Welcome to Eureka Street
Looking for thought provoking articles?Subscribe to Eureka Street and join the conversation.
Passwords must be at least 8 characters, contain upper and lower case letters, and a numeric value.
Eureka Street uses the Stripe payment gateway to process payments. The terms and conditions upon which Stripe processes payments and their privacy policy are available here.
Please note: The 40-day free-trial subscription is a limited time offer and expires 31/3/24. Subscribers will have 40 days of free access to Eureka Street content from the date they subscribe. You can cancel your subscription within that 40-day period without charge. After the 40-day free trial subscription period is over, you will be debited the $90 annual subscription amount. Our terms and conditions of membership still apply.
Earlier this month, Pope Francis once again blasted capitalism. But it is not true that all business leaders dismiss those who appear chronically unproductive. Thursday's Vinnies' CEO Sleepout included investment bankers and other capitalist 'true believers', and now venture capitalist Mark Carnegie is proposing a war against growing inequality and disengagement, as if he is on a unity ticket with the Pope.
'All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others'. This was George Orwell's parody in Animal Farm of the vicious use of language in communist states. It was one of his memorable depictions of how the absurdities of language not only reflect evil, but also predicate it. Language was a tool of oppression in communist states. In capitalism it is no less vicious.
Pope Francis' vision for the church of the poor is now joined to a stinging critique of our globalised economy which promotes a 'new tyranny' of unfettered capitalism and an attack on the 'idolatry of money'. While such language has not been uncommon, buried in the riches of Catholic social teaching, this pope has made it up front and centre stage of his message.
In the 1920s New York society of Gatsby, money is literally God: benevolent to some; laying waste to the lives of others. It's a tough call whether Luhrmann has deliberately dumbed down Fitzgerald's text in order to appeal more readily to a mass market. If cinema was a medium to excite the eyes and ears while relaxing the brain, he'd be a master.
BBC director general Mark Thompson turned down a proposal to erect a statue of Orwell on the broadcaster's premises because the writer was 'too left-wing'. But political animals of all stripes have long sought to claim Orwell. His political writing transcends both time and ideology.
The action takes place in 2008 on the eve of the GFC, at an investment bank loosely modelled on Lehman Bros. The CEO is monstrous; a kind of sinewy bishop to capitalism, gaunt and vicious. Yet even the most principled characters are shown to compromise to varying degrees in the name of self-interest.
Whatever the merits of Occupy Wall Street, it is far too early to speak of any substantial challenge to the dominance of capitalism. Yet there is a real taste for exploring alternatives. The most influential of faith-based approaches to economic theory is that of distributism.
'Disaster capitalism' entails profiting from the misery of others. Papua New Guinea's motives for agreeing to the reopening of the Manus detention centre are economic. By proceeding with the plan Australia would be complicit in the exploitation of asylum seekers for financial gain.
While WikiLeaks' exposures of US government secrets have created a media storm, the case of Chinese Artist Ai Weiwei, which reveals much about the authorities in China, has attracted little comment. China has moved towards capitalism but not democracy.
Some commentators have latched on to Benedict's encyclical Caritas in Veritate as a new 'third way' between socialism and capitalism. This is a remarkably bad idea.
Michael Moore makes documentaries only in the sense that Today Tonight does investigative journalism. That's not to say he doesn't land a few well-deserving kicks while he's at it.
The Pope's encyclical on social teaching is not a strident critique of capitalism, but it does confront abuses in the global economy. Benedict is critical of the free market ideology which extolled wealth creation but ignored the need for equity and social justice.
49-60 out of 63 results.