Tuesday, March 10, 2015

Chris Dillow — Economists! Be more Marxist


Informative post with many links.

I would disagree this: "I'm not at all sure that capitalism has a tendency to ever-increasing monopoly.

Monopoly and oligopoly power grows with consolidation and centralization. Moreover, class status and power that leads to political power which entrenches institutional power is also a strong force leading to monopoly and oligopoly rents. 

I would also question this: "And his idea that the working class would become an agent of revolutionary change has been wrong." 

It's not over until it's over. For example, liberals are sure that two hundred years of progress provides conclusive evidence that proves the success of the American experiment. The Chinese response is, Are you serious, only two hundred plus years? 

Marx thought that the workers revolution would not emerge until capitalism was globalized, that is, this moment of the historical dialectic was completed. But he also believed that the process could be forced by political activism and consciousness raising. So his hypotheses are not yet disproved by history. 

What would it take to disprove them. The eventual success of neoliberal capitalism locked in by political control. The jury is still out on this and significantly formerly Marxist Russia and presently Marxist China have allied to make sure it doesn't happen.

Stumbling and Mumbling
Economists! Be more MarxistChris Dillow | Investors Chronicle

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tough questions. I think even Marx would be surprised at the degree of capitalism's success in controlling people's minds.

Tom Hickey said...

Marx was not a position to foresee the huge social, political and economic changes brought about by WWI, the Great Depression, the rise of fascism and communism, WWII, and the Cold War.

As Piketty et al's work shows, these events completely changed the world in ways that no one could have anticipated.

Then there were technological advances that shifted social, political and economic conditions as well, not to mention the proliferation of inexpensive energy. The consequences was huge advances in the standard of living and more widely distributed prosperity.

As a result, the capitalism that Marx knew as the British economic liberalism of his time took a different turn than anyone living then could have imagined.

Margaret Thatcher made a choice to return to the former British economic liberalism and didn't mind recreating Dickensian times in the pursuit of ideology.

This can be viewed as an iteration of the historical dialectic on the way to its reversal and the onset of a new period that takes a further step in the direction of what preceded it in the tug-of war between the poles of individualism and social welfare, freedom and social responsibility, liberty and community.