> Date sent: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 11:29:40 -0800
> Send reply to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> From: James Devine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: re:please read me - was state-war
> No, it's been long-standing practice amongst pen-lers to warn people about
> long, theoretical, or abstract missives. I found that my own comments were
> nothing new, hardly exciting, too abstract.
This problem could be improved by keeping citations as few and as
short as possible. Unless really required, one should cite the most
recent missive only.
So, without citing what you say about legitimation, a key contending
issue here - including the war issue - is: who absorbs who? Do we
incorporate Weber into Marx or vice versa? Politically they are
obviously at odds, but theoretically there are some like George
Lichtheim who think that "the whole of Weber's sociology of religion
fits without difficulty into the Marxian scheme". Likewise Zeitlin and
Collins see Weber as a "supplement", or a "continuer" of Marx's
work. I tend to agree with those who see a great tension in their
work, a view which used to be the standard one in the 40s-50s when
Parsons, who dismissed Marx, interpreted Weber's work in idealistic
terms. It was in the 60s that the former view took the center stage,
as scholars began to see an `idealist' side to Marx and a
`materialist' side to Weber.
The latter view, however, can be revised - in light of further work
going beyond Parsons. To provide just a few bones, both M & W
share the same interest in the origin and nature of capitalism.
You know Marx's view; for W, however, the thing that needs to be
explained is not wage labor, but the "formal rationalism" of Western
culture. What distinguishes modern capitalism, for him, is the
penetration of this rationality into our economic practices, of which
wage labor is a key instance but not the defining one. Why this
rationality took over the economy is another issue which W is quite
happy to explain in a multi-factorial although not eclectic way.
My point, then, is that W differs from M both in terms of how he
defines the nature of capitalism and how he explains its origins.
Because his explanation of the origins tends to be multi-factorial,
M's explanation may be fitted into it (rather than the other way
around). Without being monistic, M's account gives greater weight to
fewer - more materialistic - factors.
Now, if the overarching theme in W is rationalism (or more
specifically rational capitalism), he also tries to explain other
things like the origins of the rational-bureaucratic state, which
he sees as part of this rationalization. One of the factors he
emphasizes in the rise of this state is warfare.
But it is really subsequent neo-weberians who have reached a
consensus about this: in their discussions of absolutism they
have noted that states dedicated most of their revenues towards
military functions. Thus Louis XIV spent about 75% on war; Peter the
Great around 85%
> _All_ states are "peculiar." The English state of the 19th century was
> peculiar -- allowing more political rights for British workers, for example
> -- because it had international hegemony. (Nonetheless, it is quite
> repressive, especially in the colonies.) The US state has always been
> peculiar, since it was able to grab a lot of land from the Indians and
> avoid being invaded by the Europeans. France is peculiar, etc.
Trotsky was still operating under the assumption that w.europe was the
classic case and that everything else is a deviation from that
"natural" path....The more you stress the peculiar features the
further away you are from a general theory like historical
materialism.
> By the way, here's Max W's original citation: " 'Every state is founded on
> force,' said Trotsky at Brest-Litovsk." This was not one of T's innovations
> [a.k.a. "revisions"] to fit the special situation of Russia. Rather, it was
> nothing but a quick distillation of a key part of the garden-variety left-
> Marxist theory of the state of his day, which had been elucidated by Lenin,
> in THE STATE AND REVOLUTION. (Maybe in the actual speech, he said something
> more, but I don't have a copy."
Trotsky's explanation of the peculiar character of the Russian state
is contained in his book, 1905; a brilliant account of those events
which he wrote, if I recall, when he was only 25 years old.
> BTW, you can call be "Jim," unless you prefer "professor," "Dr.", "Herr
> Doktor Professor", or "Boss." I prefer "Jim." Calling me "Devine" sounds
> like you're talking to the late 300 pound transvestite actor/ress.
Calling people by their family names is quite common among Latin
Americans. Sometimes I called some of my friends by their family
names too. Generally if your given name is too common I will use your
family name.
> Marx was right to downplay "great individuals" in history. Both much or
> most of Napoleon's personality and the institutions he wielded were made by
> the society he grew up in, just as he helped make European society change.
> It seems to me that we have to understand the society -- the making of
> Napoleon, the organizations he adapted, and the situation he faced --
> before we can understand the role of "great individuals." But see Ernest
> Mandel's more nuanced analysis in the NEW LEFT REVIEW a few years ago.
The inescapable fact for marxists is that without Lenin no
October Revolution.
> >That's right, "DEPENDING ON THE NATURE OF CLASS RELATIONS". Finally you
> got the point! The revised, sophisticated marxism which you defend can
> never go beyond an "expressive" understanding, for each relatively
> autonomous factor will always be an expression of the essential dynamic of
> class relations; classes will always be the unyifying point of all other
> relatios <
>
> I said X "depends on" Y, etc., as in "the number of hurricanes depends on
> the ocean's temperature, etc." You ignore the "etc." and interpret this as
> X is nothing but an "expression" of Y, as in "the number of hurricanes is
> nothing but an epiphenomenon of the temperature of the ocean." If you want
> to have this kind of interpretation, that's fine. It's a free internet,
> after all. But you're not talking about my views.
To say that something is an expression of something else
is not the same as saying that it is an epiphenomenon of it. If
Plekhanov sees non-economic factors as epiphenomenal, Lukacs sees
them as expressive.
> Anderson's work is too complex (or my own understanding of it too vague) to
> discuss here. But as far as I can tell, Brenner was not reducing all issues
> to class relations. He was dealing specifically with the issue of how
> land-tenure changed in the period after 1300 or so in W. Europe.
If anyone prioritizes class relations it is Brenner! I wrote my
dissertation on the transition-debate and have a long chapter on him,
which I will try to revise and publish at some point.
ricardo
> in pen-l solidarity,
>
> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &
> http://clawww.lmu.edu/1997F/ECON/jdevine.html
> "It takes a busload of faith to get by." -- Lou Reed.
>
>
