What Time Is It? (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798277244913)

We live in changing times. Across North America and Europe a postwar golden period of Keynesian big government, from roughly 1945-1975, was replaced by a privatizing, market-obsessed neoliberal period that reigned for another thirty years, roughly 1980-2010. The Great Recession of 2008 and its aftermath decisively broke the neoliberal era. Since then we have been in a period of ferment and uncertainty, with rapid political, economic, and technological change.

In this book I use political theorists, from Machiavelli to Wolin, as well as social scientists and cultural analysts, to lend insight into these changing times. The book is organized around three related themes: 1) accelerating capitalist time, 2) the necessity for slow political time, and 3) the fact that we inhabit a world of rapid political time.

At the same time as we seem to be racing into an unknown future we also seem to be stuck: stagnant living standards, an inability to build new infrastructure, a culture that keeps producing sequels and spinoffs. We are thus in a weird interregnum-stagnation amid acceleration seems to be the order of the day. The future is impossible to predict but careful analysis can lend insight into the breakdown of neoliberalism and the changing political cleavages in the wealthy democracies of the world, as the professional classes embrace the center left and the working classes embrace the right. Understanding these dynamics is essential if we are to get a grip on this unsettled time.