[...]
...the word "crisis" was not used by Doug Henwood nor enough others in the US, UK, Oz, NZ, India, or South Africa to project the logical trajectory of the economy, and hence the current mess is all a great surprise to those who, believing neoliberalism might deliver the goods, voted for neolib or neocon parties.
[...]
...give some credit for what she's accomplished, otherwise this review sounds too jealous, picky and snarky.
The review, Doug, is foul-moody. ===================================== Not my impression. I thought the review was a very good commentary on the analytical shortcomings of the anti-globalization movement, of which NK is a leading representative, and that the tone was on the whole constructive. But I suppose it depends on the angle of vision of the reader.
Also not my impression that the crisis came as a "great surprise" to Henwood and others on the left. The surprise would be if they didn't understand that financial and economic crises have been a recurrent feature of capitalism. That capitalism is crisis-prone is well understood across the political spectrum; even the speculators know that at some point the party will end and they'll and be faced with a giant hangover, despite their wishful thinking that maybe "this time is different".
There are those on the left who, from the opposite perspective, engage in wishful thinking of their own that this time will be different - that *this* crisis will be the one to result in a systemic collapse - even though the severity of these regular crises, the depth of popular response to them, and the system's capacity to recover are essentially unpredictable.