Kong Mingan: The Triple Critique of Contemporary Capitalism and Its New Interpretation
Capitalism in the 20th century—specifically modern capitalism led by the United States—can be characterized to a certain extent as financial capitalism. Since the outbreak of the first American economic crisis in 1929, which triggered a global depression, the fate of capitalism has been inextricably linked to finance. Since then, with the exceptions of the stagflation caused by the Middle East oil crisis in the 1970s and the 1998 Asian financial crisis, only the 2008 U.S. subprime mortgage crisis qualifies as a global economic crisis. The subprime crisis that erupted on Wall Street in 2008 was a classic financial crisis, yet it exhibited characteristics distinct from the 1929 crisis: although the subprime crisis struck with ferocity, the disaster it induced seems to have been steadily resolved thus far. While new crises have emerged in American finance—such as the bank run on Silicon Valley Bank in 2023—for the U.S. economy, these seem to have been "more a scare than a setback," resulting in a soft landing. The American economy appears to be heading toward a resurgence of prosperity, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average repeatedly hitting new highs, employment data looking bright, and the policy of "quantitative easing" gradually being phased out. How, then, are we to view contemporary financial capitalism led by the United States and its new characteristics?
Today’s renowned psychoanalyst and leftist scholar Slavoj Žižek, along with Alfred Sohn-Rethel—a fellow traveler of the Frankfurt School—have both conducted in-depth analyses and critiques of the operations of contemporary capitalism. Žižek utilizes modern psychoanalytic theory and Marx's dialectical method to analyze and delineate the "paradoxical" new features of contemporary financial capitalism in a granular fashion, providing a comprehensive critical analysis. Sohn-Rethel, starting from Marx’s theory of commodity exchange, discusses the epistemological origins of commodity fetishism and money fetishism. Here, we take Žižek’s critique as our primary framework, supplemented by Sohn-Rethel’s analysis of commodity fetishism, to analyze the contradictions and crises concealed beneath the cloak of legitimacy in contemporary capitalism across three dimensions: financial capital, political democracy, and ecological crisis, providing a reference for a comprehensive and profound study of capitalism.
I. Financial Capital, Digital Capital, and Welfare Capital
As capitalism entered the monopoly stage, capital accumulation manifested a high degree of concentration and unification, ultimately unifying into a capital empire dominated by "finance." In Intellectual and Manual Labour, Sohn-Rethel analyzes the centralized character of financial currency using the concept of "uniqueness" [1] within Marx’s commodity fetishism. Supported by financial markets and virtual currencies, the "uniqueness" of commodity fetishism has been enhanced to an unprecedented degree. One could say that 20th-century capitalism entered an era of financial capital and digital capital, both of which are the concentrated embodiments of this "uniqueness." In this context, financial capital is sufficient to dominate the development of the entire national economy and even exert influence on the global economy; for instance, financial speculation on Wall Street in New York can trigger a worldwide economic crisis. Engels had long ago perceived this phenomenon of financial capital, noting that "the stock exchange becomes the most prominent representative of capitalist production itself." On the surface, financial and digital capital facilitate the concentration of capital and can rapidly achieve capital accumulation; however, within this flourishing scene lies a greater crisis. As Marx predicted, while developing itself, capitalism also digs its own grave. Capital accumulation not only widens the gap between rich and poor but further leads to systemic economic crises. The more capitalism develops, the more severe the degree of alienation it suffers—this is precisely the paradox of capitalism, a trend that 20th-century modern financial capitalism continues to perpetuate.
Firstly, regarding financial capitalism, the emergence of financial capital seemingly alleviates the collapse of capitalism, but in reality, it merely postpones the crisis temporarily. Rather than saving capitalism, it plunges it into a greater "post-positioned" crisis [2]. Žižek points out that in contemporary capitalist society, characterized primarily by financial speculation, speculative activities in capital markets are closely related to the psychological activities and mechanisms of the subject in psychoanalysis; specifically, they resemble the operational mechanism of "surplus-enjoyment" (plus-de-jouir or objet petit a) in Lacanian psychoanalytic theory. Specifically, the subject in capitalist financial activities is "paradoxical": a fundamental reversal and change has occurred between the subject and object in capital and financial markets. Žižek argues that the subject in real life is not the rational subject of the "Copernican Revolution" in the sense of Kantian modern philosophy, but rather an irrational subject ($ ◊ a) [3] governed by psychoanalytic surplus-enjoyment—a void, desiring, and "paradoxical" subject. He notes that in capitalist financial activities, particularly in the operations of stock and futures markets, the subject is simultaneously a void subject and a subject full of desire—a "paradoxical" subject. That is to say, the subject embodies both "fear and greed." Here, void and desire, greed and fear, are tightly intertwined. According to Lacanian theory, the subject in reality is incomplete—a castrated, traumatic subject ($)—a subject of void and lack. Simultaneously, it is precisely this characteristic of void and lack that leaves room for the subject’s infinite desire, with the objet a constituting the cause of the subject's desire. In capitalist financial activities, the subject is driven by desire to continuously pursue profit; yet when a financial crisis arrives, the subject falls into endless panic and fear. To escape the crisis, the subject descends by any means necessary into a hysterical, irrational subject—a phenomenon most typical in the financial, stock, and futures markets. This capital operation is similar to the mechanism of objet a in psychoanalysis. While the subject appears on the surface to be chasing maximum profit, they are in truth an irrational subject swept into capital speculation by desire, a process filled with numerous unconscious impulses. The entire financial capital system is a massive "gold-swallowing beast" [4] that requires the constant operation of capital to maintain its own survival. However, this financialization of capitalism results in profits increasingly being derived from non-productive investment and capital operations. The result is a pure pursuit of capital appreciation rather than physical operating profits. Consequently, the loopholes and defects within capitalism cause an unavoidable collapse of the economic structure and financial crises. In short, the subject itself is a "paradoxical" entity. It is this paradox of the subject that leads to the unavoidable financial crises of capitalism and ultimately leads to its inevitable total collapse and demise. A classic case is the 1929 economic crisis in the United States. Before the crisis, the American securities market displayed a scene of prosperity, with people desperately speculating and buying stocks, completely unaware of the approaching crisis. However, once the crisis erupted, people were struck by panic and fled in all directions. Similarly, the 2008 subprime crisis and the subsequent global financial crisis followed the same pattern. Thus, the speculative mechanism of the capitalist financial market inevitably leads to the paradoxical character of the speculative subject: on the one hand, it highly alienates the financial speculation subject; on the other, it further exacerbates the crisis of financial capitalism and accelerates the demise of the capitalist system itself.
Of course, Žižek’s judgment of financial capitalism from a psychoanalytic perspective is, more or less, not entirely consistent with the current state of capitalism: capitalism seems to show no signs of immediate extinction; on the contrary, it remains in a period of "prosperous development." Moreover, this is not entirely consistent with what Lenin asserted 100 years ago in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism—that imperialism is monopoly, stagnant, and moribund capitalism. How, then, should we view this "discordant" phenomenon?
Žižek points out that this phenomenon does not mean the disappearance of capitalist crises, but rather that contemporary capitalism—through virtual capital and the credit system—repeatedly delays or postpones crises, shifting them into the future, thereby greatly delaying the total outbreak and collapse. Regarding the financial investment subject, because the subject is themselves a void subject of desire, every subject is greedy before a capitalist financial crisis erupts, with people desperately engaging in capital investment and financial speculation. Yet once the crisis arrives, people fall into extreme panic and fear, trying every possible means to evade it. This is true not only for individuals but also for capitalist states; this is the high degree of alienation of financial monopoly capital in contemporary capitalist society. When a financial crisis suddenly erupts, the entire state also falls into massive panic. At this moment, whether for the individual or the state, the psychological desire is to quickly escape the crisis, reduce losses, and restore the economy and production. The subject then transforms from the original void subject of panic into a "desiring" subject—a subject desperate to rid itself of the "crisis." At this very moment, the best way to resolve the "panic" caused by the crisis is through expansionary fiscal and monetary policies—that is, printing large amounts of money and issuing bonds to prevent the further outbreak and spread of the crisis. Of course, capitalist states are well aware that this expansionary, blind over-issuance of currency will inevitably lead to a more serious economic crisis next time. But to evade the immediate crisis and weather the storm, they can no longer concern themselves with the long term or the future. Quickly filling the present "void" and resolving the crisis becomes the only choice for capitalism to escape its immediate predicament. However, this monetary policy—which only cares about escaping current economic hardship by overdrawing the future—is actually a way of "post-positioning" the crisis. It is like "drinking poison to quench thirst" [5]. From the perspective of macro-budgeting and budget balancing—from the view of "balancing the books" or "settling the final account"—the financial capitalist system harbors a massive latent crisis that must ultimately lead to the total outbreak of capitalist crisis and the demise of capitalism.
Second, from the end of the 20th century to the present, finance capitalism has entered the stage of digital capitalism. As the product of a marriage between digital technology and finance capital, digital capitalism relies on high-tech digital tools to lead finance monopoly capital into a higher-order stage of digital monopoly. Bolstered by digital technology, digital capital possesses a deeper level of monopolistic character than finance capital and simultaneously manifests a more severe alienation, thereby giving rise to "digital fetishism." As Alfred Sohn-Rethel pointed out, the emergence of fetishism stems from formal uniqueness. In commodity fetishism and money fetishism, the commodity and money both become "unique" existences; they are the sole forms for measuring all other content. "The essence of this form, as the uniqueness of the commodity's determinate being (Dasein), leads to the fact that money is, by its functional essence, 'one'." In the era of digital capitalism, everything can be easily abstracted into pure numbers. However, these numbers are by no means ordinary numerical games; they possess a high degree of uniqueness. Relying on digital network platforms, they can invisibly establish worldwide connections. Digital capital thus incorporates global capital markets into its own digital structure, absorbing massive amounts of capital to achieve centralized control and application. Numbers circulate among people as the abstracted unity of the world, unconsciously relating them into a society. The mystery of why digital capital possesses such great magic lies not in capital itself, but in the infinite "charm" of the number. Based on his study of Marx’s commodity fetishism, Sohn-Rethel pointed out the immense power of the abstract unity of fetishism; he believed that "pure mathematics" is the "insurmountable dividing line between mental labor and manual labor." Of course, Rethel was discussing the commodity abstraction or exchange abstraction addressed by Marx in Capital, rather than digital capital in the true sense. However, the process and mechanism of abstraction—from the commodity abstraction of the product to finance capital, and then to the abstraction of digital capital—are analogous. Just like the abstraction in Marx’s commodity fetishism, the digital abstraction in digital capital ostensibly marks pure quantities contained within commodities, but actually reflects a social relation more concealed than those of commodity or money fetishism. Following the emergence of digital capital, people no longer need to rely on commodities or finance and currency; they can realize social relations between individuals merely by relying on pure digital symbols. Consequently, the emergence of "digital worship" is natural, and the alienation caused by it is easily imagined. Here, the process by which numbers are "essentialized" is precisely the process by which human social relations are "reified" [6]. Social relations between people are transformed into connections between numbers. Thus, numbers and mathematical symbols, which originally possessed no social attributes, take on a social nature. This is the characteristic of "digital fetishism" attached to the number. The prevalence of virtual currencies in digital capital further pushes this fetishism to its peak. The unity of digital capital simplifies social production to achieve efficient operation. As digital capitalism researcher Dan Schiller has pointed out, "information networks penetrate every aspect of capitalist economic culture in an unprecedented way and scale, becoming an indispensable tool and driver for capitalist development." However, whether in the form of finance capital or digits, the high degree of capitalist unity will lead to the homogenization of thought. As Adorno pointed out in his critique of the culture industry: "In the culture industry, individuality is an illusion, not only because the modes of production have been standardized... the individual is only tolerated and problematic so long as he is in complete agreement with the universal." The unity of society leads to the prevalence of instrumental rationality, ultimately resulting in deeper alienation.
Third, another aspect of contemporary capitalism that cannot be ignored is the birth and effect of "welfare capital." As stated above, whether finance capital or digital capital, both are products of fetishism and variations of monopoly capital in contemporary capitalism. Their purpose is to achieve a more centralized unification of capital for its efficient utilization. Paradoxically, however, the more concentrated capital becomes, the deeper the degree of its alienation and the colder the relations between people. This will inevitably further intensify the contradictions of capitalism and ultimately trigger capitalist crises. To evade the drawbacks of finance and digital capital, mitigate the high alienation they bring, and overcome the increasingly severe disparity between rich and poor, welfare capital emerged, and welfare capitalism naturally stepped onto the stage of history. In the second half of the 20th century, Western capitalist countries introduced a series of social welfare policies targeting unemployment, impoverished families, and women, aiming to eliminate serious wealth gaps and gender discrimination. On one hand, capitalist states printed large amounts of currency, injecting funds into the financial sector and investment banks and providing low-interest loans; on the other hand, they enacted social welfare laws, provided family assistance, and offered unemployment relief and social subsidies, including corresponding public health services like pensions and medical care. However, the emergence of welfare capital cannot fundamentally transform the social reality of the capitalist wealth gap, nor can it eliminate the increasingly serious phenomenon of social alienation. It must be admitted that the original design of welfare capital and welfare capitalism was well-intentioned, but its actual effect did not eliminate the wealth gap, stimulate consumption, or reduce unemployment to improve the employment rate of the poor as expected. On the contrary, it led to corruption in welfare distribution and even produced the negative phenomenon of "nurturing lazy people" [7]. Furthermore, because the implementation of social welfare requires massive capital, it led to the over-issuance of currency, resulting in capitalist fiscal deficits and debt crises. For instance, European welfare states such as Greece, Portugal, Italy, Spain, and Cyprus successively approached bankruptcy. The reason lay in their pursuit of welfare capitalism, which led to corruption in distribution and the "big pot" [8] phenomenon, breeding many "lazy people." Habermas has repeatedly mentioned welfare capital and its potential hazards in Legitimation Crisis. Similarly, Žižek argues that the popularization of mass welfare in today's capitalist society also finds it difficult to evade capitalist crises; he points out the internal connection between welfare capitalism and big capitalists represented by George Soros. He argues that, like finance capital, welfare capital and its implementation delay the crisis of the capitalist system and maintain capitalist reproduction through certain external philanthropic activities. The philanthropic activities of capital giants like Soros or Gates are not merely the result of their personal traits or a sudden burst of benevolence, because "whether such philanthropic activity is sincere or hypocritical, it represents the logical end-point of the capitalist circulation process and is necessary from a strictly economic point of view. For such behavior delays the crisis of the capitalist system. It restores balance without falling into a fatal trap: the destructive logic of resentment and the centralized redistribution of wealth to strengthen it can only end in generalized poverty. One might also say it avoids another mode of restoring balance and asserting thymos through sovereign expenditure—namely, war. This paradox points to our sad predicament: contemporary capitalism cannot rely on itself to reproduce itself; it needs external economic philanthropy to support the cycle of social reproduction." Thus, it is evident that the prescription of welfare capital not only fails to cure the ailments brought by finance and digital capital but also causes significant side effects to national finances.
In short, whether finance capital, digital capital, or welfare capital, none have changed the capitalist system itself at its root; instead, they have led to deeper social alienation. Therefore, only by opposing and overthrowing the capitalist system institutionally can the high degree of alienation of capital and its hazards be truly eliminated. On this point, Sohn-Rethel, Žižek, and Marx all coincide.
II. The Form of Political Democratization and its Paradoxes
The "uniqueness" and paradoxical characteristics of contemporary finance capital are closely related to the formality and paradox of the capitalist democratic system. In this regard, Žižek's critical analysis of contemporary capitalist democratic politics also utilizes a Lacanian "paradoxical" analytical method. He argues that contemporary capitalism is undoubtedly "democratic" in form; it is a "democratic" competitive system based on the ballot box. But this democratic form does not mean the realization of "substantive" or true democracy, let alone "whole-process people's democracy." This democratic electoral system in capitalist society is not a voluntary choice of the people, but a "forced" choice—a choice of last resort and a ballot-box democracy. Consequently, what is hidden under the democratic form is substantive non-democracy. The democratization of politics implies a paradox between the democratization of political form and the essence of true democracy.
First, it must be admitted that the modern capitalist democratic form represents a giant leap forward compared to the societies that preceded it. This form originated with the political scientist Hobbes, took shape in Locke's natural law and Two Treatises of Government, was perfected by 17th- and 18th-century French Enlightenment thinkers Montesquieu and Jean-Jacques Rousseau in The Spirit of the Laws and The Social Contract respectively, and was finally deepened by German classical philosophers Kant, Fichte, and Hegel. This democratic form of the bourgeoisie is also called abstract democracy or formal democracy. Its essence lies in emphasizing the procedural and process-oriented nature of democracy, aiming to realize the content and essence of democracy through democratic forms. It should be noted that this capitalist democratic form is closely linked to private property and a formalized legal system. Talking about bourgeois democracy apart from private property and the judicial system is like "climbing a tree to catch a fish" [9]. As Marx said, due to the capitalist private ownership system and its democratic form, "the bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce one hundred years, has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together." In other words, the critique of today's capitalism must take note of Marx's recognition of the massive role capitalism played in promoting the development of human society. Compared to feudalism, capitalist relations of production—specifically the democratic system it established—laid the foundation for capitalist economic development, thereby releasing immense productive forces. This was most clearly manifested in the British Industrial Revolution. Therefore, ignoring Marx's view on the great progress of capitalism in promoting social productive forces and subjecting it to total negation is not a historical materialist perspective.
Second, one must see the "paradoxical" characteristics of bourgeois democratic forms. Formally speaking, there is no doubt that the capitalist democratic system is adapted to the development of capitalist productive forces. However, under its abstract and formalized democratic cloak, the capitalist system of formal democracy conceals its "non-democratic" nature—that is, the "forced" or "compelled" character of bourgeois formal democracy. As is well known, regarding the choice of the subject, "choice" implies a voluntary action of the subject. Such being the case, why does Žižek still say that "forced choice" exists under the capitalist democratic system? This requires an understanding of the unique meaning of what Žižek calls "forced choice."
Generally speaking, a subject’s choice is a product of voluntary, rational will and decision-making; there is no such thing as a "forced" choice. In other words, a "forced choice" is a pseudo-proposition for the subject. However, from a psychoanalytic perspective, Slavoj Žižek argues that there is another kind of choice—namely, the forced choice. He maintains that choice is closely linked to the situation of choosing. That is to say, there are two different kinds of choice: one is a rational and autonomous choice, and the other is an unconscious, "forced" choice. Many subjects under the capitalist system face precisely the latter; therefore, their choice is a "passive" choice conditioned by the subject's situation. Žižek’s view derives from Lacanian psychoanalytic theory. Psychoanalysis holds that when a subject faces a choice, it is not a "one or the other" selection between "good" and "bad" or "virtue" and "evil"; it is not a "dualistic" choice of "either/or." Thus, psychoanalysis differs from the dualism of "good/evil" binaries found in modern philosophy and modern ethics. According to a "dualistic" model of choice, a subject's choice is either good or bad. However, psychoanalytic ethics argues that in actual society, the choices subjects face are not between "good and bad" or "virtue and evil," but rather between "bad" and "worse," or "evil" and "greater evil." This is the brutal truth or the true social reality of actual society, similar to the situations that frequently arise in a state of war. Consequently, in certain special situations, the subject’s choice can only be a "helpless," forced choice; the subject may even have to "sacrifice" one aspect in exchange for another.
A typical example often cited by Žižek is William Styron's novel Sophie’s Choice. The protagonist, Sophie, and her children are sent to a Nazi concentration camp, where a Nazi officer forces her into an impossible or mandatory "forced" choice: Sophie must choose between her two children (a daughter and a son). The child chosen will live, while the other will be sent to the gas chamber. Of course, Sophie has another option—doing nothing—in which case both children will be sent to the gas chamber. In this "forced choice" scenario, Sophie's only "rational" choice is to pick her young son, while her daughter is sent to the gas chamber. As a result, this "forced choice" and the guilt it brings cause Sophie’s psyche to nearly collapse; she becomes suicidal and is haunted for a long time, eventually taking her own life. Here, Sophie's choice was certainly not her own voluntary choice, but an "unavoidable" forced choice—a "painful but rational" imperative. The choosing subject here is not "harmonious" with her situation or community; on the contrary, they are in conflict. In other words, not only can the subject not freely choose their situation or group, but their very existence and characteristics are subordinated to the situation or community itself. Thus, the subject and their social situation or community exist in a contradiction or paradox: the subject can only make the "sole" so-called "correct" choice, otherwise things will be even worse. Choice is not made between good and bad, or virtue and evil, but is a "forced" choice between bad and worse.
Similarly, regarding democratic elections and party politics in capitalist society, the voters or the masses likewise lack the right to choose freely and are instead "forced." Public must vote between two major political parties. Consequently, capitalist democracy only formally guarantees that every citizen has an equal opportunity to exercise their rights, but in substance, it is not true democracy. Here, capitalism integrates the formal "superiority" of democracy with its substantive "coordinated" or hypocritical nature. The democratic form, originally regarded as free election, moves toward its "forced" opposite, becoming a form and system to which the masses must submit.
Thirdly, it is necessary to identify the "surface-level" "misrecognition" characteristic of bourgeois democratic forms. That is to say, people have become accustomed to capitalist electoral forms and take them for granted; thus, people no longer doubt them, and even tacitly accept and silently obey them. Žižek often uses the example of people riding an elevator to explain the capitalist democratic electoral system. As is well known, when people enter an elevator, they often like to repeatedly press the "close door" button, attempting to control the speed at which the doors close. However, the reality is that the "close door" button is merely a decorative fixture; the closing time of the elevator is pre-programmed. Therefore, the button neither accelerates nor hinders the closing speed; it is merely an illusion or "misrecognition" produced by the passenger. People believe their pressing the button can speed up the closing door, but in fact, it has no effect whatsoever. Similarly, democratic elections in capitalist society possess a similar "misrecognition" effect. When people cast votes in a democratic election, it is actually like choosing the elevator button: a "rotational" election takes place every four or five years, leading people to mistakenly believe their vote can change the outcome of the election. In reality, however, the final effect is the same as the elevator door closing—it is a pre-designed procedural effect. The results of capitalist elections are a pre-designed "procedural system"; no matter how the voting goes, the final result is largely the same. Therefore, the "superficial" "misrecognition" of the democratic election becomes the essence of capitalist democracy. Here, the superficial "deceptiveness" of democratic elections is revealed. Yet, under the capitalist system, people have become accustomed to it, misrecognizing the form of democracy for the essence of democracy. Thus, the "formal" nature of democracy covers up the "essence" of democratic elections. Substantively, people must realize that in capitalist society, as Marx stated, capitalism has never had any substantive democracy—democracy has always been formal.
III. The Inevitability of Ecological Crisis and the Dilemma of the "Ecology of Fear"
The crisis of contemporary capitalism is manifested not only in financial crises and the "forced" choices of formalized democracy but also in a third aspect: the ecological crisis brought about by capitalist development. Western leftist scholars have already conducted extensive research on the ecological crisis of capitalism. Žižek's uniqueness lies in his application of psychoanalytic trauma theory to analyze this crisis and his proposal of a critique of the "ecology of fear" [10]. He believes that as long as the capitalist system exists, its ecological crisis will be difficult to eliminate. Specifically, he discusses the ecological crisis of capital operation on two levels.
First, facing the tension between the subject in human society and nature, Žižek puts forward a world-shaking proposition: "nature does not exist." As we all know, we live on this massive planet within nature and the universe. That is to say, we humans cannot for a second leave the "nature" that nurtures us. Why, then, would he propose such a bizarre philosophical proposition? In fact, the statement "nature does not exist" is an ecological proposition based on Lacanian psychoanalytic theory. This proposition needs to be understood from the following two aspects.
On one hand, "nature does not exist" means we need to redefine the concept of "nature." That is, what Žižek calls "nature" here is not the "natural world" we interact with in daily life, but nature in its psychoanalytic sense. In his view, that original, pristine, and "Real" nature has long since ceased to exist due to human transformation. What we face is a "nature" that has been transformed by humans and has weathered many changes. That original "nature" which does not exist only lives in our "fantasies," a product of our human unconscious "presupposition." Thus, "nature does not exist."
On the other hand, this proposition also signifies a certain tension in the relationship between man and nature; man, as the subject, becomes a wound or "trauma" for nature. As is well known, trauma is a core concept in psychoanalytic theory. Psychoanalysis holds that once a subject enters society, they are subject to castration by the big Other [11] of language and the Symbolic order, making the subject a traumatized subject ($), a barred subject. However, in examining the relationship between man and nature, Žižek inverts the relationship: it is not man as the subject who is traumatized, but on the contrary, nature becomes the traumatized party threatened or suppressed by the subject. Just as "nature does not exist," the relationship between man and nature is not a "harmonious coexistence" like the "unity of heaven and man" [12]; rather, it is a "traumatic" antagonism. Relative to nature, humanity is that big Other representing the Symbolic order, constantly conquering and transforming nature, leading to the situation where "nature does not exist"—this is the "trauma" of nature. In the technologically advanced 21st century, a "paradoxical" contradiction has formed between man and nature: on one hand, humanity cannot leave the nature that nurtures us, and must respect the laws of nature and hold nature in awe; on the other hand, human greed and desire lead to the unlimited exploitation and extraction of nature, causing irreparable damage and forming the "trauma" of nature. As Engels said in Dialectics of Nature, every "victory" of humanity over nature is met with nature’s ruthless revenge, thereby forming a tension where man becomes the "wound of nature." Žižek points out that not only does "nature not exist," but "our logic is no different from the logic of ecology: man is the 'wound of nature,' and the balance of nature can never be restored; to live in harmony with the environment, the only thing man can do is to fully accept this gap, this rift, to accept this structural uprooting, and to repair as much as possible afterward; all other solutions—such as the illusion that a return to nature is possible, or the idea that nature can be fully socialized—lead directly to totalitarianism."
Therefore, whether through the "humanization of nature" or "humanized nature," humanity can never return to that ideally harmonious "relationship between heaven and man." Instead, a moderate tension must be maintained between man and nature to sustain this traumatically "fragile balance." Consequently, psychoanalytic theory holds that regarding the relationship between man and nature, "there is no final solution." Once this "fragile balance" is broken, humanity will fall into an irredeemable catastrophe.
Second, regarding how to treat and handle the relationship between man and nature, Žižek clearly opposes the views of those ecologists who advocate for a return to primitive nature—namely, the "ecology of fear" [13]. He says: "So far, the dominant ecological view is the ecology of worry and fear, that is, the fear that man-made or natural disasters will disturb or destroy human civilization, a fear that prompts us to implement planned measures to protect our safety." It is an indisputable and brutal reality that not only capitalism but the entire globe faces serious ecological problems. Scholars hold diverse views on how to view this increasingly serious ecological problem. Some ecologists and eco-socialists have proposed various solutions, such as John Bellamy Foster, André Gorz, and James O'Connor. Žižek does not subscribe to these views; instead, he puts forward his own radical ecological perspective from the angles of the psychoanalytic Real and trauma. He believes that because "nature does not exist" and because of the tension between man and nature, the alarmist views of the "ecology of fear" do not hold up. Facing the wounds of nature, we can only accept this traumatic "non-existent" nature just as we accept the existence of the Real—as an object with which we live day and night.
Third, the abandonment of the "ecology of fear" does not mean that humanity should let ecological crises and disasters take their course. Instead, it means taking more radical "revolutionary" action. Like Bartleby [14], one must adopt a posture of negation to say "no" to capitalism, performing a resolute act through the "death drive" to carry out a Great Refusal of capitalism. He says: "In refusing the employer's orders, Bartleby does not negate the predicate. Instead, he affirms a non-predicate: he does not say he does not want to do it, but that he would prefer not to." The idea that one can improve the capitalist ecological crisis without eliminating the capitalist system is undoubtedly a naive fantasy. He believes that in the logic of ecology and the analysis of ecological crisis, people possess a logic similar to that of psychoanalysis; only then can ecological crises and disasters truly be avoided.
IV. Conclusion
As humanity enters the New Era [15], characterized by changes unseen in a century [16], we must rethink and explore the new problems emerging within this era. Having undergone hundreds of years of development, capitalism has endured numerous twists and turns; yet, it remains "dropping but not dead" and "corrupt but not decayed" [17]. Conducting a comprehensive investigation into this phenomenon constitutes a major task facing Marxism in the 21st century. Utilizing Marx’s theory of historical materialism to re-evaluate contemporary capitalism and its contradictions is also an urgent task for our construction of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Regarding the critical analyses of capitalism provided by Western Leftist scholars, we should neither offer total endorsement nor simply ignore them; rather, we need to conduct profound analysis and critique based on Marxist theory, combined with the great practice of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Slavoj Žižek’s triple analytical critique of contemporary capitalism and its crises from a psychoanalytic perspective provides a certain reference and benchmark value for our understanding of contemporary capitalist contradictions and our repositioning of the world socialist movement. In view of this, regarding contemporary capitalism, we must neither assume its immediate demise nor deny its internal contradictions by assuming it is immutable and eternal. From a Marxian perspective, capitalism and socialism have always risen and fallen relative to one another within a continuous contradictory struggle; likewise, socialism has gradually grown stronger precisely through its struggle against capitalism. Therefore, how to understand and analyze the essence and characteristics of contemporary capitalism remains a major subject facing scholars in both the East and the West. While Žižek’s analysis and critique of contemporary capitalism are not without merit, they also harbor many "radical" or "extreme" elements that require our careful analysis and more comprehensive evaluation. Regardless, his sharp insights and unique perspective have become an indispensable dimension of contemporary capitalist studies, possessing essential theoretical significance and practical value for our comprehensive and in-depth understanding of contemporary capitalism and for advancing the construction of socialism with Chinese characteristics.