(JAI: Dr Price does outstanding work in explicating the fundamentals of Marxist economics and its relevance for anarchists.)
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: <[email protected]> Date: Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 7:53 PM Subject: [newplanet-newlives] Re: New Essay: Anarchist Economics, Marxist Economics, and Pareconist Economics To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] Anarchist Economics, Marxist Economics, and Pareconist Economics by Wayne Price In support of anarchist goals, and to understand how capitalism works, it is useful for anarchists to use Marx's economic theory. As an illustration, three essays on the economics of capitalism as developed by theorists of Parecon (Participatory Economics) are critiqued. http://www.anarkismo.net/article/23267 Anarchist Economics, Marxist Economics, and Pareconist Economics [image: category] international<http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire/international>| economy <http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire/economy> | opinion / analysis<http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire/opinionanalysis> [image: author] Friday June 29, 2012 22:00[image: author] by Wayne Price - personal opinion[image: author email] drwdprice at aol dot com [image: Report this post to the editors]<http://www.anarkismo.net/report_posts?subject=Reported%20Post:%20Story%2023267%20with%20title:%20Anarchist%20Economics,%20Marxist%20Economics,%20and%20Pareconist%20Economics&message=Reported%20Post:%20Story%2023267%20with%20title:%20Anarchist%20Economics,%20Marxist%20Economics,%20and%20Pareconist%20Economics%0Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.anarkismo.net%2Findex.php%3Fobj_id%3D53%26story_id%3D23267%26%0A%0AEnter+your+reason+here+-+please+do+not+remove+the+above+link+as+it+will+allow+an+editor+to+easily+remove+the+offending+content> *In support of anarchist goals, and to understand how capitalism works, it is useful for anarchists to use Marx's economic theory. As an illustration, three essays on the economics of capitalism as developed by theorists of Parecon (Participatory Economics) are critiqued.* [Italiano<http://www.anarkismo.net/article/23306> ] [image: stein04.jpg]<http://www.anarkismo.net/attachments/jun2012/stein04.jpg> ------------------------------ Anarchist Economics, Marxist Economics, and Pareconist Economics When discussing radical economics, really two different, if related, topics are meant. (1) The nature of the economy which might be created after the overthrow of capitalism (whether called socialism, communism, or anarchism). And (2) the nature of the existing, capitalist, economyhow it works and what its future development will be. This leads to my two part proposition: (1) The best theoretical approach to proposing post-capitalist, post revolutionary, economies comes from the anarchist tradition, as well as other, non-Marxist, varieties of libertarian socialism (guild socialism, Parecon, distributionism, etc.). But (2) the best approach to understanding capitalism is Marxist economics (more precisely, Marxs critique of political economy). I write this even though I identify with the overall program of revolutionary class-struggle anarchism. This is why I think that the two parts of the proposition must not be reversed. Marxism must not be used as the basis for a vision of a new society. Admittedly, there is an aspect of Marxism (of Marxs Marxism) which points to a libertarian-democratic and humanistic society, a society of the free association of individuals. This has attracted a minority to an anti-statist version of Marxism. But there are also authoritarian aspects of Marxs Marxism, such as its centralism or its determinism. In practice, Marxism as a movement has repeatedly ended up as authoritarian, oppressive, and (to be precise) massively murderous. In this essay, I will focus on proposition (2), the usefulness of Marxs economic theory. For illustration, I will counterpose it to the economic theory of Parecon. This does not cover point (1), for which the theory of Parecon is most well known: its model of a post-capitalist society, managed by a federation of workplace and community councils, with democratic economic planning, without a market or centralized planning (Albert, 2003; Hahnel, 2005). This is a very interesting topic, but instead I am discussing Pareconists views of capitalism today, as compared to an anarchist view which uses Marxist insights. The founders of Participatory Economics, or Parecon, were Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel. Originally they regarded their approach as unorthodox Marxism (Albert & Hahnel, 1978). Currently Hahnel calls his views libertarian socialism (Hahnel, 2005), while Albert completely rejects the label of socialism (Albert, 2001). Now Parecon is presented as an anarchist vision (p. 327). I take up this strain of libertarian thought not because it is particularly bad, but for the opposite reason: because it is relatively strong and developed. It has much more of an economic theory than most other anarchists or libertarian socialists. It is therefore worth examining. I will focus on three chapters on Pareconism which appear in a book on Anarchist Economics, edited by D. Shannon, A.J. Nocella II, and J. Asimakopoulos (2012). This is an excellent book for its range of views. (I have a chapter in it, on topic [1], post-capitalist anarchist economies, not the topic discussed here.) There is a chapter each by Hahnel and Albert, the co-founders of Parecon, and one by Chris Spannos, who has edited a book advocating Pareconism (Spannos, 2008). Full at http://www.anarkismo.net/article/23267 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- LAAMN: Los Angeles Alternative Media Network --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe: <mailto:[email protected]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe: <mailto:[email protected]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Digest: <mailto:[email protected]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Help: <mailto:[email protected]?subject=laamn> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Post: <mailto:[email protected]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive1: <http://www.egroups.com/messages/laamn> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archive2: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]> --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yahoo! 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