[Pen-l] SSAs and fascism

["McDonough, Terrence" <terrence.mcdonough@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Terry  McDonough wrote:
> I'd like to endorse Jim's dating below.  The postwar capitalist expansion cannot be regarded as simply an interruption in the working out of basic capitalist contradictions.  In passing I'd like to invite Jim to come out as an SSA theorist.<

Thanks, Jim,  for the response below?

>Like any school of thought, there's a tremendous amount of variety in
the SSA school. There's also a lot of overlap with other schools,
e.g., the emphasis on "medium level" institutions and empirical stuff
as determining the actual dynamics of capitalism, which is shared with
a lot of other institutionalists. (The medium level is between
abstract capitalism and specific detailed descriptions.) <

This is of course true.  But see my recent RESEARCH IN POLITICAL ECONOMY article specifically situating the school historically and in relation to other schools.

>The SSA
school might be seen as being centered on a small number of people
(Michael Reich, the late David Gordon, Terry McDoough, etc.) or as an
amorphous school that includes all Marxian political economists who
refuse to stick with abstract crisis theory (such as the presumption
that the rate or profit is always falling, all else equal, or the
presumption that capitalism is always falling into stagnation, all
else equal). Of course, under the latter definition, Baran and Sweezy
were SSA theorists, since they provided a lot of concrete detail.<

Baran and Sweezy do fit but only as genealogy.  See reference above.  For now, pragmatically speaking the school includes those who self-identify with the term in the tradition of Gordon, et al.  (By the way this kind of rule doesn't work for Regulation Theory which has split into two distinct theoretical trends often using the same terminology).

>Because of the variety, it's hard to criticize or even to join the
school. Even though I might use a concept that's a bit like an "SSA"
(and I try to bring in a lot of empirical detail), I don't think of
myself as in the SSA school. <

On the above pragmatic grounds JD isn't in - but it would be very easy to opt in.


>My impression is that the school tends to
be empiricist because they don't worry enough about what capitalist
accumulation would be like without an SSA; crises seem to arise from
the SSA more than from capitalism.<

I guess the facile response would be without an SSA there would be no accumulation.  But Jim is pointing to what I think is 'only' a difference in emphasis, but such differences have both theoretical and political consequences, so this is worth thinking about.

>More importantly, the "stages" or "eras" I point to are different from
the official SSA school that I'm familiar with: I see periods of
"strong labor" and "weak labor" situations; the abstract laws of
motion of capitalism (as I understand them) work out differently --
with different kinds of crises -- in these two types of eras. The
former situations seem more the exception than the rule, but can exist
due to strong labor institutions and a "nation-state-centric" growth
process. (Without the former, a nation-state-centric process under
capitalism might be fascism.)

For more, see my 1994 article in RESEARCH IN POLITICAL ECONOMY.<

I guess I should reread this.  One of the advantages of amorphousness is that this kind of insight can be assimilated (you might then object that "resistance is futile.")

Regarding the last comment in Jim's post:  Is fascism an option in response to this crisis?  One side of the ideology is already in place (Faith, Family, Flag) but it has become so closely linked to support for the liberal market that it seems barred from addressing the current crisis. Also we have the war without the full program.  Thoughts?

Terry
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