Late capitalism and the world we inhabit

More than a century ago, Marx exposed capitalism’s internal contradictions and predicted its collapse. The prediction did not come true as expected. Instead, we move between overwork and withdrawal while living through economic, social, and spiritual crises.

In this sequel to Hello, Mr. Marx, Yang Zhao examines the political, economic, cultural, and personal realities of late capitalism: globalization, identity politics, trade wars, financial crises, artificial intelligence, populism, the middle class, influencer commerce, short video, anxiety, and the commodification of attention.

How capital remakes everyday life

Workers have not united globally, but capital has. Democracy can turn toward populism, openness toward closure, and work can move from bodily exhaustion in factories to total exhaustion in offices. Even as technology and wealth expand, genuine freedom to choose may shrink.

The course draws on theorists after Marx—especially Fredric Jameson—to ask how commodities became not merely objects of consumption but the substance of social existence, and how systems rewrite memory, desire, time, identity, and relationships.

The more people can perceive and analyze the currents of the present, the more likely our next actions are to create change. Drifting without awareness is always the greatest danger.
— Yang Zhao

Understanding Capitalism: How Did Our Lives Come to This?