Bureaucratic capitalism and the work of Cornelius Castoriadis

[Extract] Across forty years from the 1950s to 1990s, Cornelius Castoriadis developed a critique of bureaucratic capitalism. The article looks at the strengths and weaknesses of Castoriadis' theory. The weaknesses stem from Castoriadis' economic theory; the strengths from his theory of meaning. Castoriadis' attempt to link a critique of growth to the critique of bureaucracy fails but his analysis of the tenuousness of meaning in modern bureaucratic societies is much more successful. Bureaucratization causes the draining of meaning (imaginary significations) from societies dominated by public and private bureaucracies. Superficiality, incoherence and sterility triumph over sense. Societies become consumed by hobbies and lobbies, and foist a huge amount of junk on their denizens. Junk science, junk art, junk politics, junk culture and junk everything proliferates. Everywhere one turns trivial pursuits prevail