Japan's Economic Crisis "Flat on its back for years and showing few signs of life, Japan's economy was nonetheless still in the world of the living. When we last checked, that is. Reports of its imminent demise are now coming thick and fast. A world that had grown bored with the 'Japan isn't growing' story is suddenly paying attention to the new 'Japan will collapse and take the rest of us with it' story." The Economist, 11/4/98. Phil Mitchinson analyses the reasons behind.
A New Stage in the Capitalist Crisis This long article by Alan Woods reviews the events since the stock exchange crash of October 1997, and how the crisis has spread to the once powerfull economies of South Korea and Japan despite the reassuring comments of most bourgeois economist in the aftermath of the crash. An update to the ideas developed in Ted Grant's article The First Tremors - An analysis of the global economic situation
The First Tremors - An analysis of the global economic situation In this major article, Ted Grant provides us with a general analysis of the present state of capitalism. With chapters on the nature of the boom/slump cycle, the peculiarities of the present "boom", the claim that Information Technology has solved the problems of capitalism, the crisis of overproduction, the situation in South East Asia, the consecuences that the coming slump will have and the tasks in front of Marxists at this particular juncture.
First Tremors of the Coming Slump In this introduction to the special feature Rob Sewell gives a general view of the meaning of the present turbulence in the markets and explains why we say these are just the first tremors of a coming slump.
Tiger Economies in Crisis Michael Roberts, ecomics editor of Socialist Appeal, explains the immediate causes of the present crash of the markets: the currency crisis in South East Asia and how these economies, which were supposed to be models of capitalist development suddenly collapsed.
What's happening to the working class? It has become fashionable among contemporary bourgeois historians and sociologists to belittle the role of the working class by claiming that it has been diminished in size and influence. Some even venture as far as declaring that the working class no longer exists. Nothing could be further from the truth. Mick Brooks answered these points in an article that was originally published in November 1996 in the British Socialist Appeal.
Flood-Tide: The Economic Conjuncture and the World Labour Movement The capitalist world enters a period of industrial upswing. Booms alternate with depressions – an organic law of capitalist society. The current boom nowise indicates the establishment of equilibrium in the class structure. A crisis frequently helps the growth of anarchist and reformist moods among the workers. The boom will help fuse the working masses.
