theoretical disputes

["snedeker" <snedeker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

sometimes I wonder what is at stake in the kind of
arguments we seem to have over definitions of modes of production or how we are
to understand slave or wage labor. why does it matter how capitalism immerged? I
think these questions do matter because they define how we understand the
contemporary world. for Marx, capitalism was both a scientific and moral
concept. primitive accumulation is a good example of what I am driving at here.
enclosure and the slave trade were violent processes. contemporary forms of
primitive accumulation are no less violent. capital may have come into the world
dripping with blood, but it is still causing blood to flow.
 
that brings me back to the question of
eurocentrism. we do need to fight against our tendency to see the world from a
distorted point of view, looking eastward for example. to grant to people that
their suffering has played an important role in the production of global wealth
or what is called "civilization" is simply to admit what is
true.