[OPE-L:3704] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: textual evidence

From: Rakesh Bhandari (bhandari@Princeton.EDU)
Date: Mon Aug 21 2000 - 19:43:32 EDT


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Re Steve's 3700
>Just for the sake of clarity,
>
>There are logical problems with your assumption Rakesh. First of all, you
>assume we've all read the correspondence; secondly, you take a non-answer
>for assent. You can definitely rule me out of the latter assumption (and I
>expect Ajit)--because another potential response is to see the discourse as
>irrelevant to our (very different) interpretations of Marx.

You can indeed hide, Steve. And I thought Ajit was busy looking up the uses
of the term cost price in Smith, Malthus, and Ricardo.I didn't know Ajit
considered the question of whether Marx committed a logical error
irrelevant. I know almost everyone thinks Marx did mess up the
transformation (so much so that it's not even allowed to reprint Marx's
tableau in introductions to his work). But I don't think so. So lay out for
me how and why Marx did make this error. At any rate, I know few, if any,
agree with me. I was being deliberatively provocative so at least I could
have some criticisms to think about as I must finish with this discussion.

>But as for the general issue of Sweezy misreading Marx, you have complete
>agreement from me. After all, he was the author through which most Marxists
>"learnt" that use-value plays no role in political economy, when precisely
>the opposite proposition can be found in Marx's own writings--including
>those which Sweezy himself read.

Steve, you might know that Grossmann was the first to reintroduce the use
value aspects of Marx's theory in both his magnum opus and his dynamics
book. In retinroducing use value Rosdolsky is as he often does drawing from
Grossmann, though I think you credit Rosdolsky in your written work for
reviving the role of use value in Marx's work. Do note that Grossmann is
interested in use value in terms of the impossibility of maintaining both
technical (use value) and value equilibrium simultaneously. So he's
interested in different use value aspects than you.

All the best, Rakesh



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