Global political economy

Bill Dunn, Pluto Press, 370 pages, paperback, £19.99

The economic crisis over the last year has led to serious intellectual challenges to the prevailing world order.

One of the tenets of neoliberalism has been the advocacy of free trade, while opponents have often taken refuge in forms of protectionism.

This book seeks to overcome the simplistic antagonism between free trade and protection, and dualisms between market- and state-led strategies, arguing that posing the debate in this way is misleading and profoundly conservative.

The author argues against the free trade advocates that there is no systematic relationship between the tendency to trade and overall economic well-being.

But he also warns against demands for economic self-sufficiency, which directs opposition to global capital into safe, nationalistic channels.

Similarly, the book points to the way markets are shaped and driven by the state policies, in setting the framework in which profits are generated.

This was only too graphically indicated by the way finance has been propped up by state intervention over the last year.

Surveying recent debates about imperialism, globalisation and dependency, the author concludes that there are still substantial international, national, regional and local spaces in which to organise opposition to global capital.

The terrain on which labour organises has changed, and will change again as capital restructures — but there are still possibilities for the labour movement to revive and prosper.