William I. Robinson*
AND
Trumpism is A neo -fascist response of extreme right to the social and economic crisis of the working class and the crisis of legitimacy of the State that this socioeconomic crisis has produced. The US working class has experienced continuous destabilization of their living conditions during this last half century of capitalist globalization and neoliberalism, with a particularly acute deterioration since the financial collapse of 2008 and the root of the Covid-19 Pandemic. It faces increasing precariousness, labor instability, unemployment and generalized and increasing underemployment, miserable salaries, marginalization and social decomposition, food insecurity and medical care crises, infravy and withouthogarism.
In 2023, more than 100,000 people died from opioid overdose for the third consecutive year and the figures grew, a reflection of an explosive crisis of mental health that in turn reflects the social and economic crisis. Since 2021, food insecurity increased 40 percent and, during that period, poverty grew 67 percent. More than half of working class households live in poverty or just above the poverty line, although official data disguise the scope of poverty by establishing a ridiculously low level. According to the federal government, 38 percent of households lack sufficient money to cover an emergency expense of $ 400, compared to 32 percent in 2021. More than half of US households do not receive a stable income and depend on opportunities for contingent work as they are presented, while 80 percent reports that he lives from salary.
The Democratic Party abandoned the multiethnic working class for many years. From the Clinton era it has been a party of neoliberalism, of the multimillionaires of Wall Street, of the military-industrial complex and of the war. Trump presented a populist speech that spoke of the growing socioeconomic insecurity and generalized social anxiety. He managed to project as Outsider Politician willing to fight Washington’s elite in defense of the common man. He manipulated the massive discontent with this populist, racist, nationalist and neo -fascist discourse with false promises to solve the socioeconomic problems of the masses. He turned immigrants into scapegoats and reaped mass discontent with the Democrats and the establishment.
Trumpism 2.0 does not represent a break with what happened in the last half century, but its logical final point, eliminating any remaining barrier to the unbridled accumulation of capital and culminating the neoliberal counterrevolution. Trump’s team has promised to eliminate any remaining regulation on capital, massively cut social spending, including Social Security (pensions), reduce capital taxes and the rich, expand the state apparatus of repression and surveillance, and annul the few remaining mechanisms for democratic accountability.
This government proposes to achieve this restructuring state power to put it under the most direct control of capital, that is, consolidating the dictatorship of transnational capital through new political dispensations, including a vast expansion of the presidency’s powers. However, there is a huge gap between Trump’s intention and his real ability to achieve his goals. The political crisis of legitimacy of the State and the social crisis of the working class must be seen, beyond the US, in the context of the general crisis of global capitalism and in particular in its structural dimension, the overequulation. Chronic stagnation exerts growing pressure on the political and military agents of transnational capital to open spaces for accumulation. The transnational capitalist class (CCT) and its agents must undertake increasingly desperate searches for exits to download the capital overequulate. This makes the system more and more dangerous.
The CCT Americans have taken a more direct control of the State. Trump has chosen 13 billionaires for his cabinet. The richest man in the world, Elon Musk, acts as an not elected co -chair. Corporations and billionaires, especially from the sectors of high technology, financial and energy, channeled millions unprecedented to the Trump Inaugural Committee to ensure that their interests were represented. The emerging hegemonic block of capital brings together technology and finance with the military-industrial complex and pharmaceutical capital, large oil companies and the real estate sector also represented, with transnational financial capital on the cusp.
This occurs together with a rapid political polarization as the center collapses, with the insurgency of the neo -fascist extreme right and in control of the Republican party and the three powers of the government. Trump cannot represent the interests of workers and capital and has no intention of abandoning capital. Apart from the extreme right organized in racist and neo -fascist militias such as those that broke into the Capitol on January 6, 2021, Trump has a mass base in a sector of the working class. These workers expect Trump to improve their economic situation, but it will not happen. On the contrary, to the extent that Trump is successful, the situation of the workers will deteriorate more. Trump’s coalition will disintegrate. The disappointment will be installed and, in the end, its mass base will disintegrate. These are the conditions for a popular left option to develop, but they are also conditions under which the fascist tendency could be consolidated in an open fascism of the 21st century.
The ruling classes fear popular mass surveys and have prepared for it. It is almost inevitable that the capital party collapses. When that happens, and when the mass protests intensify, the global police state will be unleashed. We will move very fast to an escalation of social and political conflict. Trump promised throughout his campaign to take energetic measures against political dissent. The absolute brutality of global capitalism, as it is now exhibited throughout the world, will end up coming to light and in the US will pass the bill.
*Distinguished Professor of Sociology. University of California in Santa Barbara
