Since about the early 1970s, it has been argued that we are situated in a new historical epoch. That epoch has been described in various ways. Some accounts emphasize cultural changes, (“postmodernism"), while others focus more on economic transformations, changes in production and marketing, or in corporate and financial organization (“late capitalism,”“multinational capitalism,” “post Fordism,” “flexible accumulation," and so on). The central concept of "postmodernity" is the proposition that in the past two or three decades, we have witnessed a historic transition from modernity to postmodernity.
According to some economic theorists modernity and postmodernity represent two different phases of capitalism. One the one hand, postmodernity has been presented as a modal change in capitalism, i.e., "late capitalism," It has also been conceptualized as a new multinational, "informational" and "consumerist" phase of capitalism. Advocates of the French Regulation School, for instance, alternatively describe it as a transition from Fordism to flexible accumulation. A similar idea occurs in rather less nuanced form in certain theories of "disorganized capitalism." Postmodernity may be appraciated as a phase of capitalism where mass production of standardized goods, and the organizational structures and forms of labor associated therewith it, have been replaced by flexibility: new forms of production such as "lean production," the "team concept," and "just-in-time" production; diversification of commodities for niche markets; a "flexible" labor force; mobile,i.e., globalized, financial capital, and so on, all made possible by new informational technologies. What we are experiencing is a new cultural and intellectual configuration, labeled "postmodernism," which is said to have replaced the culture of modernism and the intellectual patterns, social structures, and forces associated with the modernity project.
With a profound sense of resignation, Kermode argues that postmodernism is merely “another of those period descriptions that help you to take a view of the past suitable to whatever it is you want to do.”
It is against Kermode's resignation that it is necessary to conceptualize an alternative. Indeed, with respect to the issue of such intellectual patterns, what might be called postmodern science may be said to overthrow the static ontological categories and hierarchies characteristic of modernist science. In place of atomism and reductionism, the new sciences stress the dynamic web of relationships between the whole and the part; in place of fixed individual essences (e.g. Newtonian particles), they conceptualize interactions and flows.
Over the past two decades there has been extensive discussion among critical theorists with regard to the characteristics of modernist versus postmodernist culture; and in recent years these dialogues have begun to devote detailed attention to the specific problems posed by the natural sciences.
Thus, objects which are in principle unobservable ought not to be introduced into the theory. However, these criteria, admirable as they are, are insufficient for a liberatory postmodern political economy or, for that matter, science. While they may liberate human beings from the tyranny of universalism, "absolute truth'' and "objective reality," they leave unaddressed the tyranny of other human beings. Perhaps what we need a political economy that is publically answerable and of service to progressive interests. Moreover, in order to be revolutionary, political economy in the broad sense (PEBS) cannot claim to describe what exists, or, the facticity-of-the-given. Rather, PEBS should be political tools, strategies for overcoming oppression in specific concrete situations. The goal, then, of PEBS should be to develop strategic theories--not true theories, not false theories, but strategic theories.
One characteristic of the emerging postmodern science, i.e., PEBS, is its stress on nonlinearity, complex circular causality, and discontinuity: this is evident, for example, in chaos theory and the theory of phase transitions as well as non-equilibrium thermodyanmics associated with an analysis of fluidity, in particular turbulent fluidity. These two themes are not as contradictory as it might at first appear: turbulence connects with strong nonlinearity, and smoothness/fluidity is sometimes associated with discontinuity (e.g. in catastrophe theory); so a synthesis is by no means out of the question.
Secondly, the postmodern sciences deconstruct and transcend the Cartesian metaphysical distinctions between humankind and Nature, observer and observed, Subject and Object. Already quantum mechanics, earlier in this century, shattered the ingenuous Newtonian faith in an objective, pre-linguistic world of material objects ``out there''; no longer could we ask, as Heisenberg put it, whether ``particles exist in space and time objectively''. However, Heisenberg's formulation still presupposes the objective existence of space and time as the neutral, unproblematic arena.
Thirdly, the postmodern sciences overthrow the static ontological categories and hierarchies characteristic of modernist science. In place of atomism and reductionism, the new sciences stress the dynamic web of relationships between the whole and the part; in place of fixed individual essences (e.g. Newtonian particles), they conceptualize interactions and flows. Intriguingly, these homologous features arise in numerous seemingly disparate areas of science, from quantum gravity to chaos theory to autopoietic, or self-organizing systems. In this way, the postmodern sciences appear to be converging on a new epistemological paradigm, one that may be termed an ecological-cum-coevolutionary perspective, broadly understood as appreciating the fundamental interdependence of all phenomena and the embeddedness of individuals and societies in the cyclical patterns of the global biosphere.
A fourth aspect of postmodern science is its self-conscious stress on symbolism and representation. postmodern sciences are increasingly transgressing disciplinary boundaries. Quantum physics, complex number theory, and chaos theory share the basic assumption that reality cannot be described in linear terms, that nonlinear--and unsolvable--equations are the only means possible to describe a complex, chaotic, and non-deterministic reality. These postmodern theories are all metacritical in the sense that they foreground themselves as metaphors rather than as identarian descriptions/representations of reality.
Postmodern political economy provides a powerful refutation of the disciplinariness and elitism inherent in traditional approaches. The content and procedure of postmodern political economu thus provides a powerful intellectual support for the progressive political project, understood in its broadest sense: the transgressing of boundaries, the breaking down of barriers, the radical democratization of all aspects of social, economic, political and cultural life. Conversely, one part of this project must involve the construction of a new and truly progressive science that can serve the needs of such a democratized society-to-be.
The realist dream of scientific progress, of recapturing rather than revolutionizing existing methodologies and technologies is less than relevant to a political struggle that seeks something more than neo-liberalism/neo-fascism. The alternative is a profound reconception of political economy that involves a dialogical move towards redefining systems, of seeing the world not only as an coevolving whole but as a set of competing systems--a world held together by the tensions among various natural and human interests--offers the possibility of redefining what political economy is and what it does, of restructuring deterministic schemes of education in favor of ongoing dialogues about how we intervene in the global biosphere. It goes without saying that postmodernist political economy unequivocally favors the latter, deeper approach.
Let us be clear that the fundamental goal of any emancipatory movement must be to demystify and democratize the production of knowledge, to break down the artificial barriers that separate "scientists'' from the layity. This task must start through a profound reform of the educational system. The teaching of political economy and economics must be purged of its gate-keeping and disciplinary characteristics, and the content of these subjects enriched by incorporating the insights of among others the multiculturalist and ecological critiques.
The struggle for the transformation of ideology into critical science proceeds on the foundation that the critique of all presuppositions of science and ideology must be the only absolute principle of science.