The Second Contradiction of Capitalism

James O’Connor was an economist and sociologist, co-founder and editor of Capitalism Nature Socialism, the most influential ecosocialist academic journal. O’Connor, a great communicator of ecomarxist thought, is known for his theoretical contribution regarding the “second contradiction of capitalism”. The first contradiction being that which refers to how the rate of exploitation of capital produces the conditions for the organization of labor to develop as a social barrier to its accumulation, causing the emergence of crises for the realization of capital, O’Connor referred to the second contradiction to point out how the deterioration of the conditions of production of capital produces specific forms of capitalist crises, linking ecological degradation to the economic crisis and the emergence of new movements for ecosocial change.