Re: AM and dialectics

[lucinda <lucinda1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Slip away for a couple of days and this list really moves (at least on some
things). People appear to have tired out of the AM idscussion for the most part
and I am relatively pleased that David McI has posted an Althusserian response.
Nevertheless, since I brought it up and Justin was polite enough to enquire, I
do think a general orientation on Analytic vs. dialectical marxism should get a
couple of comments.

1) By no means do I intend to exclude analytic marxists from the use of the
label Marxist. I wish more people used it. Nevertheless, my limited reading
of this (what, school, tradition, research orientation, philosophy?) group
has led me to conclude that if there is a defining characteristic of AM it
is to extract analytic models from Marx and to produce their own analytic
projections based on some underlying assumptions. The exact way in which
this is pursued varies; indeed, after Justin's posts I am no longer confident
there is any meaningful underlying similarity.

Subsuming Marxian systems of thought and action to analytic techniques may
be an important and useful tool, but it neglects other aspects of these systems 
which many perceive to be equally essential. Specifically, I mentioned the
dialectical mode of reasoning. Justin rightfully points out that Hegel
has been approached analytically, and that the concept of internal relations has
been utilized by analytic marxists. However, the notion of totality strikes me
as violating certain procedural neccesities of formal analytics.

A quote from Gareth Stedman Jones article on "Dialectical Reasoning" in the
New Palgrave volume on Marxian Economics can (sort of) illustrate my point:
  [Discussing Hegelian dialectics]  The truth is the whole and it unfolds
  through a dialectical progression of categories, concepts and forms of
  consciousness from the most simple and empty to the most complex and concrete.
  ... Reflective understanding is not false, but partial. It abstracts from
  reality and decomposes objects into their elements. Analytic understanding
  represents a localized standpoint which sets up an unsurpassable barrier
  between subject and object and thus cannot grasp the systematic interconnect-
  ion between things or the total process of which it is a part. The absolute
  subject contains both itself and its other (both being and thought) which
  is revealed to be identical with itself. (p122).


This is not the clearest statement, and Marx did of course establish an
alternate base for dialectics. But the point remains that Aristotelian
forms of analytic reasoning seem to require clearly defined concrete entities
which are mutually exclusive. This to my mind leads to radical disjunctures
between levels of analysis (even though there may be continuity defined by
the analytic model itself). For example, I suggested that thin theories of
rationality suffer from their positing of a purely egoistic actor, and suggested
the necessity of collective rationality. Justin points out that rational choice
game theories have been applied to collectivities--but this was not my point.
Sociology and economics have both been embroiled for years in "micro-macro"
divisions and debates. The difficulty has been to define the relations between
the two. What I was suggesting was that individualized models of rational
choice could be served by recognizing individuals as members of collectivities
for purposes other than weighing the force of sanctionaing power.

The simple truth is that social entities are not distinct and discreet in any
simple sense, but rather we often need to treat them as if they were "for
purposes of analysis". An individual is both an individual (in the sense of
having a discreet personality and freedom of motion), and at the same time a
class actor (in the sense of being formed within a system of class relations,
and acting on the basis of his or her positioning) and any theory which attempts
to account for action at either of these levels will be incomplete without an
understanding of their interplay.

The notion that levels of abstraction constitute relations of a totality, and
as such must be kept flexibly interplayed is at the heart of Ollman's work,
and while I have some serious reservations I feel that such attempts are central
to a marxist social science. I have not worked out my own framework to such
a degree that I would post it as somesort of statement, but while the concept of
totality within a philosophic system can be approached analytically (it is a
term related to other terms), the seeming chaotic whole of which we are parts
and representatives cannot be grasped except through a conceptual framework
recognizing the interplay of forces at different levels of analysis.

2. Lest this quirky note be seen as more than it is a
couple of caveats are important. First, there are forms of analytic
dialectics. The discussion of contradictions in capital can take place at a
purely formal level, (and most often does). Second, collective identity can
be approached on a purely analytic level (indeed, thats how I have done most
of my work on the topic in the past). It is at a epistemological and
methodological level that dialectics (as one factor among many) distinguishes
Marxism from the traditional sciences. There is a very real material reason
for the emergence of analytical marxism situated in the structure of the
universities and grant giving.

Next, I need to point out that I am not a philosopher, am not schooled in
philosophy, and am less well schooled in the Marxist tradition than I would
like to be. I did decide to quit factory work and enter academia because I
became enamored with Marx and certain people whom I personally consider
marxists (no matter what others label them). Marcuse has a terrific passage
in _One dimensional Man_ where he critiques the Hawthorne experimenters for
transforming a workers complaint that "wages are to low" into a stament that
"due to his wife's illness this worker is experiencing financial difficulty"
(or some such). His point was that breaking things down into their constituent
parts and reconstructing them denies people the critical capacity emergent
from an overall view from a particular situation. While various forms of
analytic philosophy may give rise to various forms of critique, Marx provided
a confusing but coherent (in terms of essentially integrated) form of analysis
in which critique and social action are imminent.

Humbly, Brian S-J

  human activity without

o


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