What Follows Fordism? On the Periodization of Capitalism and Its Regulation

Abstract

This chapter addresses three issues: the general nature of periodization; alternative criteria for periodizing capitalism; and the contradictions of Atlantic Fordism and after-Fordist economies. My analysis rests on a ‘strategic-relational’ approach.¹ Emphasizing the interplay of structure and strategy, this implies that, within broad limits set by the abstract logic of capitalism, its structural contradictions and its strategic dilemmas, capitalist development is nonetheless open. Particular trajectories and sequences of capitalist development are always mediated and transformed through specific social forces acting in specific institutional contexts or conjunctures. This openness invalidates attempts to periodize capitalism’s past development or predict its destiny as if these were connected by a pregiven logic. But it does not mean that the succession of stages (or phases) is purely accidental. My task below is to explore the contingent necessities of capitalist development.