Capitalism

Website editor: An interesting interview

Winter 2023 (New Politics Vol. XIX No. 2, Whole Number 74)

An Interview with Alyssa Battistoni

Alyssa Battistoni teaches political theory at Barnard College. She is the co-author of A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal (Verso 2019) and is currently writing a book titled Free Gifts: Capitalism and the Politics of Nature. Phil Gasper spoke with Alyssa on behalf of the New Politics editorial board on November 4, 2022.

Jan. 28, 2023

We need to replace consumerism with “quality of life, human solidarity, and ecological sensibility”.

Much has happened in the interval that separates us from James Watson, who, by inventing the steam engine in 1784 formally marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and the world’s first fossil-fuel economy. If the Anthropocene epoch had begun by now, the revolution heightened its fervour, anticipating the emergence of modern human society.

Given that the immanent drive and constant tendency of capital is to atomize the working class, what are the effects of this tendency? For the atomized worker, all other workers are competitors; all other workers are enemies in so far as they are competing for the same jobs. All other workers potentially stand between them and the satisfaction of their needs.