-----Original Message----- From: Michael Yates <mikey+ at pitt.edu>
>Friends,
>
>In a review of "In Defence of History: Marxism and the Postmodern
>Agenda" (edited by Ellen Wood and John Foster, Monthly Review 1997),
>economics professor, Yanis Varoufakis of the Univ. of Sydney, says,
>
>"Come to think of it, the asymptotic limit of postmodern
fragmentation
>is the neoclassical general equilibrium economic model. In both
cases,
>the only admissible social explanation springs from differences in
>preferences (and if identities are freely chosen, in identities)
which
>are constructed in such a manner that they ban any comparison across
>persons.
i don't think postmodernism is a volutarism. some versions of it perhaps, tho i can't even think of any to be honest. (here's a dare: name one pomo writer who thinks that identities can be chosen?
Freedom is defined in negative terms, and
>structural exploitation is axiomatically rendered meaningless.
again, freedom is not defined in negative terms. quite the contrary: foucault's understanding of power is, i would argue structural in the sense inferred here, but not for all that diachronically or synchronically structured; moreover, foucault undertook a rigorous critique of understadnings of freedom as negative, as do butler, deleuze....
Above
>all else, both neoclassicism and postmodernity espouse a radical
>egalitarianism that is founded in the rejection of any standard by
which
>the claims of one group (or one person) are more deserving than those
of
>another.
wow! what would this standard be or look like? here we get another glimpse of that racism and sexism and homphobia that gets bandied about and gives marxism a bad name. no wonder soem people refuse to even read marx if they think this is what's there. ain't it fun when folks get to reduce the issues of sexism, racism to expressions of particularism....
Moreover, both fail to provide a principle that promotes, in
>the context of their radical egalitarianism, respect for the other's
>difference or utility.
respect for differences is exactly lyotard's premise and argument. and a thing i don't like him for much. but where does 'utility' figure? mmm... are we back to talking about how the left should instrumentalise certain issues?
If indeed postmodernity is analytically
>indistinguishable (at least in the limit) from neoclassical economic
>method,
how has that been shown? i don't see it. postie stuff pays a lot of attention to unavoiudable antagonisms, to the impossibility of equilibrium, to equilibrium as a fantasy that tries to disavow antagonism - but always fails - to establish harmony.
me thinks the authors should actually acquaint themselves with the philosophy of history, before they go about arguing that pomo (unlike fukayama, eg) abandoned history. unless, of course, they are presuming that what they see as history and historiography is a specific (and strange) version of marxism: stubbornly synchronic, essence revealing itself, etc. and there's a vision of harmony and equilibrium, though this time allocated into a redeemed future.
angela