The Relationship between Internationalization of Capital Structural Unemployment and Cultural Consensus

This thesis has several objectives. The first is to provide a descriptive, though brief, analysis of U.S. capitalism in contemporary society. U.S. capitalism, with the use of institutional and ideological structures of society has been able to inhibit class consciousness under rising material conditions. As material conditions reinforce the production consumption model, equilibrium is maintained which inhibits class consciousness and cohesiveness. When structural unemployment rises the focus shifts to blaming either the economic structure or the workers themselves for the deficit. However, the underlying problem is manifested by the capitalistic market economy's never ending quest for access to resources and cheaper labor markets outside the United States. The second objective is to provide a foundation for understanding and interpreting the ideology surrounding structural unemployment. Unemployment coupled with the growing trend towards low end wages, (58 percent of the new jobs created between 1979 and 1984 paid 7,400 dollars or less a year) creates a system of workers who are in direct and often fierce competition with one another. This intense competition undermines the basis for collective action and for class based forms of solidarity. Furthermore this fragmentation polarizes workers and actively functions as a divisive capitalistic instrument serving the long term interest of capital. Lastly, I will attempt to demonstrate the overwhelmingly powerful connective tissue of U.S. capitalism, multi-national corporations, deepening structural unemployment and the subsequent effects of cultural consensus. Therefore, the central theme of my project is the American economic structure and its subsequent impact on cultural consensus via structural unemployment. During the past decade economic changes and the interplay of capitalist and socialist ideologies have been profoundly transforming culture. This cultural transformation and consequential adaptation represent the salience of my project to the Masters program in Liberal Studies in American Culture.Master of Arts (MA)Liberal StudiesUniversity of Michigan-Flinthttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/143303/1/DeBard.pd