Contradictions of austerity
探讨了2008年金融危机后，各国从凯恩斯主义干预转向财政紧缩政策的原因，分析了新自由主义意识形态、银行权力和金融化背景，认为紧缩与资产泡沫的交替可能是新自由主义的内在特征。
The global economic and financial crisis has been marked by the following paradox. A much more severe depression than the global slump of 2008–09 was prevented by determined state intervention in the form of bank bailouts and fiscal stimuli. Yet this bout of apparently successful Keynesianism has been followed by a turn to fiscal austerity justified in terms reminiscent of the Treasury View against which Keynes relentlessly polemicised in the 1930s. This article explores the sources of this policy shift. Among the factors considered are the ideology of neoliberalism, the economic and political power of the banks, and the relative weight of finance in individual economies. The broader context of financialisation is also considered. The conclusion is reached that an oscillation between bouts of austerity and laxer policies encouraging the development of asset bubbles may be built into neoliberalism as an economic policy regime. The implication is that alternatives to austerity must embrace broad institutional transformation.