The Roots of a Crisis: Marx, Sen, and the Capability Deprivation of the Left Behind

Abstract

The emergence of the two great late modern crises—economic and environmental—has prompted calls for a return to Marx. This article describes a Marxian account of the 2008 economic crisis relating it to the phenomena of job polarization, de-industrialization, the decline of the middle class, and political populism in Europe and elsewhere. These are argued to spring from political mobilization due to certain kinds of capability deprivations as understood in Amartya Sen’s capability approach. The article demonstrates the continued relevance of Marx for philosophy of the social sciences as well as for a better understanding of the future challenge of maintaining societal stability in the West.