Crisis and State of Emergency

Abstract

In the article, the author continues the discussion on the transformation of the notion of crisis from its cyclic nature to the point of considering it an irreversible phenomenon. He does so relying upon Jameson’s reading of Arrighi’s theory of crisis within systemic cycles of accumulation. In this context, the article shows again that financial and debt crisis, which began in 2008, mark the limit of cyclic repetition of the crisis insofar as, due to different causes, a new productive cycle of accumulation cannot appear any more. The article here introduces a new concept called post-productive capitalism with which author tries to grasp precisely the difference between today’s crisis and its appearances in past historical periods. At this basis, the article further shows the difference between ancient, modern and postmodern appearances of crisis ascribing them their own corresponding temporalities (contingency, cyclic nature, a-cyclic nature). In the concluding part the article connects these theses also with Benjaminian-Agambenian theory of the state of exception and shows which type of the state of exception fits today’s postmodern form of crisis.