"The hegemony of finance capital"? Talk about flaws in one's argument...
----Original Message Follows---- From: "Ian Murray" <seamus2001 at home.com> Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com To: "Lbo-Talk at Lists. Panix. Com" <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> CC: <pen-l at galaxy.csuchico.edu> Subject: Walden Bello on Naomi Klein Date: Mon, 23 Apr 2001 19:27:11 -0700
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NO LOGO: A BRILLIANT BUT FLAWED PORTRAIT OF CONTEMPORARY CAPITALISM
A review of No Logo, by Naomi Klein, HarperCollins/Flamingo, London, 2000. 490 pp by Walden Bello
When the young Canadian woman modestly handed me her book, with the quiet dedication "to Walden, with respect and solidarity," little did I know that I was receiving a stick of dynamite. Before our meeting at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, a few weeks ago, I had, of course, heard of Naomi Klein and had read somewhere that her No Logo was fast becoming the anthem of the anti-globalization movement.
But nothing had prepared me for the dizzying intellectual experience of going through the book.
No Logo is compelling, but it is not an easy read. Reading Klein is like serving alongside a skilled commander...
Naomi Klein paints an unparalleled portrait of the culture of capitalism in the age of globalization. She also provides us with the best analysis yet of the rise of the anti-globalization movement. She has, moreover, written a very insightful work on the dynamics of light manufacturing, the service sector, entertainment, and retail, where marketing has eclipsed manufacturing, where selling the product has given way to establishing the hegemony of the brand in the consumer's total lifestyle. But the portrait is incomplete and one-dimensional. Nike and Tommy Hilfiger are not in the same class as Intel, Microsoft, Long-Term Capital, Cisco Systems, and Citigroup, the high-tech and financial giants which power the rest of the economy. Indeed, Nike and Adidas and Walt Disney ultimately dance to the tune of the Wall Street-Silicon Valley complex. In the total economy, it is not "synergy" or brand imperialism that ultimately serves as the engine of change but the classical crisis of overcapacity in production leading to the hegemony of finance capital. In sum, this is a book that is as brilliant as it is flawed. But then what great book isn't?
* Walden Bello is executive director of Focus on the Global South.
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