Money, Debt and Finance: Towards a Political Economy of Financial Innovation

Fat Cat Food

MONEY, DEBT AND FINANCE: TOWARDS A POLITICAL ECONOMY OF FINANCIAL INNOVATION

Call for participants

The Open Political Economy Network (OPEN) of The Open University will be holding its first workshop on Friday, 26 June.

Title: Money, debt and finance: towards a political economy of financial innovation

Organisers: Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos (The Open University Business School) and Andrew Trigg (Department of Economics, The Open University).

Date: Friday 26 June 2015

Place: The Open University in London, Room 2 (Ground Floor), 1-11 Hawley Crescent, Camden Town, London NW1 8NP. Nearest underground: Camden Town (Northern Line).

Modern developments in financial innovation, usually described by the term ‘financialization’, have been mostly approached from two distinct viewpoints. On the one hand, the mainstream financial literature heavily downplays the historical and social nature of financial innovation in relation to risk management. On the other hand, critical approaches in the field of political economy tend to see contemporary trends in financial innovation as a distortion of capitalist economic structures. This event explores an alternative research agenda in political economy based on Marx’s analysis and other related currents in Political Economy. Financial crises can thus be seen as moments innate in the workings of the economic system but not necessarily a sign of decline; finance and financial innovation can be integral to capitalism and not parasitic or dysfunctional within it.

By drawing on the research and expertise of a diverse range of scholars, the event will explore possible foundations for a new analytical paradigm for considering the political economy of money, debt and financial innovation. The workshop is also an opportunity for participants (academics, students, activists) to engage in a dialogue with the speakers and share their perspectives about the development of this paradigm.

Speakers will include (in alphabetical order):

Paul Auerbach, Kingston University, London

Riccardo Bellofiore, University of Bergamo, Italy

Ole Bjerg, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark

Dick Bryan, University of Sydney, Australia

Bob Jessop, Lancaster University, UK

John Kannankulam, Marburg University, Germany

Spyros Lapatsioras, University of Crete, Greece

John Milios, National Technical University of Athens, Greece

Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos, The Open University Business School, UK

Jan Toporowski, SOAS, London

Andrew Trigg, The Open University, UK

 

Workshop details

The workshop is funded by the Open University research centre, IKD, and is open to all. Registration is free but necessary as there are limited spaces available. Lunch and refreshments will be provided. More information will follow, including a programme and abstracts of papers.

For registration please email: Atalanta Richards at Socsci-IKD-Events@open.ac.uk

For further information:  https://www.open.ac.uk/ikd/events/

 

First Published in http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/call-for-participants-money-debt-and-finance-towards-a-political-economy-of-financial-innovation

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‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski?ev=hdr_xprf

Online Publications at The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.co.uk/

Kapital Ideas: Analysis, Critique, Praxis

Teaching Marx

KAPITAL IDEAS: ANALYSIS, CRITIQUE, PRAXIS

Society for Socialist Studies

Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences

June 2 – 5, 2015, University of Ottawa

http://www.socialiststudies.ca

Kapital Ideas: analysis, critique, praxis

Kapital Ideas are theories and analyses that help point us toward a better world through critique of the unequal, violent and exploitative one we now inhabit. They take inspiration from the author of Das Kapital, though they range widely over many issues which include ecology and political economy, gender and sexuality, colonization and imperialism, communication and popular struggles, but also movements and parties, hegemony and counter-hegemony, governance and globalization and, of course, class struggle and transformation.  Kapital Ideas are interventions that contribute to what Marx, in 1843, called the ‘self-clarification of the struggles and wishes of the age’.  In an era of deepening crisis and proliferating struggles, of grave threats and new possibilities, the need for these ideas, and for the praxis they can inform, could not be more acute.

 

Keynote Speaker

Himani Bannerji, York University, Toronto

Marx’s critique of ideology: its uses and abuses

 

Call for Papers

Our current Call for Papers, which lists sessions that are accepting paper proposals, is available HERE: http://socialiststudies.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/2015CallForPapers-2_19Dec14.pdf . Abstracts (maximum of 100 words) for paper proposals should be submitted before Saturday, January 31, 2015.

To submit an abstract, please click HERE: http://conferences.uvic.ca/index.php/sss/sss2015 . You will be directed to our OpenConference website.

 

We hope to see you in Ottawa!

Bill Carroll, Jean Chapman and Elaine Coburn

SSS 2015 Programme Co-chairs

rosa1919@uvic.ca

 

First Published in http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/call-for-papers-deadline-jan-31-society-for-socialist-studies-2015-conference-kapital-ideas-analysis-critique-praxis-june-2-5

 

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‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski?ev=hdr_xprf

Online Publications at The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.co.uk/

MARXISM 2014

Marx’s Grave

MARXISM 2014

Marxism 2014 – 10-14 July, 2014, central London
1914-2014: A century of war, crisis and revolution: what are the alternatives today?
Website: http://www.marxismfestival.org.uk/

Marxism 2014 is a five day political festival bringing together thousands of activists, trade unionists, students, writers and academics. There are around 200 meetings on everything from climate change to the Egyptian revolution.  The world economic turmoil continues, the police have a licence to kill, immigrants are being scapegoated, and the whole welfare state is under attack. There has never been a greater need to discuss alternatives to a world in a crisis.

Speakers include:
John Pilger, Darcus Howe, Winston Silcott, Ronnie Kasrils, Janet Alder, Gareth Pierce, Peter Hain, Michael Roberts, Alex Callinicos, Gilbert Achcar, Guglielmo Carchedi, Ian Birchall, Kevin Doogan, Susan Rosenthal, Tommy Sheridan, Paul Blackledge, Joseph Daher, Jane Hardy, Mike Savage, Louise Raw, John Molyneux, Judith Orr, Mike Wayne, Tony Collins, Liz Lawrence, Bassem Chit, Rehad Desai and many more.

Full timetable available to download here:
http://www.marxismfestival.org.uk/downloads/marxism-2014-timetable.pdf

 

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski?ev=hdr_xprf

Online Publications at The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Marxist Essays on Neoliberalism, Class, ‘Race’, Capitalism and Education – A new book by Dave Hill

Professor Dave Hill

MARXIST ESSAYS ON NEOLIBERALISM, CLASS, ‘RACE’, CAPITALISM AND EDUCATION – A new book by DAVE HILL

Foreword by Peter McLaren

Published by the Institute for Education Policy Studies at http://www.ieps.org.uk

 

Marxist Essays on Neoliberalism, Class, ‘Race’, Capitalism and Education

Published September 2013

With the onset of Austerity Capitalism and Immiseration Capitalism, and with the increasing commodification, marketisation and privatisation of society and of education, Marxist theory and Marxist Education Theory have taken on a new urgency. This is particularly so in the face of the `class war from above’ , in which bankers and the capitalist class gets ever richer, while the living standards, public and formerly public institutions and the material conditions of life are diminished and degraded.  

In this collection of essays, written from a classic Marxist perspective, and fired with a cold anger and incisive analysis, Dave Hill lays bare how the capitalist class and their often unwitting helpers in the knowledge industry/ academia, use ideological (and repressive) state apparatuses, such as education,  to divide, disarm and demoralise critical, Marxist analysis and activism.

In this powerful collection, Dave Hill, a Marxist academic, activist in academia and on the streets in different countries,  catalogues and castigates Capitalist / pro-capitalist depredation both within the academy, within classrooms and within society. But in this volume, there is more than critique- there is a call to action, a call for anger and analysis, a demand for theoretically informed practice in the different arenas of Resistance.

  

CONTENTS:

Foreword: Peter McLaren

Introduction: Dave Hill

 

PART 1: Class and “Race”

1. Social Class and Education

2. The Culturalization of Class and the Occluding of Class Consciousness: The Knowledge Industry in/of Education.

3. Culturalist and Materialist Explanations of Class and ‘Race’: Critical Race Theory, Equivalence / Parallelist Theory and Marxist Theory

 

PART 2: Neoliberalism, Immiseration and Workers’ Rights

4. Books, Banks and Bullets: Controlling our minds – the global project of imperialistic and militaristic

neo-liberalism and its effect on education policy

5. Globalisation and its educational discontents: Neoliberalisation and its impacts on education

workers’ rights, pay, and conditions.

6. Embourgeoisment, Immiseration, Commodification – Marxism Revisited: a Critique of Education in Capitalist Systems

7. Immiseration Capitalism, Activism and Education: Resistance, Revolt and Revenge.

 

Price £22 inc post and packaging

Available from: http://www.ieps.org.uk/subscriptionsandpurchasing

ISBN 978-0-9522042

 

**END**

 

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

 

 

Talk by Jodi Dean on ‘The Communist Horizon’

Jodi Dean

TALK BY JODI DEAN ON ‘THE COMMINIST HORIZON’

THE COMMUNIST HORIZON

By Jodi Dean

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Jodi Dean will be discussing THE COMMUNIST HORIZON at Goldsmiths University, London, on the 19th of March. Further information below.

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In this new title in Verso’s Pocket Communism series, Jodi Dean unshackles the communist ideal from the failures of the Soviet Union. In an age when the malfeasance of international banking has alerted exploited populations the world over to the unsustainability of an economic system predicated on perpetual growth, it is time the left ended its melancholic accommodation with capitalism.

In the new capitalism of networked information technologies, our very ability to communicate is exploited, but revolution is still possible if we organize on the basis of our common and collective desires. Examining the experience of the Occupy movement, Dean argues that such spontaneity can’t develop into a revolution and it needs to constitute itself as a party.

An innovative work of pressing relevance, THE COMMUNIST HORIZON offers nothing less than a manifesto for a new collective politics.

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“This is what everyone engaged in today’s struggles for emancipation needs: a unique combination of theoretical stringency and a realistic assessment of our predicament. To anyone who continues to dwell in illusions about liberal democracy, one should simply say: read Jodi Dean’s new book!” – Slavoj Žižek

“Jodi’s sharp analysis of the impasses of the left is also a kind of requiem for much of the 2.0 bluster of the last decade.” – Mark Fisher, author of CAPITALIST REALISM

———————————–

A talk with the author:

March 19, 2013, 7pm, GoldsmithsUniversity, London

Jodi Dean will introduce the book with time for questions and answers from the audience. The talk will be followed by a wine reception and book signing. For the full details please visit:

http://www.versobooks.com/events/624-the-communist-horizon-talk-with-author-jodi-dean

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ISBN: 9781844679546 / $19.95 / £12.99 / $21.00CAN/ 256 pages

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For more information or to buy the book visit:

http://www.versobooks.com/books/1151-the-communist-horizon

 

First published at: http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/new-from-verso-the-communist-horizon-by-jodi-dean

 

**END**

 

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Reading Group on ‘A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy’

Marxism Against Postmodernism in Educational Theory

READING GROUP ON ‘A CONTRIBUTION TO THE CRITIQUE OF POLITICAL ECONOMY’

LONDON MARK READING GROUP

I warmly extend to you, on behalf of the London Marx Reading Group, a cordial invitation to join us in our new reading project. 🙂

We will be reading Karl Marx’s “A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy” (hereafter the CCPE), in fortnightly reading sessions beginning at the end of February. The CCPE is, of course, one of Marx’s few texts published during his lifetime and perhaps that in itself is enough to warrant reading it in a group. It also offers something to both newbies and more seasoned readers of Marx. For those relatively unfamiliar with Marx’s oeuvre, and for whom the three volumes of Capital might represent too monumental a challenge, the CCPE offers a digestible introduction to the core of Marx’s theory of value and money. Indeed it may plausibly be asserted that this was Marx’s intention as well since he published it a few years before the first volume of Capital. For those who have read Marx’s more well known texts, the group offers the opportunity to renew and extend their acquaintance with Marx’s theory of value and money. As such, of particular interest will be how Marx edited the manuscript of the Grundrisse (written a couple of years previously) to produce this text and what further changes he then felt compelled to make prior to producing Capital. For those members of our group who went through the Grundrisse last year, an interesting question will revolve around how much of the “method” Marx promised Engels would be well “hidden” in the pages of Capital remains visible and accessible for interrogation in this text.

As far as logistics are concerned the group traditionally used to meet at UCL but unfortunately it looks like there will be no rooms available from March. So we are in the process of discussing which venue to use – among the suggestions so far has been hiring a pub (cost to be shared between all members of the group) and using the Mayday Rooms if open by March. Of course to some extent the venue is decided by the number of people we would expect to attend and it is important for people to register their interest to give us some idea of numbers.

 

There is a google group where the members of the group post announcements – the “London Marx Reading Group” at this url: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/london-marx-reading-group

There is also a website which hosts
i) presentation notes from previous Reading Group sessions as well as
ii) a forum to discuss text-related questions.

The website can be accessed at the following url: http://www.readingmarx.net

I would urge you to register at both the Google group and also the website.

At this stage it is envisaged that we can cover this (relatively, by Marx’s standards!) ‘small’ text in a matter of 6 fortnightly reading group sessions spread over two months or so although this (given experience of previous reading groups!) may prove somewhat optimistic! The website will contain presentation notes from each of the meetings but hopefully the forums on the website will take on a life of their own crisscrossing with readers’ concerns and also with online readers who cannot physically attend for whatever reason.

I look forward to welcoming as many of you as possible to the group! 🙂

Biswadip Dasgupta
(on behalf of the London Marx Reading Group)

 

**END**

 

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Marx and the Frankfurt School – Call for Papers

Theodor Adorno

MARX AND THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL – CALL FOR PAPERS

CALL FOR PAPERS

6TH INTERNATIONAL CRITICAL THEORY CONFERENCE OF ROME

Stream on Marx and the Frankfurt School: New Perspectives and their Contemporary Relevance

May 6-8, 2013

John Felice, Rome Center of Loyola University Chicago

Recent years have seen a flourishing of new perspectives on the contemporary relevance of Karl Marx’s thought. Very little of this thought has been applied to the relationship between Marx and the work of the Frankfurt School. Instead much of the work on Marx and the Frankfurt School is still approached through paradigms such as the Marxist Humanist discourse of alienation or of scholarly interpretations established by Jurgen Habermas, Martin Jay and Gillian Rose. This stream aims to bring together the best contemporary scholarship offering new perspectives on the relationship between Marx and the FrankfurtSchool and to consider the contemporary relevance of this relationship.

Possible topics include:

·      New assessments of the relationship between Marx and major figures from the Frankfurt School including Horkheimer, Adorno, Benjamin, Marcuse, Habermas and Honneth.

·      New assessments of the relationship between Marx and minor figures from the Frankfurt School including: Sohn-Rethel, Kracauer, Kirchheimer, Löwenthal Neumann, Pollack, Wittfogel, Negt, Kluge, Schmidt, Backhaus, Reichelt.

 ·      Comparative accounts of different figures from the Frankfurt School’s interpretation of Marx.

 ·      New assessments of theories central to Marx and thinkers from the Frankfurt School such as critique, society, reification, second nature, natural history, commodification, fetishism, value, money, exchange, equivalence, ideology, domination, class, capital, social reproduction, epistemology, subjectivity etc.

 ·      New assessments of the reception and the influence of the Frankfurt School’s relation to Marx in national and international contexts.

 ·      Importance that the ideas of Marx and the Frankfurt School have for contemporary theories of capital, social domination, subjectivity, the state, epistemology, class, critical pedagogy, emancipatory politics, and issues of crisis, social reproduction, ecological catastrophe etc.

 ·      Criticisms different Marxisms or critical theories might have of thinkers from the FrankfurtSchool.

 ·      Criticisms the thinkers from the FrankfurtSchool might have of Marx and different Marxisms.

 ·      Productive and elective affinities between Marx, figures from the Frankfurt School and other Marxists such as Bataille, Bensaid, Foucault, Open Marxism, Althusser, Heinrich, Kurz, Dieter Wolf, Castoriadis, Illyenkov, Bogdanov, etc.

 ·      Productive and elective affinities between Marx, figures from the Frankfurt School and other Marxist schools such as Autonomism, Political Marxism, Open Marxism, communisation and value-form theory.

 

If you are interested in presenting a paper or organizing a panel (of up to 5 speakers), please submit a 1-2 page abstract by February 28, 2013 (including name and institutional affiliation). Abstracts should be submitted by email to the stream coordinator Chris O’Kane at theresonlyonechrisokane@gmail.com

Decisions regarding the program will be made by March 2013.

 

First published at: http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/cfp-stream-on-marx-and-the-frankfurt-school-new-perspectives-and-their-contemporary-relevance-1

 

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‘The Lamb’ by William Blake – set to music by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vw3VloKBvZc

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

 

Glenn Rikowski’s paper, Critical Pedagogy and the Constitution of Capitalist Society has been published at Heathwood Press as a Monthly Guest Article for September 2012, online at:

http://www.heathwoodpress.com/monthly-guest-article-august-critical-pedagogy-and-the-constitution-of-capitalist-society-by-glenn-rikowski/

 

Heathwood Press: http://www.heathwoodpress.com 

The Great Recession: Profit Cycles, Economic Crisis

Crisis Theory

THE GREAT RECESSION: PROFIT CYCLES, ECONOMIC CRISIS – A MARXIST VIEW

An E-book

Author: Michael Roberts

At: http://archive.org/details/TheGreatRecession.ProfitCyclesEconomicCrisisAMarxistView

 

First published at: http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/book-available-online-the-great-recession.-profit-cycles-economic-crisis-a-marxist-view-by-michael-roberts

 

**END**

 

‘Human Herbs’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

 

Glenn Rikowski’s paper, Critical Pedagogy and the Constitution of Capitalist Society has been published at Heathwood Press as a Monthly Guest Article for September 2012, online at:

http://www.heathwoodpress.com/monthly-guest-article-august-critical-pedagogy-and-the-constitution-of-capitalist-society-by-glenn-rikowski/

 

Heathwood Press: http://www.heathwoodpress.com 

 

Marx for Today

Marx for Today

MARX FOR TODAY

Edited by Marcello Musto

After having being sold out as special issue (Nr. 54 – December 2010) of the journal “Socialism and Democracy” already in March 2011, Routledge has published “Marx for Today” as a book:
http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415503594/

—
DESCRIPTION

Since the onset of global crisis in recent years, academics and economic theorists from various political and cultural backgrounds have been drawn to Marx’s analysis of the inherent instability of capitalism. The rediscovery of Marx is based on his continuing capacity to explain the present. In the context of what some commentators have described as a “Marx renaissance”, the aim of this book is to make a close study of Marx’s principal writings in relation to the major problems of our own society, and to show why and how some of his theories constitute a precious tool for the understanding and critique of the world in the early twenty-first century.

The book brings together varied reflections on the Marxian oeuvre, drawing on different perspectives and fields, and argues its case in two different parts. The first will encompass such diverse areas and themes as political thought, economics, nationalism, ethnicity, post-capitalist society, freedom, democracy, emancipation, and alienation, showing in each case how Marx has still today an invaluable contribution to make. The second presents a complete and rigorous account of the dissemination and the reception of Marx’s work throughout the world in the last decade. Both parts make a significant contribution to the current research on Marx and Marxisms.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Socialism and Democracy.

—
REVIEWS

“In Marcello Musto, the Marx revival has found an ‘Impressario’ with a range of interests and contacts, a tolerance for differences, and an exquisite taste for only the finest and most provocative of Marxist scholarship. With this volume of exceptionally astute essays (the second for Routledge after Karl Marx’s Grundrisse: Foundations of the critique of political economy 150 years later, and a third is on its way), Musto has set the gold standard for Marxological studies in the modern era. No one who wants to understand why Marx was chosen as the greatest thinker of the last millenium in a BBC poll of its listeners can afford to miss any of Musto’s volumes, including his own remarkably lucid and insightful contributions to each of them. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!” — Bertell Ollman – New York University

“With the relentless globalization of capital in recent decades, a global capitalist economic crisis, and uprisings in Greece, Italy, Spain, the Occupy Movements, and the Arab Uprisings of 2011, Marx has perhaps never been as relevant for the contemporary moment as now. Marcello Musto has orchestrated a series of projects that have ignited the Marx revival and contributed his own scholarship and ideas for making Marx alive for us today. His edited book Marx for Today is an extremely important contribution to the ungoing “Marx renaissance”, and shows how Marx’s work contributes to understanding and engaging key problems of today’s society, and thus how Marx contributes to projects of understanding, critique and transformation of the world in the early twenty-first century.” — Douglas Kellner – UCLA

“The ruling doxa wants us to believe that Marx belongs to yesterday. The truth of the matter is that his analysis, his theories and his indignation are relevant today, as much, and perhaps more so, than in his own times. This brilliant collection of essays edited by Marcello Musto shows us why”. — Michael Löwy – CNRS (French National Center of Scientific Research)

—

CONTENTS

1. Introduction, Marcello Musto.

Part 1: Re-reading Marx in 2010

2. Not Just Capital and Class: Marx on Non-Western Societies, Nationalism and Ethnicity, Kevin B. Anderson.

3. The Myth of Twentieth-Century Socialism and the Continuing Relevance of Karl Marx, Paresh Chattopadhyay.

4. Change the System, Not Its Barriers, Michael A. Lebowitz.

5. Emancipation in Marx’s Early Work, George Comninel.

6. Revisiting Marx’s Concept of Alienation, Marcello Musto.

7. Marx and the Politics of Sarcasm, Terrell Carver.

8. The ‘Lesser Evil’ as Argument and Tactic, from Marx to the Present, Victor Wallis.

9. In Capitalist Crisis, Rediscovering Marx, Rick Wolff.

10. Universal Capitalism, Ellen Meiksins Wood.

Part 2: Marx’s Global Reception Today

11. Marx in Hispanic America, Francisco T. Sobrino.

12. Marx in Brazil, Armando Boito and Luiz Eduardo Motta.

13. Marx in the Anglophone World, Paul Blackledge.

14. Marx in France, Jean-Numa Ducange.

15. Marx in Germany, Jan Hoff.

16. Marx in Italy, Gianfranco Ragona.

17. Marx in Russia, Vesa Oittinen.

18. Marx in China, Daping Hu.

19. Marx in South Korea, Seongjin Jeong.

20. Marx in Japan, Hiroshi Uchida.

—

A 20% discount flyer for universities and/or libraries is available from marcello.musto@gmail.com.

A library recommendation form is available at the following location – see: http://www.routledge.com/resources/librarian_recommendation/9780415503594 for more details. You can fill this out for your own librarian and forward the link to interested parties who would like to see your book appear in their libraries as well.

And in case a colleague would like to review the book: A review copy request form can be found at the following here: http://www.routledge.com/resources/review_copy_request/9780415503594   

 

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

‘Stagnant’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.myspace.com/coldhandsmusic

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Glenn Rikowski’s MySpace Blog: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski/blog

 

 

 

Value, Money and Crisis: A Workshop on the Work of Hans-Georg Backhaus

Money

VALUE, MONEY AND CRISIS: A WORKSHOP ON THE WORK OF HANS-GEORG BACKHAUS

The Department of Sociology, Goldsmiths, University of London invites you to:

Value, Money and Crisis: A Workshop on the Work of Hans-Georg Backhaus

Presentations by Riccardo Bellofiore and Tommaso Redolfi Riva, responses by Chris Arthur and Werner Bonefeld

4 June 2012
Room 137, Richard Hoggart Building, Goldsmiths, University of London
4-6 pm
All welcome

Hans-Georg Backhaus is one of the most provocative thinkers of the Frankfurt School. Together with Helmut Reichelt, Alfred Schmidt, and Hans-Jürgen Krahl, he was at the origin of the Neue Marx-Lektüre. Building on Adorno’s critical sociology, Backhaus has been engaged in a problematization of the Marxian critique of political economy which takes seriously its roots in Hegel’s Logic. Questioning orthodox Marxism and Engels’s legacy, he has advanced a whole-scale reconstruction of Marxian theory, confronting the inconsistencies in Das Kapital, and rescuing Marxism as a critical theory of society. The most important of his essays were collected in Dialektik der Wertform: Untersuchungen zur marxschen Okonomiekritik (The Dialectic of the Value Form: Investigations into Marx’s Critique of Economics) by the German publisher Caira. Very few of them are available in English, but the seminal contributions (in particular his 4-part Materials for the Reconstruction of Marx’s Theory of Value) have now been published in Italian under the editorship of Bellofiore and Redolfi Riva. At the core of Backhaus’s reconstructive project is the uniqueness of Marx in building the only monetary theory of value available to us, together with a full recognition of the fetish character and the displaced/perverted nature of contradictory capitalist reality. Backhaus’s contributions put the question of the ‘constitution’ of capitalist social ‘objectivity’ once again on the agenda of Marxian theory and politics. They are essential today for anyone preoccupied with building an analysis of the crisis – one that would not only depart radically from mainstream economic theory, but go far deeper than Neo-Ricardianism and Keynesianism.

Riccardo Bellofiore has published books on Marx, Luxemburg, Minsky, Napoleoni, globalization, and the current economic crisis. With Giovanna Vertova he has a FB page, Economisti di classe. He teaches at the University of Bergamo, Italy.

Tommaso Redolfi Riva studied Philosophy and History of Political Economy in the Universities of Pisa and Florence. Together with Riccardo Bellofiore he is the editor of Hans Georg Backhaus, Dialettica della forma di valore, Roma, 2009.

Chris Arthur is the author of The New Dialectic and Marx’s Capital.

Werner Bonefeld teaches at theUniversity ofYork. He recently edited Subverting the Present, Imagining the Future: Insurrection, Movement, Commons.

 

Further information: http://www.gold.ac.uk/sociology/calendar/?id=5410

 

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

‘Stagnant’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo  

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.myspace.com/coldhandsmusic

Red Mist

Red Mist

RED MIST

Introducing a new radical cultural project: http://redmistreviews.com/

Cultural products are produced because someone has something important to say, progressive or reactionary, rational or irrational; yet everywhere the result is trite banality. Late capitalism has become ever more adept at enforcing its conservative, accountant-friendly worldview on culture. In the world of the market, an artist can only try something that has already been tried and been seen to succeed. The state’s arts-funding bureaucracies, not much less conservative than private investors but acting at least in the name of different priorities, are getting slashed out of existence, along with everything else that needs public money to function (failing banks excepted, of course). At this rate, in fifty years all movies will be sequels, all plays will be musicals and all novels will be airport-friendly crime yarns. (All academic papers, meanwhile, will be cooked up to order by corporations.)

Red Mist is the successor to London Book Club, to whose interesting accumulation of reviews we intend to add some serious political direction, editorial focus and old-fashioned panache. As Marxists, we do not think that the above depressing outlook is the only possible outcome for the human race. More to the point, we do not think that artists, writers and thinkers meekly accept their fate – nor do their works. Ernst Bloch used to say that every artefact of capitalist society, no matter how apparently banal and degraded, had a hidden Utopian striving beyond its mundane existence; the reverse is also true, however, and even the most radically leftist work has to come to terms, secretly, with the reality that gave it birth.

Working out what is what is the job of critics. It is not our job to say that we liked film X and thought that it was good; or (still worse, as the reviews in most leftwing publications do) say that we liked the explicit political content of film X, and therefore liked it, and thought that it was good. And though we are a theoretically minded project, we will not destroy your will to live with 10,000 word Lacanian disquisitions on Proust.

What we will do is review all manner of texts – from pop singles to academic monographs – and reveal what really makes them tick. We will do this with the oldest tools in the box: a knowledge of context, an understanding of the medium, and a sprinkling of humour (after all, if you didn’t laugh, you’d cry). Join us on our journey through the bizarre, contradictory cultural life of capitalism – and hopefully we will one day get out the other side.

Red Mist: http://redmistreviews.com/

This looks to be most welcome development for the times we live in — Glenn Rikowski

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‘Human Herbs’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.myspace.com/coldhandsmusic

Andrew Kliman at Bookmarks Bookshop

Andrew Kliman

ANDREW KLIMAN AT BOOKMARKS BOOKSHOP

PRESENTS

The Failure of Capitalist Production
with Andrew Kliman
5 March, 6.30pm £2* (refreshments inc)

The recent financial crisis and Great Recession have been analysed endlessly but this is the first book to conclude, on the basis of in-depth analyses of official US data, that Marx’s crisis theory can explain these events.

Kliman’s conclusion is simple but shocking: short of socialist transformation, the only way to escape the stagnant, crisis-prone economy is to restore profitability through full-scale destruction of existing wealth, something not seen since the Depression of the 1930s.

Venue: Bookmarks Bookshop, 1 Bloomsbury Street, WC1B 3QE
*£2 redeemable against any purchase on the night

Please contact us to reserve a place, 020 7637 1848: events@bookmarks.uk.com

Liberate Your Mind!
Bookmarks Bookshop
1 Bloomsbury Street
London
WC1B 3QE
020 7637 1848
http://www.bookmarksbookshop.co.uk

Follow us on twitter: @bookmarks_books

See our book of the month on the website!

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‘Maximum levels of boredom

Disguised as maximum fun’

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.myspace.com/coldhandsmusic (recording) and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub,Bangor, northWales)  

 

‘Stagnant’ – a new remix and new video by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski