Just thought I'd clarify: I meant the issue has been dressed up as two 'opposites' neither of which we need necessarily embrace - but if we don't embrace 'em, our discourse isn't in the frame - the frame constituted for economic debate today is one of Hayekian freedom plus price as optimal communication versus some quasi-Stalinist bureaucratic system by which political and economic power is reputedly even more concentrated and allocation decisions are reputedly necessarily sub-optimal. There's gotta be room opened up beyond this pair, no? Is there any new literature on this question? Cheers, Rob. ---------- >G'day all, > >Seems to me that the coherent critique we lefties have available to us has >four other political problems, too: >1) it has easily been dressed up as the optimal but problematic 'hidden >hand' versus the demonstrably spotty history of the social democratic state >as corruptible and bureaucratic 'dead hand'; >(2) it is difficult to sustain it empirically [although if it were right, I >reckon the world would look a lot like it actually does]; >(3) it suggests a revolutionary politics insofar as the differential >ownership and control of the means of production must be stopped [which >involves expropriation, which might involve coercion - but maybe another >decade or two of mega-mergers and super-privatisation might see the whole >lot of us in a very different relationship to the MoP], and >[4] one critique doesn't necessarily lead to one programme [market >socialists like Nove and Schweikert would disagree with councilists like >Albert and Hahnel, who would disagree with Leninists - who are always >bagging each other, like the Trots and the Stalinists]. As we know, these >disagreements are often extremely intense and often definitively impossible >to resolve. > >The defenders of the status quo need defend but one order, but progressives >have the difficult job of proffering competing scenarios. Solidarity, the >left's only realistic modus operandi, is actually a lot easier for the >individualistic right - and an economic position that does not offer >currently dominant notions of freedom and the individual, neat numbers, >untraumatic programmes and a solid linear prescription, is pushing shit >uphill. > >And then we have the problem of rhetorical association, eh? Everyone's >convinced the leftie critique is the thin edge of the gulag archipelago >wedge. We are nipped in the bud, because people are convinced the flower >will be bureaucratic centralism, I think. > >And maybe we do need to do a little work on some of our common premises. >Doug O. suggested the other day, for instance, that we could best keep the >law of value by allowing for Schumpetarian moments of innovation and >associated fleeting moments of non-labour-endowed value. Would such an >approach, for instance, defeat widely accepted wholesale rebuttals of the >law of value (eg. Stigler and Boulding)? > >Yours musing incoherently, >Rob. > > >---------- >> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Tom Walker) >> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Subject: [PEN-L:6859] RE: Old "foggies"/"fogeys" >> Date: Sat, 15 May 1999 07:06:33 -0700 >> >>The winnowing of the left from economics is hardly surprising if one steps >>back for a moment from who or what economics claims to be and do and >>considers instead how economics is historically situated as a discipline >>within the university and within society -- that is to say, if one takes a >>historical materialist view of economics. Economics is a sub-genre of >>history. It has appropriated to itself the authoritative posture of the >>natural sciences, from which position its objects of study -- the >>historical relationships in society -- necessarily are recast as nature-like. >> >>If one accepts a priori that private property, wage labour and market >>exchange are *essentially* natural, rather than historical, features of >>economic life, then one is reduced to higgling over their contingent >weights >>and prices. The mathematics is seductive. It begins soothingly, "if we >>bracket out [for the sake of argument] history . . ." and it concludes >>sternly with a taboo against bringing history back in. But the real scandal >>occurs later with the supplementary concession that history may be appended >>to the [supposedly 'real'] analysis. Thus for economics, history is a >>contingent appendage while private property, wage labour and market >>exchange are essential. >> >>One need only read Lionel Robbins' Essay on the Nature and Significance of >>Economic Science to see precisely how and why historical materialism is >>banished as *non-economics*. "Marxist economics", however, is permitted to >>play the game by the rules, the first of which -- the very definition of >>the object of "economic science" -- is to concede the universality of private >>property, wage labour and market exchange. >> >>Michael Perelman wrote: >> >>>Peter is correct that radical economics is not reproducing itself. The >>>space for new left economists is limited to a few liberal arts colleges, >>>Catholic institutions, and less prestigious state colleges. For the most >>>part, these do not have graduate programs. >>> >>>During the '60s, students demanded something other than standard >>>neoclassical fare. In order to maintain majors, departments had to hire a >>>few lefties to make their programs more interesting. I was hired for this >>>purpose. >> >>regards, >>Tom Walker >>http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/covenant.htm
