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Late-Stage Capitalism? Accumulation in the Ruins

Late-Stage Capitalism? Accumulation in the Ruins

The Socialist Register 2026

This 62nd volume of The Socialist Register unravels the crises of late-stage capitalism—plutocratic plunder, techno-feudalism, Trump’s return, fractured empires—while charting struggles, contradictions, and emerging left alternatives.

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About the book

The current matrix of capital accumulation is shifting—but what comes next? New terms abound: plutocratic plunder, political capitalism, techno-feudalism, techno-futurism. Some envision a new “habitation economy” where non-standardized services replace commodity production. Others warn of an unstable interregnum, with authoritarian states fusing with far-right movements. The common image is of a capitalist class barricaded in securitized enclaves, shielded from climate chaos and the anger of dislocated, hyper-stressed workers.

This volume untangles these competing themes, identifying key trends, contradictions, and conflicts at the heart of “late-stage capitalism.” What does Donald Trump’s return to the presidency signal about this new phase? How are these shifts reshaping state power, institutional practices, and global markets?

Amid trade wars and geopolitical rivalries, how is the US empire being reinforced—or resisted? Most importantly, where is the left finding new political spaces amidst the economic ruins? These are the urgent questions the essays in this volume confront.

Economics International Politics Political Economy

Authors

Greg Albo

Greg Albo teaches political economy at the Department of Political Science, York University, Toronto. He is currently co-editor of the Socialist Register. He is also on the editorial boards of Studies in Political Economy, Relay, Capitalism, Nature, Socialism, Canadian Dimension, The Bullet and Historical Materialism (England). Co-editor of A Different Kind of State: Popular Power and Democratic Administration and author of numerous articles in journals such as Studies in Political Economy, Socialist Register, Canadian Dimension, and Monthly Review.

Stephen Maher

Stephen Maher is a social critic, PhD candidate at York and Socialist Register assistant editor.

Late-Stage Capitalism and Capitalist Economic Policy Today (Cedric Durand)
Finance / Central Banking and the Dollar (Scott Aquanno)
The Middle East States in the Arc of Global Capitalism (Adam Hanieh)
The Economic Policy of Contemporary Fascism (Alfredo Saad-Filho)
De-Dollarization, BRICS and India (Paramjit Singh)
Korea and Authoritarian Developmentalism (Dae-Oup Chang)
Sri Lanka and Confronting the IMF (Kanishka Goonewardena)
New Configurations of Accumulation in Latin America (Ana Garcia, Luciana Ghiotto & Rodrigo Pascual)
Contradictions of the Morena Project (Hepzibah Munoz-Martinez & Alejandro Alvarez)
Occupation and the De-Development of Palestine (Ibrahim Shikaki)
New Configurations of Global Trade (Michael Robert)
Trumpism and US Economic Policy: Counter-Revolution in Public Finances (Paul Heideman & Melinda Cooper)