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The view of Karl Marx as “revolutionary” endorsing violent overturn of the capitalist system is standard textbook fare filtering through to popular and professional opinion. John Stuart Mill specialists frequently contrast their subject with Marx in this regard. The perspective on Marx as “revolutionary” is unconvincing, for Marx was no less “evolutionary” than Mill, his version of evolution reflecting concern that reformist measures to correct perceived injustices in the capitalist-exchange system might assure its permanence, and extending to the stage following a proletarian political takeover which might itself occur by way of democratic voting enabled by extensions of the franchise accorded by the capitalist state itself. Our demonstration prefaces a speculative evaluation of Mill’s stance regarding Marx – “speculative” since Mill apparently never read Capital. In particular, Mill would doubtless have welcomed Marx’s position, for to differentiate him from the continental “revolutionaries” makes excellent sense considering his principle that when it comes to prediction all depends on ruling circumstances coupled with his evolutionism including allowance after a proletarian takeover of a residual capitalist sector, income inequality, and compensation of expropriated property owners. By the same token he would have found unpalatable Marx’s vision for a more distant communism of a central-controlled system.

Nobody concerned with political economy can neglect the history of economic doctrines. Structural changes in the economy and society influence economic thinking and, conversely, innovative thought structures and attitudes have almost always forced economic institutions and modes of behaviour to adjust. We learn from the history of economic doctrines how a particular theory emerged and whether, and in which environment, it could take root. We can see how a school evolves out of a common methodological perception and similar techniques of analysis, and how it has to establish itself. The interaction between unresolved problems on the one hand, and the search for better solutions or explanations on the other, leads to a change in paradigma and to the formation of new lines of reasoning. As long as the real world is subject to progress and change scientific search for explanation must out of necessity continue.

Peter Boettke and I had taken Don Lavoie's graduate Comparative Economic Systems course during the Fall of 1985. Lavoie had just published Rivalry and Central Planning (Lavoie, 1985b) and National Economic Planning: What is left? (Lavoie, 1985a), and was at the cusp of establishing himself as a major player in the comparative systems and contemporary critique of socialist planning literature.¹

There are good reasons for preferring the concept of capitalism over that of “market economy.” A capitalist economy is one that depends on the commercialization-through-monetarization of ever more social relations. The result is disequilibrium as the normal condition of a society placed under pressure by its “economy” for continuous reorganization in line with a need for ongoing capital accumulation. A capitalist society enlists the possessive individualism of its members as its principal vehicle of social progress, measured as an increase in wealth-as-money. While Polanyian theory has pointed out important features of advanced capitalist societies, there is no need to sacrifice core Marxian concepts for it. Marxian theory helps avoid the trap of political voluntarism, which stipulates a priority of politics in the capitalist political economy or a fundamental difference between “varieties” of capitalism. Moreover, rather than regarding the capitalist economy as by definition “always embedded,” political-economic theory must allow for a self-destructive, and indeed socially destructive, tendency of capitalist political economies to “disembed” themselves by struggling free from social controls and dictating to social life the imperatives of market efficiency and a market-conforming distribution of life chances.

This paper analyses “luxemburgian” political and economic thought and tries to associate its importance with Luxemburg’s role as a socialist and as an activist in the women’s liberation movement. Luxemburg’s “feminism,” Marxism, anti-authoritarianism and independent thinking make her a figure of continuing importance within both Marxism and feminism. At the same time, she was part of a changing political and social reality and not only passed on an important legacy to economics, but also through her political activism alerted us to the dangers of anti-democratic behaviour. Similarly, her defence of internationalism and denunciation of economically motivated imperialist wars was equally original. Summing up, it is Luxemburg who originated new ways of thinking, which go beyond simple representational thought.

This essay is a response to Zak Cope’s defense of the “labor aristocracy” theory of working class reformism and conservatism. Specifically, the essay engages Cope’s claims that British colonialism, imperialist investment, and transnational “monopoly” corporations have accrued “surplus-profits” that have underwritten the existence of a “labor aristocracy” historically, and that “unequal exchange” today has transformed almost the entirety of the working classes of the global North into a labor aristocracy. We conclude with a presentation of an alternative explanation of working class reformism and conservatism.

The first thing to be said about this excellent book is that it is written at least as much for laypeople as for professionals. With the exception of an occasional technical term such as “externality” and inevitable references to Marxian expressions that have special meanings, there is nothing in it that should deter the interested general reader. Alec Nove matches any abstraction with a gallery of lively illustrations, so that his meaning is easily discerned.

At the turn of the twentieth century, various Socialist parties vied for a place in the American political system, making alliances where possible and convenient with elements of organized labor. Robert Franklin Hoxie, an economist at the University of Chicago whose principle contributions lay in his writings on the labor movement, wrote a series of essays in which he scrutinized the activities of the Socialist Party of America as it appeared to be at the time poised to become a viable force in American politics. This essay examines Hoxie’s writings on the conventions of the Socialist Party within the context of the political dynamic of the period and reveals his interpretations of events based on contemporary accounts and first-hand observations.

In recent decades, capitalist globalization has entailed a new international division of labor with the relocation of some stages of manufacturing production from the Center to the Periphery through the Global value chains (GVCs). This new pattern of global production is marked by wide income disparities between the different regions of the world economy, accentuated by value transfers hidden within both traditional and GVCs international trade. The chapter presents a theoretical model based on a Marxian approach for the accounting of unequal exchange in international trade in value-added, resulting from the decoupling of value-produced and value-captured inside and outside GVCs. The empirical results show the ongoing relevance of unequal exchange in contemporary capitalism as one of the fundamental causes of disparities in income and economic development among the countries of the global economy.