with austerity measures. This left a power vacuum to which any adequate response was noticeably lacking. From 2016, and the date bookends the year in which populism and authoritarian leaders 'first appeared', the wave of similar populist reaction has continued globally. Part of this has been the contention over what constitutes 'the truth' and facts themselves and misinformation, disinformation and 'fake news' continue to persist as serious problems. The bigger issue it might be argued is the implication that these methods can be used to attain power, either political or in any other sphere: a secondary and no less alarming problem also covered by this essay. Explicating a materialist analysis of what exactly the problem and threats populism and authoritarianism embody, and 'where they came from', the essay is most heavily influenced by the dissident and unorthodox Marxism of the Institut für Sozialforschung (Institute for Social Research). This paper takes as its subject the weapons of Marx and the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory to critically analyze the concept of Ideology Critique, and how Marx and Marxism remain the 'bad conscience of philosophy'. It also applies the concept of ideology critique to the unnerving predominance of right-wing and authoritarian narratives, still very much vying for political power in 2024.
https://www.publicacoesfacfil.pt/product.php?id_product=9344&fbclid=IwY2xjawEj
Marx and Philosophy Review of Books , 2021
Marx and Philosophy Review of Books , 2021
Garland, C. (2021) Review essay of Fleming, P. (2017) The Death of Homo Economicus: Work, Debt, a... more Garland, C. (2021) Review essay of Fleming, P. (2017) The Death of Homo Economicus: Work, Debt, and the Myth of Endless Accumulation (London: Pluto Press) and Moore, P.V (2019) The Quantified Self in Precarity: Work, Technology, and What Counts (London: Routledge) in Marx & Philosophy Review of Books ISSN 2042-2016
Contention: The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest, 9(2): 49-63, 2021
Ten years ago, a seemingly titanic wave of contention swept the globe. This article reflects on h... more Ten years ago, a seemingly titanic wave of contention swept the globe. This article reflects on how the impact of a wave of contentious political action that is now a full decade old manifests today. These "legacies of contention"-the historically contingent impact of contentious episodes-can variably re-enforce, undermine, or depart substantially from the original focus of a given contentious episode, a sign of how difficult it can be to extrapolate from the causal impact of contentious politics in the near-run. Herein we discuss the fates of some of the 2011 contentious episodes, including Syria, Greece, Israel, England, and the United States.
Platform Capitalism and the Wasteland of Technological Neoliberalism Ninth Biennial Conference... more Platform Capitalism and the Wasteland of Technological Neoliberalism
Ninth Biennial Conference, International Herbert Marcuse Society Conference 2021
October 7-10 2021, Arizona State University, Phoenix
In the early-2020s, the hyper-acceleration of digital technologies in the advanced economies-but production long since off shored to 'Newly Industrializing' countries and what was once known as the 'Third World'-continuously displacing human labor, what remains of 'work' becomes fragments of insecure and erratic directed activity. Much of this directed activity is without purpose, and very often will be pointless: what the late David Graeber correctly identified as Bullshit Jobs.
The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism, 2nd Edition eReference ISBN 978-3-030-29901-9 Print + eBook ISBN 978-3-030-29902-6 Print ISBN 978-3-030-29900-2 (London & New York: Palgrave Macmillan), 2020
Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital , 2019
Chapter in Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital, Crisis in the 21... more Chapter in Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital, Crisis in the 21st Century: Cross-National Evidence (London & New York: Palgrave Macmillan) Print ISBN 978-3-030-13638-3 Online ISBN 978-3-030-13639-0
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-13639-0
UnMediated (Journal of Politics and Communication) Issue 2.0 ‘Disruption’, 2019
http://unmediatedjournal.com/about/
Fast Capitalism Vol 16 Issue 1, 2019
In our present early Twenty-First Century epoch, in bold contradistinction with the 1989-91 end o... more In our present early Twenty-First Century epoch, in bold contradistinction with the 1989-91 end of the Cold War and subsequent reassurances of the 90s, that 'The End of History' 1 had arrived, the past decade has seen the rise of populism and authoritarian would-be leaders worldwide. Similarly, both nationalism and outright fascism have once again become credible threats, whilst 'the left' has largely failed to respond or offer feasible answers to multiplying social problems. This belated and misfiring reaction to capitalism in crisis, simply the year: 2008 will give all that is needed to explain what is being referred to. What has occupied the energies of substantial sections of populations angry at elites seemingly operating as usual and the same limited and fatally flawed system continuing as before. Those individuals and institutions who helped it teeter on the brink of terminal failure, were able to profit from this whilst populations suffered as states socialized debt making society pay with austerity measures. This left a power vacuum to which any adequate response was noticeably lacking. From 2016, and the date bookends the year in which populism and authoritarian leaders 'first appeared', the wave of similar populist reaction has continued globally. Part of this has been the contention over what constitutes 'the truth' and facts themselves and misinformation, disinformation and 'fake news' continue to persist as serious problems. The bigger issue it might be argued is the implication that these methods can be used to attain power, either political or in any other sphere: a secondary and no less alarming problem also covered by this essay. Explicating a materialist analysis of what exactly the problem and threats populism and authoritarianism embody, and 'where they came from', the essay is most heavily influenced by the dissident and unorthodox Marxism of the Institut für Sozialforschung (Institute for Social Research). This paper takes as its subject the weapons of Marx and the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory to critically analyze the concept of Ideology Critique, and how Marx and Marxism remain the 'bad conscience of philosophy'. It also applies the concept of ideology critique to the unnerving predominance of right-wing and authoritarian narratives, still very much vying for political power in 2024.
https://www.publicacoesfacfil.pt/product.php?id_product=9344&fbclid=IwY2xjawEj
Marx and Philosophy Review of Books , 2021
Marx and Philosophy Review of Books , 2021
Garland, C. (2021) Review essay of Fleming, P. (2017) The Death of Homo Economicus: Work, Debt, a... more Garland, C. (2021) Review essay of Fleming, P. (2017) The Death of Homo Economicus: Work, Debt, and the Myth of Endless Accumulation (London: Pluto Press) and Moore, P.V (2019) The Quantified Self in Precarity: Work, Technology, and What Counts (London: Routledge) in Marx & Philosophy Review of Books ISSN 2042-2016
Contention: The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest, 9(2): 49-63, 2021
Ten years ago, a seemingly titanic wave of contention swept the globe. This article reflects on h... more Ten years ago, a seemingly titanic wave of contention swept the globe. This article reflects on how the impact of a wave of contentious political action that is now a full decade old manifests today. These "legacies of contention"-the historically contingent impact of contentious episodes-can variably re-enforce, undermine, or depart substantially from the original focus of a given contentious episode, a sign of how difficult it can be to extrapolate from the causal impact of contentious politics in the near-run. Herein we discuss the fates of some of the 2011 contentious episodes, including Syria, Greece, Israel, England, and the United States.
Platform Capitalism and the Wasteland of Technological Neoliberalism Ninth Biennial Conference... more Platform Capitalism and the Wasteland of Technological Neoliberalism
Ninth Biennial Conference, International Herbert Marcuse Society Conference 2021
October 7-10 2021, Arizona State University, Phoenix
In the early-2020s, the hyper-acceleration of digital technologies in the advanced economies-but production long since off shored to 'Newly Industrializing' countries and what was once known as the 'Third World'-continuously displacing human labor, what remains of 'work' becomes fragments of insecure and erratic directed activity. Much of this directed activity is without purpose, and very often will be pointless: what the late David Graeber correctly identified as Bullshit Jobs.
The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism, 2nd Edition eReference ISBN 978-3-030-29901-9 Print + eBook ISBN 978-3-030-29902-6 Print ISBN 978-3-030-29900-2 (London & New York: Palgrave Macmillan), 2020
Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital , 2019
Chapter in Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital, Crisis in the 21... more Chapter in Confronting Capital in the 21st Century: Lessons from Marx’s Capital, Crisis in the 21st Century: Cross-National Evidence (London & New York: Palgrave Macmillan) Print ISBN 978-3-030-13638-3 Online ISBN 978-3-030-13639-0
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-13639-0
UnMediated (Journal of Politics and Communication) Issue 2.0 ‘Disruption’, 2019
http://unmediatedjournal.com/about/
Fast Capitalism Vol 16 Issue 1, 2019