Jerry wrote in [OPE-L:4889]: It would be worthwhile to give further consideration to what it means to "soften the impact". While heterodox economics of any variety has offended marginalists (for whom nothing less than uncounditional surrender to their hegemony is acceptable), within the wider environment of academia it is more "respectable" to be a "classical political economist" (or e.g. a "Ricardian") than it has been to be a "Marxist". The desire for respectability both within and outside of the University by both faculty and students (the later might be concerned about how classes on Marx on their college transcripts might look to prospective future employers) is one source for this. In the case of faculty, this might also be taken to be related to job security and the promotion and re-appointment process. Perhaps this also is a large part of the explanation for why there are so many more "Marxians" than "Marxists" in universities: I guess "Marxian" sounds like less of a threat to bourgeois authority. None of the above suggests that it is not entirely possible for someone to legitimately identify with the perspectives of both classical political economy and Marx, but that shouldn't retroactively transform Marx into a classical political economist. On this point I think he was clear -- indeed much of what became under the editorship of Kautsky the _Theories of Surplus Value_ was an explanation of how his perspectives differed from those of cpe (and others as well, of course). What I find the most absent by "Marxians" in the claim that Marx was a classical political economist is the recognition of his *revolutionary* perspective. Lest anyone forget, Marx was a communist. This sounds like such a trivial statement, but don't you get the feeling that many economists consider Marx to have been an economist? In solidarity, Jerry Jerry's point is both interesting and important. In Korea, "political economy" is usually used for "Marxist(or Marxian economics)". As for me, my major is known as history of economic thought to the faculty and students. Actually, I have never studied history of economic thought seriously. More often than not, I realize that it is safe in numerous senses for me to be an economist of history of economic thought, rather than Marxist economist. Dong-Min Rieu Dept. of Economics, Chungnam National University 220 Kung-Dong, Yusong-Gu, Taejon 305-764, Korea(S.) rieudm@cnu.ac.kr http://business.cnu.ac.kr/~dmryu ----- ¿øº» ¸Þ½ÃÁö ----- º¸³½ »ç¶÷: Gerald_A_Levy ¹Þ´Â »ç¶÷: ope-l@galaxy.csuchico.edu º¸³½ ³¯Â¥: 2001³â 2¿ù 14ÀÏ ¼ö¿äÀÏ ¿ÀÀü 9:13 Á¦¸ñ: [OPE-L:4889] Re: Was Marx a classical? (was: Was Marx a Copernican or what?)
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