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Articles 1 - 7 of 7
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
A Theory Without A Movement, A Hope Without A Name: The Future Of Marxism In A Post-Marxist World, Justin Schwartz
A Theory Without A Movement, A Hope Without A Name: The Future Of Marxism In A Post-Marxist World, Justin Schwartz
Justin Schwartz
Just as Marx's insights into capitalism have been most strikingly vindicated by the rise of neoliberalism and the near-collapse of the world economy, Marxism as social movement has become bereft of support. Is there any point in people who find Marx's analysis useful in clinging to the term "Marxism" - which Marx himself rejected -- at time when self-identified Marxist organizations and societies have collapsed or renounced the identification, and Marxism own working class constituency rejects the term? I set aside bad reasons to give on "Marxism," such as that the theory is purportedly refuted, that its adoption leads necessarily …
The Enclosure And Alienation Of Academic Publishing: Lessons For The Professoriate, Wilhelm Peekhaus
The Enclosure And Alienation Of Academic Publishing: Lessons For The Professoriate, Wilhelm Peekhaus
Wilhelm Peekhaus
This paper interrogates and situates theoretically from a Marxist perspective various aspects and tensions that inhere in the contemporary academic publishing environment. The focus of the article is on journal publishing. The paper examines both the expanding capitalist control of the academic publishing industry and some of the efforts being made by those seeking to resist and subvert the capitalist model of academic publishing. The paper employs the concepts of primitive accumulation and alienation as a theoretical register for apprehending contemporary erosions of the knowledge commons through the enclosure effects that follow in the wake of capitalist control of academic …
Primitive Accumulation And Enclosure Of The Commons: Genetically Engineered Seeds And Canadian Jurisprudence, Wilhelm Peekhaus
Primitive Accumulation And Enclosure Of The Commons: Genetically Engineered Seeds And Canadian Jurisprudence, Wilhelm Peekhaus
Wilhelm Peekhaus
This paper juxtaposes the legal decisions made in the case of Percy Schmeiser, who was sued by Monsanto for patent infringement, against the attempt by the Organic Agriculture Protection Fund to obtain class certification in its efforts to sue Monsanto and Bayer for genetic contamination of organic canola. Together these two cases establish an unacceptable incongruity at common law between the rights enjoyed by intellectual property owners and any corresponding duties that might attach to their inventions. I suggest that Marx’s concept of primitive accumulation offers a suitable theoretical register for apprehending contemporary erosions of the commons through the enclosure …
Primitive Accumulation And Re-Appropriation Of The Information Commons, Wilhelm Peekhaus
Primitive Accumulation And Re-Appropriation Of The Information Commons, Wilhelm Peekhaus
Wilhelm Peekhaus
This paper suggests that LIS might benefit from critical political economy as a way of theorizing and responding to enclosures of information commons. The autonomist Marxist re-invigoration of ‘primitive accumulation’ offers a register for apprehending contemporary erosions of the commons. Autonomist Marxism also helps conceptualize resistance to enclosures.
Spinoza And Marx, Eugene W. Holland
Spinoza And Marx, Eugene W. Holland
Eugene W Holland
This essay explores what replacing Hegel with Spinoza as a philosophical source might do for contemporary Marxism.
What's Wrong With Exploitation?, Justin Schwartz
What's Wrong With Exploitation?, Justin Schwartz
Justin Schwartz
Abstract: Marx thinks that capitalism is exploitative, and that is a major basis for his objections to it. But what's wrong with exploitation, as Marx sees it? (The paper is exegetical in character: my object is to understand what Marx believed,) The received view, held by Norman Geras, G.A. Cohen, and others, is that Marx thought that capitalism was unjust, because in the crudest sense, capitalists robbed labor of property that was rightfully the workers' because the workers and not the capitalists produced it. This view depends on a Labor Theory of Property (LTP), that property rights are based ultimately …
The Paradox Of Ideology, Justin Schwartz
The Paradox Of Ideology, Justin Schwartz
Justin Schwartz
A standard problem with the objectivity of social scientific theory in particular is that it is either self-referential, in which case it seems to undermine itself as ideology, or self-excepting, which seem pragmatically self-refuting. Using the example of Marx and his theory of ideology, I show how self-referential theories that include themselves in their scope of explanation can be objective. Ideology may be roughly defined as belief distorted by class interest. I show how Marx thought that natural science was informed by class interest but not therefore necessarily ideology. Capitalists have an interest in understanding the natural world (to a …