DOCSLIB.ORG

Class, State and Ideology

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Class, State and Ideology SOCIOLOGY 621 CLASS, STATE AND IDEOLOGY: AN INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL SCIENCE IN THE MARXIST TRADITION Fall Semester, 2003 Professor Erik Olin Wright Department of Sociology University of Wisconsin, Madison Office: 8112D Social Science Office hours: 8:30-10:00 a.m., MW, Catacombs Coffeehouse email: [email protected] Introduction ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Basic objectives ......................................................................................................................................................... v A note on the scope of the course............................................................................................................................. vi Requirements........................................................................................................................................................... vii Lecture Schedule ....................................................................................................................................................... x COURSE TOPICS PART I. INTRODUCTION: WHAT IS MARXISM? WHY STUDY IT?......................................................... 1 1. Setting the agenda: The Goals of Emancipatory Social Theory ................................................................... 1 2. Foundational Theses of Sociological Marxism ............................................................................................ 2 3. Foundational Theses of Sociological Marxism, continued........................................................................... 2 PART II. THE THEORY OF HISTORY.............................................................................................................. 4 4. The Classical Marxist Theory of History ..................................................................................................... 4 5. The Classical Marxist theory of History, continued ..................................................................................... 4 6. Critiques and reconstructions ....................................................................................................................... 6 7. Critiques and reconstructions ....................................................................................................................... 6 8. Capitalist Dynamics: a sketch of a theory of capitalist trajectory................................................................. 7 PART III. CLASS STRUCTURE ......................................................................................................................... 9 9. What is Class? .............................................................................................................................................. 9 10. The Concept of Exploitation...................................................................................................................... 10 11. Rethinking the Class Structure of Capitalism............................................................................................ 12 12. Class and Gender I: Marxism and feminism ............................................................................................. 13 13. Class and Gender II: the interaction of class and gender........................................................................... 14 14. Class and Race........................................................................................................................................... 15 IV. CLASS FORMATION.................................................................................................................................... 17 15. Basic Concepts of class formation............................................................................................................. 17 16. Rationality, solidarity and class struggle................................................................................................... 17 17. Dilemmas of Working Class Collective Action ........................................................................................ 18 18. Class Compromise..................................................................................................................................... 18 PART V. THE THEORY OF THE STATE AND POLITICS .......................................................................... 20 19. What is “Politics”? What is “the state”?.................................................................................................... 20 20. What, if anything, makes the capitalist state a capitalist state? Is the state a patriarchal state? ............... 21 21. The State & Accumulation: functionality and contradiction ..................................................................... 22 22. The State and the Working Class: The democratic capitalist state and social Stability............................. 24 PART VI. IDEOLOGY AND CONSCIOUSNESS............................................................................................ 26 23. What is Ideology?...................................................................................................................................... 26 24. Mystification: ideology as false consciousness ......................................................................................... 27 25. Ideological Hegemony and Legitimation ................................................................................................. 29 26. Ideology and Exploitation: the problem of consent................................................................................... 30 27. Explaining Ideology: Micro-foundations for the theory........................................................................... 31 PART VII. SOCIALISM AND EMANCIPATION............................................................................................ 32 28. The Classical Theory of Socialism............................................................................................................ 32 29. New Models of emancipatory futures........................................................................................................ 33 Introduction iii SUPPLEMENTARY TOPICS SUPPLEMENTARY TOPICS ON THE THEORY OF HISTORY (i). An Historical Example: The Origins of Capitalism .................................................................................... 35 (ii). Non-Marxist Theories of History................................................................................................................ 36 SUPPLEMENTARY TOPICS ON CLASS STRUCTURE (i). The Bourgeoisie in Advanced Capitalism I: the Social Constitution of the Ruling Class .......................... 37 (ii). The Bourgeoisie in Advanced Capitalism II: Structural Differentiation and Integration............................ 37 (iii). The Bourgeoisie in Advanced Capitalism III: the problem of management ............................................... 38 (iv). The Traditional Petty Bourgeoisie .............................................................................................................. 38 (v). Internal Differentiation of the Working Class............................................................................................. 39 (vi). Empirical Studies of Class Structure........................................................................................................... 39 (vii). Race and Class: the underclass debate ........................................................................................................ 40 (viii). Gender and Class: alternative class analyses of gender .............................................................................. 41 SUPPLEMENTARY TOPICS ON CLASS FORMATION (i). The labor process and class formation ........................................................................................................ 42 (ii). Class Structure and Class Formation in the Third World............................................................................ 42 (iii). Explaining Variations in Capitalist Class Formation .................................................................................. 43 (iv). Explaining Variations in Working Class Formation ................................................................................... 43 SUPPLEMENTARY TOPICS ON THE STATE (i). Alternative Marxist perspectives on the State: “structuralist” and “instrumentalist” approaches............... 45 (ii). Critical Theory approaches to the state: Habermas..................................................................................... 46 (iii). The State as a “Condition of Existence” of Capital: “post-Althusserian” British Marxism........................ 47 (iv). Capital Logic and State Derivation Perspectives ........................................................................................ 47 (v). Gramsci and the State.................................................................................................................................. 48 (vi). The State and the Oppression of Women.................................................................................................... 48 (vii). The State in the Third World ...................................................................................................................... 49 (viii). American Exceptionalism ........................................................................................................................... 50 (ix). Explaining variations in Welfare State policies .........................................................................................
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Andy Higgins, BA
    Andy Higgins, B.A. (Hons), M.A. (Hons) Music, Politics and Liquid Modernity How Rock-Stars became politicians and why Politicians became Rock-Stars Thesis submitted for the degree of Ph.D. in Politics and International Relations The Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion University of Lancaster September 2010 Declaration I certify that this thesis is my own work and has not been submitted in substantially the same form for the award of a higher degree elsewhere 1 ProQuest Number: 11003507 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a com plete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. uest ProQuest 11003507 Published by ProQuest LLC(2018). Copyright of the Dissertation is held by the Author. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States C ode Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. ProQuest LLC. 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106- 1346 Abstract As popular music eclipsed Hollywood as the most powerful mode of seduction of Western youth, rock-stars erupted through the counter-culture as potent political figures. Following its sensational arrival, the politics of popular musical culture has however moved from the shared experience of protest movements and picket lines and to an individualised and celebrified consumerist experience. As a consequence what emerged, as a controversial and subversive phenomenon, has been de-fanged and transformed into a mechanism of establishment support.
    [Show full text]
  • Fifteen Years of the Communist Party
    University of Central Florida STARS PRISM: Political & Rights Issues & Social Movements 1-1-1934 Fifteen years of the Communist Party Alex Bittelman Find similar works at: https://stars.library.ucf.edu/prism University of Central Florida Libraries http://library.ucf.edu This Book is brought to you for free and open access by STARS. It has been accepted for inclusion in PRISM: Political & Rights Issues & Social Movements by an authorized administrator of STARS. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Recommended Citation Bittelman, Alex, "Fifteen years of the Communist Party" (1934). PRISM: Political & Rights Issues & Social Movements. 260. https://stars.library.ucf.edu/prism/260 IY ALEX BITIELMAN 10c REPORTS, SPEECHES AND DECISIONS of the Historic IJTH PLENUM •I tll• Executive Committee of the COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL • Theses and Decisions, Thirtaellth Plenum of the E.C.C.I. • . • . • • . .OS Fascism,• the Danger of War and the Tasks of the Communist Parties a.port b')I ICUUSINEN .••• , . • . • . • . • • • . .10 We are Fighting for a Soviet Germany Rqorl b')I WILHELM Plli:CK, Sccrd•ry of th• Co"'''""''" Po-rty of Gc1'11'411'JI . • . • • . • . • . • . .to The Comm.Dist Parties in th.e Fight for the Masses Ste.ch by 0. PlATNITSICY • • . • • . .10 Revolutionary Crisis, Fascism and War S'ucb by D. Z. HANUILSJCY • • • • • • • . .OS Fascism, Social Democracy and the Communists Stucb by V. KNORIN, lfr"'b'r of tbe B.C.C.I. .10 .Revolutionary China Today Sp-.cb by WAN MING tutti KANG SIN . .10 ffhe Revolutionary Struggle of the Toiling Masses of Japan Sp1uu:b by OKANO, Jato. , . • . • . .OS • Ortln- fr01'1 WORKERS LIBRARY PUBLISHERS P.O.
    [Show full text]
  • Intellectual Radicalism After 1989: Crisis and Re- Orientation in the British and the American Left Berg, Sebastian
    www.ssoar.info Intellectual Radicalism after 1989: Crisis and Re- orientation in the British and the American Left Berg, Sebastian Veröffentlichungsversion / Published Version Habilitationsschrift / habilitation treatise Zur Verfügung gestellt in Kooperation mit / provided in cooperation with: transcript Verlag Empfohlene Zitierung / Suggested Citation: Berg, S. (2016). Intellectual Radicalism after 1989: Crisis and Re-orientation in the British and the American Left. (Edition Politik, 32). Bielefeld: transcript Verlag. https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839434185 Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Dieser Text wird unter einer CC BY-NC-ND Lizenz This document is made available under a CC BY-NC-ND Licence (Namensnennung-Nicht-kommerziell-Keine Bearbeitung) zur (Attribution-Non Comercial-NoDerivatives). For more Information Verfügung gestellt. Nähere Auskünfte zu den CC-Lizenzen finden see: Sie hier: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.de Diese Version ist zitierbar unter / This version is citable under: https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-70052-4 Sebastian Berg Intellectual Radicalism after 1989 Political Science | Volume 32 2017-02-20 13-47-25 --- Projekt: transcript.titeleien / Dokument: FAX ID 026e453961482398|(S. 1- 4) TIT3418.p 453961482406 to my friends Sebastian Berg (Dr. habil.) teaches Social and Cultural Studies of Anglophone Societies at Ruhr University Bochum. His research interests include the history and politics of »the Left«, social movements, and environmentalism. 2017-02-20 13-47-25 --- Projekt: transcript.titeleien / Dokument: FAX ID 026e453961482398|(S. 1- 4) TIT3418.p 453961482406 Sebastian Berg Intellectual Radicalism after 1989 Crisis and Re-orientation in the British and the American Left 2017-02-20 13-47-25 --- Projekt: transcript.titeleien / Dokument: FAX ID 026e453961482398|(S.
    [Show full text]
  • The Socialist Calculation Debate and New Socialist Models in Light of a Contextual Historical Materialist Interpretation
    THE SOCIALIST CALCULATION DEBATE AND NEW SOCIALIST MODELS IN LIGHT OF A CONTEXTUAL HISTORICAL MATERIALIST INTERPRETATION by Adam Balsam BSc [email protected] Supervised by Justin Podur BSc MScF PhD A Major Paper submitted to the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in Environmental Studies York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada December 11, 2020 Table of Contents The Statement of Requirements for the Major Paper ................................................................................. iii Abstract ........................................................................................................................................................ iv Foreword ...................................................................................................................................................... vi Section I: Introduction, Context, Framework and Methodology .................................................................. 1 Preamble ............................................................................................................................................... 1 Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 4 Context of this Investigation ................................................................................................................. 5 The Possibilities of Socialist Models ..................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • The Nairn–Anderson Interpretation
    ITLP_C06.QXD 18/8/03 9:58 am Page 86 6 An exceptional comrade? The Nairn–Anderson interpretation Mark Wickham-Jones Since the early 1960s, in a series of articles and books, Tom Nairn has articulated a distinct and challenging interpretation of Labour Party politics. Many of these publications formed part of a wider project, one closely associated with the work of Perry Anderson which examined the trajectory of British political development over the last 300 years. While there was much overlap with Anderson’s concerns, Nairn’s central – and initial – contribution to this undertaking focused on a particular account of the character of British reformism. Two of Nairn’s publications stand out as especially relevant in this regard. First, in ‘The nature of the Labour Party’, a paper in two parts originally published in New Left Review during 1964 and subsequently merged as a chapter of Anderson and Blackburn’s Towards Socialism (1965), he gave a coruscating overview of the party’s failures during the first sixty years of its history. In passing, the reader should note that although these publications are cited by their original titles as papers, where applicable, they are quoted from the volumes in which Nairn and Anderson later republished them. Second, in The Left Against Europe (Nairn 1973), a short book originally published as a special issue of New Left Review, Nairn assessed what he considered to be the British Left’s inade- quate response to the Conservative Government’s application for membership of the Common Market. Aspects of Nairn’s critique of the Labour Party are not original, echoing those associated with other condemnations of ‘Labourism’.Taken together, however, his work has provided a distinctive explanation of the difficulties encountered by the party, the failures it has generated and the many disappointments it has induced.
    [Show full text]
  • “Long Live Anarchism” and Its Southern Discontent
    DOSSIÊ “LONG LIVE ANARCHISM” AND ITS SOUTHERN DISCONTENT: SOUTH-VERTING THE “TRANS-” OF RADICAL TRANSNATIONAL KNOWLEDGE IN IL RISVEGLIO “VIVA O ANARQUISMO” E A SUA DISSENSÃO SULISTA: SUL- VERTENDO O “TRANS-” DO CONHECIMENTO RADICAL TRANSNACIONAL EM IL RISVEGLIO Lara Palombo1 ABSTRACT: Il Risveglio This study proposes the re-orienting of the radical transnational politics exchanged in the first anti-fascist and anarchist newspaper , produced in 1927 in Australia. It combines a critical analysis of its transnational and translocal political imaginaries with an examination of the linkages of its “trans” of gender, race, class and imperial relations to unsettle its responses to the historical, Italian based southern discontent. It argues that its focus on the social question and the predominance of northern-based responses to women’s equality and the racialisation of migrants effaces and negates the lives of diaspora from the southern regions. This negation also intersects with its support for the formation of a white working class and negation of Indigenous sovereign ontologies and epistemologies in the settler colony of Australia. This paper demonstrates that KEYWORDS:the effacement of the southern discontent is re-configured across varied and relational systems of radical diasporic knowledge. RESUMO: Anarchism, Southern Italy, Australia, Discontent, Diaspora. Il Risveglio Este estudo propõe reorientar as posturas políticas, radicais e transnacionais, compartilhadas através do primeiro jornal antifascista e anarquista , publicado em 1927 na Austrália. O presente trabalho combina uma análise crítica dos seus imaginários políticos transnacionais e translocais, com uma investigação sobre as conexõesIl doRisveglio seu prefixo “trans-”, referido a gênero, raça, classe e relações imperiais, com as dissensões históricas baseadas no Sul da Itália.
    [Show full text]
  • Document Type Philosophy Paper Proposal Topic on Puritanical
    Document Type Philosophy Paper Proposal Topic On Puritanical Socialism (Draft 8) Date March 3, 2017 First Draft December 14, 2016 Author(s) Christophe Simpson Editor(s) Jonathan Orgill Jamaica LANDS Page 2 of 27 Contents Preface by the Proponent ............................................................................................................ 3 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 5 Marx & Engels............................................................................................................................ 6 Lenin and the Russian Revolution ............................................................................................... 8 Mao and China.......................................................................................................................... 11 Hoxha and China ...................................................................................................................... 15 LANDS and Jamaica................................................................................................................. 18 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 23 Jamaica LANDS Page 3 of 27 Preface by the Proponent As a hardline Socialist, hoping for LANDS to be a hardline Socialist party in Jamaica, I find myself between 2 brick walls. Often, I am disappointed when the People’s National Party drifts
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter Seven Tom Nairn on Hating Britain Properly
    Chapter Seven Tom Nairn on Hating Britain Properly I Tom Nairn is a great hater. Though he has demonstrated little regard for the British working class and its insti- tutions, and even less for the British middle-class and theirs, the prime object of his hate has been Britain, something he believes championed by both. Thus, Nairn proves that identity is more a function of what we are against rather than what we are for. In his case, hatred of Britain has been the only constant in what postmodern- ists have informed us is a contingent and never-ending project of identification. More so than his early associa- tion with socialist internationalism or his later, more enduring, fondness for Scotland, hatred of Britain has constituted the defining feature of his contribution to New Left political thought. Indeed, amid an intellectual career characterised by sometimes-abrupt shifts, Nairn’s enmity toward Britain stands out like a headland resis- tant to disintegration.1 Nairn, though, has always sought to hate Britain prop- erly: because it is a premodern, anti-democratic and imperial state resistant to modernisation whose obdurate presence has involved the suppression of ethnicity. But the wellsprings of his hatred have, nonetheless, changed over time. The reversals in his reasoning will constitute the subject of what follows. After a brief exploration of Nairn’s ‘identity problems’, the remaining sections of the 1. For a compressed overview of what he has called his ‘embarrassingly long trail of “identity decisions” ’ – including Italy, France, the Netherlands, Scotland, Ireland and Australia – see Nairn 2004a, p.
    [Show full text]
  • Download Download
    'THE LEFT IN BRITAIN': A REPLY by David Widgery The quote which prefaces The Left in Britain 1956-68, so scathingly reviewed by Ken Coates in last year's Socialist ~e~z'ster,'was the key to my intention. It is William Morris's prophetic remark, 'Men fight and lose that battle, and then the thing they fought for comes about in spite of their defeat, and when it comes, turns out not what they meant and other men have to fight for what they meant under another name.' It was an attempt to trace backward some of those battles, some of those defeats and some inadvertent victories, undertaken in the hope it might illuminate the present dilemmas of the Left. But if I have learnt any lesson from history, it is Don't Write It, especially about the recent past of the Left. First of all socialists in the full flush of the present just aren't interested; 1968 is old hat and '56 the Dark Ages. The new generations of the converted are, justifiably, more interested in the Commune than Grosvenor Square. And those who have first hand experience are, again justifiably, infuriated by newcomers tampering with their memories. Those socialist stayers of the generation of '56, who stood up against Stalinism when it was still intact, a world- wide, marble-faced orthodoxy, no doubt feel ill-tempered at us little squirts, parrotting our post-Trotskyist cliches to the manner born, but with our knowledge safely out of books, spared the doubts and dangers, presuming to draw the lessons.
    [Show full text]
  • In Spite of History? New Leftism in Britain 1956 - 1979
    In Spite of History? New Leftism in Britain 1956 - 1979 Thomas Marriott Dowling Thesis Presented for the Degree of PhD Department of History University of Sheffield August 2015 ii iii Contents Title page p. i Contents p. iii Abstract p. vi Introduction p. 1 On the Trail of the New Left p. 5 Rethinking New Leftism p. 12 Methodology and Structure p. 18 Chapter One Left Over? The Lost World of British New Leftism p. 24 ‘A Mood rather than a Movement’ p. 30 A Permanent Aspiration p. 33 The Antinomies of British New Leftism p. 36 Between Aspiration and Actuality p. 39 The Aetiology of British New Leftism p. 41 Being Communist p. 44 Reasoning Rebellion p. 51 Universities and Left Review p. 55 Forging a Movement p. 58 CND p. 63 Conclusion p. 67 iv Chapter Two Sound and Fury? New Leftism and the British ‘Cultural Revolt’ of the 1950s p. 69 British New Leftism’s ‘Moment of Culture’? p. 76 Principles behind New Leftism’s Cultural Turn p. 78 A British Cultural Revolt? p. 87 A New Left Culture? p. 91 Signifying Nothing? p. 96 Conclusion p. 99 Chapter Three Laureate of New Leftism? Dennis Potter’s ‘Sense of Vocation’ p. 102 A New Left ‘Mood’ p. 108 The Glittering Coffin p. 113 A New Left Politician p. 116 The Uses of Television p. 119 History and Sovereignty p. 127 Common Culture and ‘Occupying Powers’ p. 129 Conclusion p. 133 Chapter Four Imagined Revolutionaries? The Politics and Postures of 1968 p. 135 A Break in the New Left? p.
    [Show full text]
  • An Interview with Tom Nairn for Scottish Affairs 26.4 (November 2016)
    Scott Hames & William Storrar Lucky Thinker: An Interview with Tom Nairn for Scottish Affairs 26.4 (November 2016) . Abstract Needing no introduction to readers of Scottish Affairs, Tom Nairn is that very rare thing: an intellectual whose writings have genuinely transformed political debate. His analysis of Scotland in the UK from The Breakup of Britain in 1977 to Old Nations, Auld Enemies, New Times in 2014 has been seminal in shaping the movement for independence as well as the academic study of nationalism. What is too little known is the intellectual journey that led him to be one of the few thinkers on the left to take nationalism seriously as the modern Janus, a progressive as well as regressive force. In this interview, we retrace the unplanned course of his thinking from art school to aesthetics, philosophy to politics, nationalism studies to the study of globalisation, Benedetto Croce to Iris Murdoch, Antonio Gramsci to Hamish Henderson, Perry Anderson to the New Left Review. Such interests and friendships took him from Pisa to Hornsey, Amsterdam to Melbourne; yet always circling back north again. The interview concludes with impressions and hesitations on UK ‘nationality politics’ in the weeks prior to the 2015 General Election. Keywords: Tom Nairn; aesthetics; globalisation; Antonio Gramsci; Iris Murdoch; nationalism; nationality politics; New Left; Scotland. Author biogs Scott Hames is a lecturer in English at the University of Stirling, where he chairs the Stirling Centre for Scottish Studies. He has written widely on contemporary Scottish writing and literary nationalism, and edited Unstated: Writers on Scottish Independence. He is completing a monograph on Scottish literature and the politics of devolution, partly based on the findings of a two-year research project funded by the British Academy.
    [Show full text]
  • Robin Blackburn Source: the William and Mary Quarterly, Vol
    The Old World Background to European Colonial Slavery Author(s): Robin Blackburn Source: The William and Mary Quarterly, Vol. 54, No. 1 (Jan., 1997), pp. 65-102 Published by: Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2953313 Accessed: 25-08-2014 12:53 UTC Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The William and Mary Quarterly. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.148.231.12 on Mon, 25 Aug 2014 12:53:36 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions The Old World Backgroundto European Colonial Slavery Robin Blackburn PT HERE are many features of medieval Europe that, it has been claimed, anticipate the colonial slavery of the New World. The pow- ers that successfully colonized the Americas had their roots in medieval kingdoms, each of which displayed a propensity for intolerance and persecution, territorial expansion, colonial settlement, arrogant impositions on subject peoples, and theological justification of slavery, racial exclusion, and sordid enterprise. More generally, late medieval Europeans were prone to stigmatize the infidel and the pagan and to entertain fanciful notions of "wild" or "monstrous"peoples.
    [Show full text]