Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have the
WLSeems to me you do in fact get the distinction between productive capital and speculative capital. A good Ponzi scheme is not back until it collapses. Profits to be made from that side of the business constituting productive capital has never been bad business. I never said I didn't get such a distinction (although why do I not like that term 'productive' capital? Will get back to you about that.) For the purposes of analysis Marx, Lenin, Veblen and Keynes all make such a distinction. I don't think any would deny how they overlap in the 'magic of profit-taking' of capitalism. Industrial capitalists like what the UK, US had in the 19th century might not exist today (afterall, they were people in the 19th century), but we can still use the term 'industrial capital'. I just refuse to go over the ontological or exegetical deepends (as so many Marxists are wont to do). But I do detect a thesis in your posts WL. I just don't know that it means anyone else is wrong about the current crisis of capital. CJ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have...
In a message dated 1/7/2009 12:28:16 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, jann...@gmail.com writes: I'm not sure I'm following your arguments. One, who here has said that nothing has changed since Lenin? WL: CB . . . repeatedly and directly . . . in his line of arguing the existence of industrial capital and Lenin's Imperialism. And in statement that American society is not qualitatively different from feudal Russia. Russia was after all basically feudal in its economic and social structures when Lenin died. America was qualitatively different from Russia when Lenin was alive. Some of the discussion is sectarian on both sides but not the majority of it. I think. The matter of who rules today is going to be important with Obama coming into office. One cannot push him to the left. He is finance capital representative left to tap dance between the whims of productive and non-productive capital. Get ready for advocacy of the anti-monopoly coalition. It is the Democratic party that has to be isolated and their grip over the workers broken. Obama has already had his day in the sun by being elected. Give it six months. WL **New year...new news. Be the first to know what is making headlines. (http://www.aol.com/?ncid=emlcntaolcom0026) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have the
I guess one question here is why Ford, Chrysler and GM didn't re-invest profits into accumulating their industrial capital. One, if the goal was to reach a certain level of production to stay competitive in the world (what is the benchmark now, 2 million vehicles per year?), the most obvious solution was to acquire stakes in and control of other car companies and attempt integration of production. Two, this very easily moves over to finance and speculative finance because of the way such deals were run by investment banks able to put together the 'leverage' to finance the deals (while taking a huge cut for themselves). Three, what is most surprising though is how these companies all say at the same time that they are in effect 'bankrupt' and need federal loans to stay solvent. So did management as ownership strip out so much money from these companies to enrich themselves (so they could, for example, speculate on other things)? So much for the idea that management even tries to act in the best interest of the company. A different area of inquiry and analysis is how so much of the political economies we produce in have become owned by 'holding companies', which ultimately are owned by private equity groups and things like hedge funds (who invest for 'institutional investors'), while these private equity groups and hedge funds are dominated by US and UK 'interests'. CJ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have the
If only this guy would read Marx. No wait, that would just make him another HCKL or something similar to that. BTW, I noticed one of the more famous private equity groups, Carlyle Group, is trying to put together big deals in overseas universities. I guess they think 'American-quality' higher education is the next big wave. And Laureate is the model. http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09282007/watch.html BILL MOYERS: This story in THE NEW YORK TIMES this week. What do you think when you read a story like that? JOHN BOGLE: Well, first, it's a national disgrace. Simply put. And there are some things that must be entrusted to government and some things that must be entrusted to private enterprise. And what we see there, at least in my judgment, is that we've taken medical care, healthcare and going from making it a profession in which the patient is the object of the game — preserving the patient first do no harm as Hippocrates would say or would have said and turn that into a business. And so, it's a bottom line. I've often said we're in a bottom line society. We're measuring the wrong bottom line. BILL MOYERS:What does it say to you that the real owners of the nursing home, the private investors have created this maze of smoke and mirrors that make it virtually impossible to find out who the owners really are? JOHN BOGLE:Well, that's so typical of much that's going on in American finance, the way we structure these financial instruments, which are stock certificates or debt instruments. But it's the same thing of the removal of your friendly, local neighborhood bank holding the mortgage and being able to work with you when you fall on hard times to some unnamed, often unknown, financial institution who couldn't care less. BILL MOYERS:These private equity firms that own these nursing homes wouldn't even talk to THE NEW YORK TIMES. They won't talk to reporters. I mean, there's no accountability to the public. JOHN BOGLE: There's no accountability. And it's wrong. It's fundamentally a blight on our society. BILL MOYERS:What does it say that big private money can operate so secretly, with so little accountability, that the people who are hurt by it, the residents in the nursing home have no recourse? JOHN BOGLE:It says something very bad about American society. And you wonder — the first question anybody would have after reading the article — how in God's name do they get away with that? Well, we have all these attorneys that are capable of devising complex instruments, and money managers who are capable of devising highly complex financial schemes. And there's kind of no one to answer to the call of duty at the end of it. BILL MOYERS: And we're talking about some of the most powerful names in the business. I mean, these are formidable forces, right? JOHN BOGLE: They're formidable forces. But, I'm afraid-- BILL MOYERS: Respectable citizens, right? JOHN BOGLE: Well, I mean, I don't know about that. But, it's certainly -- it's easy to say that greed is taking — playing a part — greed has a role in a capitalistic society. But, not the dominant role and-- BILL MOYERS: What should be the dominant? What is the job of capitalism? JOHN BOGLE:Well, ultimately, the job of capitalism is to serve the consumer. Serve the citizenry. You're allowed to make a profit for that. But, you've got to provide good products and services at fair prices. And that's the long term, that's what businesses do in the long term. The businesses that have endured in America have done that and done that successfully. But, in the short term, there's all these financial machinations in which people can get very rich in a very short period of time by creating highly complex financial instruments, providing services that can be cut back easily as in the hospital article, not measuring up to basically their duty. We all know that in professions, the idea has been service to the client before service to self. That's what a profession is. That's what medicine was. That's what accountancy was. That's what attorneys used to be. That's what trusteeship used to be inside the mutual fund industry. But, we've moved from that to a big capital accumulation — self interest — creating wealth for the providers of these services when the providers of these services are in fact subtracting value from society. So, it doesn't work. BILL MOYERS:So, the private equity nursing homes have added to their wealth. But, they've subtracted from society the care for people who need it. JOHN BOGLE: That is exactly correct. Not good. BILL MOYERS:THE WALL STREET JOURNAL editorial page celebrates what it called the animal spirits of business. And as if that's the heart of capitalism. What do you think about that? JOHN BOGLE:Well, I like the animal spirits of business. I mean Lord Keynes told us about animal spirits. And it comes out of a part of his work that says, You know, all the precise numbers and the perspectives mean nothing. What determines the
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have...
Hello, I found this list via Jim Farmelant's post on Marxmail. After reading Waistline's arguments about the macro economic composition of capital and his brave challenge that provokes us to provide evidence to the existence of the SECTOR called industrial capital, eventually I decided to subscribe to the list and post a small contribution to the debate. I think the fundamental error of Waistline's claim resides in confusion of dialectical method with the descriptive dimension of dialectical analysis. Therefore, he takes the concepts literally whereas their purpose is to reflect diverse forms of the object in its dialectical movement. When Marx accuses the political economy for throwing commercial capital and industrial capital together and overlooking the characteristics of former, he does not, in any sense, blame them for neglecting the categorical division of capital but draws attention to the diverse forms of capital in the operation of capitalist accumulation. For instance, in the vol. 3 of Capital, Marx says, ...our purpose, which is to define the specific difference of this special form of capital: We have explained (Book II, Chapter VI, The Costs of Circulation,) to what extent the transport industry, storage and distribution of commodities in a distributable form, may be regarded as production processes continuing within the process of circulation. These episodes incidental to the circulation of commodity-capital are sometimes confused with the distinct functions of merchant's or commercial capital. Sometimes they are, indeed, practically bound up with these distinct, specific functions, although with the development of the social division of labour the function of merchant's capital evolves in a pure form, i.e., divorced from those real functions, and independent of them. Those functions are therefore irrelevant to our purpose, which is to define the specific difference of this special form of capital. In so far as capital solely employed in the circulation process, special commercial capital, partly combines those functions with its specific ones, it does not appear in its pure form. We obtain its pure form after stripping it of all these incidental functions. So when Marx applies the concepts such as, industrial capital, industrial capitalists, fictitious capital, commercial capitalists and so on, he designates singular forms of capital in the movement of its being but not the specific categorical divisions of capital. With this in mind, also when Lenin invoked the financial capital or when Sweezy, talked about the triumph of financial capital they were merely describing the distinctive characteristics of a specific form which is the core of imperialist exploitation. I think the answer of Waistline's question is quite easy: There is no such a thing as industrial capital sector or industrial capital as a subdivision in the totality of capital. And in this sense, there is no financial capital too. The supposed difficulty of this question rises on the bizarre confusion about categories and forms. Mehmet Çagatay http://weblogmca.blogspot.com/ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Piaget and Marx
CB: What are some of the specifics of that integration ? First, a correction. I must have imagined any Piaget-Vygotsky correspondence. Piaget only found out about Vygotsky's work after his death, through contact with people who studied under Vygotsky. Second, we have discussed this before ^^^ CB: Yes, I recall. Will have to look into the Thaxis archives. I recall developing a critique of Piaget's theory of the origin of the concept of number as positivistic. That is the idea of some child counting pebbles on a beach as occurring over and over again down through the centuries , as if the original discovery of the concept of number was made in this way. It is positivistic in the essential sense that it is individualistic, or in Marx's terminology, a Robinsonade. The concept number is discovered socially , I hypothesize in the original commodity exchange, as abstractly outlined in Marx's first pages in _Capital_. I hypothesize that Number is invented in commodity exchange. Name is invented at human origin. Number is invented with swivilization. Anyway, psychologically, number is socially psychologically learned, not learned through re-invention by individual geniuses. Empirically , many primary cultures don't count very, high even ones that are on beaches with lots of pebbles. (or at least Piaget as a philosopher of social science of the 20th century, a status the Anglo-analytic traditions ignore), but since that time I have found more online, including a straightforward Marxist critiques of Piaget (Lektorsky, Durak): http://www.marxists.org/glossary/people/p/i.htm#piaget-jean http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/fr/piaget2.htm http://www.marxists.org/archive/lektorsky/subject-object/ch01.htm#s2 http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/comment/piaget.htm http://tomweston.net/PiagetDurak.pdf --- I will follow up on that use of the term 'means of production' as that fascinates me more than the 'dialectic' one, which we already discussed anyway. I think Durak's charge (after a quick scan read, so don't hold me responsible for not understanding Durak just yet) against Piaget of 'idealism' holds, then it makes all structuralists and Frege idealists as well. CJ This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] American capitalism is such that a speculative stock market dominates
American capitalism is such that a speculative stock market dominates the policies of businesses. by Lawrence E Mitchell AlterNet (December 22 2008) Editor's Note: The following is an edited excerpt from The Speculation Economy: How Finance Triumphed Over Industry (2007), Lawrence Mitchell's definitive history of the rise of American finance and analysis of how it shaped corporate behavior in the modern era. During the rise of the speculation economy in the early years of the 20th century, business' focus on production was replaced with business management's focus on stock prices. That goal might be consistent with healthy, sustainable and responsible business practices, but it also might not be. Understanding the complex development of American corporate capitalism can help us better improve and sustain the strength of the American economy. While our current economic crisis is frequently compared to that of the Great Depression, its roots and causes go further back in history - to the development of the modern American stock market at the turn of the 20th century. Contrary to popular belief, the public market for industrial securities didn't finance industrialization - industrialization had already taken place. Instead, it exploded into existence as a result of trust promoters and investment bankers trying to restrain competition through the creation of giant combinations of corporations and at the same time getting rich quick by dumping the overvalued securities of these giant corporate behemoths onto an emerging middle class eager to share the wealth. The first major industrial stock market crash followed fast on the heels of its birth. The formative era of American corporate capitalism took place between 1897 and 1919. The American business landscape of the late 19th century had been characterized by independent factories. No matter what their size, they typically were owned by entrepreneur industrialists, their families and perhaps a few business associates. But in the first decades of the 20th century, American business transformed into a vista of giant combinations of industrial plants owned directly and indirectly by widely dispersed shareholders. Business reasons sometimes justified these combinations. But they might never have come into being if financiers and promoters had not discovered that they could be used to create and sell massive amounts of stock for their own gain. The result is a form of capitalism in which a speculative stock market dominated the policies of American business. The result is the speculation economy. Historians have studied virtually every aspect of the Progressive Era, including the social and philosophical changes that took place in Americans' ways of living and thinking about their world, the dramatic technological and economic developments that occurred, the rise of big business, the growth in importance of the federal government, the fitful creation of American industrial policy, the establishment of the bargain between labor and capital, the changes in political relations between government and big business, the development of new styles of regulation and America's assumption of its turn as the world's dominant economic power. Many have provided rich pictures of different aspects of the dramatic and related economic, social and political transformations that occurred during that period. The story I tell in The Speculation Economy: How Finance Triumphed Over Industry (2007) is the economic equivalent of the political creation of the republic. It is a story that needs to be told for many reasons, not least of which is that the corporate economy that emerged during this era has been beset with problems ranging from short-term management horizons that can damage the long-term health of business to the increasing willingness of corporate managers to externalize the costs of production for the benefit of their stockholders. A recent survey of CEOs running major American corporations revealed that almost eighty percent would have at least moderately mutilated their businesses in order to meet financial analysts' quarterly profit estimates. Cutting the budgets for research and development, advertising and maintenance, and delaying hiring and new projects are some of the long-term harms they would readily inflict on their corporations. Why? Because in modern American corporate capitalism, the failure to meet quarterly numbers almost always guarantees a punishing hit to the corporation's stock price. One lesson of the formative period is that meaningful reform can be achieved only by reforming the market, by reforming finance itself to create the incentives for stockholders, and through them the market, to re-learn the lesson that profits come from industrial production, not from the breeze that blows toward tomorrow. It is a lesson that was often forgotten during these early
[Marxism-Thaxis] How Finance Capital Cripples Industrial Capital
How Finance Capital Cripples Industrial Capital: The Role of Fractional Reserve Banking http://www.cbpa.drake.edu/hossein-zadeh/papers/HowFinanceCapital.htm [Published in Briefing Notes in Economics, Vol. 4, Issue No. 26 (January 1997).] Huge amounts of debt have plagued the economies of the United States and many less-developed countries during the last two decades. Despite the heavy toll that the debt burden is taking on these economies, mainstream economic theories have been pitifully inept in explaining the causes or developments that led to the proliferation of the debts thus accumulated. According to these theories, whether Keynesian or monetarist, the supply of credit is determined by two factors: (a) the savings by households and businesses, and (b) the Federal Reserve policies that determine reserve requirements and the money supplyâthe so-called fractional reserve banking (FRB), which will be discussed later in this essay. But the huge sums of credit that financial intermediaries extended to a variety of borrowers during the last two decades went far beyond the boundaries set by the amount of savings or Federal Reserve money supply regulations. For example, in the United States alone the amount of domestic lending during the 1982-90 period exceeded the amount of household and corporate savings by 23% (Citicorp Economics Database, as cited in Pollin, 1992:22). Neither do the standard theories explain the demand side of the debt overhang (i.e., the demand for debt financing). For example, neoclassical economists attribute the rise in the debt financing since the mid-1960s to the low cost of borrowing in the 1960s and 1970sâthe high inflation rates of those years made the real interest rates very low, sometimes even negative. But this explanation is inadequate in light of the fact that deficit spending continued through the 1980sâindeed, it speeded up during the 1980sâdespite the drastic rise in the cost of borrowing during that decade, especially in the first half of the decade. The view of the Post-Keynesian economists of the debt overhang is similarly inadequate. Based on Hyman Minsky's financial fragility hypothesis of mature market economies, this view maintains that during long expansionary business cycles both lenders and borrowers tend to base their lending/borrowing decisions more on positive expectations of the upswing of the cycle than on realistic calculations of returns on investment against which they accumulate debt claims, or debt burdensâthis tendency to base lending/borrowing decisions on optimisitic expectations of the expansionary of cycle is called boom psychology. Under the boom psychology even the less secured and less competitive businesses embark on a borrowing binge in an effort to expand their market share. Partly due to this boom psychology, partly due to competitive pressure, banks discard their hesitations to extend loans to less and less-secured borrowers. Eventually as the expansionary cycle reaches its peak and a fall in sales and/or profits occurs, businesses in weaker financial positions fail to meet their payment commitments. The lenders then retreat form extending additional credit. The credit crunch that replaces the prior credit boom will subsequently lead to a crisis of illiquidity and indebtedness (Minsky, 1978 and 1982). Implicit in this theory is that there is a positive correlation between real investment (i.e., capacity buildup), on the one hand, and debt financing, on the other. That is, investment in plant and equipment during the upswing of the business cycle is associated with debt financing, and a decline in real investment on the downside of the cycle is accompanied or followed by credit crunch and a decline in deficit expenditure. This theory is valid as far as it goes (i.e., to the extent that it explains such developments in real world). In other words, it is an empirical explanation, not a scientific theory. For example, it does not explain the rise in U.S. business/corporate debt financing since the mid-1960s as this rise has in fact been accompanied by a relative fall in real investment. Nor does it therefore explain the broader global debt overhang that has tormented the economies of the United States and many less-developed countries during the last two decades. Within these two major views of the debt crisis there are a number of less known explanations of the problem. Despite the fact that these secondary explanations are distinct from one another in many respects, they all tend to be based not so much on scientific theories or factual evidence of the debt or credit crisis as they are on exogenous or psychological hypotheses such as rational expectations, the moral hazard problem, a principal-agent dilemma, uninformed bankers, overborrowing thesis, and so on (see Darity, 1985, pp. 15-49, for example). Thus, orthodox economic theories, whether Monetarist or Keynesian, do not provide adequate explanations of the ongoing
[Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
Jim Devine wrote: but even FDR's Bonapartism was not very good in the early New Deal. The NRA, for example. Needed was mass pressure from the left. Lou Pro: Sad but true. With the left so weak, there is even less incentive for Obama to move boldly. If he has any motivation to create a kind of new New Deal, it will be from a policy wonk perspective. In other words, the kind of thing you get from the U. of Chicago economists he relies on. The screwy thing is that from the long term needs of the capitalist system, it is imperative to address infrastructure, environment, education, etc. but the state is too much a captive of ideological accretions and institutional inertia. When I had a house guest from Uganda in November who had exactly the same ethnic background as Obama, he dismissed Obama with one word: Brezhnev. ^ CB: Brezhnev was to the left of the Bonaparts , FDR, and Krugman. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
On Jan 7, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Brezhnev was to the left of...Krugman. How many counterrevolutionary invasions did Krugman launch? How many political opponents did he send to labor camps? How many did he imprison in mental hospitals? Was Krugman a Stalinist? Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures. Herakleitos of Ephesos ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital
U have the CeJ jannuzi at I guess one question here is why Ford, Chrysler and GM didn't re-invest profits into accumulating their industrial capital. One, if the goal was to reach a certain level of production to stay competitive in the world (what is the benchmark now, 2 million vehicles per year?), the most obvious solution was to acquire stakes in and control of other car companies and attempt integration of production. Two, this very easily moves over to finance and speculative finance because of the way such deals were run by investment banks able to put together the 'leverage' to finance the deals (while taking a huge cut for themselves). Three, what is most surprising though is how these companies all say at the same time that they are in effect 'bankrupt' and need federal loans to stay solvent. So did management as ownership strip out so much money from these companies to enrich themselves (so they could, for example, speculate on other things)? So much for the idea that management even tries to act in the best interest of the company. A different area of inquiry and analysis is how so much of the political economies we produce in have become owned by 'holding companies', which ultimately are owned by private equity groups and things like hedge funds (who invest for 'institutional investors'), while these private equity groups and hedge funds are dominated by US and UK 'interests'. CJ CB: Yeah. I think the whole thing has been aimed at busting down auto-workers' wages and benefits. So, Waistline's point is correct at this level. Lenin's merger of industrial and finance capital as finance capital. By the way, did Waistline forget that he is basically putting forth Lenin's position ? Lenin in _Imperialism_ said that industrial and finance capital had merged into finance capital. So, this merged finance capital in the late twentieth century ordered its industrial branch to ruin the US companies so they could bust the autoworkers and wages and benefits down. They seem to have succeeded. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
Shane Mage On Jan 7, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Brezhnev was to the left of...Krugman. How many counterrevolutionary invasions did Krugman launch? How many political opponents did he send to labor camps? How many did he imprison in mental hospitals? Was Krugman a Stalinist? CB: Stalinist is rightwing terminology. Are you are rightwinger ? Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures. Herakleitos of Ephesos ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Manufacturing Tumbles Globally
(Chart Redacted) a.. JANUARY 3, 2009 Page A-1 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123094144619950373.html Manufacturing Tumbles Globally By KELLY EVANS and ROBERT GUY MATTHEWS Manufacturing activity around the world fell sharply in December, suggesting that the U.S. recession will extend well into 2009, if not longer, and that unemployment will rise globally. A broad index of change in U.S. manufacturing activity fell to its lowest level since June 1980, when the economy was on the verge of a severe double-dip recession, according to the Institute for Supply Management. Not one of the 18 industries surveyed reported growth, and some, such as wood products, have been in decline for more than two years. New orders, a gauge of future activity, sank to the lowest index level since records began 60 years ago. Exports and production also sank, and employment levels declined. The downturn in demand for manufactured goods is prompting companies of all sizes to lay off workers, shut down plants and reduce production of machinery, steel, plastics and other basic components. Separate surveys of manufacturing activity around the world released on Friday, the first business day of the new year, were also bleak. Manufacturing is a key component of a country's gross domestic product, and the data often serve as a barometer of future economic growth. Nevertheless, on Friday, stock markets around the world shrugged off the manufacturing numbers, posting gains in Hong Kong, Seoul and Europe on light trading volume. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 258.3 points, or 2.94%, to close at 9034.69. Some analysts say global weakness is already priced into shares, which in the U.S. just closed their worst year since 1931. Manufacturing activity contracted in Germany, France, Italy and Spain, pushing the Markit Economics survey of euro-zone manufacturing last month to the lowest level in its 11-year history. In Russia, the VTB Bank Europe manufacturing index fell to its lowest level since it began in September 1997. The data from Asia also looked grim. A survey by brokerage firm CLSA showed employment and output fell at a record clip in Chinese factories in December. Indian manufacturers cut jobs for the first time in the history of a survey by ABN AMRO Bank. The simultaneous woes of manufacturing in rich countries and poor countries are something new in the global economy. In the past, weaknesses in U.S. and European manufacturing meant a windfall for developing economies, which took up the slack. Hong Kong, which like the euro zone slipped into recession in the third quarter, saw manufacturing activity as surveyed by Markit decline for the sixth straight month. Earlier this week, Japan's Nomura/JMMA index of manufacturing sank to a new low, due to a reduction in overseas demand and the deteriorating global economy. The spreading and deepening manufacturing slump has some experts worried that the global economy in 2009 won't fare much better than last year. J.P. Morgan's global manufacturing index, released Friday and compiled from surveys in 19 countries, reached a new low in December, consistent with a severe 17% annualized contraction in global activity. J.P. Morgan estimates global output declined 4% in the last three months of 2008 compared to the previous quarter, reflecting reduced spending and available financing on autos, housing and capital equipment. Manufacturers around the world have already begun layoffs to conserve cash and reduce production, but many more are expected this year. The job cuts are coming across industries and borders. Nickent Golf, a golf-club manufacturer in the Los Angeles area, recently cut assembly workers in China and the U.S. to cope with falling demand. In Elbow Lake, Minn., Cosmos Enterprises Inc., which makes metal and plastic parts for manufacturers including car and farm-equipment makers, has cut capacity, and in October it laid off five machinists and one quality inspector. What is 2009 going to bring? There's a scary thought, says sales manager Kelly Chandler. The struggles of big steel companies are particularly troubling, because that industry's health is considered an early indicator of how other industries are faring. ArcelorMittal, U.S. Steel Corp. and AK Steel all have announced layoffs in the U.S. or Canada. In the U.S., mills that produce raw steel are working at only about 43% of capacity. Gerdau Macsteel Inc., a specialty-steel maker, said it would eliminate 300 employees by Jan. 16 at its Jackson, Mich., plant, although it is unclear whether the layoffs will be permanent. The steelmaker has been hit especially hard because about 50% of its output goes into automotive applications. The U.S. shed some 1.9 million jobs in 2008, through November, and the unemployment rate, currently 6.7%, is expected to rise when the government reports December figures next Friday. The surveys underscore the depth of the
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
On Jan 7, 2009, at 2:02 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Shane Mage On Jan 7, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Brezhnev was to the left of...Krugman. How many counterrevolutionary invasions did Krugman launch? How many political opponents did he send to labor camps? How many did he imprison in mental hospitals? Was Krugman a Stalinist? CB: Stalinist is rightwing terminology. Are you are rightwinger ? When I was young, all the Stalinists I knew were proud of the title. Weren't you? Weren't you all rightwingers? [rhetorical question] Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures. Herakleitos of Ephesos ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
Shane Mage shm...@pipeline.com 01/07/2009 2:26 PM On Jan 7, 2009, at 2:02 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Shane Mage On Jan 7, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Brezhnev was to the left of...Krugman. How many counterrevolutionary invasions did Krugman launch? How many political opponents did he send to labor camps? How many did he imprison in mental hospitals? Was Krugman a Stalinist? CB: Stalinist is rightwing terminology. Are you are rightwinger ? When I was young, all the Stalinists I knew were proud of the title. Weren't you? Weren't you all rightwingers? [rhetorical question] Shane Mage CB: No I taking it as an insult as it is thrown as an insult . It's anti-Communist and reactionary ( rhetorical answer) This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures. Herakleitos of Ephesos ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Unemployment systems crash as jobless numbers hit 26-year high
Unemployment systems crash as jobless numbers hit 26-year high Archive - Daily Online Author: John Wojcik People's Weekly World Newspaper, 01/07/09 14:53 Jobless benefit filing systems all over the country are crashing this week as an unprecedented wave of tens of thousands of newly unemployed Americans scrambles to survive. The states are saying that their web sites are going down because they are already overloaded with data on the 4.5 million now collecting benefits, the highest number in 26 years. In many states where the systems have not yet crashed the newly unemployed are left to hold on the phone lines for hours or are cut off with “all lines are busy” messages. On Jan. 6 systems in New York, North Carolina and Ohio were shut down completely. New York’s phone and Internet claims system started to fail on Jan. 5 and was out of service completely on Jan. 6. It was restored a day later but workers there still report waiting hours to get help. “Regardless of when you call, be prepared to wait and just hang on. Try not to get frustrated,” is the advice offered in a telephone interview with Howard Cosgrove, a spokesman for the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development. Unemployment statistics that the government will release Jan. 9 are expected to show that 500,000 more people lost their jobs in December, which could push the official national jobless rate over 7 percent. November’s 6.7 percent figure was already the highest in 15 years. For people in the rapidly growing ranks of the unemployed the crashing of the systems turns what is already a harrowing experience into a certified nightmare. Tom McAvey, 54, was laid off Jan. 2 from the custodial staff in a Brooklyn, N.Y., elementary school. “I waited until Monday to file my claim,” he told the World. “Two of us at the school were laid off. We had no idea it was coming. What a way to start the new Yyar. I’m two week’s salary away from the poorhouse. My wife lost her job at Bear Stearns and is still out. I don’t know how I’m going to pay the bills. One of my daughters is in a Catholic high school – there’s the tuition.” McAvey has difficulty mustering any sympathy for state officials who say the systems crash because of the unprecedented number of jobless applicants. “I don’t buy it. The government has computers that handle much more information like the ones that keep track of all the taxes they are owed. If they weren’t laying off their own workers they could maintain better systems and plan for these emergencies. Layoffs and budget cuts are to blame – it's not the fault of the unemployed.” An unemployed worker in Rhode Island emphasized how, even before the crashes, filing for benefits in her state constituted a virtual nightmare. Her state, along with Michigan, tops the nation with the highest unemployment rates. “They have eliminated the old unemployment offices, she said. They have laid off state employees. You can’t go anywhere to talk to a person. If I was lucky I got a recording that told me to call back later. This went on for days.” The woman described for the World how she had to research the location of an actual office where she could find a live person. “But even there, I was told to fill out a form with a message and that in a few days someone would call me back. I was lucky to be home at the time they did call back. They were helpful – it was a worker trying to do a good job, but there just aren’t enough of them. “Between the trips back and forth, the 75-minute waits on hold – once, out of desperation I held on for two hours – it’s a struggle. It’s a lot of time lost that could be spent on the Internet or going out to look for a job,” she said. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Another Crisis of Capitalism
Another Crisis of Capitalism By Wadi’h Halabi click here for related stories: capitalism 11-24-08, 9:31 am Unfolding globally today is another capitalist crisis of overproduction and a corresponding crisis of unmet human needs, even for food and water. Earlier crises (1907, 1929) led to terrible suffering, political breakdowns and war, but also opened the path for the Russian, Chinese (1917, 1949) and other socialist revolutions. Today, without labor unity and action, humanity itself faces a terrifying death amidst war and social and environmental destruction. Capitalism's failure will accelerate the damage already done to the social and environmental foundations of human existence, and further spread the nightmare that millions are facing in the Congo, Haiti, Palestine, India and the Russian Federation – and in significant pockets of poverty in most capitalist countries, the US included. The crisis is certain to escalate Wall Street and big capital's efforts to further cheapen labor and plunder weaker countries. The capitalists will make every attempt to divide workers, to provoke nationalist reactions and racism among workers and their organizations everywhere, and to oppose internationalist class-based responses. This attempt to provoke nationalism as opposed to internationalism will be extend worldwide (even to China), with the most dangerous focus of reaction being white American nationalism, a tendency already evident in supremacist and anti-immigrant groups. Global labor unity, organization, class-consciousness, and coordinated action can turn this latest failure of the old system into victories for a new system, and holds extraordinary potential for human liberation from capitalism. Sponsored Ad Subscribe to Socialist Economics Email: Visit this group For any economy to avoid crisis, an approximate balance must be maintained between production and demand by both producers and consumers. A similar, approximate balance must be maintained between the countless factors necessary for modern production. Otherwise, significant waste and economic losses result. (Note that only approximate balances are ever achievable even under communism, due to inevitable changes in technology, the environment and consumer tastes.) Rosa Luxemburg correctly identified imbalances between production and demand as the underlying causes of capitalism's periodic crises. These crises are best labeled crises of disproportionality rather than crises of overproduction. But Luxemburg only pointed to imbalances between production and workers' incomes. The Soviet economists Nikolai Bukharin and Evgeny Preobrazhensky correctly added the income and demand of producers (enterprises and their owners) to that of workers, and introduced the general contradictions of commodity production into the equation of disproportionality and crises. Contrary to bourgeois propaganda (which unfortunately has penetrated the labor movement), the capitalists do not control a capitalist economy. If they did, they would avoid periodic crises, such as today's, which slash their profits and can endanger their rule. A capitalist economy is regulated by the laws of commodity production and exchange, independent of the capitalists' wishes. This was one of Marx's basic contributions to our understanding of capitalist political economy and its periodic crises. The only element of control capitalists hold lies in the redistribution of pain caused by crises and environmental destruction. The IMF, WTO, NAFTA, etc., are among the global institutions used for redistributing pain, backed by the US military, NATO, the FBI and the CIA. As such all pretense at democracy or national sovereignty quickly disappear. China and the Global Economy After a socialist revolution countries can gain a degree of control over their economy, through planning, greater participation and input from below, and the constant re-allocation of the surplus (rather than the private appropriation of profit), in order to achieve an approximate balance in the economy. For these reasons, socialist economies are not subject to the intensity and depth of the economic cycles that plague capitalist economies. Wars and other political crises, along with mismanagement, however, can lead to economic downturns in economies formed by socialist revolutions, or even collapse. With capitalism still a significant mode of production worldwide, control over the economy after a socialist revolution is limited, in part because of the domestic legacies of capitalism (poverty, small-scale production), and in part because of capitalism's inherent instability. Today, the growth of economies formed by workers' revolutions, particularly China, tends to introduce some stability into the world economy. China's potential stabilizing role is why I am still reluctant to call the present crisis a general
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U hav...
In a message dated 1/7/2009 2:30:37 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, farmela...@juno.com writes: Forwarded from Mehmet Cagatay. \ Reply Thank you very much for this contribution. You are quite correct in me taking categories of capital in their literal sense. This literal interpretation is political and part of my tradition, which I am not wedded to. On the other hand it is part of trying to chart the development of industry and its corresponding historically distinctive form of capital. It seems what is being stated is that from the standpoint of circulation (circulation of commodities or M-C-M as a circuit) historically distinctive forms of capital lose their distinction and their origin is immaterial to the fact of circulation and reproduction. On the other hand in the circulation of commercial capital - money, whose specific circuit is C-M-C, its distinctive form and origin is immaterial to the fact of capital in its totality. Literal interpretations over the years have on more than one occasion been my undoing. The question posed was trying to make heads or tails out of the concept of capital without a notional value and the relatively new non-banking financial regime, that appears to have severed even a remote connection with value as reproduction and circulation of commodities. And its expression in the world of finance and as policy. Welcome. Waistline Jim Farmelant --- On Wed, 1/7/09, Mehmet Cagatay mehmetcagatayay...@yahoo.com wrote: With this in mind, also when Lenin invoked the financial capital or when Sweezy, talked about the triumph of financial capital they were merely describing the distinctive characteristics of a specific form which is the core of imperialist exploitation. I think the answer of Waistline's question is quite easy: There is no such a thing as industrial capital sector or industrial capital as a subdivision in the totality of capital. And in this sense, there is no financial capital too. The supposed difficulty of this question rises on the bizarre confusion about categories and forms. Mehmet �agatay http://weblogmca.blogspot.com/ Refine your culinary schools at a top Culinary program near you. http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL2141/fc/PnY6rw2ROjvk74Ry8g42dyLN1LMUCcAZae 7p140NwIzRTaGTCtBnz/ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis **New year...new news. Be the first to know what is making headlines. (http://www.aol.com/?ncid=emlcntaolcom0026) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Bush a Socialist? Don't Make Me Laugh; Response
Bush a Socialist? Don't Make Me Laugh By Joel Wendland click here for related stories: socialism 1-02-09, 10:14 am The Republican Party is lashing out again. This time at itself. Several media sources recently reported that at an upcoming Republican National Convention meeting a resolution has been submitted that accuses George W. Bush of promoting socialism through the Wall Street bailout. This move is remarkably ironic given that Republicans unabashedly supported Bush until just weeks ago. Many had accused his critics of anti-Americanism and of supporting terrorism. A host of Republican ideologues and right-wing media outlets even took to calling Barack Obama a communist for a variety of reasons, but especially for his plan to give 95 percent of Americans a tax cut. Here is what the resolution reportedly said, in part: WHEREAS, the Bank Bailout Bill effectively nationalized the Nation's banking system, giving the United States non-voting warrants from participating financial institutions, and moving our free market based economy another dangerous step closer toward socialism. Now it is tempting to laugh at this nonsense and let it go. But the chance offered by these circumstances to explain a socialistic response to the economic crisis is too tempting to do so. Additional resources: Podcast #89 – Auto Bailout: Why and What's the Reason For PA Editors Blog Obama Admin. and the Employee Free Choice Act Ten Best and Worst of Marxism for 2008 Act Now! Imminent Vote on Fair Pay Legislation Subscribe to this Feed In a recent article, we here at PoliticalAffairs.net reported recently on a new campaign to halt the bailout because of the lack of oversight in the Troubled Assets Relief Program, or TARP. Almost $350 billion in taxpayer money has been given to the world's richest banks without the least bit of curiosity on the part of the Bush administration about what they have done with the cash. According to some accounts the application for taxpayer money is a surprisingly uninquisitive two-page document that can be submitted online. Also, a recent media survey of several major banks who have taken the money revealed that they are flat out refusing to explain what they have done with the cash. A little deeper digging found, however, that many banks have hoarded the money rather trying to stimulate economic activity by loosening credit. Others have used the cash to buy smaller banks or expand their holdings in others. And the most corrupt have simply used the money to pad their profit margins or to pay outrageous executive bonuses, stockholder dividends, and for corporate jets and getaways. It is what Political Affairs contributing editor Norman Markowitz, in a recent article, called vulture capitalism. This isn't socialism. Those are the fundamentals of the Republican ideology of the free market – with direct government assistance. Far from being a dangerous step toward socialism, that's how Republican free market concept works. Privatize benefits and profits; socialize costs and pain. No government oversight. Some actual socialist thinkers have called this type of economic activity the state monopoly stage of capitalism. It is the worst, most exploitative stage. Smaller businesses are gobbled up or eliminated; workers' rights are squashed. Rules and laws designed to reign in the worst excesses are discarded. Monopolies grow increasingly large and powerful. It is also this stage of capitalism that is most vulnerable to change, a stage in which socialist solutions to crises seem most feasible and even necessary. A socialist program for resolving the crisis in the banking industry would possibly have begun by using the TARP funds to gain public ownership and oversight of the banks. It would not have been a handout. Further, the socialist approach would have originated with the interest of working families. If indeed the TARP project had been a socialist one, it would have been embedded in, controlled by, and enacted with working people's interests at its center. The guiding principle would be the socialization of benefits and profit. For example, if TARP were handled in a socialistic way, homeowners who now face the loss of their homes would be a top priority. Mortgages would have been renegotiated with greater urgency than that which the Bush administration rushed to give payouts to the JP Morgans, Citigroups, and Bank of Americas. Credit with good terms for small farmers and small businesses would have been prioritized above the bottom lines of Wall Street. Capitalism is based on a couple of basic building blocks. Wealth is socially created and privately accumulated. Simply put, workers, for example, make all of the value accumulated by the auto companies, but the Ford family (and stockholders who rarely add an significant value to the end product) get the profit. Profit, then, is the
[Marxism-Thaxis] Act Now! Imminent Vote on Fair Pay Legislation
Act Now! Imminent Vote on Fair Pay Legislation From the National Organization for Women: Two important bills, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (H.R. 11) and the Paycheck Fairness Act (H.R. 12), will be among the House of Representatives' first votes of the 111th Congress. Please take time now to call or email your representative and urge her/him to vote for these bills that will help reduce wage discrimination against women. The votes could come as early as Wednesday, Jan. 7, but might possibly be held off until Friday, Jan. 9. Regardless, please send your message -- by sending an email or calling your House member's office. The U.S. Capitol switchboard number is 202-224-3121; just ask to be connected to your representative's office and leave a message of support for these bills. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.com ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
On Jan 7, 2009, at 6:33 PM, waistli...@aol.com wrote: I am one of those persons who once wore the mantel of Stalinism with pride. However, this tells no one of who I am or my body of politics or belief system. I tend to avoid such sloganeering and throwing Stalinism or Trotskyism at an individual because it tells no one nothing. You seem not to notice that the individual at whom I threw the brand Stalinist wasBrezhnev. On Jan 7, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Charles Brown wrote: Brezhnev was to the left of...Krugman. How many counterrevolutionary invasions did Krugman launch? How many political opponents did he send to labor camps? How many did he imprison in mental hospitals? Was Krugman a Stalinist? Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures. Herakleitos of Ephesos ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Krugman critiques Obama stimulus plan
You seem not to notice that the individual at whom I threw the brand Stalinist wasBrezhnev. Hey call me a Stalinist if you want, I couldn't give a toss, really--just don't call me a Krugmanite. I think the point to be made here though is we need more than Krugman to critique the evolution of the ruling class's response to the crisis (which some focus on the presidency of a guy who hasn't even taken office yet). Afterall, the Krugman dude went at the Bushwa for 8 years and it was pretty milquetoast for we Stalinists. CJ ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Evidence please. Productive . Industrial capital U have the
And as the past 8 years (and before as well) have shown, MILITARISM really hasn't left the 'equation' and in fact has grown even more immense in its hold on the US. Of course we Marxists already knew this, but here is the analysis showing up in American academia (albeit from someone who is not Marxist but Marxist ideas permeate non-Marxist discourse). Much better than the Chalmers Johnson books from what I can tell looking at copies online (read-only, so I can't quote). It's in my Amazon shopping cart now. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0230602282/ref=ord_cart_shr?_encoding=UTF8m=ATVPDKIKX0DERv=glance Review Ismael Hossein-zadeh's penetrating analysis of the role of the military-industrial complex in driving U.S. foreign policy and rearranging domestic priorities could not be more timely. With U.S. military spending at levels higher than the peak years of the Vietnam War, Hossein-zadeh provides the most cogent explanation yet of how we got to this point.--William D. Hartung, Senior Research Fellow, World Policy Institute at the New School America has been overrun not by military force, but by the force of militarism. Using statistics, analysis and historical references, Hossein-zadeh reveals the troubling picture that America may have succumbed to militarism despite the warnings of Washington, Eisenhower and Butler. Hossein-zadeh reveals the true cost of Pentagon programs by adjusting the federal budget for Social Security and unmasking the insatiable, consuming maw of spending run amok. He reveals how budgetary militarism is defeating the New Deal, even as it musters a long term assault on the Bill of Rights and other foundations of American democracy. The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism is a must-read for patriots concerned about the future of the United States. --Grant F. Smith, Director of Research, Institute for Research, Middle Eastern Policy Writing in a scholarly but accessible manner, Ismael Hossein-zadeh provides an impressive overview of policy trends, their historical background and their political and economic influences. In examining the recent tendencies towards war and militaristic responses to foreign policy issues, the author looks past the now dominant neo-conservative justifications, focusing on the powerful interests that lie beneath.--David Gold, Associate Professor, International Affairs Program, The New School Ismael Hossein-zadeh has produced an original and powerful synthesis of previous explanations of contemporary U.S. militarism. He locates the relevant economic, political, and ideological forces within a power-elite military-industrial complex framework firmly grounded in a structural analysis of capital accumulation. By steering past the twin dangers of conspiracy theory and economic reductionism, this framework clearly reveals the parasitic, class-biased, and systemic character of the Bush administration's unilateralism. Along the way, Hossein-zadeh provides a challenging analysis of the cyclical fluctuations of U.S. military spending since World War II.--Paul Burkett, Professor of Economics, Indiana State University Product Description This wide-ranging, interdisciplinary analysis blends history, economics, and politics to challenge most of the prevailing accounts of the rise of U.S. militarism. While acknowledging the contributory role of some of the most widely-cited culprits (big oil, neoconservative ideology, the Zionist lobby, and President Bush's world outlook), this study explores the bigger, but largely submerged, picture: the political economy of war and militarism. The study is unique not only for its thorough examination of the economics of military spending, but also for its careful analysis of a series of closely related topics (petroleum, geopolitics, imperialism, terrorism, religious fundamentalism, the war in Iraq, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict) that may appear as digressions but, in fact, help shed more light on the main investigation. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Revolution and the Role of New Ideas
Revolution and the Role of New Ideas The history of revolution shows that fundamental change in society does not occur without the introduction of new ideas. What we have in our favor today, over any other historical period, is that the conditions are favorable for abolishing private property forever. Millions are being propelled into motion against the capitalist system, but revolutionary transformation cannot take place unless there is an understanding of the root of the problem and the solution. Poverty and oppression, or even the energy of a global movement against today’s horrendous conditions – only create the opportunity for change. They have never on their own created revolution. Only a vision of what’s possible can do that. That’s what we mean when we talk about introducing new ideas. What’s new today is that a society that nourishes the material, intellectual, spiritual and cultural needs of all its people is possible. The role of revolutionaries is to help align the people’s thinking with the possibilities of today. How revolution comes about Once the objective conditions for revolution are in place, the intellectual development of the people is key to revolution. By objective, we mean those processes that exist independent of thought – the qualitative changes in the means of production that disrupt the economic and social order. In this era automation and globalization have created an explosion of destitute people who are living in urban slums. Revolution comes about as a result of conscious revolutionaries utilizing the objective changes to develop the subjective side of the revolution. By subjective, we mean the ideological expressions in peoples’ minds about the objective processes – their beliefs, hopes, and visions, their religious and spiritual life. This ideological process – that is, what people think and believe – is currently dominated by the ruling class. Revolutionaries focus their activity here. full: _http://www.lrna.org/2-pt/v16ed5art4.html_ (http://www.lrna.org/2-pt/v16ed5art4.html) This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from _http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm_ (http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm) **New year...new news. Be the first to know what is making headlines. (http://www.aol.com/?ncid=emlcntaolcom0026) ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis