[lbo-talk] Debt

Wojtek S wsoko52 at gmail.com
Wed May 2 12:44:23 PDT 2012


Adam: "There is so much more to say here. I'm interested in other's thoughts on this."

[WS:] I am still reading Graeber's book, but the impression that I got so far is that he treats debt per se as a nearly universal human condition, but it takes very different forms in different societies. In human economies it takes the form of different social obligations among social unequals which are represented by "primitive money" used as tokens, and in market economies where it simply represents the amount of money owed to another party and where both parties are nominally. The thrust of his argument seems to be that the existence of debt in market economies leads to the subversion of the assumption of equality, because it results in bondage and slavery.

I do not think he is condemning market economies any more than he he is condemning human economies for creating slavery and bondage - he seems to argue that the factor responsible for it the use of violence which can operate in both types of economy. However, his argument is difficult to summarize, since he seems to be beating around the bush a lot. But that is what makes his book fun to read - he amasses a very impressive amount of secondary historical sources.

I also think that his main polemical thrust is against neoliberal economic theory rather than against any type of society.

-- Wojtek

"Modern conservatism is just a neoliberal gloss on medieval domination."



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