Brian Holmes's blog

Periodization, again

Brian Holmes — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 18:46:49 +0000

Here's the difficulty I have with Kondratiev waves: it really seems to take two waves to create a complete cycle. What Perez calls a "technological style" actually unfolds over two Kondratiev waves. Between the two there is a regulation crisis with some kind of "successful" resolution (although it is very hard to call WWII "successful"); and then at the end, a kind of chaotic period during which the technological style begins to change.

So what will the 6th Kondratiev look like?

Brian Holmes — Sun, 19 Aug 2012 15:28:01 +0000

Industrial investment at the end of the Great Recession will likely be in the new generation of robots, used in both manufacturing and distribution.

"The Rise of China and the Demise of the Capitalist World-Economy"

Brian Holmes — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 05:01:43 +0000

While in China I read an extremely significant book about the development of the world-economy in the neoliberal period, by the expatriate Chinese economist Minqi Li.

Continental Drift through the Pampa

Brian Holmes — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 04:05:43 +0000

Recently I and Claire Pentecost went on an artistic research trip in Argentina with local collaborators. What we call a "Continental Drift." This was a perceptual encounter with the productive processes of a country subject to intense neoliberal restructuring. Hopefully next year we will do more collaborative research in a public seminar context in Buenos Aires, both to define Argentina's position as a hi-tech agro-exporter within Neoliberal Informationalism, and to contribute in some small way to the political breakdown of that hegemony, which is being actively sought by many on the official Argentine left. In the meantime you can read the one post I wrote in English during the experience:

http://brianholmes.wordpress.com/2011/04/20/this-way-to-the-port

Three Crises: 30s-70s-Now. A self-organized seminar at Mess Hall in Chicago.

Brian Holmes — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 03:48:09 +0000

Here is the outline of an autonomous technopolitics course which I plan to co-teach next fall with a Chicago collective. The focus is on US conditions but it's meant to have use-value for everyone involved, whether close or afar. Significant comments will result in changes to the outline. Selected readings and a full bibliography will eventually be added.

The Stalder/Holmes debate on technopolitics

Brian Holmes — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 21:02:27 +0000

This continues the series of "Three nettime posts on the Egyptian Uprising." Felix launched this debate by suggesting that the fall of Mubarak was the end of the process of eliminating outmoded central-planning and dictatorial state-forms that started in 1989. I proposed it was beginning of the breakdown of a 30-year attempt to stabilize the new conditions of globalization. The discussion then shifted onto technopolitical ground in the posts below, as I tried to describe the paradigm of neoliberal informationalism and Felix sorted out what he would and would not accept in that description. This pushed me to finally accept (in a slightly modified form) the idea that the current crisis is a regulation crisis of informationalism. Great debate!

Three nettime posts on the Egyptian uprising

Brian Holmes — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 04:29:06 +0000

1. A comment on a Hernando de Soto article in the Wall Street Journal:

Thanks for this, Patrice:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870435870457611868391303288...

Do Containers Dream of Electric People?

Brian Holmes — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 17:20:51 +0000

This article is a first attempt to specify some technical and conceptual aspects of the productive process under Informationalism, and to cut through some of the ideology surrounding it. The text suggests the role of the imaginary both in enabling and potentially disabling this social form (i.e. the value-form as expressed in contemporary society); but it doesn't deal with the integrative processes. Some research on migrant labor struggles in the US intermodal and warehouse sectors is underway, so hopefully we will publish something on it soon. All comments welcome, changes can still be made. Thanks to Armin for the just-in-time critique on version 1.0.

Book Review: The Origins of International Economic Disorder

Brian Holmes — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 01:03:42 +0000

The Origins of International Economic Disorder
A Study of United States Monetary Policy from World War II to the Present

by Fred L. Block
University of California Press, 1977 -- 277 pages

The book begins with an overview of the British gold standard and its gradual breakdown during the interwar period. This sets the stage for the main subject: the history of the monetary order underlying the multilateral free-trade system promoted and managed by the United States.

FAULT LINES & SUBDUCTION ZONES: The Slow-Motion Crisis of Global Capital

Brian Holmes — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 13:23:51 +0000

The housing-price collapse of 2008, the credit crunch, the bank failures, the downswing of the world economy, the fiscal crisis of the sovereign states, all have been expressed as wild gyrations in the global circulation of information, attention, emotion. Everything undergoes tremendous acceleration at the crucial moments, before the wave recedes into a blur.