Free trade and the freedom of capital to move across borders have been the cutting edge of globalisation. They’ve also led to the succession of crises that have led to the widespread questioning of capitalism as a way of organising economic life — and of its paramount ideological expression, neoliberalism.
The protests against capitalism at the recent G20 meeting in Hamburg may seem superficially the same as those which marked similar meetings in the early 2000s. But there’s one big difference now: Global capitalism is in a period of long-term stagnation following the global financial crisis. The newer protests represent a