Capitalism is good except when it’s bad–and vice versa. It’s the best machinery we’ve come up with to grow wealthier in the aggregate, and it’s still quite a shitstorm. 2008 was only the most recent reminder. Will political tumult caused by technological employment force it to be seriously moderated? In a Spiegel interview conducted by Romain Leick, Marxist jokester Slavoj Žižek sees gathering clouds in the Western political structure-democracy, namely–but he probably always does. The opening:

Spiegel:

Mr. Žižek, the financial and economic crisis showed just how vulnerable the free market system can be. You have made it your task to examine the contradictions of contemporary capitalism. Are you anticipating a new revolution?

Slavoj Žižek: 

Unfortunately not.

Spiegel:

But you would like to experience one? Are you still a communist?

Slavoj Žižek: 

Many consider me to be a crazy Marxist who’s waiting for the end of time. I may be a very eccentric, but I’m not a madman. I am a communist for lack of something better, out of despair over the situation in Europe. Six months ago, I was in South Korea to gave talks on the crisis in global capitalism, the usual you know, bla bla bla. Then the audience started to laugh and said: What are you talking about? Just look at us — China, South Korea, Singapore, Vietnam — we’re doing very well economically. So who is that has slipped into crisis? It’s you in Western Europe — or, more precisely, in parts of Western Europe.

Spiegel:

Well, it’s not quite as simple as that.

Slavoj Žižek: 

Still, there’s some truth to it. Why do we Europeans feel that our unfortunate situation is a full-fledged crisis? I think what we are feeling is not a question of yes or no to capitalism, but that of the future of our Western democracy. Something dark is forming on the horizon and the first wind storms have already reached us.•