To borrow (as is always wise) from a man much smarter than I, the role Marx’s work plays today is to inspire that part of the critical left which is not openly Marxist in much the same way that Freud inspires our angst-filled discussions of our emotional lives. That is, based not so much on a reading of any of his work itself, nor even necessarily consciously drawing on his ideas, but simply because the basic critique of capitalism, at least the parts of that have any coherence, filtered into our social worlds via a dozen intermediaries, till we forgot, or even never even came to think, to question from whence they came.
Far from smart and original we’re just regurgitating stuff that entered our consciousness, later to spew back out in our own specific inadequate reinterpretation. Get something that passes for an education, cite him once or twice in an essay, and then move on, secure in the knowledge you more or less have a handle on the whole Marxism thing, because in the final analysis history has proved him wrong on his most fundamental point – that the innate contradictions of capitalism will inevitably lead to its destruction as the dominant mode of production in the global economy. Capitalism is still here, and going strong, whilst those who embarked on the great socialist experiments are either long gone, or are languishing behind the standards of living that are enjoyed by so many in the most developed capitalist countries. What does Marx have to say to those seeking to find some way out of the political mess that constitutes the Arab world? Or to the ‘bottom billion’ for whom capitalism has never even swung by to give them the chance to be exploited to the benefit of capitalist elites? Or a world which many feel we can’t entertain a theory which suggests that utopia can only lie the other side of the wrenching transformation of industrial capitalism? Pick different battles, smaller injustices - free Palestine, stop American aggression, temper market fundamentalism, get Britney some help. Whatever the cause might be there is no outright need to adopt the unfortunate label ‘Marxist’, one of the few social groupings that can make me feel fashionably dressed.
But perhaps its time for all those like me that find themselves in this description to reassess their relationship to a body of work that already informs us, directly or indirectly, but we assume that though useful and incredible analysis for its time, no longer has anything greatly interesting to say that cannot be better expressed within a new idiom, be it talk of multitudes, empires, social constructionism, or neo- or post- or whatever kind of colonialism. What has pushed me to this unpalatably revolutionary point was, of all things, an article that appeared recently in the Financial times, written by Martin Wolf one of capitalism's most consistent attack dogs. My feelings towards the beret-wearing, frequently-leather-clad, coffee-stained-fingernails of the often appalling Marxist left have begun to be reluctantly reassessed by the idea now fixed firmly in my head, that in going green, are we actually in serious danger of going red?
“[I]f there are limits to emissions, there may also be limits to growth. But if there are indeed limits to growth, the political underpinnings of our world fall apart. Intense distributional conflicts must then re-emerge – indeed, they are already emerging – within and among countries.”
For some two hundred years the entire world system has been buttressed on the misleading truism that 'a rising tide raises all boats', during which time the immense dynamism and ‘creative destruction’ of capitalism has delivered unprecedented standards of living even for those at the very fringes of its reach. As such a liberal democratic system has become institutionalised whose leadership has passed peacefully from one hegemon (the UK) to another (the US), whose leadership the majority of the capitalist rest are willing to follow (albeit with frequent tantrums) riding the wave of prosperity that is has brought.
Are we genuinely going to give saving the planet a go, as the most optimistic reading of the recent conference in Bali would suggest? If so a dark cloud (more pertinent than a specter) hovers over the global economy, for this means accepting, as Martin Wolf appears to fear, that the amount of carbon that can be emitted in its functioning has limits. But if we accept that there are limits to what we can emit, then we have also to accept that there are limits to what we can produce. But once you understand capitalism through the prism of Marx's analysis there are very good reasons for believing this to be immensely problematic.
One of capitalism's most enduring laws is that total production must continually rise. In a competitive economy producers must continually find ways to lower their costs if they wish to survive, which in the long-run means investing in new technologies that increase productivity. Hence the trend for goods which begin as expensive items to fall in price over time, bringing them within reach of more and more people, as companies battle to get the largest market share they possibly can.
Unfortunately it is not sufficient to rely on falling prices to bring products within reach of more and more people. Ultimately in order to continue selling all this ever increasing production firms need to find new markets, and hence the relentless expansion of the capitalist economy across the planet by a variety of means. As long as this process has no limits then, contrary to Marx's own analysis, despite continual 'crises' in different parts of the global economy over time, the system itself is not under threat. It is empirically true that on aggregate all have benefited from capitalism's expansion. True enough anyway to distract from the fact that these benefits are very unequally distributed.
But a world with limits on emissions challenges the very process that so characterises the capitalist mode of production; its very strength becomes its greatest, and possibly fatal, weakness. The endless drive to increased productivity, the endless creativity of its destruction, must meet the limits of nature before it ever meets the limits of man's ability to exploit his fellow man. For it is as we approach that moment when the tide can perhaps no longer continue to rise that capitalism as a mode of production's true colours, so artfully hidden in a system that is at once both emancipatory and oppressive, could re-emerge into full view. It is conflict and struggle that are the grinding cogs at the heart of the capitalist machine.
It is time for those of us on the critical left who have learnt suspicion of the grand narrative to reaquaint ourselves with it. This is a generation of unparalleled challenge, but also unparalleled opportunity. However as Marx once wrote:
"[h]istory does nothing; it does not possess immense riches, it does not fight battles. It is men, real, living, who do all this."
Do we stand a chance?
Far from smart and original we’re just regurgitating stuff that entered our consciousness, later to spew back out in our own specific inadequate reinterpretation. Get something that passes for an education, cite him once or twice in an essay, and then move on, secure in the knowledge you more or less have a handle on the whole Marxism thing, because in the final analysis history has proved him wrong on his most fundamental point – that the innate contradictions of capitalism will inevitably lead to its destruction as the dominant mode of production in the global economy. Capitalism is still here, and going strong, whilst those who embarked on the great socialist experiments are either long gone, or are languishing behind the standards of living that are enjoyed by so many in the most developed capitalist countries. What does Marx have to say to those seeking to find some way out of the political mess that constitutes the Arab world? Or to the ‘bottom billion’ for whom capitalism has never even swung by to give them the chance to be exploited to the benefit of capitalist elites? Or a world which many feel we can’t entertain a theory which suggests that utopia can only lie the other side of the wrenching transformation of industrial capitalism? Pick different battles, smaller injustices - free Palestine, stop American aggression, temper market fundamentalism, get Britney some help. Whatever the cause might be there is no outright need to adopt the unfortunate label ‘Marxist’, one of the few social groupings that can make me feel fashionably dressed.
But perhaps its time for all those like me that find themselves in this description to reassess their relationship to a body of work that already informs us, directly or indirectly, but we assume that though useful and incredible analysis for its time, no longer has anything greatly interesting to say that cannot be better expressed within a new idiom, be it talk of multitudes, empires, social constructionism, or neo- or post- or whatever kind of colonialism. What has pushed me to this unpalatably revolutionary point was, of all things, an article that appeared recently in the Financial times, written by Martin Wolf one of capitalism's most consistent attack dogs. My feelings towards the beret-wearing, frequently-leather-clad, coffee-stained-fingernails of the often appalling Marxist left have begun to be reluctantly reassessed by the idea now fixed firmly in my head, that in going green, are we actually in serious danger of going red?
“[I]f there are limits to emissions, there may also be limits to growth. But if there are indeed limits to growth, the political underpinnings of our world fall apart. Intense distributional conflicts must then re-emerge – indeed, they are already emerging – within and among countries.”
For some two hundred years the entire world system has been buttressed on the misleading truism that 'a rising tide raises all boats', during which time the immense dynamism and ‘creative destruction’ of capitalism has delivered unprecedented standards of living even for those at the very fringes of its reach. As such a liberal democratic system has become institutionalised whose leadership has passed peacefully from one hegemon (the UK) to another (the US), whose leadership the majority of the capitalist rest are willing to follow (albeit with frequent tantrums) riding the wave of prosperity that is has brought.
Are we genuinely going to give saving the planet a go, as the most optimistic reading of the recent conference in Bali would suggest? If so a dark cloud (more pertinent than a specter) hovers over the global economy, for this means accepting, as Martin Wolf appears to fear, that the amount of carbon that can be emitted in its functioning has limits. But if we accept that there are limits to what we can emit, then we have also to accept that there are limits to what we can produce. But once you understand capitalism through the prism of Marx's analysis there are very good reasons for believing this to be immensely problematic.
One of capitalism's most enduring laws is that total production must continually rise. In a competitive economy producers must continually find ways to lower their costs if they wish to survive, which in the long-run means investing in new technologies that increase productivity. Hence the trend for goods which begin as expensive items to fall in price over time, bringing them within reach of more and more people, as companies battle to get the largest market share they possibly can.
Unfortunately it is not sufficient to rely on falling prices to bring products within reach of more and more people. Ultimately in order to continue selling all this ever increasing production firms need to find new markets, and hence the relentless expansion of the capitalist economy across the planet by a variety of means. As long as this process has no limits then, contrary to Marx's own analysis, despite continual 'crises' in different parts of the global economy over time, the system itself is not under threat. It is empirically true that on aggregate all have benefited from capitalism's expansion. True enough anyway to distract from the fact that these benefits are very unequally distributed.
But a world with limits on emissions challenges the very process that so characterises the capitalist mode of production; its very strength becomes its greatest, and possibly fatal, weakness. The endless drive to increased productivity, the endless creativity of its destruction, must meet the limits of nature before it ever meets the limits of man's ability to exploit his fellow man. For it is as we approach that moment when the tide can perhaps no longer continue to rise that capitalism as a mode of production's true colours, so artfully hidden in a system that is at once both emancipatory and oppressive, could re-emerge into full view. It is conflict and struggle that are the grinding cogs at the heart of the capitalist machine.
It is time for those of us on the critical left who have learnt suspicion of the grand narrative to reaquaint ourselves with it. This is a generation of unparalleled challenge, but also unparalleled opportunity. However as Marx once wrote:
"[h]istory does nothing; it does not possess immense riches, it does not fight battles. It is men, real, living, who do all this."
Do we stand a chance?
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