Re: Nazi racial and economic theory (was Re: Michael Mann, again)

[Justin Schwartz <jschwart@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 12 Jan 1996, David McInerney wrote:

> This makes things clearer -- perhaps you could give us some of your theses
> from your critique of Elster, Bardhan et. al. from your paper in summary
> form?

As you might expect, it's a long story. Are people actually interested in
the logic of functional explanation? If so, I will talk about this. But
not if it's just a sidebar.

> I purchased Elster's _Karl Marx: An Introduction_ at a second-hand
> bookstore today to round out my AM collection.

No substitute for Making Sense of Marx, which contains all the interesting
arguments, most of them wrongheaded.

> bookstore also had a copy of Shaw's book, but I left it there as his
> article from the same time (1978) -- 'the handmill gives you the feudal
> lord' I think it was called -- was an awful piece of hard-core
> economic-determinism.

Warmed-over Cohen, one would say. It was his D.Phil or Ph.D thesis with
Cohen. Shaw has become fairly social democratic, or was when I saw him a
couple years back.

  I'm not surprised that Miller has left the fold.  Is
> he a straight-out communitarian now?  Perhaps he discusses the Vatican
> and/or Aristotelianism with dear old Charles Taylor?
>
I haven't read his ethics book with any care, so can't report.

> Robert Brenner is sometimes associated with this tendency.[Analytical
Marxism}  I
like > Brenner's work quite a lot.  It does mean that AMs are a rather
> broadly-defined bunch though, doesn't it??
>
Brenner is certainly an AM. We are a broadly defined bunch.

> What a strange thing to say!  "Marx was an analytical Marxist" -- did he
> know about this?

I think so. He thiught he was doing science by the best lights of his day.

  I think what you mean is -- when Marx was being sensible
> he was an AM

No, I mean he is always an AM, though he's not always sensible. But lots
of Ams are not always sensible, myself excepted, of course.

(but then again, as nobody can really agree on what AM is
> rather than an ethic of how to approach theory, then I guess this is true a
> priori by your criteria!)

No, lots of Marxists aren't analytical, even setting aside the
fundamentalists. Lukacs is not. Trotsky is not. I could go on.
Incidentally I have been profoundly influenced by these two writers and
admire them deeply.

  What do you mean by "norms"??  These aren't those norms of
> bourgeois social scientific practice that AMs keep apealling to?

The norms of "bourgeois" social science have to be evaluated on their
merits, not on the basis of the political views of their users. If you
have some better norms that logical consistency, explicitness about your
premises, respect for empirical evidence, explanatory power, theoretical
unification, and other "bourgeois" virtues, I'd like like to hear about
them. Of course in talking to me you would do well to recall that I have
been thoroughly indoctrinated by the Michigan polisci dept in quantitative
research techniques, which I regard as immensely valuable. The alternative
to using such norms, which are indeed not a priori but evolving and
subject to critique, is the abandonment of science, the attempt to explain
and (where possible) predict the empirical world.

  Marx must
> have been extra silly then when he spoke of ideology in the work of David
> Ricardo.  What would Robert Brenner have to say about such a suggestion?
>
I dunno. Why don't you ask him? You want his e-mail?

Why is it inconsistent to treat the work of a great economist like Ricardo
with the immense respect Marx does treat it while at the same time
critiquing its ideological limitations? Must someone's work by all
ideology or not at all? Your Althusserianism is showing here. It's not as
if Ricardo was a vulgar apologst whose work was devoid of scientific
merit, like Harold Demsetz, whose defense of private property we are about
to take up in my Property law class and of which I spent the afternoon
writing a savage critique.

> I actually think that the ethic of appealling to the norms of the bourgeois
> academy is the defining aspect of AM.

I find this very strange after your rather pleasant post explaining how
Marxists can learn from and find their work enriched by all sorts of
nonMarxists and even anti-Marxists like Foucault, etc. Why not Weber or
Stiglizt or Giddens? Once again, I ask, what is the alternative to
carefully argued, empiriaccly grounded research?

 I remain non-plussed as to what
> Brenner is doing amongst that lot, given his opposition to bourgeois
> economics (or has he recanted now?  I can't keep track!)

Brenner is an historian. He hasn't "recanted": he's a comrade of mine in
Solidarity, a smallish revolutionary socialist group in America. What he's
doing in that lot is making important and widely respected contributions
to our understanding of early modern society.

> Sorry to always be so negative about AM Justin -- I guess it's good to have
> people on the list that you can discuss AM with though, even if they always
> seem to disagree.  Please let me know if I am just being irritating.

Oh, this stuff is mild compared a lotof the stuff one hears, e.g., from
Ellen Wood. ("Class traitor!" etc.)

--Justin




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