Michael Dawson wrote:
>>We are great admirers of Sweezy, although we can also see his
>>limitations. Sweezy did not get EVERYTHING right. The monopoly capital
>>school took a giant step forward by introducing power into the analysis,
>>and therefore abandoning value as a yardstick for pecuniary
>>accumulation. But this approach stopped short of thinking through the
>>implications of power for the very concept of CAPITAL. If you allow
>>power, you cannot measure capital in terms of value or utility. And when
>>you lose your basic "substance" of measurement, the entire notion of
>>"production" as the quantitative basis for accumulation is gone -- along
>>with all the historical "tendencies", "laws of motion", "expanded
>>reproduction", "overaccumulation" etc., etc. Such theoretical collapse
>>requires a new theory altogether.
>>
>>
>
>Sweezy would strongly disagree with you that the division you think is there
>is there. Why can't you talk about capital as BOTH power and value? Power
>maintains a system in which money (an abstract numerical category) is
>accepted as the measure of value, and accumulated money directs power. But
>having money is not a dream. It's real. And capital represents "savings,"
>meaning that is functions as a way of tying future investment and work to
>past investment and work. It's a form of counting, but it counts, albeit
>with serious slippage, real activities.
>
>And, if this is true, your whole argument collapses.
>
>
>
>
>>Incidentally, where did we argue that nobody foresaw the "new economy"?
>>
>>
>
>In the first few pages of your paper, you treat the "new economy" as if
>everybody who looked at it was convinced it was a genuine structural change
>in the system. But Sweezyists certainly did not. Neither did or does Doug
>Henwood. In fact, I doubt any major Marxist observers thought so.
>
>Treating all Marxists as "new economy" believers appears to be the basis for
>your whole argument. You say only your new perspective can explain the
>implosion of the "new economy" and current geopolitical trends. You can
>only say this by folding Sweezy and others into the school of "new economy"
>dupes.
>
>
>
>
>>>Personally, I also find your presentation of Veblen to be radical
>>>inadequate.
>>>
>>>
>
>
>
>
>>I'm not sure what you refer to in this statement. Veblen was the first
>>one to see power ("sabotage") as a basis for understanding capital.
>>
>>
>
>Not true! Marx was the first one. And my objection to your treatment of
>Veblen is that you try to pass him off as somebody who claimed you could
>only understand the system by means of some ultra-abstract "overall"
>appreciation of capital. In reality, Veblen viewed the relations of
>capitalism as but a "covert regime" for applying to age-old means of class
>coercion -- "force and fraud."
>
>
>
>
>>>Veblen and Sweezy retain immense explanatory power for the present day.
>>>
>>>
>>Why
>>
>>
>>>do you deny this?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>We don't deny that at all. On the contrary. A note: Sweezy adopted
>>Veblen's insight into power, but missed entirely his suggestion that
>>capital itself should be thought in terms of power.
>>
>>
>
>Well, by zooming past the explanatory power they have, you deny it. And you
>also obscure the fact that you are very, very close to claiming to have
>invented the idea that capital is power. That idea goes back farther than
>Marx. Adam Smith knew capital is power. He just thought it was mostly just
>power. Marx disagreed.
>
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