The Alibi of Capital: How We Broke the Earth to Steal the Future on the Promise of a Better Tomorrow

Stealing the future and concealing the theft - capitalism's method, as examined by the author of the acclaimed Carbon Democracy

Today, extraordinary wealth seems to arrive from nowhere. The trick of conjuring this unearned wealth is, in fact, the key to understanding capital­ism's origins and a clue to why the catastrophe of climate collapse is upon us: value is created by consuming the future.

The Alibi of Capital explains how this came about through the imperial expansion of the West, en­cumbering today's generations with repayments on earlier extractions. Timothy Mitchell identifies the forms of capitalisation, credit, and coercion that turn prospective assets into present income. Rejecting the common idea that claims on the future create only financial or fictitious capital, he traces the terraforming projects - the destruction of rivers, the colonising of territory, the expan­sion of infrastructure, and the burning of carbon - through which the future has been squandered. Terms such as finance, technology, the economy, and growth function as alibis that conceal this devastating form of extraction.

Author: Timothy Mitchell
Publisher: Verso
Published: 03/10/2026
Pages: 400
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.23lbs
Size: 9.44h x 6.36w x 1.25d
ISBN: 9781836742272


Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 03/16/2026

About the Author
Timothy Mitchell is a political theorist and historian who has written about colonialism, Middle East politics, economics, expert knowledge in the government of collective life, and the history and politics of energy. His previous books include Carbon Democracy, Rule of Experts, Questions of Modernity, and Colonising Egypt. His writings have been translated into many languages. He is the William B. Ransford Professor of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at Columbia University in New York.