The Old "New Economy"
by Peter Spillmann
After 10 years of striving towards liberalisation and deregulation, another economic upturn is being heralded, also now in Europe. At the centre of attention there are, on the one hand, the capital market, and, on theother hand, the so-called New Economy. The latter describes those new companies and markets, which have emerged during recent years in conjunction with the commercialisation of the internet.
In a recently published advertisement, promoting Viatel shares,an old black-and-white photograph shows workers celebrating the completion of a railway line with the passing of a bottle of Champaign from one steam engine to another to mark the festive occasion. “Yet another border crossed”, reads the slogan of the communication giant, “no borders, no barriers, no limits” is the ultimate message. It is not just coincidental that many aspects of this time of “New Departures” of the “New Economy” are reminiscent of the “Gründerzeit”, the years of rapid industrial expansion in Germany after 1871. In the centre of the boom there is a new key technology, which becomes the apparent “natural” reason for a far-reaching restructuring of the entire economic and social order, and, in this way, the trigger for a new burst of economic universalisation. Using pathetic promises of “simpler and borderless” communication, “better service for all”, and the development of “new worlds”, the IT company itself suggests contextual parallels with the key technology of the 19th century – the railway. At that time, as well as today, at the heart of the economic dynamics was the development of new territories, cheaper access to resources, and the creation of greater fluidity in the streams of commodities. The only difference today is that coal and steel have been replaced by information and knowledge.
The capital required for this latest rush is provided by the globalised capital market. The latter also maintains a key function in this “new Gründerzeit”. Due to spectacular profits on shares, capital investments are more attractive than ever. For a few years now, massive resources – including those of small investors – have been concentrated. Enormous quantities of flexible capital are needed for this new wave of new companies, and the erection of the infrastructure required for them. For new mobile phone licences in Germany alone, 100 billion DM were spent by interested companies and their investors. Young start-ups, i.e. new IT companies with alleged promising service or software concepts, which have never earned a penny, are occasionally given greater value by the stock markets than the old industrial giant Siemens. This confirms at least the current, exaggerated hopes that economists are pinning on the new technologies.
However, the party à la “Gründerzeit” also marks the breakthrough of a new generation in Big Business. A small elite of youngish business people celebrate their self-realisation in entrepreneurship. Money and success are trendy again. The “creative new Gründerzeit generation” and “young entrepreneurs” are societal constructions. Internet-related jobs are valorised and the relevant knowledge systematically professionalised. The prospect of participation in a certain sense of living and lifestyle seems convincing. Waged work is represented as a creative challenge, and no longer as an annoying job. The images used for this purpose are a mixture of subculture, fashion and music. “brand eins”, a German economy magazine, aiming at the young ”Gründerzeit generation” and other “creative doers”, consistently adopts the look of a slick lifestyle magazine. All those appearing in it are unconventional and flexible, as well as trend-conscious, but ambitious: living time and working time are identical, and their own identity resembles that of the company‘s. The implicit message is: only idiots don‘t take part in this.
The infinitely repeated promises of creative participation, flexibility and new opportunities obviously contradict reality. For a large section of the population, the transformation of the entire economic order, however, leads to existential uncertainties, new social exclusions and increasing pressures to achieve. In the centres of the West the illusion of a smart, soft and trendy economy can only be upheld because of a massive shifting of real production processes to the periphery. “Low-wage” work is shifted to the East or South, or is taken over by a continually discriminated class of migrants.
Large parts of society and culture are caught by the maelstrom of the general trend of economic universalisation, and feel forced to legitimise themselves in entrepreneurial terms. Social solidarity or collective forms of responsibility are abandoned and systematically compromised. A changed work concept disables traditional forms of workers‘ struggles. In this way, even the idea of the Political, as an expression of a societal intention, is called into question in many ways.
The “New Economy” has remained the same “old” one, as far as distribution of resources and power are concerned. Under new signs, and a new image, the old order continues its dominion. The rules of the “New Economy” essentially also contain “free access” to real and virtual resources and globally uniform terms of competition – dictated from Europe and the United States. From a cultural perspective it seems appropriate to fill the vacuum, which has formed between society and politics, on the one hand, and society and economy, on the other, with an ongoing critical discourse and creative interventions.
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