Seminar by Prof Paris Yeros (Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC), Brazil)

The growth of labour reserves in the peripheries of the world economy has accelerated dramatically over the last half century. This occurs as global warming has also accelerated. The conjuncture presents an existential crisis for the peoples of the South and also marks the terminal decline of capitalism as a social system. There is now a renewed systemic rivalry between West, East and South whixh is an expression of these global contradictions. The historic question is: what type of transition is required to serve the modern needs of peripheral social formations? The concern with an emerging polycentric world must bring focus to the trajectories of social reproduction and the character of social protest, as well as to the necessary transition to economic planning for rural and urban industrialization.