Globalization of American Fear Culture: The Empire in the Twenty-First Century

The idea that capitalist system reproduces by the growth of inequality and poverty is not new since it has been discussed widely by Marxism and post-marxism in the four corners of the world. However, the intersection of terrorism and capitalism seems be a heated discussion which today retains considerable concern from scholarship. In his recent book, Globalization of American Fear Culture, Geoff Skoll continues a much deeper discussion instilled by former work, Social theory of Fear. At a closer look, the act of governing through fear is used by US to create a culture of mistrust. From the onset, US was based on the belief that the world as a dangerous place to live. Over recent decades in XXth century, fear was used to enhance the legitimacy of elite, sometimes oriented for the workforce to accept policies otherwise would be rejected. At the time, capital and American Empire expanded to colonize new worlds, a much deeper sentiment of fear accompanied the politics. Therefore, it is safe to say we live in a world characterized by a " global fear " which is functional to a particular way of making politics. One of the aspects facilitated the expansion of capitalism was the idea that citizens live in the best of the possible worlds. Beyond the boundaries of consuming society, of course, any change represents a threat for popular parlance, a barrier to overcome. In the first chapter, Skoll traces the historical roots of the culture of fear in America. In retrospect, the capitalist system and theories of economy showed widely that accumulation only is feasible if we introduce exploitation as a key factor to produce and distribute wealth in few hands. The monopolization of surplus value, as Marx puts it, resulted not only from human creativity but by the means of elite to commoditize labor into exchangeable goods. The number of rank-and-file workers involved in a process of production affects directly the profits of capital owners. From that moment on, the capital reproduction seems to be always in detriment of workforce. In this mayhem, when conflict rises, fear undermines the possibilities of claimers and protesters to impose their views. Two major instruments were used by privileged classes to keep the control, ideology and repression. While the latter appealed to surveillance to exert violence against the pathological agents, the latter one was enrooted in a process of fear-mongering that limited the negotiation …