Zombie companies and global crisis
Abstract
A series of empirical studies in the advanced countries have recently revealed the existence of significant a fringe of highly indebted companies that, despite their inability to generate income, remain active. They are called zombie companies. In this article we outline academic research and other sources of information with the purpose of explaining and quantifying the phenomenon. "Forced" survival of capitalist companies did not result from "normal" economic functioning of the system; it was instead an outcome of state policy deliberately conceived to temper social and political consequences of the crisis. Is it possible to moderate through state action the capital destruction process without eventually disturbing the functioning of the capitalist organism? The question of zombie companies offers an adequate terrain for discussing the contradictions and limits of this policy.
Keywords: economic crisis, economic cycles, countercyclical policies.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright notice
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right to be the first publication of the work as licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of authorship of the work and initial publication in this journal.
Authors may separately enter into additional arrangements for non-exclusive distribution of the version of the work published in the journal (e.g., placing it in an institutional repository or publishing it in a book), with an acknowledgement of initial publication in this journal.
Authors are allowed and encouraged to disseminate their work electronically (e.g. in institutional repositories or on their own website) before and during the submission process, as it may lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and higher citation of published work (see The Effect of Open Access).
