From: Gerald A. Levy (Gerald_A_Levy@MSN.COM)
Date: Fri Mar 26 2004 - 13:37:58 EST
> I think it would be better if you chose select points and made > them succinctly. Rakesh, I will respond as you suggest. > Brenner himself says the proximate cause of the long downturn was a > fall in the rate of profit; the question is how he explains it. You > don't show that the intra capitalist conflict could have by itself > caused a fall in the rate of profit the long downturn. Nor do you > show that any of your other factors can account for it. I wasn't responding to Brenner; I was responding to what you wrote. > > By inference, you are suggesting that any factor which is > >not a direct expression of the class struggle between wage-labour and > >capital can not be the primary causal force behind a 'protracted' > >economic downturn. > Yes general crises require not a simple redistribution of capital but > the devaluation of capital as such and a rise in the rate of > exploitation of the working class as a whole. This shows that you recognize that I was responding to the position you suggested. > So you disagree with Cyrus' arguments against cartelization? Cyrus offers an explanation for why the oil industry is no longer controlled by a cartel. He does not claim that it can never again be controlled by a cartel. > It can demonstrated that a rise in the price of oil was not the cause > of the mid 70s downturn. I made no reference to the 1970's. > Please, Jerry, if you are going to invent strawman, invent new names > for them. Don't use my name. There were no strawmen invented. Deconstructing your own words was enough. > The point remains that class relations though manifested in things > and prices are not just another causal factor. The point remains that while class relations between capital and wage-labour can be considered to have primary explanatory power when analyzing capitalist crises _in general_ one can not therefore presume that it represents the primary cause of an _individual_ crisis. Previously you wrote: > The inability of intra capitalist competition in itself to > explain a protracted downturn has been demonstrated by several of > Brenner's critics. And then added: > Ultimately Brenner explains a depression in the > profit rate as a result of a rise in the real wage, though he insists > that the real wage does not rise as a result of working class > militance. That is, Brenner himself does not ultimately explain the > long downturn as a result of simply intra capitalist competition; he > too turns to a change in the real relationship between capital and > wage labor in the division of net product. To which I replied: > If Brenner 'ultimately' grounds the current economic downturn in > the struggle between capital and labour then all of the efforts by > Brenner's critics to 'demonstrate' that competition can not 'in itself' > cause a protracted downturn were misplaced. You then ask: > How does this follow? a) you claim that Brenner's critics have 'demonstrated' that intra- capitalist competition 'in itself' can not explain a protracted economic downturn. b) you then recognize that 'ultimately' Brenner does not explain the downturn as a result of intra-capitalist competition. a + b necessarily mean that "Brenner's critics" were advancing an argument against a position that Brenner did not hold. > A classic 'straw > man' type argument by the critics of Brenner. > What are you saying here? See above. In solidarity, Jerry
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sun Mar 28 2004 - 00:00:02 EST