The Crack Cocaine phenomenon was simply a Capitalist tool to facilitate and service a level and degree of Capitals development, at a specific point in the development of U.S. Imperialism, specifically Finance Capital.
U.S. Imperialism--- A Brief Summery
The beginnings of the 1980's was economically a trial for the U.S. Capitalism was entering a new and distinct phase particularly for the mature, industrial-manufacturing economy of the U.S. The National Economy was under the intense strain of birthing the expansionist flux of Finance Capital in it's more mature appearance and the effects were at odds with the more linear and stable result of servicing a National Economy based on credit.
The late '70's and prior to the Reagan Administration, 1980-88; saw an extreme decline in the economy, both nationally and internationally. Whole sectors of Bulwark industry such as the automobile industry as represented by Chrysler Motors were on the brink of bankruptcy even to the point that the U.S. Govt., itself had to bail out Chrysler Motors by giving it a direct loan. The commercial banks who normally would have been the ones to do so could not afford to undertake the massive responsibility and subsequent servicing of the loan. Oil and it's derivatives was on the one hand with the contraction of the steel and it's component industry on the other exerting profound adverse effects on the economy. In the face of all that, politically the U.S. was laid impotent with a type of political action occurring in Iran that it's executive and military leadership were ill-prepared to deal with. Capital, particularly Finance-Capital, which as we know, knows and has no allegiances nor borders was transforming itself into a maturity that the U.S. with it's international presumptions of leadership could either vanguard of a more able political- economy would assert itself that would ensuingly leave the U.S. in it's wake---this was the climate of the U.S. circa late '70's early '80's.
The National Economy of the pre '80's was on the one hand lacking the high volume of cash flow required to satisfy U.S. Global obligations and on the other, the maintenance at a stable level the effects of Finance Capital's motion upon the mid and lower level incomes. Finance Capital was in it's expansionist mode, consequently formal manufacturing such as Steel production were losing out to the up and coming cheaper economies of the far east. Finance Capital was restructuring and stabilizing itself towards the servicing of speculation and Super-Monopolies. The political-economical landscape in the U.S. was in a state of shock and paranoia. Tried and proven, time -worn industries were being squeezed out. Attitudes that had nurtured post World War II industry were coming up short in the face of the highly agitated ones necessary to exist in the unstable wake of Finance Capital. Post World War II, the American Economy had been of the basis for the revitalization of the economies of allies and foe, particularly the German and Japanese economic resuscitation. The U.S. economy had proven mature and nationally massive enough to maintain it's anomalies independent from the strain of it's obligations.
The dearth of any political-economy is Value, which is indicated materially as money and the means of it's production. What this means is first, the human being in that activity of re-creating those necessary means for survival and existence brings value or purpose to those necessities created and developed. The value which is purpose given those creations and developments are in essence extensions of the human being on which survival and existence are dependent. This is what, within a community or society of humans it's means of transfer, and exchange then becomes the most common form and vital medium of interaction with fellow human, that most basic manner those necessities for survival and existence are circulated---which is what we know as money/capital.
The U.S. prior to the Reagan years was on the verge of having a short-fall with money. Tenders of political-economies subscribe to a variety of mechanisms in protecting and developing their respective political-economies. The Reagan Administration chose one that has been tried and proven. It chose that of governmental spending, which in the instance was building up the Military with the resultant expenditure on defense. Flooding the national economy with cash through defense spending, the Reagan Administration had to solve the problem of how to truly stimulate the economy with it's cash infusion. Money was being pumped into the economy massively, but it was in wrong hands. The white suburbanites who worked for the defense industry and were accessing the cash were not the compulsive consumers, nor was their type of consumption the appropriate and necessary one for that agitated circulation of cash demanded by a resurging national economy. A crucial factor emerged, which as a result served as that point of fusion, through which that required flow cash from suburbanite white workers into desired circulatory flow of cash was made possible. A sizable element of those defense workers were products of parents who had participated in the counter culture drug imbibing years of the '60's and as such the drug culture was familiar to them. It was then, with them that the Reagan intent found it's maturing medium.
Drugs, illegal drugs, controlled substances or narcotics have been a part of U.S. culture for a while. But the middle '80's saw a profound change in the effect such have had and can have on a society as a whole. The U.S. drug culture naturally is illegal and as with anything illegal it's servicing and activity remains where we colloquially describe as underground, which in this case a part of the underground economy. Underground economies, as your astute and pragmatist economist know are phenomena that, in the absence of a resolute above ground economy then become that medium through which a political economy resuscitates and gathers itself, because they facilitate and enable that required volume of cash [capitol] to circulate quickly within the society resulting in a stimulation of economic activity pursuing the cash that can appear above ground and proceed participatorially in the process of giving direction and stability to the above ground economy. This, then is what happened during the middle years of the Reagan Administration.
The middle Reagan years witnessed a resurgence and emergence of political economic activity that if one has the wherewithal to discern, doesn't appear as conventional wisdom would've us think "due to the market forces" or it's least understood and cabalistic sibling "Free Market Enterprise". The U.S. economy of the middle Reagan years due to certain specifics gathered steam resulting in a whole host of circumstances, of which the most significant and profound was the culture of drugs, particularly "Crack Cocaine".
U.S. National Economy---A Brief Summery
The national economy developed upon two deterministic factors: (1) stable employment (2) debiting and credit. The formal heavy-industrial manufacturing that was the structural support for economic development particularly within the national economic sense, provided dynastic employment in the sense that , for instance Lunch Box Willy would gain employment, organize his existence around the white picket fence ideal, do his bit in supporting the national economy through the various debiting for services and consumption of social commodities, his son(s) shall follow in his foot steps of comparative one's, hence replicating the entire cycle, which in it's turn created a national economy that could support whatever was termed and postured as the American ideal and way of life.
The above described phenomena was the norm for the average of White America and the exceptions of Black America. But on the other hand Black America's social and economic development differed greatly from the White experience.
The Black inner-city experience was once directed from it's inception, that it's participants would not have the stability of stable employment. The middle class phenomena of credit and debit was not a factor in the development of Black America. Rather a cash on demand was the variant. If it should be said that the White economy provided the national economy with long term fore-sight, Black economy catalysed the short term fulfilment of it's needs. This environment and the vacuum appearing from the effects of Finance Capital's activities upon the economic landscape coupled with Crack-Cocaine phenomenon catapulted Black inner-city economy preeminently int the pulse and heart of capital and placed it realistically within reach of that economic stability of self-determination that had been effectively denied Black America.
Inner city---Servicing the National Economy
To speak of a Black economical landscape within the American one is to infer a homogeneous entity inter-acting with the national body, but that isn't the case, Black economy simply designates a level of U.S. economy, a particular niche and servicing a particular type of capital. There exist a few exceptions, but in the all Black economy maintains a retail function generating that high volume of cash necessary for the short term fulfilment of capital. But due to the cumulative effects of Finance Capital, the Black economical landscape during the Reagan years experienced a radical transformation at the inner-city level.
Black populations of inner-city U.S.A. were as they have always been a stimulant in the raw sense on the national economy, A mechanism for flow of cash within the national economy. Reaganomics understood this function clearly, and in the wake of Finance Capital's activity upon the national economic landscape, it utilized the services of the inner-city in a fashion reminiscent of the Prohibition Era.
Black America due to it's unstable relationship with mainstream America has historically found it's economic activity in the illegal underground economies of it's evolving milieus. The Reagan years were not any different. Cocaine had gradually begun to reassert itself during the late '70's, and during the Reagan initial years a more potent and powerful variant of it was developed, Crack.
Crack Cocaine then flooded Black communities and then became the New Work Horse for Black economic initiative in the underground economy. Crack Cocaine a solidification and rockification of it's base powdery form became a variant that was able to transmit it's narcotizing agent so powerfully and for a limited amount of time, during which the narcotizing sensation was intensely magnified that it became the El Dorado Mother Lode of the drug underground economy because it's consumers in that never ending quest of pursuing that brief and highly intense narcotizing stimulation were compelled to spend money, time after time in that cycle, which therein signaled the awesome power of it's addiction---and that in raw economic terms was what the Reagan tendered National-Economy needed to attain that stability, that respite to leverage itself on to it's above ground realization of vanguarding capital in it's Finance Capital maturity and it's international imperatives.
The dynamism of the illegal drug economy particularly Crack Cocaine
The decade of the '80's; has the historical designation as the era of Reaganomics. On the surface, advocacy by Black Nationalistic imperatives critiques Reaganomics as being racist and anti-black, however a close dispassionate scrutiny has to conclude that Reaganomics, in it's specificity of enabling Black America to access massive cash could have completed what that other Republican, Abraham Lincoln started---The access to true political economical development for Black people.
The political economical landscape the Reagan administration inherited was one that was in shambles, as already pointed out, Finance Capital was in a rapid state of motion, the economical integrity had been compromised, to stabilize it a true and correct interpretation of economic determinism had to be bought lock, stock and barrel, in a sense, colonial policies comparative to the British dictates of Sino Policy during the 1800's had to be once again lifted up from their dusty shelves, dusted off, to once again see the light of day, as Reaganomics struggled to support the long term objectives of Finance Capital with a short term necessity for creating a highly dynamic national economy.
Reaganomics picked chapters out of British-Sino Colonial policies of the 1800's and pages out the Post-Stock Market Crash of the 1920's Prohibitionist Era and welded such to a contemporary commitment that had a 'no compromise" attitude towards social reality, an effort that would have raised the eye brows of the past-master himself Machiavelli. The British-Sino Policies of the 1800's were designed to Bulwark British Imperialism ---The policies of Reaganomics were designed to direct U.S. imperialism towards the fulfilment of it's national and international obligations. The policies of Reaganomics a la' Neo-Taipanism were designed to saturate the national economy with credit power for the impending maturity of Finance Capital, as such the national economical landscape was turned into a deregulated netherworld of acquisition.
Reaganomics picked chapters out of British-Sino Colonial policies of the 1800's and pages out the Post-Stock Market Crash of the 1920's Prohibitionist Era and welded such to a contemporary commitment that had a 'no compromise" attitude towards social reality, an effort that would have raised the eye brows of the past-master himself Machiavelli. The British-Sino Policies of the 1800's were designed to Bulwark British Imperialism ---The policies of Reaganomics were designed to direct U.S. imperialism towards the fulfilment of it's national and international obligations. The policies of Reaganomics a la' Neo-Taipanism were designed to saturate the national economy with credit power for the impending maturity of Finance Capital, as such the national economical landscape was turned into a deregulated netherworld of acquisition.
As I've shown in proceeding paragraphs, the suburban White defense workers had the cash and Black America had a new and potent banner of the drug culture as such it was inevitable that both would fuse and with that simple matter of factness of the human condition and it's tendencies and habits, the Reagan Administration was able to solve that question of what and how to stimulate a Capitalist Political Economy which in it's seeming implosion had been the bane of 3 previous Presidents and even causing one to undertake an endeavor which, it it's revelatory aftermath caused his exit in disgrace from the Presidency.
Those element of White suburban America with the means to experience the new drug phenomenon, spent their cash which due to the Reagan Administration Defense Buildup was made available. The cash upon entering the Black community and it's elements of whom since the emergence of the Black social condition has been unstable relative to the applied and governing forces of the political-economy which dictated the Black American existence, once again, with the manner the incoming cash was utilized fulfilled what has been the Black historical role in the U.S., a sizable amount of the Black community now possessing large amounts of cash begun the process of enabling the cash to mature and realize itself with spending it in consuming commodities. In consequences of the intense and high amount of consumption entire industries pursuing the now awakening national economy and it's cash flow emerged. The U.S. economy attaining that stability and development was now ready to once again vanguard capital and it's Finance Capital imperialistic imperatives.
Reaganomics A Summary
The Black populations of inner-city U.S.A. were as they have always been, a consuming function for the retail tier of the national economy and it was with the Black populations that Reaganomics unleashed the raw might of capital.
The period of Crack Cocaine dominance can be likened unto a vacuum within the U.S. National Economical landscape, a transitional period wherein capital sought to define a comprehensive direction for economical doctrine. Reaganomics was in effect a two-prong directive to maintain the stability of the economy through:
1. The public sector, specifically the Military-industrial Complex.
2. The dynamism of the illegal drug economy particularly Crack Cocaine.
The combination of the exceeding high volume of cash that was recycled within the inner-cities and the inner-cities habit of unbridled consumption catalysed the resuscitation of the national economy, hence servicing the needs of Finance Capital internationally, and allowing for the realization of capital nationally.
Thus in essence the Crack Cocaine Phenomenon during the Reagan Era was simply a tactical maneuver in the service of revitalizing U.S. imperialism and it's Strategic pursuits.
By Apropos
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