Capitalism, Biotechnology, Securitisation and Other Scary Words! By Melancholic Troglodytes - on Mute.
Speculation and risk management, once the preserve of finance, have become defining traits of all facets of contemporary capitalism - from military planning to stem cell research. The Melancholic Troglodytes review two recent books exploring the expansion of this speculative logic There are distinct ideological ties of continuity between these two contributions. Influenced as they are by post-structuralist and autonomist currents, they attempt to project certain characteristics within contemporary capitalism into the near future in order to theorise emergent trends. Both texts link these trends to novel forms of warfare and security. Moreover, without stating it explicitly, they both employ discourse and rhetorical analysis as methodology. Thematically, however, they focus on different areas of capitalist development. Cooper's book looks at the rise of biotechnology within neoliberalism whilst Martin identifies risk management and the derivatives market as the driving force of a new form of American imperialism. Below we will review these two texts separately although significant overlaps will be pointed out as and when applicable. http://tinyurl.com/645d89 _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
