This is interesting in the sense that I am somewhat surprised the discourse around capital does not make mention of Lenin, who wrote quite a substantial body of texts discussing this exact subject. From what I remember from his readings was that essentially becuase capitalism affords the accumulation of surplus capital, the unavoidable consequence of imperialism is an abstracted yet directly implicated resultant. Hence, financialization exists as a precursor towards foreign control and occupation of distant economies in the effort of securing more capital.
The derivatives component in terms of how he classifies it as leveraging risk is correct. The securitization of debt as a means of not only guaranteeing your assets irrespective of the market conditions but also facilitating a somewhat obscure accounting technique to cover your actual leverage (level 3 accounting) and hence avoiding the mark-to-market is the tactical and strategic course of action which led the US system to the collapse as it is seen today. Bear Stears evidently was leveraged 100 / 1 before it's borrowing capacity was revoked. If we return to fractional lending practices, if we return to why a fiat currency was created at all, then it becomes painfully obvious how the resource manipulation as well as conglomeration of power became assimilated into central banks and the federal reserve, as opposed to the treasuries of democratic welfare states. Everyone should be buying silver, and a lot of it. /*Chad Scoville -----Original Message----- From: Paul Miller [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, October 3, 2008 05:09 PM To: 'nettime-l' Subject:Capital and Language: Christian Marrazi # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: http://mail.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
