Over the past two centuries, crisis has been endemic to capitalism. Yet classical and neoclassical economics has tended to treat crisis more as an aberration to ‘the norm’ of a stable self-regulating market. Since the onset of the 2007/08 global crisis, however, this axiomatic truth of capitalist economics has been called into question. The 2007/08 crisis is ongoing and has been compared to the general crisis of the Great Depression (1929–1941). It is now considered one of the worst crises in the history of modern capitalism, having eclipsed the Great Depression. So, how do we characterise the nature of the contemporary capitalist crisis? Are we experiencing a cyclical crisis or a deeper systemic crisis? Are we living through a time of periodic and general crises? Given the scale and depth of the contemporary crisis, which poses major existential threats to planetary life, this chapter argues that we are dealing with an unprecedented civilisational crisis with multiple systemic dimensions: the systemic crises of capitalist civilisation.

I situate the argument in the context of Marx's conceptions of capitalist crisis. Marx's understanding of capitalism, as a body of knowledge and with its valuable contribution to modern social thought, has not been surpassed. However, in engaging Marx it is necessary to appreciate that classical theory on capitalist crisis, originating with Marx, is at an impasse in terms of comprehending the contemporary systemic crises of capitalist civilisation. The critical engagement with Marx is not about refuting his corpus, however, but about seeking new openings and ways of thinking about the contemporary capitalist crisis. It is about finding theoretical space in Marx's understanding of the ‘deep structures of capital’ for the notion of the ‘systemic crisis of capitalist civilisation’ and other conjoined concepts, such as ‘capital as a geological force’. This is grounded in an appreciation that Marx's work is unfinished and open to development by deploying his own dialectical method of thinking.

Also significant in this search for new openings and ways of thinking about capitalist crisis is the challenge of the level and scale at which we think about this crisis. To merely think about crisis in the abstract, at the level of the ‘deep structures of capital’, is not very useful in itself. Similarly, to think about the crises of capitalism as merely economic crises is wholly inadequate.