The Crisis of Neoliberal Capitalism: The Limits of Populism and the Necessity of Socialist Transformation
Jonathan Brown
Abstract
This article by Jonathan Brown offers a historical-materialist analysis of neoliberal capitalism, tracing its ideological and economic foundations, development, and mounting crisis. Beginning with the post–Cold War triumphalism exemplified by Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history” thesis, the study outlines how privatization, deregulation, trade liberalization, and mass incarceration coalesced into a bipartisan neoliberal regime in the United States from the late 1970s through the early 2000s. The paper examines neoliberalism not only as a policy agenda but also as a pervasive governing rationality that reshapes institutions, subjectivity, and social life according to market logic. Drawing on Marxist and Leninist frameworks, the essay situates neoliberalism as a distinct phase within the broader historical evolution of capitalism and argues that its internal contradictions have produced a deep legitimation crisis since the 2008 financial collapse. Rising populist movements on the left and right signal growing mass discontent, yet remain politically incoherent and easily absorbed by the existing order. The paper concludes that only a conscious, organized, working-class movement (grounded in revolutionary communist theory and led by a disciplined vanguard party) can transform contemporary populist energies into a unified struggle capable of overthrowing neoliberal capitalism and reconstructing society on socialist foundations.
Keywords
Marxism, neoliberalism, capitalism, privatization, deregulation, mass incarceration, market rationality, Leninism, legitimation crisis, populism, working-class movement, vanguard party, Jonathan Brown
