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In The Political Economy of the Spectacle and Postmodern Caste, John Asimakopoulos analyzes the political economy of the society of the spectacle, a philosophical concept developed by Guy Debord and Jean Baudrillard. Using the analytical tools of social science and historical research, Asimakopoulos reveals that all societies in every epoch have been and continue to be caste systems legitimized by various ideologies. He concludes that there is no such thing as capitalism (or socialism)-only a caste system hidden behind capitalist ideology. Asimakopoulos's approach is broad, interdisciplinary, and draws on both quantitative and qualitative data to weave a narrative that is clear, well written, and offers much to both specialists and general readers.

The Political Economy of the Spectacle and Postmodern Caste

Foreword

Greg Palast
Acknowledgements
Illustrations

Introduction: Busting out of Plato 's Cave

1 The Symbolic Institution of Society

1
Symbolic Interactionism

2
Interaction Exchange and Collective Norms

3
Critical Theory and Post-Structuralism/Postmodernism


3.1
Cornelius Castoriadis


3.2
Michel Foucault


3.3
Guy Debord


3.4
Jean Baudrillard

4
Beyond Post-Structuralism/Postmodernism

2The Spectacle

1
Audience Segmentation


1.1
Sociocultural and Spatial Segmentation


1.2
Educational Segmentation


1.3
Economic Segmentation


1.4
Political Segmentation

2
Total Propaganda

3
Symbolic Institutions


3.1
Educational Institutions


3.2
Economic Institutions


3.3
Political Institutions


3.4
Legal Institutions


3.5
Protective Institutions

3 It 's All Spectacular

1
Spectacular History

2
Postmodern Spectacles


2.1
Doubleplusgood: Spectacular Capitalism


2.2
Plusgood: Spectacular Socialism/Communism

3
Spectacular Class

4
The Quantum Mechanics of Value and Capital


4.1
The Relativity of Value


4.2
There Is No Spoon: Capital(ism)

4 The Monetization of Everything

1
Life, Flesh, and Death

2
Food, Water, and the Environment

3
Cities, Nations, and Culture

4
Time and Space

5
The Global Spectacle


5.1
Finance


5.2
Trade


5.3
Segmented Labor

5 The Structure of Postmodern Caste

1
Social Order


1.1
Privileges and Disabilities Based on Ascription


1.2
Who Pays the Piper?


1.3
Extreme Structural Inequality

2
Caste Groups


2.1
Ruling Caste


2.2
Nobles


2.3
Privileged Labor


2.4
Required Labor


2.5
Precarious Labor


2.6
Institutional Slaves

3
Legitimizing Twenty-First-Century Serfdom


3.1
Mr. Baptist Has Been Too Harsh on the Slavers

Conclusion: Bakunin 's Conundrum


Bibliography

Index