[...] In today's neoliberal, globalized network society, "the monopoly of capital" has indeed become "a fetter upon the mode of production." We can see this in all sorts of ways. So-called austerity programs transfer ever more wealth to the already rich, at the price of undermining living standards for the population as a whole. The privatization of formerly public services and the expropriation of formerly common resources undermine the very infrastructures that are essential for long-term survival. "Digital rights management" and copy protection restrict the flow of data and cripple the power of the computing technologies that make them possible in the first place. [...]

And yet, none of these contradictions have caused the system to collapse or have even remotely menaced its expanded reproduction. As Deleuze and Guattari say, "no one has ever died from contradictions". Instead, capitalism perpetuates itself through a continual series of readjustments. Despite the fact that we have reached a point where capitalist property relations have become an onerous "fetter upon the mode of production" that they initially helped to put into motion, this fetter shows no sign of being lifted. [...] The "capitalist integument" has failed to "burst asunder"; instead, it has calcified into a rigid carapace, well-nigh suffocating the life within.