So there we are – three major structural pressures on the ability of capitalists
to accumulate capital which are the result of secular trends and
which continuously ratchet upward. This crisis, not in growth but in
capital accumulation, is further complicated by a different phenomenon,
the loss of legitimation of the state structures. States are a crucial element
in the ability of capitalists to accumulate capital. States make possible
quasi-monopolies, which are the only source of significant profit levels.
States act to tame the ‘dangerous classes’, both by repression and by
appeasement. States are the principal source of ideologies that persuade
the mass of the population to be relatively patient.