Full Text | Time of Monsters: Fascism and the Fusion of the State and the Corporation

The Centre for Financial Accountability (CFA), in collaboration with The Wire as media partner, Sambhaavnaa Institute, and Progressive International, is co-organising this eight-part webinar series titled ‘The Political Economy of the Trump Era: Challenges & Opportunities of the Shifting World Order’, conceived to better understand the global moment we are all inhabiting. Read the full text of the first part here. 

In the context of growing authoritarianism and deepening corporate capture, the second webinar in the series The Political Economy of the Trump Era, titled ‘Time of Monsters: Fascism and the Fusion of the State and the Corporation’, looked at how the collusion between state power and corporate capital is reshaping democracies across the world. Set against a backdrop of ecological collapse, disinformation, and rising inequality, the session critically examined how the corporate-state nexus is no longer concealed but has become an explicit political project - framed in the language of efficiency, innovation, and freedom.

Even when the webinar was held, it did appear that the honeymoon period between the White House and Trump was waning, but the phenomenon on display today goes beyond individuals. Even their apparent fallout underline the close ties that the political class and corporates are exhibiting as Musk called Trump ungrateful and even claiming that it was because of him that he won the election. It only further reveals the quid pro quo relation that has been unfolding and how any move that would disappoint Musk’s
expectations is now openly being challenged in public. There is no attempt to even hide the same on their part.

The webinar examined the emergence of a neo-fascist political economy - where billionaires shape policy, public institutions are systematically weakened, and dissent is delegitimised or criminalised. Drawing comparative insights from the United States and
India, it highlighted how figures such as Elon Musk and Gautam Adani exemplify a new oligarchic order sustained by deregulation, surveillance, and a global financial architecture that privileges capital over democratic accountability. Musk’s intention of opening a party of his own after the apparent fallout with White House is further symptomatic of the tendency to merge politics and business. One of the speakers underline the fact that behind the veneer of patriotism, the oligarchs are ultimately self- serving and opportunists and thats revealed by the fact that the same Musk had earlier supported Obama, Hillary and even Biden.

The conversation traced the historic complicity of private capital with authoritarian regimes from corporate support to Nazi Germany, to today’s privatised governance experiments like ‘charter cities’ and ‘freedom zones’ which outsource state functions to multinational corporations, eroding democratic oversight and sovereignty. Rather than a breakdown of liberal democracy, the speakers argued that this fusion of corporate and state power represents its transformation, and where state power is wielded to protect monopoly, suppress dissent, and silence opposition. The panelists for this webinar included Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, Ladan Mehranvar, Aditya Nigam, and the discussion was moderated by Sharmita Kar.

Below is the full text of the talk. The transcribed text has been edited lightly for clarity and readability.

Opening Remarks: Sharmita Kar | The Wire

When we speak of the fusion between the state and corporations, one image that immediately comes to my mind is a photograph that went viral from Donald Trump’s second inauguration. For many, it symbolised the rise of oligarchy in the United States. In that image, businessmen like Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai, and Jeff Bezos were seated in exclusive sections - closer to the president than even some members of his cabinet. This image is more than symbolic. It reflected how major industries, media, and even space research are now concentrated in the hands of a few powerful individuals. At one point, Elon Musk was even accused of giving what appeared to be a Nazi salute. Not long after, Musk, having grown close to the U.S. president, was given his own department within the government. It was named ‘Doge’, after a meme coin, and was tasked with reducing government spending. This is unprecedented. Since then, Trump’s second term has brought about significant changes: funding for education and research has been slashed, sustainability policies have been scrapped, and a series of reciprocal tariffs have been announced - almost like a bullying tactic. These measures triggered volatility in global markets and triggered a tariff war, and caused uncertainty worldwide.

In India too, over the past decade, we've seen something similar. The ties between political leaders and industrialists have grown stronger, with Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani standing out as prominent figures. Power today is more concentrated than ever before, with government projects routinely handed over to this select few. These same industrialists now control key sectors from ports and petrochemicals to media and entertainment. This growing concentration of power hints at unmistakable fascist tendencies, even though political leaders deny such labels. Globally, we are seeing this shift reinforced through various means of censorship, resulting in the gradual erosion of critical thinking. It undermines the public’s ability to question dominant ideologies, especially those around nationalism and hampers democratic consciousness.
So, to open this discussion, I want to pose a fundamental question: What is the true cost of this growing bonhomie between political leaders and industrialists that we are witnessing around the world? And, perhaps more crucially - are we really living in a time of monsters?

Paranjoy Guha Thakurta | Journalist

What I’m going to do today is illustrate what I have to say by referring to two individuals: Elon Reeve Musk, born in 1971,and Shri Gautam Adani, born in June 1962. My task today, will be to compare and contrast these two individuals who are affectionately referred to as oligarchs. But before I get to them, let me take a few steps back.

The link between fascism and corporations, particularly private corporations, is not new. We know how the big engineering firms, the major multinationals, and household names like Krupp and Siemens, were complicit in Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime. They funded him, supported him, and were very close to him.

But we've seen the world change quite a lot since the end of the Second World War. Capitalism, socialism, communism, all these “isms” have taken different forms and avatars in different countries. It is simplistic, perhaps even naïve, to talk of these ideologies as if they can be understood in one-size-fits-all terms.

Oligarchy in Putin’s Russia is different from oligarchy in the People's Republic of China. Oligarchy in India is different from oligarchy in the United States. And yet, there are striking commonalities. My aim today is to explore both the differences and the overlaps.

First, the point to note is that the nexus between business and politics is neither new nor unique to the United States or India. The so-called world’s oldest democracy and the so-called world’s largest democracy both have witnessed this before. But what has changed? What has changed is that this nexus has become closer, more brazen than ever before.

Who would have imagined that Elon Musk would be informally asked to lead a new U.S. government department - DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, without any formal appointment? This appears to be an attempt to shield Musk from scrutiny, with no hearings or confirmation process. While others undergo Senate confirmation, Musk’s influence seems to bypass all of that. At the same time, it’s worth noting that Donald Trump himself has yet to appear before any Senate or House committee.
The additional point is also that, let’s not treat the right wing as monolithic. There is the right - and then there is the right. Historically, the right has done well at dividing the left and the centre. The question today is: can the centre and left forces divide the right?

Take Bill Gates, himself seen as an oligarch, is extremely unhappy with Musk. He has publicly accused Musk of causing immense harm to the world’s poorest children by shutting down U.S. foreign aid and effectively winding down USAID. These internal contradictions within the elite, can they be exploited by progressives? That is a question we must ask.

Now, let us turn to crony capitalism. Is crony capitalism an inevitable form of capitalism? Is there such a thing as capitalism that is not dominated by cronies? But let me offer two examples - Musk and Adani.

Elon Musk was born in Pretoria, South Africa. He moved to Canada, and then the United States, becoming a U.S. citizen in 2002. He rose through software and online payments, eventually creating PayPal, acquired by eBay in 2002. Since then, he has plunged into new-age industries: electric vehicles (Tesla), space exploration (SpaceX),neurotechnology (Neuralink), and satellite communications.

But one thing that must be remembered is that oligarchs are opportunists to the core. Musk supported Obama in 2008 and 2012, Hillary Clinton in 2016, and Joe Biden in 2020. Then, almost overnight, he became a major donor to the Republicans and a huge fan of Donald J. Trump.

Now, let's look at India. Mukesh Ambani was always around, but the rise of Gautam Adani has been truly spectacular. Twenty-five years ago, hardly anyone knew who he was - he was just another diamond trader in Mumbai’s Jhaveri Bazaar. His rise has been extraordinary - from a modest family run plastic recycling factory to becoming the builder of India’s largest Special Economic Zone to a massive player in energy and infrastructure. One thing is clear, his rise has coincided with Narendra Modi’s 12-year term as Chief Minister of Gujarat, and thereafter in his tenure as Prime Minister since 2014.

Today, after NTPC, Adani is now India’s largest private generator of coal-based power. He’s also the biggest coal importer, a major coal miner, and a leading player in solar energy. He doesn’t just generate power - he transmits and distributes it too.

In infrastructure, out of nowhere Adani has become the largest operator of seaports and airports. How did this happen? Rules were tweaked, objections from within the government- including the Department of Economic Affairs and NITI Aayog, were overruled. He was allowed to take over Mumbai’s airport, India’s second biggest, even as the previous operator was systematically hounded.

This is the new face of Indian oligarchy. Law enforcement agencies like the Income Tax Department, the Serious Fraud Investigation Agency, the Enforcement Directorate, the Central Bureau of Investigation - have all become weapons, tools to assist processes that support crony capitalism.

And it doesn't stop there. Adani is one of India’s leading drone manufacturers, producing UAVs used by Israel in Gaza. Overnight, he became the second-largest cement manufacturer in India by acquiring Swizz company - Holcim’s assets. In real estate, he’s virtually the king of Mumbai. He’s spearheading the Dharavi redevelopment project, in what is the most densely populated part of the world. Even in daily consumption - edible oils, for example, he once controlled a fourth of the market nationally, and three-fourths in Gujarat.

The spread of Adani's global footprint - from Australia and Israel to Sri Lanka and
Myanmar is also owed to his association with Mr. Modi. Likewise, Musk’s influence has soared with Trump by his side.

The Hindenburg Research Report accused Adani of stock manipulation. Yet under SEBI’s current leadership, action has been minimal. The Supreme Court declined to order a CBI or SIT probe. And this issue continues to remain unresolved.

How rich are Elon Musk and Gautam Adani? As of May 2025, Forbes estimated Musk’s net worth at over $420 billion. Adani’s, as of late 2023, was about $54 billion - though these are volatile figures driven by market capitalisation.

But here’s the crux: never before has the nexus between business, politics, and oligarchy
been as brazen as it is today. Both Trump and Modi are unashamed about these alliances. And therefore, today, if you criticise Adani, you’re accused of criticising India. This is the shift that has taken place.

We must reflect, and here, I go back to my original point - the right wing is no longer monolithic. Alliances and rivalries shift. These are opportunistic actors - they’ll change sides when needed. But what happens if, say, Trump is no longer president in 2029? Will Musk disappear? No. Likewise, if Modi steps down - Adani will remain. These individuals are here to stay.

And what about regulation? In the U.S., people like Lina Khan tried to curb monopolies. In India, our regulatory bodies - SEBI, the Competition Commission, have been rendered toothless.

Why should we care? Because monopolies hurt consumers, they drive up inflation, they deepen inequality. India today is more unequal than at any point in the last 80 years -including under colonial rule. That’s not just my opinion, that’s the work of leading economists like Thomas Piketty and his team.

So, to those who believe monopolies are bad, that inequality is bad, and this is our
moment to resist. ”

On the Rise of the Right and the Fight for India’s Democratic Future

“One of the reasons the right wing, in all its many shades, has been on the ascendancy in recent times is the failure of left, progressive, and democratic forces to adequately counter their ideology, their tactics, and their power. Too often, these forces have turned away, behaving in what can only be described as a cowardly manner.

Let me turn to something unfolding before our eyes in India. Muslims constitute about 14% of India’s population, roughly 200 million people. That’s more Muslims than in any country in the world, except Indonesia and Pakistan. Yet what we see today is their widespread demonisation. This is not incidental, it is central to the authoritarian project. As pointed out earlier, disinformation plays a vital role. So does surveillance, which are an integral part of this phenomenon.

The issue is also with the reluctance of liberals, leftists, and so-called progressives to fightback. Their reluctance to take to the streets, to organise, to stand up—is striking. They shrug and say, “This was bound to happen. Let me conserve my energy for the next fight.” This self-preserving hesitation has only emboldened the right.

Yet, I am not as pessimistic as some. We are seeing signs of resistance - even in unlikely places.

Let’s look at the courts. In the United States, the situation is different. But in India, we’ve
had Chief Justices not only capitulate to the regime, but actively court it. Justice D.Y.Chandrachud, for example, invited Prime Minister Modi into his home for a religious ceremony.

But just months later, his successor, Justice Sanjiv Khanna, has surprised many with his decisions—on the Places of Worship Act, the Waqf issue, Pegasus surveillance, illegal demolitions in Uttar Pradesh, and even the call for judges to publicly disclose their assets. I’m not saying the judiciary will save us. But it is a sign that fascism, even in its Indian form, is being challenged in parts of the state.

Still, that isn’t enough.

Take the case of Professor Mahmoodabad, head of Political Science at Ashoka University.

Today, he’s out on interim bail. And yet, instead of standing by him, his own university disowns him - saying these were merely his “private views.” This pattern isn’t unique to India. It’s happening at Columbia University, and in campuses around the world.

But unless the left and the progressive forces leave their echo chambers, unless they hit the streets and articulate their protests—this will continue. As rightly pointed out, we must ask: Why did so many women vote for Trump? Why did working-class people, African-Americans, and Latin communities support him?

Likewise, here in India, why do millions support Modi? Has one-third of this country really
been so thoroughly brainwashed that they cannot see anything wrong with a man who says, “I am God”?

It is time for those of us who speak of fighting fascism to get our act together. It’s time to introspect as to why the right wing and the oligarchs are where they are today.

But let’s confront the reality. To argue that oligarchs and capitalists don’t have friends
across political parties is to be dangerously naïve. The proximity between big businessand political power is not new. But what we are witnessing today is its most brazen, unchecked form in modern Indian history.

Take unemployment. According to the government’s own data, youth unemployment is at 45% - the highest in the past 50 years. We are the youngest country in the world, with a population of 1.45 billion and a median age of around 27 or 28. Yet, we haven’t had a national census since 2011 - for the first time since 1881. Think about that. Through two world wars and the Partition, India never missed a census. Why now?

Why has the government suddenly rediscovered the idea of a caste census - just in time for elections? These are questions we must ask. And they lead us to deeper structural failures.

Let me raise a few more questions -
Why, in the run-up to the 2024 elections, did Prime Minister Narendra Modi repeatedly taunt Rahul Gandhi with “Ambani-Adani, Ambani-Adani” like a mantra? If such allegations were made by the head of government himself, why didn’t the Lokpal act? When a complaint was filed, the response was that things said in the heat of elections should not be taken seriously.

This reveals everything.

It isn’t about one party or another. It's about the system that has institutionalised cronyism. The question is not whether oligarchs have political allies. The question is: how long can this go on?

Let’s look at Uttar Pradesh. The BJP dropped from 303 seats in 2019 to 240 in 2024 - a total loss of 63 seats, 30 of which were in UP. Why did they lose in Ayodhya? Or in Faizabad. They lost six Union Ministers, including Smriti Irani, Maneka Gandhi, Ajay Mishra Teni.

Ajay Mishra Teni wasn’t just anyone - he was the Minister of State for Home, Amit Shah’s right-hand man. Narendra Modi’s own victory margin dropped from around 480,000 in2019 to 150,000 in 2024. Why?

Look at Maharashtra. Why are the allegations of electoral rigging in Maharashtra
incredible? Voter rolls went up by 4 million in just five months, something that hasn’t happened in five years. In one case, an individual was listed as having 100 children, six of whom were apparently born in the same year. One address had 1,000 registered voters. This is unprecedented.

We’ve seen these patterns elsewhere, in Haryana, Delhi. Jharkhand was lost. What happens next in Bihar, Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala—remains to be seen. But what is clear is this: the political situation is in a state of flux.

It’s easy to be cynical and say, the more things change, the more they remain the same. But no - they don’t have to.

And that brings me back to you, the questioner. If we don't speak up, if we don’t hit the streets, if we don’t protest - things will remain the same. Of course, there will be consequences. They’ll try to make your life miserable. They’ll threaten you, jail you, silence you.

Ask yourself this: would the Head of the Political Science Department at Ashoka University have been jailed if he weren’t Muslim?

So unless we connect the dots across joblessness, electoral manipulation, corporate collusion, communal targeting, and fight back, nothing will change.

But I want to end on a note of cautious optimism.

Despite the challenges, for the first time in a decade, I’m feeling more hopeful about India.

Ladan Mehranvar | Legal Researcher on Sustainable Investment

I have to say, the title Time of Monsters feels more apt than ever. We're sort of living in what Gramsci called an interregnum - that in-between moment when the old order is dying but the new hasn't yet been born. And it's in that kind of suspended, unstable gap, marked by economic turmoil, political drift, and social disillusionment, that Gramsci warned a great variety of morbid symptoms will appear.

And today, those symptoms are hard to miss.

We're seeing the rise of authoritarian leaders all around the globe, a normalisation of state violence, ecological breakdown, growing inequality, and deepening disinformation. But these aren't just random events or a series of unrelated crises. They're symptoms of something deeper - systemic outcomes of a capitalist order in crisis.

In particular, we're seeing the long-term contradictions of neoliberalism - decades of austerity, deregulation, deindustrialisation, and runaway finance - starting to catch up with us. The model that was supposed to deliver prosperity and stability? That’s starting to unravel - and not just economically, but politically.

As many critical thinkers have pointed out, economic crises on their own don’t automatically lead to progressive change. Just because a system breaks down doesn't mean something better will emerge. When power still rests in the hands of the economic elites, like it is today, these moments of crisis tend to produce counter-revolutionary responses, not emancipatory ones.

So instead of getting more democracy, more fairness, and more public control, what we often get is the opposite: more nationalism, more militarism, more authoritarianism. And we're seeing that now, both globally and very clearly here in the U.S where the fusion of corporate power and the state has gone from a background structure to a public and much more aggressive political project.

And what's striking is that this fusion is being sold in familiar terms: freedom, prosperity, innovation, modernisation, security. But the actual strategy underneath is quite clear. Economic elites aren’t just defending their dominance - they’re actively expanding it by taking control of more and more of the public sphere.

In these moments, public institutions get turned into tools: to bail out corporations when the economy falters, to repress dissent through surveillance, policing, militarised borders, and to redirect public frustration onto scapegoats - immigrants, racialised communities, student protesters against the genocide, gender minorities, or so-called foreign threats. In that context, Trump isn't the origin of the crisis - he's a symptom of it. His administration didn’t invent the corporate-state relationship, it just dropped the language that used to obscure it. Things like tax cuts for billionaires, financial deregulation, and fossil fuel giveaways - none of that is new, of course.

What is new, I think, is how proudly and publicly it's being done - and how it's framed as "for the people."

Beneath all of that, there’s a deeper pattern at work. Capitalism in decay is turning authoritarian.

And as the crises multiply- stagnation, ecological collapse, social unrest - the ruling class doesn’t seem to believe it can govern through consent anymore. So it’s turning to coercion.

This isn’t a loss of control, it’s a shift in how control is being maintained. And that shift is happening by peeling away the democratic façade. And this, I think, is where fascism starts to gain traction not as some anomaly or accident, but as a deliberate adaptation, a
rational (if terrifying) response by capital to a world it can no longer manage peacefully. So the question we have to ask is: How does this authoritarian logic actually manifest? And maybe more importantly, where is it taking us?

That’s what I want to focus on.

One of the clearest examples of this authoritarian logic playing out right now is the rise of charter cities, also called "freedom zones" in some circles, or "model cities." They’re a super special economic zone, more than just an economic zone. They’re experimental
governance models that claim to offer innovation and efficiency which is similar to the terminology used by DOGE.

So a part of a state, a sovereign state, is ceded to a private company, which then governs it just like a state would. They promise less bureaucracy, more freedom for investors, for innovation, and the chance to build these mini-states or laboratories of development from scratch.

But once you dig a little deeper, a very different story emerges.

What’s really happening is that democratic accountability is being replaced with
corporate rule. Power is being insulated from public oversight. Sovereignty is being handed over to private developers and multinational firms whose priorities lie far from the public good. And we’ve seen this model gaining traction in several places.

Take Trump’s interest in freedom zones - whether it’s in Gaza, which he just declared a couple of days ago when he was in the Middle East, in Greenland, or even the U.S. itself. In the interior of the U.S. It might sound fringe, but it’s not just a pet project. It’s part of a broader pattern: using crisis moments to push through elite-driven restructuring and dressing it up as progress.

It’s similar to what Naomi Klein called disaster capitalism or the shock doctrine.

In the U.S. just recently, I think it was a couple of weeks ago, the area where Elon Musk’s SpaceX company operates on the southern tip of Texas is to officially become a private city called Starbase. And it’s not just happening in the U.S.

If we look at Honduras, a small country in Central America - there’s a law that passed back in 2014 called the ZEDEs law, which stands for Zones for Employment and Economic Development. These zones were designed to be semi-autonomous, governed by private entities that effectively function as states within a state.

Sounds great - development, employment. But to give you a bit of context - the law was pushed through by the former narco regime of Juan Orlando Hernández, who’s now serving a 45-year sentence in New York for drug trafficking. That tells you something about the political conditions under which these kinds of laws and frameworks get passed.

One of the most high-profile ZEDEs in Honduras is called Prospera, located on the island of Roatán, just off the coast of Honduras, and it’s owned by a U.S. company - Prospera. It operates under its own regulatory framework. It’s written up its own charter, in fact. It gets to set its own legal, tax, and judicial systems, basically functioning outside of Honduran national law.

To become a resident or an e-resident, because you do have that option, individuals and legal entities have to enter into a legally binding agreement of coexistence with the Prospera ZEDE government, which outlines the rights and responsibilities within the zone.

Now this isn’t a new story. We’ve seen it before with the British East India Company, which didn’t just trade goods, it governed millions with its own courts and armies. Or the United Fruit Company in Central America, which controlled vast territories, infrastructure, labour, and even had a big influence domestic politics.

These corporations also promised jobs, modernisation, development. But what they actually delivered was exploitation, environmental degradation, and the erosion of state institutions.

Today’s versions like Prospera may come with sleeker branding, Silicon Valley buzzwords, and blockchain-based governance models, but the logic is pretty familiar: seed sovereignty in exchange for capital.

Prospera is marketed as a kind of libertarian utopia, run on what they call a “tech stack of governance,” and the people behind it? Mostly U.S. and European entrepreneurs, many with ties to Silicon Valley venture capital and digital libertarian circles.

And we’ve all probably heard of most of them. We know Peter Thiel. We know Patri
Friedman. Mark Andreessen. These are all the backers of this libertarian utopia in
Honduras.

They are also part of the Trump team. Actually, it was Peter Thiel who suggested JD Vance be put in the team to begin with. And of course, Peter Thiel was the creator of PayPal, which then Elon Musk became part of.

And the types of investments being attracted to Prospera in Honduras are really concerning - such as medical tourism, gene therapy experiments to prolong your lives, crypto ventures, and unregulated biotech.

These are high-risk sectors operating in a legal grey zone - a place where oversight is weak and public accountability is virtually non-existent. So this isn’t about development in any meaningful way. It’s about regulatory arbitrage and finding places where rules are
lax and setting up shop there.

Prospera has now officially launched its Africa Project. It’s called Prospera Africa, where it’s advertising that these charter cities will maximise prosperity and create wealth, and where poverty will become a thing of the past.

What ties all of these projects together, whether they’re in Honduras, Africa, the U.S., or Latin America—is the same idea: that the state shouldn’t serve the public anymore. It should serve capital more directly and more efficiently. And of course, it has been for the past 80 years or so.

That’s what I’ve been following - how these projects are being pitched as visionary, utopian, even humanitarian. If you listen to the CEO of Prospera, he’s always talking about humanitarian purposes. But what they really reveal is a shift to a world where crisis isn’t handled collectively anymore by a democratically elected government but it’s handed off to private, unaccountable actors. And all of this is happening under the ideological banner of freedom. That’s why Trump calls these cities freedom cities. But what’s really being advanced is the erosion of democracy, a deepening of inequality, and the entrenchment of a global elite that no longer feels it needs the appearance of liberal legitimacy.

The Honduran example is a perfect one.

Another important aspect: when the newly elected government took power in 2022 they
repealed the ZEDEs law. The President, Xiomara Castro, ran on a campaign platform promising she was going to do this. And for that, and probably other reasons she was elected. The public demanded it. Civil society, legal scholars, communities across the country and around the world. And on top of that, the Supreme Court of Honduras ruled the law unconstitutional.

But here’s the twist.

Prospera turned around and filed a lawsuit against Honduras at the World Bank’s investor-state arbitration tribunal, called ICSID. Their claim? That the repeal of the ZEDEs law violates the U.S–Central America free trade agreements. And they’re asking for $11billion in damages. That’s about a third of Honduras’ annual budget. Even though the company admits that about $120 million has been invested or committed so far and we don’t even know the truth to that.

Let that sink in.

A company creates a semi-autonomous zone under a law many consider illegitimate from day one. It’s rejected by the population and the courts. And many people were killed during this time for their dissents, not just on this law but on other similar ones. And then it turns around and sues the country for lost future profits after the law has been repealed.

This is corporate colonialism with legal teeth. And it’s not enforced by tanks or troops like it used to be. It’s enforced by treaties signed by states which include arbitration mechanisms which allow foreign companies to bypass domestic courts and sue governments in a privileged, secretive arbitration panel at the international level.

These mechanisms are being used to go after all kinds of policies—environmental regulations, labour protections, public health laws. We know of over 1,400 of these cases, just based on publicly available information. But the real number is probably much higher. There are over 3,000 of these treaties in existence today. And it’s not just Honduras.

Germany has been sued for phasing out coal. Colombia was sued for rejecting a gold mine in a fragile ecosystem. South Africa was sued over economic empowerment policies for Black communities. Uruguay was sued for passing tobacco control laws.

These cases disproportionately target Global South countries. But the system is international - is global.

Who designed it? Wealthy capital-exporting states and their lobbyists who are the same people whose corporations now benefit from it. Ironically, many of those states like the U.S., Canada, EU member states have started pulling out of these treaties among each other, once they realised they were limiting their own regulatory space. But they still pressure countries in the Global South to keep signing these treaties, all while their corporations continue using them to extract billions from public budgets in developing countries.

So where do we go from here?

I know this sort of paints a bleak picture. But I like to think it’s not a hopeless one. At least
the one I’ve laid out. These systems were built and what’s built can also be dismantled orreimagined. There are movements pushing back. In Honduras, it was civil society thathelped repeal the ZEDEs law. In Ecuador, South Africa, Bolivia where governments andcitizens challenged these one-sided investment treaties and terminated them.

All over the world from India to Tanzania to Colombia, civil society is calling for
democratic accountability and fighting for investment and trade frameworks based onbalanced rights and obligations, sustainability, and climate justice. And of course, weneed to start naming what’s happening here, not as innovation or development, but asenclosure. Not as reform or cooperation, but as a recalibration of empire. And we need tolink these struggles across borders, across sectors, and across movements. Because themonsters we’re facing today, they may be wearing suits and not uniforms but they’re noless dangerous.

So if we want a different future, it’s not going to come from new charters or investment chapters and free trade agreements. It’s going to come from collective struggle, transnational solidarity, and a bold reclaiming of public power. And that’s my intervention today

Aditya Nigam | Political Theorist

Theorist I want to return to the question of fascism because that’s something which has to be looked into further.

So I want to talk a bit about the three parts of our thematic title today, but specifically in the context of the changed relationship between the state and corporations. Even there, I think there’s something to unpack, to look at afresh. Much of this will be primarily based on the current goings-on in the U.S. and the West.

As a starter, I should also say this: we are in a phase of global capitalism. I don’t agree with the Varoufakis kind of position that we are now in something other than capitalism, whether we call it “techno-feudalism” or whatever. Because this is still a kind of capital.

There’s some kind of very idealised image of capitalism we have which was based on a certain kind of mode of production logic, where economic coercion alone was responsible for the production of surplus value. Ground rent and rent were supposed to be not part of capitalism.

But our experience in the global South as Samir Amin wrote about long ago, and others during the 60s and 70s pointed out - is that the mode of exploitation and oppression here has never primarily been the production of surplus value. In fact, some people have called it primitive accumulation or dispossession as the main form of exploitation in the global South.

Today, we are in a situation where large parts of the global South population have actually become redundant to capital. They are neither important as labour, nor as consumers. That is, in a way, the backdrop within which I think we have to see what’s going on. Now, first, a little bit about the fascism question.

We often tend to draw a direct connection between capital, capitalism, the state, and fascism - as a kind of response to the crisis of capitalism, which it is. But I think there's a very important dimension that we miss if we forget that there is another actor here.

That actor or the actors are the ordinary people who voted for Trump, or who vote for fascist leaders across the world, including in India. Unless we’re arguing that these common people are also acting for the payoff of capital—which I don’t think is a meaningful argument—then we have to ask: what is it that connects these two?

What is it that connects the mass of these people rising in revolt against a certain order, and these oligarchs?

How is it that they are able to come together to make a front against liberal democracy or the left or what is now, in the U.S., even called “the far left”? The whole language has shifted. This, I think, is where the crucial question lies and which is what interests me here.

This shift hasn’t taken place only at the level of corporations and capital. That’s there, I’m not denying it. But the way in which these populations have gravitated towards Trump and the way in which Trump’s rhetoric, or the rhetoric of most right-wing/fascist leaders, has played out is by presenting their attack on liberal democracy, the system of government, and so on, as an attack on a corrupt establishment.

Trump, for example, his only connection with the common white working-class or the MAGA supporter is that he speaks their foul language, their misogynist language, their patriarchal language. But that is what connects him.

And the impact he’s able to make is by presenting himself and them as the common, oppressed by a highly corrupt system. And that corrupt system has two very important strands of theoretical and political propaganda that have emerged over the last 20 years to connect these forces.

Here’s the rub: if you’re trying to defend these corrupt systems that existed before, what does that make you?

There’s a study of the U.S. by two political scientists, Benjamin Page and Martin Gilens - in 2014, they did an empirical study on how laws are framed in Congress and the Senate. They found that whatever pro-people legislations are considered, they’re ultimately scuttled. It is the corporate bodies and their professional associations that determine how laws are framed whether related to healthcare or anything with a welfare dimension. They concluded that the U.S. is not a democracy - it’s an electoral oligarchy.

That was in 2014, before Trump emerged seriously in 2016. But this system was already corrupted and hijacked by corporations and is now being attacked by another section from within the oligarchy, as the corrupt system. And that corrupt system is identified now with liberal democracy and the so-called “left.” So, liberal democracy becomes, in their language, the “far left,” the “loony left,” and so on.

One of the key ideologues of this new formation, Curtis Yarvin, a political theorist associated with the “Dark Enlightenment” calls this corrupt system “the Cathedral.” The Cathedral is an image of media houses, universities, and institutions where liberal, critical,
and left ideas dominate. That is where, in their view, the threat lies. And so you have people like JD Vance saying openly in speeches that they must crush the universities, destroy them. The attack on Harvard, Columbia, and so on, is not out of some whim of
Donald Trump.

This ties into how the gas sector, telecom sector, and others were being manipulated in India - we saw it with the Radia tapes, with lobbyists placing ministers in key portfolios. So unless we’re able to catch this shift in time, as Arundhati Roy rightly said - there’s not just one right-wing. There is the older right-wing and capitalist arrangement, and then this new formation of billionaires and oligarchs.

They are not interested in production. They are only interested in accumulating more wealth. In the U.S., this now moves into another dimension altogether, which I now come to. What’s happening is not just that capital is taking over the state. It is dismantling the state. This is clear in the writings of political theorists over the last 20-25 years people like Nick Land, who started the whole thing of accelerationism. Then you have Curtis Yarvin and others in the “Dark Enlightenment.” Elon Musk once said in a speech that he represents not just MAGA but “dark, Gothic MAGA.” What is this “dark Gothic”? What is the plan?

As Ladan discussed, these “freedom cities,” Prospera, and others are not just policy gimmicks. They fit into a larger theoretical architecture that suddenly makes Trump’s actions look deliberate, not random. Appointing Elon Musk to dismantle the Department of Government Efficiency, shutting down government departments, aviation, health services are not accidents. These attacks on universities, too, are not random. They are part of a well-funded, long-term project of the far-right think tanks. They’ve placed their
people in key positions.

They’re not interested in mobilising public opinion except as a temporary means to an end. Because they haven’t yet consolidated control, they still need voters. So, for now, they’ll speak to the masses. But their vision is very clear.

For the theorists of the Dark Enlightenment, the Supreme Court will eventually be reduced to an advisory body. The business of government will be taken over by CEOs. They don’t want a democracy - they want the whole business of government to be taken
over. And when I look at it from here, it’s not capital taking over the state, it is capital dismantling the state.

That’s the “network state.” That’s the logic of freedom cities. And we should always be suspicious of that word because “freedom” has always meant only freedom for the capitalist. Never for the rest of us.

Now, if you connect this to what’s been going on for the last 30 years around taxation, remember what Warren Buffett said: “My class has been conducting a class war against the American people.” The tax paid by billionaires and corporates has come down drastically since the mid-1990s. That interview was around 2011-12. In the same period, the taxes paid by ordinary Americans have gone up exponentially. This new group of billionaires are taking a leaf from the Dark Enlightenment. It's strongly linked to Silicon Valley, with its ideas of technological acceleration and control. They also recognise that the time of the American empire is over. It’s in decline.

So what do they want instead? Separate cities run like corporations. CEOs will rule them. Trump is now being talked about not just as a CEO but as a monarch - a king. He wants that. And this isn’t just Trump. That literature is full of arguments that democracy is a sham, that it must be dismantled. That ordinary people have no sense and no place. This is where it ties into fascism and Nazism. The idea that there is a new section of humanity

in this brave new world who is technologically and even genetically better equipped to rule - that must rule. So, this is not governance. It’s the transformation of government into corporate domination.

Even if they tolerate a judiciary for a while, they’ll try to reduce it to an advisory role. In India, we’re already seeing this. The courts make critical remarks, but take no action. They let everything pass. The Babri Masjid demolition - that’s very bad - but go ahead, build the Ram Mandir. That’s become the model. The judiciary has acquiesced here. In the U.S., it’s still an arena of resistance alongside civil society but they’re aiming to dismantle that too.

So yes, this is a new kind of fascism which is not identical to Nazism or Mussolini’s fascism, but with strong elements of continuity. Bernie Sanders has pointed this out too, that there is a difference between productive corporations that had some accountability, and this new class of billionaires and oligarchs who have none. That’s where I’ll end my main argument: we must see both the continuities and the ruptures. Just one small point- I don’t want to end on a pessimistic note. We must think differently. Three-fourths of the world is still not fully connected to this internet-based matrix. They live outside the matrix.

Large populations in the global South should resist being integrated into it. Or at least use it only minimally. And remember that this high-tech, hyper-networked world is also extremely vulnerable. One disruption, one spark, can collapse the whole thing. The next collapse may not come from protests on the streets. It could come from an unexpected fuse blowing somewhere. So this is not an impenetrable system. The more networked itis, the more vulnerable it is.

And even within Silicon Valley, many have broken away and many have cautioned us about the dangers of this system. So, yes, there are elements of hope.

On the Changing Form of Colonialism and Resistance

I think the realisation that we're coming to now is that with the formal end of the colonial order, things have not fundamentally changed. The whole question of decolonisation today - in terms of knowledge, in terms of the domain of ideas, and so on - is on the table precisely because what we are seeing is a continuation of neocolonial domination across the global South. And even today, a recent study in 2015 had actually calculated that, in the last 10 years, the transfer of wealth and resources that had taken place from the global South to the global North was enough to reduce world poverty 70 times over. So even now, the situation is that the prosperity of the West is built on colonial, neo colonial exploitation. And yet, we are the ones who are called dependent. When in fact, Western prosperity is dependent on that of the global South.

This is something which I don't have time now to go into in detail, but the recent developments in Africa have actually caught on to that. So, after the coup in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, and the new alliance that has emerged, especially the way in which Ibrahim Traoré of Burkina Faso has emerged practically as a cult leader and has become a hugely popular leader among the youth of Africa.

Why? Because within two years, he repaid all debt, refused all IMF suggestions, asked the French troops and French companies to pack up and leave, asked the Americans to leave. The whole Sahel region has now opted out of that economic cooperation zone which was called ECOWAS. They have now formed their own digital currency because the currency that existed was franc-based. And the French froze it. So they basically managed to break away. They're moving toward separate passports and so on.

What I'm saying is this: the gold of Burkina Faso, which used to all go to France, while they had no gold reserves there, continued to have the highest gold reserves. This is being reversed.

There have been nineteen attempts on his life in the last two and a half years to assassinate him, to effect a coup d’état, and so on. So this is something which is going to be game-changing - because it’s raising hopes all across Asia and Africa. And across Africa, there are different governments now beginning to take seriously the possibility of a break. So far, all the elected governments have basically been kowtowing to Western demands. But this has shown that it can be done - that you can break with them and still be standing on your feet. This could well be a game changer, if they allow him to survive. Unlike Thomas Sankara, who was murdered at exactly the same age - he was 37 when he was assassinated.

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