The Relevance of Marxist Political Economy
The question as to whether Marxist political economy is still relevant today is as important a question to address as ever before. In the current age of advance capitalism we find many of the conditions and trends that Karl Marx outlined in his critique of capitalist political economy. More so even than the earlier capitalism of the 20th century. The rise in inequality and the level of concentration of wealth since the 1980’s parallels the rise in the same statistics before and during 1920’s.
The advancement in military weapon systems, the ecological crisis, the industrial pollution induced climate crisis, and the ongoing inherent instability of the capitalist system punctuated by recessions and stagnation point to the irrefutable relevance and importance of a Marxist analysis. Given that all of the issues mentioned stem directly or indirectly to the material conditions brought about by private property and class relations only serves to impart the vital importance of bringing into the public discourse the analysis of Karl Marx a leading figure in the analyses of materialist conceptions, private property, and class relations.
If one understands Marxism’s relevance the next question one may ask is whether it requires a significant revision — to which I would argue fundamentally “no”.
The reason is that the notion of a revision would imply some flaw in his basic analysis and categories utilized to explain and critique the existing political economy: capitalism. Later we will show that such flaws — in their basic analyses — do not exist.
I would, however, argue that rather than a revision, Marxist theory should instead include additional qualifications. Additions that serve only to outline responses and plans of actions based on its own analyses. There could be a number of qualifications or additions to a Marxist theory informed by contemporary research and experience, I will however, focus on only a few, that could be argued to be necessary as a foundational base from which to carry out a praxis of Marxist theory.
One important addition that Marx never fully developed would be a concrete blueprint as to how the forces of production should be organized within the economic base. To this I would say that a full notion of worker owned productive enterprises or cooperatives is in order. Something that was never fully outlined in the past (as in the Soviet era) due to usual and often necessary focus on the political superstructure in labor and worker movements. In essence this would be what many would call a paradigm shift in how an economic system is composed, from one of privately controlled enterprises, whether State owned or individually owned, to one that in which enterprises are inherently, thus structurally democratically controlled. As Marx himself famously said: “Democracy is the road to socialism”. An economy having such a composition could be called Economic Democracy. The other addition I would include is the scientifically informed importance of the interplay between production, energy, and natural ecosystems — such as the climate. Given the ongoing disaster, in the making, that is climate change and its possible civilization ending prognosis steeped in capitalist production.
Going back to Marxism’s relevance due to the structural contradictions inherent in capitalism — giving rise as of late to popular unrest across the world. We should consider that today’s economic reality was outlined and predicate in Marxist theory. What is this reality? To name a few of its contours we need only to look at the statistics. Case in point consider Oxfam’s report of inequality and concentration of wealth, that earlier in the year reported eight individuals having as much wealth as the bottom half of the world’s population coming down from 62 individuals in the previous report — now, as of February 17, 2017 that figure has thus come down to just six individuals holding the equivalent wealth ($412 billion) as the world’s bottom half [1]. This is the result of the assault on regulations and policies stemming from the New Deal era by those who Michael Joseph Roberto in his essay — The Origins of American Fascism — calls the fascist finance monopolists starting in the late 1970’s primarily in the US but paralleled globally. In fact a 2011 publication by the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality, stated that: “Over the last 30 years, wage inequality in the United States has increased substantially, with the overall level of inequality now approaching the extreme level that prevailed prior to the Great Depression.” [2] In that study the authors quantified the growth of inequality measured in various ways such as the ratio of CEO pay, homelessness, child poverty, Intragenerational Income Mobility etc. Each statistic points to the fact that inequality and its source — the concentration of wealth and income — have increased and are continuing to increase exacerbating the precarious stability of class relations vis-à-vis labor and capital. This occurred because of another crisis of capitalism during the 70’s referred to as stagflation, the response was neoliberalism: a further entrenchment of capitalism’s tenets of free markets, private property, and limited government intervention of capital. This response and inadequate understanding by liberal politicians to the series of crises that has plagued capitalism is what has led to the current levels of inequality and the popular unrest that has followed it — especially since the 2008 recession. This is of course the reality of an economic system such as capitalism that is composed of various private interests competing with each while exploiting, for profits, the rest of society and its political system. What many call crony capitalism — a euphemism for real and existing capitalism — is really the natural evolution of the competition between private interests in which the so called “cronies” are just the winners of the free for all competition that is capitalism. This bleeds over into the growing concerns regarding the rise of far-right groups across the globe, especially in the core centers of global capitalism, that many are calling rightfully so neofascism. However, this trend of neofascism is also, if traced dialectically, the natural progression of the inherent contradictions within capitalism such as that between labor and capital, the falling rate of profit, and the rise of monopolistic economic actors who seek to maintain their dominance and continue their drive for capital accumulation. As John Bellamy Foster succinctly states in his essay — This Is Not Populism — ”Today’s neofascism is the inevitable product of the crisis of monopoly-finance capital”(Foster, p.21). The clincher in this is that Marx predicted and outlined the conditions from which all of this has emanated in his analysis of political economy as many commentators and leading Marxist scholars have pointed out. Marx warned about the monopolistic tendencies within capitalism due to its competitive mode and basis in private property. He stated its danger to human society and its association with centralization of power between capital and the state apparatus, and even a non-Marxist like Roosevelt warned of this same tendency as quoted in Roberto’s essay: “the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism — ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling power”(Roberto, p.34). Roosevelt’s error, as is the same for today’s liberals, was in thinking that legislation could curtail this intrinsic property of the capitalist mode of production. Thus Marx’s analysis of our economic system is as relevant and potent as it ever was, if we are to ever overcome its contradictions.
As shown above Marxist theory does not need a revision in its basic analysis since economic and social data collected since his time leading up to the present have validated his analysis to the letter. However, we should provide additions to his basic analysis. Such as incorporating blueprints on how a post-capitalist society could be organized without resorting to old conceptions such as a Soviet styled system. The core of such a post-capitalist society should be derived directly from Marx’s analysis of the inherent contradictions within the capitalist mode of production. Central to this is the antagonistic relationship between capital and labor which has played out with disastrous effects throughout history. As Marx himself characterized the evolution of economic systems through feudalism, slavery, and capitalism as structurally similar though varying in their social and political configurations. This was due to the fact that in each there has persisted the dichotomy of the few exploiting the many for economic gain — in other words a class based structure of exploitation. So any successor system should absolve this inherent contradiction that continues to exist in capitalism. How would this take form? The only logical conclusion would be having an economic system not composed of antagonistic relations of production but rather cooperative and democratic relations in terms of ownership and management of the means of production. This therefore can only be practically realized in having the productive enterprises owned and managed — directly or indirectly dependent on size — by its very own workers. Thus worker cooperatives would form the microeconomic unit of a successor system. Furthermore having an economic system composed of cooperatives would allow the eventual abolition of markets themselves. This would be possible by the gradual monopolization, as in capitalism, of worker cooperatives joining together into one large conglomerate of worker cooperatives in the various industries along with the rise of one large consumer cooperative working in tandem, since members of each would also be members of the other. Thus, a form of decentralized State planning would emerge, facilitated unlike in the Soviet days by the advent of big data and super computers to assist in their management. Not only would markets cease to exist in the practical sense — ending turbulent competition — under such conditions there would emerge a truly democratic economic system in unison with a real political democracy producing for the first time in human history a truly democratic society.
One other addition that would be necessary given the reality under which we exist, is the inclusion of the importance of maintaining a healthy natural ecosystem and of curbing the emissions that cause climate change. This is necessary because climate change is a civilization ending process for which the scientific evidence is irrefutable. One of the problems with our current system’s inability to really deal with the issues is the existence of industries, financial institutions, and wealthy individuals who profit from maintaining our current trajectory of fossil fuel use. The other problem is capitalism’s dictatorial control of society’s surplus manifested in the privately owned excess capital sitting hidden and in plain sight across the globe. Capital that can be used to transition to a different energy infrastructure but is not utilized for that purpose because it is under the control of private entities who have no incentive to do so — due to the lack of short term returns on the capital that would be invested. This is symptom of the natural structure of the capitalist system. Given the importance of this issue: strategies to combat climate change should be at the forefront of any Marxist based prescription to the ills of capitalism. Not only that but Marxists should make the investment in and procurement of alternative and renewable energy sources central to any social plans envisioned. Particularly, in the short term the focus should be on implementing solar, wind, and tidal energy systems and in the long term the focus should be on obtaining the holy grail of energy research: Nuclear Fusion. A dialectical approach to the environment and its ecosystems should also be at the forefront of any Marxist analysis, since their maintenance is directly connected to the survival of the human species and to the achievement of the higher level communism that Marx envisioned.
The reality of living in today’s world is that everything that is occurring or that we are experiencing is the direct or indirect by product of the capitalist mode of production. All of the data and outcomes that have occurred since Marx’s publication of Das Kapital point to and support overwhelmingly his broad analysis. The multiple crises that humanity now faces makes the general realization of this fact ever more important, not only to overcoming the negative effects of capitalism, but for our very own survival and that of the planet’s ecosystem. One notion that Marx would agree with is that — Money or Capital is the alienated potential of humankind — that rings truer today given the host of problems we face and bourgeoisie society’s inability to address them, in light of the fact that technologies now coming into being are the keys to the post-capitalist society that Marx saw. Those technologies being: automation, AI, and renewable energy. Such technologies coupled with expanded space exploration/colonization offer humanity the pieces to achieve a truly post scarcity society — the question remains will humanity consider then, the relevance of Marxism today or will it be consumed by the contradictions of capitalism?
Endnotes
[1] https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/02/20/morbid-inequality-now-just-six-men-have-much-wealth-half-worlds-population
[2] http://inequality.stanford.edu/publications/20-facts-about-us-inequality-everyone-should-know
References:
Foster, John B. “This Is Not Populism.” Monthly Review, Vol. 69, №2: June 2017, DOI: https://archive.monthlyreview.org/index.php/mr/article/view/MR-069-02-2017-06_1
Roberto, Michael J. “The Origins of American Fascism.” Monthly Review, Vol. 69, №2: June 2017, DOI: https://archive.monthlyreview.org/index.php/mr/article/view/MR-069-02-2017-06_3
