On Sun, 27 Sep 2009 12:53:22 -0400 Marv Gandall
<marvgandall at videotron.ca> writes:
> Jim Farmelant wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, 25 Sep 2009 16:38:33 -0400 Bhaskar Sunkara
> > <bhaskar.sunkara at gmail.com> writes:
> >> Is Chris' objection simply the intrumentalist view of the state?
> >> I've
> >> always found that analysis a bit wanting, but what are the
> >> alternatives?
> >> Poulantzas?
> >
> > ...within the Marxist tradition,
> > there have been those who have been
> > critical of instrumentalist notions
> > of the state, most notably,
> > Nicos Poulantzas, who developed
> > a structuralist analysis of the state
> > which emphasized its relative autonomy,
> > and its functioning on behalf of the
> > long term interests of the capitalist
> > class as a whole precisely because of
> > its relative independence from the capitalist
> > class.
> >
> > In Marx's writings one can find both
> > instrumentalist analyses of the state
> > and analyses of the state which emphasize
> > its relative autonomy in relation to
> > social classes...
> =========================================
> Did you mean to say "ruling classes", Jim? Neither Poulantzas nor
> Marx
> suggested that the state was somehow equidistant from all of the
> "social
> classes", only that in certain circumstances it functioned
> relatively
> autonomously of the ruling class but always in it's ultimate
> interests -
> including in those instances when the state "mediates" internal
> conflicts
> within the ruling class or between it and antagonistic classes, or,
> as I've
> indicated elsewhere, when it takes the lead in capital accumulation
> and
> economic development on behalf of a weak and developing
> bourgeoisie.
I addressed this in my following post in which I discussed Richard W. Miller's attempt to synthesize instrumentalist and structuralist conconceptions of the state. There I wrote:
would also recommend Richard W. Miller's unjustly neglected book, *Analyzing Marx: Morality, Power, and History* (Princeton University Press, 1984). Miller's book was one of the more interesting texts of Analytical Marxism. He devoted one section of the book to an investigation of Marxist understandings of power and focused in particular on the debate between "structuralists" and "instrumentalists" over the nature and functions of the state. Miller's discussion of this debate took Poulantzas' *Political Power and Social Class* along with Althusser's "Ideology and Ideological-State Apparatuses" as key texts on the structuralists' side, and he took Ralph Milliband's *The State in Capitalist Society* as representative of the instrumentalist position. Miller saw both positions as containing important truths that a full Marxist analysis of the state must take into account. He also saw both sides as being afflicted by distortions which limit the utility of their analyses. Miller attempted to provide a resolution of the debate which incorporates the insights of both sides. He also took a look Franz Neumann's *Behemoth* as respresenting a persuasive Marxist analysis of the Nazi seizure of power in Germany.
>
> Having been exposed to much "mediation" as a former trade union
> negotiator,
> I'm aware of how one-sided such mediation can be -it's purpose being
> to
> offer relatively modest concessions in exchange for an end to costly
> and
> messy conflict. Labour boards are a micro example of how the state
> intercedes between the classes on a macro level, even though to the
> uninitiated looking in from the outside, like Wojtek, Chris, and
> uninformed
> mainstream reporters, these boards appear to be "neutral", above
> the
> conflict between the two sides, the most powerful of of the parties
> concerned, and the one most responsible for the outcome - rather
> than the
> instrument of the employers, their paymasters, which is their
> intended
> function.
>
> Just to be clear: No one on this thread has been taking the side of
> the
> "instrumentalist" Miliband against the "structuralist" Poulantzas or
> vice
> versa - nor should they, since the respective approaches of both
> Marxists to
> the state were complementary rather than contradictory. Miliband
> suggested
> that the capitalists exercised state power more directly through
> the
> political institutions and parties it created, while Poulantzas,
> like
> Gramsci, extended this analysis by taking wider cultural and other
> factors
> into account, all the while maintaining that the state was
> capitalist - even
> lacking direct input from the corporations or governed by parties
> other than
> the conservative ones favoured by the big bourgeoisie - because it
> continued
> to ensure the maintainance of the existing system of capitalist
> property and
> power.
>
>
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