What are the root causes of the global economic crisis?
Von Tobias Tulinus und Florian Hauschild
Im gesellschaftspolitischen Diskurs sind derzeit aus fast allen politischen Richtungen systemkritische Stimmen zu hören. "Konservative" erkennen dass "Linke" oft Recht hatten, es wird gemahnt und gewarnt, und dass der real existierende Kapitalismus nicht funktioniert, scheint mittlerweile eine Binsenweisheit geworden zu sein.
Dennoch tut die immer breitere Kritik dem derzeitigen EU-Krisenmanagement keinen Abbruch. Die europäische Elite über Merkel bis Sarkozy droht mit dem umstrittenen ESM-Vertragsentwurf das europäische Demokratie- und Transparenzdefizit nicht nur zu zementieren, sondern auch nationalstaatliche Handlungsspielräume weiter einzuschränken, so die Kritiker des so genannten Rettungsschirms.
Auch wenn generell eine koordinierte Wirtschafts- und Finanzpolitik Teil einer Währungsunion sein sollte, stellt sich doch die Frage, unter welchen Voraussetzungen und Kriterien dieser Politikwechsel nun verwirklicht werden soll.
Die öffentliche Debatte über Geld wird derweil unermüdlich geführt, doch woher Geld überhaupt kommt und wie unser Geldsystem funktioniert, wird dabei kaum erörtert. Dass der im Geldsystem verankerte Zinseszins mathematisch bedingt zu einer immer stärkeren Vermögensumverteilung führt, ist unwiderlegt. Kritiker dieser These werden zwar vereinzelt noch laut, lassen sich aber recht leicht widerlegen.
Ein weiterer bedeutender, aber viel seltener diskutierter Fehler im derzeitigen Geldsystem liegt jedoch in der gängigen Praxis der Geldschöpfung. Diese Praxis ist zutiefst ungerecht und undemokratisch. Da es ohne ein demokratisches Geldsystem auf Dauer auch keine funktionierende Demokratie geben kann, soll im Folgenden noch einmal detailliert diese Thematik vertieft werden. Aufbauend auf einem PDF der Bundesbank wird die gängige Giralgeldschöpfung umfangreich dargestellt:
What are the root causes of the global economic crisis?
by chilywilly
In the past decade, the world has seen the kind of power that unaccountable institutions wield. The effects of globalization since the mid 20th century have revealed highly centralized structures of power, from financial conglomerates to pharmaceutical monopolies and oligarchic neo-corporate states.
These dominant institutions not only have extensive control over resources and capital, but make social, economic, and political decisions outside the public’s sphere of influence. Their links to one another became ubiquitously apparent during the global economic crisis of 2008, and their alliances continue to pose the greatest threat to economic stability internationally moving forward.
Extensive analyses of global institutions have been done in the past by intellectuals and by courageous journalists. Much work has been done on explaining the roles that both businesses and states have to play in what's called a market society, and their respective (and general) interests have been closely examined. The work of populous intellectuals and muckraking techniques used by whistleblowers like WikiLeaks has inspired activists in communities all around the world to socially pressure powerful institutions for various humane purposes.
What are the root causes of the global economic crisis?
by AIS
"It is well that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning." ― Henry Ford
Historically, many things have been used for money with the most enduring form being Gold or Silver. Paper money is largely a new idea, and the tool of scoundrels and the devious to debase the value of people's savings.
The US dollar as the World's Reserve Currency was established as such by the Bretton Woods Agreement in 1944: “The chief features of the Bretton Woods system were an obligation for each country to adopt a monetary policy that maintained the exchange rate by tying its currency to the U.S. dollar and the ability of the IMF to bridge temporary imbalances of payments”.
“On August 15, 1971, the United States unilaterally terminated convertibility of the dollar to Gold. As a result, "[t]he Bretton Woods system officially ended and the dollar became fully 'fiat currency,' backed by nothing but the promise of the federal government."
Fiat currency is simply this: The government says that something is money and must therefore be used as money. In the case of the US it is paper money and base metal coins.
The Fed essentially creates money “out of thin air”. You can find out how this is done here.
What are the root causes of the global economic crisis?
Authored by JP Orient
Abstract: This analysis argues that today's financial crisis is driven by computational heuristics, discoveries made by machines, to find logical rationales for maintaining moribund power structures. Rather than using computational heuristics to lead societies toward a world in which people desire to co-exist, the essay shows how vested interests have used machines to dictate and defend corroding centers of power. The result is an Imperium ex Nihilo, an "Empire Out of Nothing" but the assumptions of man inside the narrow focus of profit and greed.
Today's financial crisis can be analyzed through an array of lenses. In the narrowest, it is the capitulation of Keynesian economics to social conservatism emboldened by concentrated wealth. In the broadest, it represents lost trust in societies that delivered some of mankind's greatest social achievements: Enlightenment, Scientific Method, Democracy and Human Rights. Through an ecological lens we might see it as a resource-limitation shadow cast upon an ailing Earth. Militarily we may someday see the crisis as the product of imperial overreach. Commercially it could be scrutinized as a corporatist revolt, whereby organized interests overthrew the state in managing the world's tenuous plenty behind fortified castles of capital.
However history's kaleidoscope is used to see the crisis, it will be observed that the designers all used the same weapon in its proliferation: machines built to think for them.[1]
THEME
The third monthly WikiLeaks Central Essay Competition 2011 solicits an answer to the question:
What are the root causes of the global economic crisis?
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