Prediction and caution after COVID-19 crisis: The ecological and epidemiological risks of financial speculation

Since the COVID-19 pandemic spread worldwide, optimistic ecological and economic analyses have arisen. On one hand, the lockdowns that have taken place are pointed out as a means of reducing gas emissions, environmental exploitation, and consequently, factors that reduce the risk of zoonoses. On the other hand, macroeconomic policies that support state intervention in the economy and social benefits are seen as a signal for a more social and eco-friendly organized capitalism. The objective of our article is to call for caution on these predictions, indicating a post-pandemic countertrend according to which the relationship between economy and environment might be even more unstable and conflictual after the pandemic. Here, we discuss the relevance of Karl Marx’s fictitious capital concept as a fundamental key to thinking about financial market pressures on the environment. Hereby, we aim to raise the concern that the financial policies adopted in the course of the crisis have encouraged speculative instruments that lead to the overaccumulation of fictitious capital. This, in turn, requires the increased exploitation and expropriation of the environment in order to realize the overaccumulated rights and claims on future surplus value. Thus, we argue that the risk of environmental destruction will not be reduced as claimed by optimistic assumptions, but on the contrary will increase in the next few years. Such a risk does not dismiss, but rather suggests that new zoonoses may also arise.

Crisis del Capitalismo Global o, Fin du Globe?

En este ensayo he intentado contribuir al fecundo debate sobre la crisis del capitalismo global. La tesis desarrollada se fundamenta en una sucesión de acontecimientos históricos, convergentes y orgánicamente dependientes. La crisis del capitalismo keynesiano de la Segunda Posguerra confluyó –y contribuyó a profundizar– con la crisis del desarrollismo en América Latina y en el continente africano. El auge de la contrarrevolución neoliberal liderada por Thatcher-Reagan, junto a sus discípulos europeos de la Tercera Vía, convergió con el derrumbamiento del Imperio Soviético y el extraordinario ascenso de la China posmaoísta. Durante la era de Deng Xiaoping iniciada en 1978, en el país asiático se desarrolló un capitalismo de Estado que dos décadas después, bajo un control políticamente comunista, se había transformado en un régimen socialista con características chinas y afinidades neoliberales. Las consecuencias de este nuevo orden mundial se analizan en la segunda parte del ensayo como problemas centrales del siglo XXI: la desigualdad existencial global de una ciudadanía sometida por la lógica del capital ficticio a una implacable servidumbre por deudas; la erosión de la política pública; la explotación laboral expresada simultáneamente en las economías posindustriales y en el Sur global a través de la destrucción no tan creativa de las cadenas de valor y otras formas vinculadas a la expansión de la gig economy y al tecnoutopismo del silicio; así como la alteración antropogénica de la biodiversidad terrestre sin precedentes en el registro histórico. In this essay I have tried to contribute to the fruitful debate on the crisis of global capitalism. The thesis developed is based on a succession of historical, convergent and organically dependent events. The crisis of Keynesian capitalism of the second postwar period converged –and contributed to deepen– with the crisis of developmentalism in Latin America and on the African continent. The rise of the neoliberal counterrevolution led by Thatcher-Reagan, along with her European Third Way disciples, converged with the collapse of the Soviet Empire and the extraordinary rise of post-Maoist China. During the Deng Xiaoping era, which began in 1978, a state capitalism developed in the Asian country that two decades later, under politically communist control, had been transformed into a socialist regime with Chinese characteristics and neoliberal affinities. The consequences of this new world order are analyzed in the second part of the essay as central problems of the 21th century: the global existential inequality of a citizenry subjected by the logic of fictitious capital to implacable debt bondage; the erosion of public policy; labor exploitation expressed simultaneously in post-industrial economies and in the global South through the not so creative destruction of value chains and other forms linked to the expansion of the gig economy and silicon techno-utopianism; as well as the anthropogenic alteration, without historical precedent, of terrestrial biodiversity.

A MODERNIZAÇÃO DO ESPÍRITO SANTO NOS ANOS 1970 E 1980 E A CRISE FUNDAMENTAL DO CAPITAL: UM EXAME A PARTIR DO SETOR DE PAPEL E CELULOSE NO ÂMBITO DOS "GRANDES PROJETOS"

Os empreendimentos industriais chamados de “grandes projetos” são uma designação comum nas pesquisas acadêmicas e nos estudos produzidos pelas autarquias de planejamento econômico do Espírito Santo. Abordados como parte de um “novo ciclo de desenvolvimento” estadual mediante a “atuação decisiva” do Estado entre os anos 1970 e 1980, os “grandes projetos”, em seus nexos com a modernização do Espírito Santo, deveriam ser reinterpretados. Nosso objetivo principal foi abordar os fundamentos dessa modernização na sua relação com a particularidade capixaba, a partir da ampliação do setor de papel e celulose e da construção da Aracruz Celulose. Palavras-chave: “grandes projetos”; Aracruz Celulose; modernização; crise; capital fictício. THE MODERNIZATION OF ESPIRITO SANTO IN THE 1970’S AND 1980’S AND THE FUNDAMENTAL CRISIS OF CAPITAL: AN APPROACH STARTING FROM SECTOR OF PAPER AND CELLULOSE WITHIN THE SCOPE OF “LARGE-SCALE PROJECTS” Abstract: The industrial enterprises called “large-scale projects” are a common designation in academic research and in studies produced by autarchies of economic planning of Espirito Santo. Approached as part of a “new term of development” of Espírito Santo through decisive action of State between the 1970’s and 1980’s, we defend that “large-scale projects” concerns what we understand have been the integration of Brazil and Espirito Santo into process of catch-up modernization (KURZ, [1991] 1996). Therefore, our objective was approached the foundations of this modernization and how it achieved the periphery of the world and the Brazilian and Espírito-santense spatialities. To proceed to this understanding, we focus the focus on the sector of paper and cellulose and the building of Aracruz Cellulose factory, an of main enterprise of “large-scale projects”. Keywords: “large-scale projects”; Aracruz Cellulose factory; modernization; crisis; fictitious capital. LA MODERNIZACIÓN DE ESPÍRITO SANTO EN LOS AÑOS 1970 Y 1980 Y LA CRISIS FUNDAMENTAL DEL CAPITAL: UN EXAMEN DESDE EL SECTOR DEL PAPEL Y DE LA CELULOSA EN EL ÁMBITO DE LOS “GRANDES PROYECTOS” Resumen: Las empresas industriales llamadas “grandes proyectos” son una denominación común en la investigación académica y en los estudios emprendidos por las autarquías de planificación económica en el estado de Espírito Santo (Brasil). Abordado como parte de un “nuevo ciclo de desarrollo” estatal a través de la acción decisiva del Estado, entre las décadas de 1970 y 1980, sostenemos que los "grandes proyectos" se refieren a lo que entendemos ha sido la integración de Brasil y Espirito Santo al proceso de modernización retrasada (KURZ, [1991] 1996). Así, nuestro objetivo es abordar los fundamentos de esta modernización y como ella llegó a la periferia del mundo en general y las espacialidades brasileñas y de Espírito Santo en particular. Para lograr este análisis nos enfocamos el sector de papel y celulosa y de la construcción de Aracruz Celulose, uno de los principales emprendimientos de los denominados “grandes proyectos”. Palabras clave: “grandes proyectos”; Aracruz Celulosa; modernización; crisis; capital ficticio.

Assessing the capitalization of oil and gas companies

Subject. The article considers the capitalization of oil and gas companies. Objectives. The purpose is to research and evaluate the capitalization of the said companies. Methods. The study rests on general scientific methods of analysis. Results. The paper formulates the concept of capitalization as the most important result of the economic efficiency of production, investment attractiveness, and prospects for the development of corporation's business. It shows that the efficiency of using available resources is a crucial factor for capitalization. It considers the opportunities to single out fictitious value in market capitalization, using the fair value calculation method. This enables investors to make more informed investment decisions. The paper also identifies problems related to capitalization growth in the oil and gas business, and gives recommendations for its improvement. Conclusions. Capitalization growth should be seen as the main goal of sustainable development of companies. The concept of market capitalization should be tied to the assessment of economic performance. At the present stage, the paper reveals that the market capitalization index is away from actual business results, with the accumulation of fictitious capital in value.

The Influence of Internal Contradictions in the Us Economy on Global Financialization and the Expansion of Fictitious Capital

The financialization genesis of the global economy centered in the United States is on the bifurcation point now— a fictive capital’ expansion is damaging with the social capital regeneration mechanism disaster. The method of identifying and estimating the fictive capital’ extension is absent for now. The fictive capital exists as a metaphor on the science papers but not as an institutional basis of the capital flows directions. The paper aims to update the configuration of the global financial system, its dependence on the performance of US corporations and banks; to identify the sources of vulnerability of world finance and global liquidity from the fictitious capital of American financial markets. The methodology is theoretical pattern’ of financial capital movements and its real statistical market indicators comparison. The empirical base is statistical data about the financial flows and financial results especially about the US as a global financial center. Based on the results the authors have revealed an origin of fictive capital on the US bank sector by the justification for the conclusion of liquidity above the profitable as the purpose of financial operations. This conclusion is confirmed with the scale of off-balance sheet transactions of banks. Besides the regression between the prices of derivative’ basis assets and stock indexes has been shown. Also, the market capitalization of American companies is not sensitive to change in market liquidity indicators. The authors concluded that global financialization is supported by significant internal contradictions in the US economy. The source of contradictions is the financial mechanism for withdrawing liquidity from the sphere of production and circulation into the sphere of financial markets. Capital investment using instruments of the US financial market entails the threat of losing their liquidity. Forecasting the dynamics of the global economy without taking into account the role of fictitious capital, which is emerging in the American financial markets, leads to global vulnerability and may cause the next financial crisis.

Capital as a social process: A Marxian perspective

This paper analyzes the very important notion of capital from a Marxian perspective as opposed to a neoclassical one. It is argued that when capital is viewed as a historically determined social process (relation), rather than as a thing or a col-lection of things, it tends to assume certain specific forms more often than others depending on the particular stage of economic history. Capital thus refers simulta-neously to social relations and to things. Given this frame of reference, notions such as money and property capital are more easily accommodated and conse-quently are not written off as financial or fictitious capital - not real capital because they produce nothing. The paper also focuses on Marx's important analy-sis of the time of production and the turnover of capital in terms of the production of surplus-value (profit). It then examines Marx's equally important and prescient analysis of how the turnover speed of capital is affected by the time of circulation of commodities (the realization of surplus-value) and the growing use of credit (in its various forms) in the capitalist system. Finally, the paper turns its attention to the economic role of time as it relates to interest - bearing capital - one whose clear comprehension rests on viewing capital as a social construct.

Editorial: New horizons in corporate law and governance research

Corporate governance and corporate law cover a wide range of eminent topics for the effective governance system. The articles published in this issue have focused particularly on the board configuration, commercial code regulations about the managers’ decision and compensation, the comparative perspective of the common law rule on pre incorporation contracts, and the responsibility of the company with the authorized fictitious capital from the evidence of emerging markets. Moreover, this issue includes a book review of the theoretical, essential, and international practices of corporate governance, which consists of various timely and interesting concepts, such as the role of institutional investors in corporate governance, the board of directors’ impact on performance and the role of non-executive directors, the audit function and the role of regulation international corporate governance, and socially responsible investment, etc.

The responsibility of a limited liability company with authorized fictitious capital: Evidence from the emerging market

The phenomenon of law related to the capital subscribed and fully paid up company is limited liability companies in Indonesia, many of which are not real. The aim of this research is to answer the question: "What is the legality and legal consequences of an establishment with a fictitious authorized capital?". The research was conducted via the study of literature with this type of normative legal research supported by an empirical approach. The results of the research contribute to knowledge that the responsibility of a limited liability company with a capital payment basis is fictitious when the establishment does not essentially meet the validity of the establishment of the limited liability company itself, whether based on terms “materially” or “formally”. The terms formilnya (“formally”) depositing of the authorized capital must be issued and paid-up in full. Although the capital is fictitious or not real, if it has been approved by a legal entity, then it remains as a legitimate legal entity, but the substance of it is a limited liability company. Depositing the authorized capital which is not real contradicts the nature of the limited liability company as a legal entity