Socialdem. 21st Century

One of the most absurd aspects of the Marxist and communist mentality is the militant unwillingness to recognise that the Soviet Union practised its own form of imperialism, and that there is no special reason to imagine that powerful communist states – if they existed – would avoid imperialist behaviour, given that, no matter whether a state is communist or capitalist, it will almost inevitably be drawn onto the world stage to protect its interests and access to resources and...

This follows quite clearly from (1) the logic of Marx’s own theory in volume 1 of Capital and (2) the empirical history of capitalism.Let us run through the steps: (1) Let us assume that the concept of abstract socially necessary labour time is valid (even though the concept is incoherent, cannot be properly defined and is empirically irrelevant). But, as I note, let’s assume – for the sake of argument – that it is coherent and empirically relevant.(2) For Marx, the total working day is...

The working day under Marx’s theory in volume 1 of Capital can be conceptualised in the diagram below, where there is a total working day of 12 hours. Although the total working day in any particular industry can be variable, there are two parts of the working day as follows: (1) necessary labour-time, which is “determined by the working time required for the reproduction of the labour-power of the labourer himself” (Marx 1906: 256), and(2) the surplus labour-time (Marx 1990: 341). Let us...

In a word: no.Why? Because an economy with more and more automation based on private enterprise and private capitalist production could still sell its output and obtain money profits, if a government managed the demand-side of the economy by providing a guaranteed income (with, say, taxes on consumption, property, and ownership of financial and real assets and returns from those assets, with the shortfall covered by central bank money creation). As long as the balance of payments functioned...

Well, sort of agrees in the post that can be read here: Jehu, “Reply to LK: How Labor Theory of Value destroys Fiat ‘Money’,” The Real Movement, June 12, 2015. My original post is here.We must remember that for Marx money is a special commodity that itself must have a labour value so it can function as a universal medium of exchange and numéraire. That is the basis by which money can exchange for other produced commodities under the law of value in volume 1 of Capital. But fiat money...

Chapter 13 of volume 1 of Capital is called “Co-operation” and it deals with the concept of cooperation of workers in production process and with historical aspects of the development of capitalist modes of production.Marx sees cooperation in capitalism as having three historical forms (1) simple co-operation, (2) manufacture, and (3) modern industry, but the earlier forms can persist within modern capitalism (Brewer 1984: 50).At the beginning of capitalist history, Marx sees changes in the...

Chapter 12 of volume 1 of Capital is called “The Concept of Relative Surplus Value” and it deals with yet further aspects of surplus value.Marx points to another way of increasing surplus value. He considers this representation of the working day: Working Day 1: A-----------B--CWorking Day 2: A-----B′---B--C AB represents the necessary labour-time equivalent to the value of maintaining and reproducing workers. BC therefore represents surplus labour.In Working Day 2, the total length of the...

From Louis Boudin’s book The Theoretical System of Karl Marx in the Light of Recent Criticism (1920): “The appearance in 1894 of the third volume of Capital created a sensation in interested circles. While it does not stand in any direct relation to the Revisionist movement, it can hardly be denied that it made its formal argumentation more plausible. The solution of the Great Contradiction contained in the third volume, and the rest of the matter therein contained and intimately connected...

Bernie Sanders won in the New Hampshire Democratic primary and beat Hillary Clinton.[embedded content]And people on the left should take careful notice of Sanders’ outstanding good sense in opposing open borders, as we see in the video below.[embedded content]In this respect, Bernie Sanders’ views are just like those of Ralph Nader.[embedded content]The concept of open borders is a lunatic libertarian idea, whether from the anarcho-capitalist libertarians or far left libertarians.Bizarrely,...

Marx published volume 1 of Capital in 1867. He never published any further volumes of the work in his lifetime. Early reviews and critiques of volume 1 included Eugen Dühring (1867; 1871; 1875), Carl Knies (1873), Maurice Block (1872; 1884a; 1884b), Wilhelm Roscher (1874), Achille Loria (1884), Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk (1884); Philip H. Wicksteed (1884 = Wicksteed 1933), Richard Theodore Ely (1883), George Bernard Shaw (1885), Knut Wicksell (1893 = Wicksell 1954) and Vilfredo Pareto (1893).In...