> Ok, this was written almost forty years ago. Since then, we've seen
> the rise of Japan, Korea, and China, the neoliberal restructuring of
> the so-called Third World, Reaganism/Thatcherism in the north, the
> total transformation of the American corporate landscape, and
> intensification of competition worldwide, the crushing of labor, and
> a substantial restoration of profitability. This is not a tale of
> stagnation or failure, but of a very dynamic system.
>
> Doug
And the per capita global growth rates of output of the 50s were higher than of the 60s, the 60s were higher than of the 70s, the 70s were higher than the 80s, the 80s were higher than the 90s and the 90s were higher than the 00s so far. Vibrant dynamism?
Baran and Sweezy were not saying that monopoly capitalism would not change, indeed they were arguing that faced with its central contradictions it would more and more rely on militarism and imperialism and "sales effort" and all the features that have come to dominate its present existence.
As for "intensified competition" let's not go round the bush again with the one nonsense paper from the Harvard BS without sources. "Intensified competition" does not describe the world i'm living in - the media? Microsoft? Wall-Mart? retail or investment banking and brokerage? energy companies? , in fact all the biggest and most important sectors are more concentrated and with less competition, in the US and globally.
But as i see it things are not as dark as you picture them to be. As for their ability to use their power to offset their problems - yes, in the class war in the core countries & the ex-bloc the working class has as you say been "crushed" - but the story is far from over, and broad resistance has emerged (note in particular Latin America) that is challenging big time "the neoliberal restructuring of the so-called Third World". Even in China and India, where intellectuals/clerks have swallowed whole the neoliberal nonsense, suddenly there is a visible slowing of the spread of the marketliberal disease.
But back to the Norris question of why there is a flood of "capital" but no sound investment opportunities, the answer of Baran&Sweezy was right 40 years ago and fits like a glove today. Investment in new capacity is a threat to profits - "overcapacity" in manufacure is the normal state - and the bloating of the "sales effort" and militarism and monopoly profits in "intellectual property" and gambling in casinos, stock markets, housing markets, whatever, pumped out by the great US dollar machine requires more and more pumping for smaller and smaller results. As Baran and Sweezy said it would.
john mage