The Politics of Public Debt

In The Politics of Public Debt, Daniel Bin analyzes how fiscal and monetary policies and the administration of public debt related to class, labor, and democracy during the period of neoliberal financialization in Brazil. Sustained by state action, the politico-economic context allowed the establishment of a macroeconomic framework that favored finance capital. It was characterized by the expropriation of workers' incomes through a system involving public debt and taxation, capable of deepening labor exploitation. Decisions about public debt and related policies are analyzed in terms of their implications for economic democracy. The book raises the hypothesis that the 2016 coup within the Brazilian capitalist state sought to overthrow the political forces that were no longer able to administer this model.

ISBN: 9781642593617

Publication date: November 3, 2020

Acknowledgements ix
Preface x
List of Figures xii

Introduction

1The Politics of Financialization
1
Crisis of Accumulation and Reaction of Finance
2
Financial Expansion of the Brazilian Economy
3
Fictitious Capital as a Concrete Social Relation

2Capitalist State and Financial Hegemony
1
Capitalist Economy and Capitalist State
2
Financial Hegemony in the State Apparatus
3
The Class Character of Macroeconomic Policy

3Fiscal Superstructure, Expropriation, and Exploitation
1
The Financialization of Class Exploitation
2
Exploitation beyond Labor Exchange
3
Public Debt, Taxation, and Redistribution of Surpluses
4
Public Debt and the Rise in the Rate of Exploitation
5
State Spending and Appropriation of Income

4Macroeconomic Policy and Economic Democracy
1
Capitalism or Democracy
2
Depoliticization of Economic Policy
3
Selective Bureaucratic Insulation
4
Monetary Expectations and Inducements
5
The Talking Shop of Macroeconomic Policy
6
Economic Democracy and Democratic Socialism

Conclusion
Afterword: The 2016 Coup d 'état

Bibliography
Index