Download Marx - OGDI

Marx
How to debate about the economy
What is Capitalism?
• Economic systems are classified based on the ownership of the means of production
• Defined by the relationship between those who own the means of production (the
capitalists or bourgeoisie) and those who do not (the workers or the proletariat).
• According to Marx, history evolves through the interaction between the mode of
production and the relations of production.
Dialectical Materialism
• Hegel
• Dialectics
• Historical teleology
• Ideology/Idealism
• Materialism
• Historical materialism and Class Struggle
• Ideology is created by economic/material reality
Base v Superstructure
• Base- the forces and relations of
production into which people enter to
produce the necessities and amenities of
life
• employer–employee work conditions
• the technical division of labor
• property relations.
• Super Structure- society’s other
relationships and ideas
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Culture
Institutions
Rituals
State/ Governments
Ideologies
Base and Superstructure Cont.
• The base determines the superstructure
• yet their relation is not strictly causal, because the superstructure often influences the base; the
influence of the base, however, predominates.
• In Orthodox Marxism, the base determines the superstructure in a one-way relationship.
• Creates a framework for debate
• Economic conditions > Ideology
• Fixing the economic conditions comes before every other impact
The Labor Theory of Value:
An Alternative Economic Model
• The value of a commodity is determined by the amount of labor that went into producing it
• Opposed to traditional model of supply and demand
• Commodity- an external object that satisfies wants or needs.
• Use-value- their capacity to satisfy such wants and needs.
• Exchange-value- their value in relation to other commodities on the market, which is measured in terms of
money.
• Marx asserts that in order to determine the relative worth of extremely different commodities with different
use-values, exchange-value, or monetary value, must be measurable in terms of a property common to all such
commodities.
• The only thing that all commodities have in common is that they are a product of labor. Therefore,
the value of a commodity in a market represents the amount of labor that went into its
production.
Surplus Value and The Theory of Exploitation
• Profit= Selling Price - Cost of Production
• Surplus Value= Selling Price - exchange-value
• Exchange-value= value of labor to produce product
• Rather than buy or sell products at their true exchange-value, as determined by the labor
that went into making them, capitalists enrich themselves by extracting a “surplus-value”
from their laborers—in other words, exploiting them.
Why is Capitalism Bad?
• Privileges Economic Concerns Over Other Decision Making Factors
• Wars
• Environment
• “Epistemic Blind spots”
• Structural Violence
• Poverty
• Inefficient Distribution of Resources
• Alienation
• Dialectical Materialism- The Human Relationship to Labor
The Alternative:
A Non-Exploitative System of Economics
• Communism: Workers Own the Means of Production
• Classless, Stateless Society
• A Better Economic System
• Capitalists are Inefficient
• Competition is Inefficient
• Dictatorship of the Proletariat
• Re-learning of Values
The Inevitability of Communism
• “All History Hiterto is the History of Class Struggle”
• Communism as the End of History
• Capitalism Sows the Seeds of its Own Destruction
• Production Capacity
• Communication
• Capitalism is a System of Infinite Growth on a Finite Planet
• Resource Scarcity
Class Consciousness v False Consciousness:
Learning to Fight for the Right Team
• Class Consciousness- awareness of one's place in a system of social classes, especially as it
relates to class struggle.
• False Consciousness- a way of thinking that prevents a person from perceiving the true
nature of their social or economic situation.
• Capitalism attempts to perpetuate false consciousness in order to prevent revolution.
Using Marx to Answer The K
• Garnering the Links
• Idealism/ Ideology- Base v Superstructure
• Individualism- Collectivism as a Superior Method
• Historical Materialism- How does Class Better Explain Inequality
• Race- False Consciousness of the White Working Class
• Gender- Exploitation of Domestic Labor
• Turning the Aff
• False Consciousness -> Scapegoating
• Solving the Aff
• Restructuring the economic base resolves the superstructure that creates their impacts
• Materialism means that they can’t resolve the aff without first resolving capitalism
Using Marx to Answer Policy
• The Links
• The State
• Economic Growth
• Labor
• Turning the Aff: How Capitalism Makes Their Impacts Inevitable
• Alternative Solves the Aff
• Framing
• “Epistemic Blindspots” means that their aff is propaganda
• “Particular Facts are Irrelevant” the system is more important than individual senarios