Symposium on Ellen Meiksins Wood's Empire of Capital: Editorial Introduction

2007 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 45-55
Author(s):  
Paul Blackledge
Keyword(s):  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Editorial Introduction ◽  
Historical Specificity ◽  
New Imperialism

AbstractEllen Wood's study of the new imperialism represents the latest instance of her broader project of reconstituting a non-deterministic form of Marxism which is able both to explain the historical specificity of capitalism and to inform socialist political activity. This essay seeks to locate her analysis of imperialism both in the wider political context within which it was written and as an example of the fecundity of her re-interpretation of historical materialism. After outlining the main themes of Wood's 'political-Marxist' project, I move on to overview the thesis of her book Empire of Capital (2003) before finally pointing to the main themes of the ensuing debate.

scholarly journals Endlich ta wolność… czyli o początkach mniejszości niemieckiej w województwie opolskim w latach dziewięćdziesiątych XX wieku

2018 ◽  
pp. 87-101
Author(s):  
Paweł Popieliński ◽  
Magdalena Lemańczyk
Keyword(s):  
Political Context ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Religious Issues ◽  
German Minority ◽  
Language Issues

The article is devoted to the problems of institutionalisation of the German minority in the Opolskie Province between 1989 and 1990. It indicates the peculiarity of this group in this area. Based on interviews conducted among the founding members, chairmen and active members of the German Friendship Circles (DFKs) in the Opolskie Province who led socio-cultural and political activity, particularly in the early 1990s, the authors analyse and show the twists and turns of the processes of creating and functioning 15 DFKs in this province. They focus on the socio-political context of establishing the organisations, motives for joining them, intra- and extra-group contacts, religious issues, minority-majority relations and language issues.

scholarly journals Translating the Commune: Cultural Politics and the Historical Specificity of the Anarchist Text

2007 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald Bruce
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Cultural Politics ◽  
English Translation ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Functional Identity ◽  
Semantic Ambiguity ◽  
The Third ◽  
Historical Specificity ◽  
Specific Factors

Abstract Translating the Commune: Cultural Politics and the Historical Specificity of the Anarachist Text — This essay deals with three interrelated matters: the first is the role of discourse analysis and the conscious theorization of discourse typologies in translation methodologies; the second is the absence of any complete English translation of Jules Vallès's autobiographical/historical trilogy, Jacques Vingtras, comprised of L'Enfant (1879), Le Bachelier (1881), and L'insurgé (1885); and the third is the analysis of specific discursive characteristics which establish the formal and functional identity of the Discourse of the Commune. Though widely published in popular and scholarly editions in France, Vallès's novels have not been included in the lycée corpus through an act of conscious cultural exclusion. This has contributed to the exclusion of Vallès abroad and to the absence of translations of the trilogy. In order to remedy this situation the translator must be aware of the specific socio-political context surrounding these novels as well as the particular formal characteristics which make up the discourse from which these texts emerge. Radical decentralisation, narrative fragmentation, multiple enunciative positions, neologisms, a structure based on an unresolved binary dialectic, interdiscursive mixing and semantic ambiguity are common characteristics of the discourse of the Commune as they are transposed metaphorically from the anarchistic theoretical discourse of P.-J. Proudhon to the Vallès texts: these specific factors coupled with a cultural politics of exclusion have long marginalized the trilogy in various curricula and, in addition, led to its exclusion from non-francophone cultures both in the original French and in translation.

The New Imperialism of Globalized Monopoly-Finance Capital: An Introduction

2015 ◽  
Vol 67 (3) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Bellamy Foster
Keyword(s):  
Global Economy ◽  
Index Volume ◽  
World System ◽  
First Century ◽  
Neoliberal Globalization ◽  
Present Issue ◽  
Finance Capital ◽  
The World ◽  
Historical Specificity ◽  
New Imperialism

It is now a universal belief on the left that the world has entered a new imperialist phase.&hellip; The challenge for Marxian theories of the imperialist world system in our times is to capture the full depth and breadth of the classical accounts, while also addressing the historical specificity of the current global economy. It will be argued in this introduction (in line with the present issue as a whole) that what is widely referred to as neoliberal globalization in the twenty-first century is in fact a historical product of the shift to global monopoly-finance capital or what Samir Amin calls the imperialism of "generalized-monopoly capitalism."<p class="mrlink"><p class="mrpurchaselink"><a href="http://monthlyreview.org/index/volume-67-number-3" title="Vol. 67, No. 3: July 2015" target="_self">Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the <em>Monthly Review</em> website.</a></p>

Editorial Introduction

2007 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 53-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Conceptual Structure ◽  
Editorial Introduction ◽  
Research Projects ◽  
Socialist Movement

AbstractHistorical Materialism has previously published a significant number of studies from the contemporary 'Marx Renaissance'. Roberto Finelli's intervention into the debate over Chris Arthur's The New Dialectic and Marx's 'Capital' provides an opportunity to consider the international reverberations of this movement and its political presuppositions and consequences. Working in a very different tradition of Marxism, Finelli's interpretation of Marx has decisive similarities with Arthur's reading of the importance of Hegel's Logic for the conceptual structure of Capital. Yet whereas Arthur argues for a 'direct homology', Finelli proposes a heuristic 'analogy'. The different conclusions reached by the two theorists reflect different orientations, both theoretical and political. Comparison to theses of the Italian workerist tradition and other contemporary readings of Marx suggest that these differences are best comprehended in a political rather than solely intellectual register. Despite their differences, these various research projects are in agreement regarding the necessity of deriving concrete strategies for the contemporary socialist movement from theoretical debate.

Editorial Introduction

2011 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Blackledge
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Editorial Introduction ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
Mode Of Production

AbstractChris Wickham’s Framing the Early Middle Ages is a towering comparative overview of Rome’s successor-states in the four centuries after its collapse in the West. Not only does it bring together evidence from across the continent in a way that will inform all subsequent serious discussions of the period, it also conceptualises an important, peasant-mode of production. Notwithstanding these strengths, Framing has been criticised for its structuralist, static characterisation of feudalism. The debates surveyed in this essay suggest that, while Wickham’s book will act as a milestone in the history of Europe, it should also act as a spur to further research and critical reflection on the period. Moreover, in the light of recent criticisms of Marxist historiography, Wickham’s book and the debate surrounding it point to the continued vibrancy of historical materialism.

‘Come and See the Blood in the Streets’: Luciano Berio, ‘Coro’, and the Affective Staging of the One-Crowd

2019 ◽  
Vol 100 (4) ◽  
pp. 685-712
Author(s):  
James Davis
Keyword(s):  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Felix Guattari ◽  
The Political ◽  
Luciano Berio ◽  
Musical Production ◽  
Philosophical Framework ◽  
The One ◽  
Political Alignment

Abstract Luciano Berio’s most substantial work from the 1970s was Coro (1976)—an hour-long piece for chorus and orchestra. This work has attracted a small literature that attempts to understand it in terms of the philosophical framework of the French theorists Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari. These Deleuzo-Guattari speculations have remained rather abstract; specifically, they have not attempted to relate the work to the concrete political context of 1970s Italy. This essay attempts to enrich our understanding of Berio by relating the choral work to this political context. In so doing, it will contribute towards a more thorough understanding of the political significance and functioning of the works of one of Italy’s leading composers, and suggest a striking political alignment between his musical production and the radical extra-parliamentary political activity of the 1970s.

Labour, Eco-Regulation, and Value: A Response to Benton's Ecological Critique of Marx

1998 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Burkett
Keyword(s):  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Social Constructionist ◽  
The Political ◽  
Relational Approach ◽  
Political Conservatism ◽  
Historical Specificity ◽  
Material Conditions ◽  
The Unemployed

AbstractIn an earlier article, I responded to Ted Benton's charge that Marx and Engels, upon realising the political conservatism associated with Malthusian natural limits arguments, retreated from materialism to a social-constructionist conception of human production and reproduction. I showed that Benton artificially dichotomises the material and social elements of historical materialism, thereby misreading Marx and Engels's recognition of the historical specificity of material conditions as an outright denial of all natural limits. In place of Marx and Engels's materialist and class-relational approach to population issues and the reserve army of the unemployed, Benton employs a partially Malthusianised Marxism heavily reliant on ahistorical notions of natural limits.

Rome, the Cosmos, and the Emperor in Seneca's Natural Questions

2006 ◽  
Vol 96 ◽  
pp. 42-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harry M. Hine
Keyword(s):  
Natural World ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Scientific Investigation ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Writing ◽  
The One

This paper examines the political content and context of Seneca's Natural Questions. It argues that, on the one hand, Rome is marginalized in the context of the immensity of the cosmos; and philosophy is elevated above traditional Roman pursuits, including political activity and historical writing. But at the same time the work is firmly anchored in its Roman geo-political context; Seneca situates himself in a long and continuing tradition of investigation of the natural world, where Roman writers can stand alongside Greeks and others; and the current emperor Nero is presented not just as princeps and poet, but as sponsor of geographical and scientific investigation.

scholarly journals இச்சா:ஈழத்தமிழரின் வலியும் வேதனையும் ததும்பிடும் துன்பியல் கதை

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
N Murugesapandian
Keyword(s):  
Sri Lanka ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
The West ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Armed Struggle ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Government

The struggle of the Eelam Tamils and the repression of the Sinhala chauvinist army against it have a long history dating back to 1981 until the 2009 Mullivaikkal massacre.The atrocity of desecrating human bodies without any virtue has taken place naturally in Sri Lanka.The struggles of the movements for Tamil liberation, especially the fierce war against the government by LTTE, brutal military attacks of the Sinhala chauvinist state, armed struggle against LTTE with the support of the West, including India and China.Blood is pouring down the pages of Sri Lanka’ s history.The armed Eelam war led by Velupillai Prabhakaran in the history is incomparable; have a strong. The heroic wars of the LTTE was float in the air as indelible memories.The thirty-year armed struggle of Tamil Eelam is today became stories for future generations.A novel namely, Ichaa written by Shobha sakti with the understanding that creation is a political activity, has emerged as a social critique.The uniqueness of Ichaa’ novel is that it questions the politics of power embedded in the destruction of human dignity and values. This article expands into a cross-sectional critique of Ichaa novel, written in a political context of the past.

Social Theory and Revolutionary Activity in Marx

1979 ◽  
Vol 73 (2) ◽  
pp. 521-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Gilbert
Keyword(s):  
General Theory ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Socialist Revolution ◽  
Unexpected Events ◽  
Political Experience ◽  
Critical Activity ◽  
General Expectation

Economic determinist attempts to deduce specific political conclusions or strategies from Marx's general theory do not jibe with Marx's own extensive political activity. Instead, Marx's development as a political theorist and organizer passed from observation of (French Revolution, Chartism) or participation in (1848, the International Workingmen's Association) existing radical movements to formulation of new theories and strategies, and then to application of these strategies in subsequent movements. In applying his general theory to formulating strategies and historical explanations, Marx utilized a framework of mainly political auxiliary statements to define the specific international and national historical setting. Faced with the defeat of a strategy or a tension between the strategy and an older theory, Marx reformulated his theory in different ways, sometimes altering these auxiliary statements rather than the general theory to explain unexpected events, more rarely changing the general theory itself. These new explanations reinforced his strategies. This impact of political experience on Marx's thinking illustrates his famous definition, drawn from Theses on Feuerbach, of revolution as a “practical-critical” activity. Taken as a whole, Marx's new explanations underline the role of politics in historical materialism and conflict with Marx's general expectation that economic oppression alone would ultimately drive the proletariat to make socialist revolution.

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