Our world is in the grips of the most calamitous economic crisis since the Great Depression # and its epicenter is the imperial United States, where hallowed investment banks have disappeared overnight, giants of industry have gone bankrupt, and the financial order has been shaken to the core. While many around the globe are increasingly wondering if another world is indeed possible, few are mapping out potential avenues # and flagging wrong turns # en route to a post-capitalist future. In this groundbreaking analysis of the meltdown, renowned radical political economists Albo, Gindin and Panitch lay bare the roots of the crisis, which they locate in the dynamic expansion of capital on a global scale over the last quarter century # and in the inner logic of capitalism itself. With an unparalleled understanding of the inner workings of capitalism, the authors of In and Out of Crisis provocatively challenge the call by much of the Left for a return to a largely mythical Golden Age of economic regulation as a check on finance capital unbound. They deftly illuminate how the era of neoliberal free markets has been, in practice, undergirded by state intervention on a massive scale. With clarity and erudition, they argue persuasively that given the current balance of social forces # as bank bailouts around the globe make evident # regulation is not a means of fundamentally reordering power in society, but rather a way of preserving markets.