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Crisis and “law of motion” in economics: a critique of positivist Marxism

In: The National Question and the Question of Crisis

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  • Alan Freeman

Abstract

This chapter restores the concepts of freedom, consciousness, and choice to our understanding of “economic laws,” so we may discuss how to respond to economic crisis. These are absent from orthodox economics that presents “globalization” or “the markets” as the outcome of unstoppable forces outside human control. They were integral to the emancipatory political economy of Karl Marx but have been lost to Marxism, which appears as the inspiration for mechanical, fatalistic determinism. This confusion arises from Marxism's absorption of the idea, originating in French positivism, that social laws are automatic and inevitable. The chapter contests the organizing principle of this view: that economic laws are predictive, telling us what must happen. Marx's laws are relational, not predictive, laying bare the connection between two apparently distinct forms of appearance of the same thing, such as labor and price. Such laws open the door to democracy and choice, but do not unambiguously predict the future because what happens depends on our actions. The commodity form conceals these laws, disguising the true social and class relations of society. Accumulation, however, undermines the circumstances that permit the commodity to play this role. The result is crisis, defined in this chapter as the point when the blind laws of the commodity form are suspended and open political forces come into play. In past crises, capitalism has restored the rate of profit through such destructive interventions as imperialism, war, and fascism. Economic laws, properly defined, offer society the real choice of alternative outcomes from crisis.

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  • Alan Freeman, 2010. "Crisis and “law of motion” in economics: a critique of positivist Marxism," Research in Political Economy, in: The National Question and the Question of Crisis, pages 211-250, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    • Handle: RePEc:eme:rpeczz:s0161-7230(2010)0000026008
    DOI: 10.1108/S0161-7230(2010)0000026008
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    1. Anwar M. Shaikh, 1998. "The Empirical Strength of the Labour Theory of Value," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Riccardo Bellofiore (ed.), Marxian Economics: A Reappraisal, chapter 15, pages 225-251, Palgrave Macmillan.
    2. Andrew J. Kliman, 2002. "The law of value and laws of statistics: sectoral values and prices in the US economy, 1977--97," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 26(3), pages 299-311, May.
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    4. Lefteris Tsoulfidis, 2002. "Values, prices of production and market prices: some more evidence from the Greek economy," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 26(3), pages 359-369, May.
    5. W. Paul Cockshott & Allin Cottrell, 2005. "Robust correlations between prices and labour values: a comment," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 29(2), pages 309-316, March.
    6. Bagchi,Amiya Kumar, 1982. "The Political Economy of Underdevelopment," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521284042.
    7. Paul Cockshott & Allin Cottrell, 1998. "Does Marx Need to Transform?," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Riccardo Bellofiore (ed.), Marxian Economics: A Reappraisal, chapter 6, pages 70-85, Palgrave Macmillan.
    8. Wesley Clair Mitchell, 1927. "Business Cycles: The Problem and Its Setting," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number mitc27-1.
    9. Freeman, Alan, 1998. "The indeterminacy of price-value correlations: a comment on papers by Simo Mohun and Anwar Shaikh," MPRA Paper 2040, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 1998.
    10. Freeman, Alan & Kagarlitsky, Boris, 2004. "World Empire - or a world of Empires?," MPRA Paper 52543, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 27 Dec 2013.
    11. Andrew J. Kliman, 2005. "Reply to Cockshott and Cottrell," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 29(2), pages 317-323, March.
    12. Andre Gunder Frank, 1978. "Dependent Accumulation and Underdevelopment," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-16014-3, December.
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    1. Freeman, Alan, 2015. "Social Structures of disaccumulation: a 101 on the rate of profit and the cause of crisis," MPRA Paper 69649, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 21 Feb 2016.

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    JEL classification:

    • B1 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925
    • B14 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925 - - - Socialist; Marxist
    • B3 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought: Individuals
    • B5 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Current Heterodox Approaches

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