Abstract

Fundamental changes in the world economic system have resulted in a new differentiation, that between centre and periphery, between a global financial market on the one hand and production, services and labour on the other. As modern society has now become financial society, the old distinction between capital and labour has lost its informational value for party politics. The fact that the distinction between centre and periphery cannot be copied into the national political system means that economic policy can no longer be decided through political choice. Politics has the task of coping with the political effects of the global financial market with the result that elections are dependent on the state of the economic cycle. Would a new political alignment involve a centre party of capital and labour against an ecological left and a `law and order' right?