Download Liberalism, Marxism and the Class Character of Radical Democratic

Liberalism,
Marxism and the
Class Character of
Radical Democratic
Change
BRUCESMARDON
ith the reexamination of socialism that has occurred as a result of the crisis of working class
politics and the implosion of the Eastern Bloc in
the 1980s, there has also been a reexamination on the Left
of the role and importance of liberalism in the development
of new democratic forms. This reassessment has occurred
in a context of great concern with the politics of language
and discourse as well as with the need to recognize the
plurality of democratic struggles. One major current of
thought that has grown out of these different concerns is
that associated with the notion of "radical democracy." In
this approach, liberal democracy and liberal democratic discourse are seen as the starting point for radical democratic
institutions that greatly increase the rights and freedoms of
various oppressed groups.
Two of the most complete expositions of this approach
are provided in the work of Samuel Bowles and Herbert
Gintis as well as that of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal
Mouffe.! Both sets of writers argue that liberal democracy
and liberal democratic discourse provide the crucial context
for the development of radical democracy. Laclau and
Mouffe state that, "The task of the Left ...cannot be to renounce liberal-democratic ideology, but on the contrary, to
deepen and expand it in the direction of a radical and plural
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Studies in Political Economy 37, Spring 1992
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democracy. "2 In their opinion, radical democracy, which has
as one of its goals "the abolition of capitalist relations of
production,"3 continues a long process of "democratic revolution" that started with the French Revolution and has gained
impetus with the development of "the so-called 'new social
movements' of the last few decades."4 Bowles and Gintis
echo this opinion:
we are not suggesting that liberal democratic society step outside
its historical trajectory to inaugurate a new order. We believe
that liberal democratic capitalist society has itself produced the
conditions that make our postliberal democratic vision historically relevant.J
They claim that "no fundamental shift in social dynamics"6 is required to move into a society that involves
the displacement of profit-driven capital markets by the
democratically accountable planning of investment and resource
allocation, the organization of workplaces and other communities by means of representative and participatory institutions. and the attenuation of economic inequality ...?
Central to this approach is the claim by these writers
that there is a cumulative movement toward greater and
greater individual rights within liberal discourse and liberal
democracy. Both Laclau and Mouffe as well as Bowles and
Gintis claim that there has been a progressive expansion
of democratic demands - "the deepening of the democratic
revolution" in the case of Laclau and Mouffe, and "the expansionary tendency of personal rights" in the case of
Bowles and Gintis - which has increasingly extended the
scope of democracy to different areas of social life. 8 Radical
democracy is viewed by these authors as a further phase
in this cumulative development. For Laclau and Mouffe, as
for Bowles and Gintis, the process of radical democratic
change from within liberal democratic arrangements, while
subject to the requirements of successful mobilization, is
not necessarily restricted by any fundamental obstacles.
In addition, they argue that there is no necessary "class
belonging" to the process of democratic change. Instead, a
multiplicity of different identities that have been discur130
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sively articulated form the basis for democratic development. Indeed, it is Marxism's insistence on the necessity
of class struggle that is opposed most clearly by these writers.
Laclau and Mouffe state that
From everything we have said, it is evident that the deepening
of a mass democratic practice ...can be achieved only if it is
recognized that these tasks do not have a necessary class character and if stagism is renounced in a thoroughgoing manner.s
Similarly, Bowles and Gintis argue that
the criteria of group membership, and hence its social composition, cannot be determined a priori. A multiplicity of "us and
them" divisions is possible in any social order.10
As a result, both sets of writers also argue that analysis
of democratic development must move beyond Marxism and
its stress on class struggle as a necessary aspect of radical
social change. I I
In combination, these views provide a particular understanding of political struggle and democratic development.
For Laclau and Mouffe, the crucial task for a "New Left"
in the current period is the construction of a new "hegemonic articulation" in which the discourse of democratic
rights provides the unifying theme for the diverse forms of
opposition to oppression. This new hegemonic articulation
is formed in opposition to the hegemonic project of "liberalconservative discourse" which "under the cover of the defense of 'individual liberty' would legitimize inequalities
and restore the hierarchical relations which the struggles
of previous decades had destroyed."12
Similarly, for Bowles and Gmtis, the focus of struggle
is the promotion of personal rights (the rights of persons
to control their own bodies, to economic security, to equal
opportunity etc.), In their understanding of struggle, what
is crucial is that the discourse of personal rights be mobilized by the various oppositional forces into ever greater
areas of social life; thereby undermining remaining
"citadels" of unaccountable power and increasing the participation of people in decisions affecting their work places
and their communities. This extension of personal rights
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occurs in opposition to other notions of rights, such as those
connected with property rights, which have developed as
key sources of legitimacy for economic inequality and undemocratic forms of social power. They state that
the discourse of rights is fraught with internal tensions due to
its genesis in social conflict and the consequently contradictory
forms it is obliged to assume in social life. This contradictory
character explains both its emancipatory potential and its seemingly limitless capacity to legitimate social inequality and undemocratic economic arrangements.U
Thus, for all of these writers, the crucial confrontation
on the path to greater democracy is that between different
discourses. And the crucial determinant of success is the
ability of different groups to mobilize alternative "hegemonic articulations" or to promote expanded definitions of
"personal rights" from within liberal democratic arrangements.
Utopian Democracy It will be argued that this view does
not give nearly enough weight to private capital and its
opposition to radical democratic change. While both sets
of writers acknowledge the existence of social forces capable of limiting democratic development, they do not sufficiently integrate an analysis of those forces into their treatment of the movement from liberal to radical democracy.
In the case of Bowles and Gintis, they point to the difficulties experienced by the Mitterrand government in
France after its election victory in 1981 as an example of
the power of the "capital strike,"14 but do not integrate this
form of class power into their analysis of radical democratic
change. Instead, the constraints imposed on democratic
change by the ability of capitalists to withdraw their investments and by the international mobility of capital, occur
only in the context of an alternative anti-democratic model
of development called "global liberalism,"lS For Bowles
and Gintis, radical democracy is a means of removing the
limitations on democratic development that are created by
the power of the capital strike,16 but they fail to see that
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the process of development of radical democracy is itself
constrained by this power.
Instead, they simply argue: 1) that this evolution is based
on the essentially democratic character of the drive for expanded "personal rights"; 2) that their postliberal vision is
"not synonymous with the extension of state power," because it "affirms the sentiment that neither the centralized
state nor the capitalist corporation will be the vehicle of
human liberation;" and 3) that the "new technical and organizational demands being made upon economic life today," such as the growing importance of knowledge to the
process of economic growth, are incompatible with the hierarchical nature of capitalism and will raise the costs of maintaining that type of social order.l? None of these explanations deals with the process of conflict that underlies the
movement from a liberal democratic capitalist society into
one which features a radical extension of democratic rights.
Similarly, Laclau and Mouffe are aware of social forces
working against democratic development, but do not feel
that those forces create major incompatibilities between liberal
and radical democracy. At one point, they state that
In the case of the strategy of construction of a new order, the
changes which it is possible to introduce in social positivity
will depend not only on the more or less democratic character
of the forces which pursue that strategy, but also upon a set of
structural limits established by other logics - at the level of
the state apparatuses, the economy and so on.18
But at another point, they observe,
If the radical democratization of society emerges from a variety
of autonomous struggles which are themselves overdetermined
by forms of hegemonic articulation; if, in addition, everything
depends on a proliferation of public spaces of argumentation
and decision whereby social agents are increasingly capable of
self-management; then it is clear that this process does not pass
through a direct attack upon the State apparatuses but involves
the consolidation and democratic reform of the liberal State.
The ensemble of its constitutive principles - division of
powers, universal suffrage, multi-party systems, civil rights etc.
- must be defended and consolidated.
It is within the
framework of these basic principles of the political community
that it is possible to advance the full range of present-day
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democratic demands (from the rights of national, racial and
sexual minorities to the anti-capitalist struggle itself).19
In their discussion of the transition from liberal to radical
democracy, Laclau and Mouffe make no mention of the
"structural limits established by other logics" - particularly
the structural limit represented by the investment powers
and global mobility of private capital - but instead focus
on the ability of liberal democracy to provide "public spaces
of argumentation and decision." This view leaves out of
consideration the role of capitalist economic prerogatives
in constituting liberal democracy, a "constitutive principle"
that is directly challenged by the goals of radical social
change.
Laclau and Mouffe also do not analyze the problems that
may be associated with sustaining the commitment of
"human beings" to greater equality rights in a context of
economic crisis brought on by the opposition of capital to
radical democratic goals. It appears that, in some "essentialist" way, the drive for equality rights is regarded as an
inherent aspect of the human character, one which has been
developing without interruption from the time of the French
Revolution.
Laclau and Mouffe claim that, " ...once human beings accept the principle of equality in one sphere they will attempt
to extend it to every other sphere of life."2Q In their view,
once the principle of political equality was established with
the "Rights of Man" and the French Revolution, an inevitable process was started, leading to the demand for more
and more rights in other spheres of social life. There is no
discussion of the impact of different social situations on
the very existence of this drive. While they do discuss the
effect of various social conditions on the specific form and
timing of demands for equality rights (eg, their analysis of
anti-capitalist struggles in the nineteenth century),21 there
is still an assumption that these events take place within
an overall necessary progression toward the establishment
of equality rights in all spheres of social life.
Because Bowles and Gintis, as well as Laclau and Mouffe,
do not contextualize their analysis of radical democratic
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change in terms of the contradictions created by existing
liberal democratic institutions and their articulation with
capitalist economic prerogatives, they are able to posit a
continuous and linear transformation of liberal democracy
into radical democracy. The result is a form of utopian
democracy in which new democratic forms develop without
any necessary connection to the power relations of liberal
capitalism.
Two Positions Other writers have covered this theme in
their critiques of the radical democratic theorists. Ellen Meiksins Wood, in particular, has stressed the extent to which
Laclau and Mouffe and Bowles and Gintis do not consider
the serious obstacles, at the level of both the state and economy, to the democratization of production relations because they view new democratic relations as a continuation
of liberal democracy.22 These points, however, are made as
part of a general defense of classical Marxist notions concerning the primacy of the working class in the transformation of social relations.23
Two very distinct positions have thus been established.
On the one hand, the radical democrats point to the development of a multiplicity of social movements and a variety
of political identities in the current period, and argue that
democratic struggle must not "privilege" class by assuming
that class antagonism will necessarily occur and will be at
the heart of any democratic mobilization. On the other hand,
the Marxists argue that major democratic change, given the
capitalist context in which it will occur, cannot avoid class
struggle. They also argue that the working class must be
primary because it remains as the only social force capable
of challenging capital on its own terrain at the work place.
The debate thus moves between arguing for "no necessary
classes" or arguing for "the necessity as well as the primacy
of classes."
The present analysis claims that there is no need to
choose between such stark alternatives. The radical democratic theorists do make an important point: that the social
movements have changed the political landscape in the latter
part of the twentieth century by multiplying the number of
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political identities. besides those of class. that can be involved in democratic struggle. and by focusing attention
on other forms of oppression. besides those of class. which
must be dealt with in any truly democratic social transformation. They are also correct in pointing to the fact that
these identities are not necessarily anti-capitalist. but only
become so through a process of "bonding through discourse
and organization. "24
They do assume. however. that. because workers are not
necessarily anti-capitalist. and because class identity is just
one of many identities with a potential interest in radical
democratic change. class antagonisms can be regarded as
a contingent aspect of democratic struggle. This view is
unrealistic because it claims that a political project which
has as one of its goals "the abolition of capitalist relations
of production," and "the displacement of profit-driven capital markets by the democratically accountable planning of
investment and resource allocation." can be pursued without
the necessary involvement of class antagonisms.
In the first place. class-defined struggle is necessary because a major radical democratic task must be to empower
workers in their role as producers (i.e. as a group of people
placed in a particular relationship of subordination to capital); and to create a degree of unity and understanding that
will allow that goal to be achieved. Some specification of
struggle in class terms is necessary in order for workers
and others to understand what is to be accomplished through
an important part of the radical democratic agenda. There
is a correspondence between the goals of radical democratic
change and the creation of class identities that it would be
foolish to ignore. This correspondence is particularly significant given the location of workers at the heart of the
capitalist production process and thus their importance in
terms of successfully implementing radical democratic
change at the work place.
As well. the opposition of private capital to radical social
change is an unavoidable class antagonism. which. it will
be argued below. is more important than ever before. Class
forms of understanding are thus also necessary in order for
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workers and others to see what stands in the way of radical
democratic change.
The critical importance of private capital in opposing
radical democratic demands, and the importance of class
identities in contributing to the achievement of radical democratic goals does not mean that worker-led organizations
and the demands emanating from those bodies must be given
the highest priority in the organization of struggle. Indeed,
it will be argued below that broadly based democratic struggle against capital in the current period is not likely to be
one in which worker-led organizations are dominant or
primary. This paper thus argues for radical democratic
change in which classes are necessarily involved, but does
not argue for a process of struggle in which the working
class is primary.
In this context; it should be pointed out that capitalist
class obstacles do not represent the only barriers to radical
democratic development. There are other potential obstacles
to such a development in areas such as gay and lesbian
rights, gender rights as well as the rights of black and ethnic
minorities which cannot be simply reduced to, or derived
from, class divisions. However, this paper focuses on the
limitations imposed by class power, not because these are
the only obstacles to radical democratic development, but
because it is the constraints in this area which are most
blatantly denied in the attempt by Bowles and Gintis and
by Laclau and Mouffe to downplay the significance of class
antagonisms in the construction of radical democracy.
Strong Capital and Democratic Change The opposition
of capital to fundamental democratic change has a particularly strong impact in the current international economic
context. The globalization of production and of finance has
greatly undermined the ability of governments based in particular nation states to pursue policies that challenge the
economic prerogatives of capital.
A clear illustration of this point is provided by the fate
of the Meidner Plan proposal in Sweden. This plan was
met with stiff and uncompromising resistance on the part
of capital, and was implemented only in a greatly watered
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down form. As Gregg Olsen points out, "A series of amendments made between 1976 and 1983 gutted the plan,leaving
it a mere shadow of the original Meidner program. "25 The
original program had called for the development of wageearner funds which would have given worker-elected representatives a much greater say in the operations of many
of the largest Swedish companies. When the plan was finally
enacted in 1983, the impact of the program was greatly
circumscribed by the limited sources of funds and the inadequate coverage of Swedish corporations. Attempts to increase work place democracy in Sweden experienced a
similar fate. The 1977 Act of Co-determination fell far short
of requiring democratic input on the part of workers.26
A critical reason for the success of Swedish capital in
opposing these changes was its much greater independence
from the Swedish state and economy. During the 1970s and
1980s, a number of economic changes occurred in which
Swedish capital greatly increased the importance of foreign
investment and the proportion of exports in its business
operations.S? These changes decreased the ability of the
Swedish state to exercise control over the investment patterns of Swedish capital, and the ability of Swedish labour
to challenge the prerogatives of capital, because a much
smaller proportion of overall business operations was based
in Sweden or was dependent on the Swedish domestic
market. As well, the Swedish state was much more constrained by international financial markets as a balance of
payments deficit and a government budgetary deficit forced
it to rely on external sources of funding.28
All of these changes undermined the ability of the
Swedish state to pursue democratic reforms that were out
of line with international trends. The original Meidner proposals, which called for a 20 percent levy on corporate profits to finance the wage-earner funds, would have represented a significant cost difference between Sweden and
other countries had it been implemented - a cost difference
that was particularly difficult to implement given the expanded role of exports in overall economic activity. This
cost was in addition to the fact that the original Meidner
proposals would have led to a significant erosion of
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capitalist control over investment and over the disposition
of profits - an erosion which the Swedish state was illprepared to enforce given its greater reliance on international money markets and the increased ability of Swedish
multinationals to move production to other countries.
In important ways, the same situation is apparent in other
western capitalist nations. In all of these countries, there
has been a common tendency toward internationalization
of production and toward expanded trade based on greater
intraindustry specialization and the rapid rise of multinational corporatiens.t? In this more globalized environment,
individual states are increasingly concerned with maintaining conditions within their boundaries that are internationally competitive in order to avoid major shifts of production
away from their areas, to ensure that exports are not priced
out of world markets and to avoid major currency crises.
Robert Cox points out that
Throughout most of this century the role of states has been
conceived as a buffer protecting the national economy from
disruptive external forces in order to encourage internal levels
of economic activity sufficient to sustain domestic employment
and welfare ...In the past couple of decades the priority has
shifted to one of adapting domestic economies to the perceived
exigencies of the world economy.30
The radical democratic agenda runs up squarely against
this new political reality. The increased interest on the part
of states in promoting international competitiveness has
provided a basis in many countries for slashing wages, benefits and other rights won by workers in the period of fordist
compromise.U Even when governments attempt to promote
international competitiveness through various kinds of interventionist policies, rather than through "hyper-liberalism,"32
the purpose is to expand an economy which continues to
be run according to capitalist principles of ownership and
control.
This context makes it very difficult for any liberal democratic government to move against the grain and undermine
capitalist power by increasing popular control over the eco-
nomy. As in the Swedish case, that government would be
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risking serious erosion in the level of exports as well as in
production and employment. It is completely unrealistic to
expect that, in a context of global restructuring, capital
would accept the investment and work place changes of
radical democracy and not move in a massive fashion to
other jurisdictions with more favourable conditions - particularly in those countries, such as the United States, Canada
and Britain, which have strong 'free-market' traditions.
The problems associated with the likely reaction of
capitalists to radical democratic change are only enhanced
by the steady increase in the mobility of capital, which has
indeed accelerated in the 1980s. This change has produced
far more integrated global financial markets employing
sophisticated technologies which allow for the almost instantaneous transfer of large quantities of capital - a
change that greatly increases the ability of capital to respond
to radical democratic demands.33 The ability of capital to
shift when unfavourable economic conditions are perceived
was amply illustrated after Mitterrand's victory in the 1981
election in France. That government was forced to back
down from its redistributive Keynesian policies in the face
of a serious balance of payments deficit, declining investment, and rising unemployment.H
However, the importance of globalization is not restricted
only to demands for investment and work place democracy.
The entire gamut of radical democratic concerns ranging
"from the rights of national, racial and sexual minorities to
the anti-capitalist struggle itself" are affected by this
changed context. The current environment of limitations on
human rights legislation, of funding cuts for AIDS research
and development programs and for women's programs are
all part of a political agenda that is heavily informed by
the "need" to promote international competitiveness through
lowering taxes, reducing business costs, and maintaining
maximum "flexibility" in the utilization of labour.35
This context is diametrically opposed to radical democratic changes concerned with increasing the rights of oppressed groups under liberal democratic capitalism. As was
shown by the opposition of capital to the development of
pay equity in Ontario's private sector and the response of
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the provincial state to capital's opposition, there is little
willingness to implement changes which greatly increase
costs of production and limit the ability of capital to determine employment conditions. In Ontario, small capital was
opposed to any form of legislated pay equity, claiming that
it could not afford it, and the provincial government
responded to this opposition by exempting all employers
with 10 or fewer workers from the legislation. Large capital
was also opposed to pay equity and gained a series of
amendments to the legislation which greatly limited the
scope and coverage of the plan in the private sector.36 These
limitations were passed despite the efforts of the Equal Pay
Coalition, which had fought for much more inclusive legislation. Currently in Ontario, there is strong business opposition to the reform agenda of the New Democratic Party
(NDP) government. How many of its planned changes in
areas such as pay equity, worker protection, and increased
minimum wages will be implemented, in the face of threats
by capital that Ontario will suffer for its support of the
NDP, remains to be seen.37
None of these issues, however, are considered by Bowles
and Gintis or by Laclau and Mouffe because they do not
see any form of fundamental contradiction between liberal
democracy and radical democracy. Rather, because the development of new forms of social relations is seen as an
unproblematic extension of existing liberal democratic
trends within capitalism, there is no attempt to consider the
potentially disruptive impact of strong capital in an era of
global competition. Indeed, for Bowles and Gintis, radical
democracy is a major means of stimulating economic growth
through increasing work place productivity and eliminating
the economic costs associated with the need to monitor and
supervise labour in the alienated conditions of hierarchical
work places.38
Marxism and Radical Democracy There is another important reason why Laclau and Mouffe and Bowles and Gintis
do not place enough emphasis on the class obstacles to
radical democratic change: their rejection of Marxism and
its insistence on class struggle as a necessary aspect of fun141
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damental democratic transformation. The desire on the part
of these theorists to distance themselves from Marxist explanations of social change leads to a very limited treatment
of Marxism as a body of theory.
From Marx through to more recent Marxist literature on
the transition to socialism, one central concern of Marxists
has been the tension between democratic expansion and
class forms of social power.39 Neither Laclau and Mouffe
nor Bowles and Gintis discuss this aspect of the Marxist
debate in a serious way. Instead, they simply claim that
Marxism is fatally flawed by a commitment to objectively
defined class struggle, and by a tendency toward "totalitarian" forms of politics. On this basis they move beyond
Marxism to "new" forms of politics in which there is a
greater appreciation of the importance of democratic rights
as well as a less predetermined view of social change.40
But this simply ignores central aspects of the main
theoretical concerns of Marxists. The fact that Marxist debates have often led to a qualified belief in the possibility
of democracy in particular situations is neither the result
of a lack of concern with democratic rights, nor is it due
to a commitment to objectively defined social change.
Rather it is due to their belief that the possibility of democracy in advanced capitalism cannot be defined or analyzed
without considering the class contradictions that would
stand in the way of any major attempt at the democratic
transformation of the economy.
This aspect of Marxist analysis needs to be retained in
any radical democratic project. Because both Laclau and
Mouffe and Bowles and Gintis do not seriously consider
this crucially important theme in Marxist thought, they also
do not seriously consider the important insights which Marxism provides concerning the class structures of power and
domination that must be overcome if the development of
radical democratic institutions is to proceed.
However, not all aspects of Marxist analysis retain their
relevancy in the current period. The growth of the social
movements and the dramatic failures in Eastern Europe have
changed the context of struggle in a way that undermines
the tenability of traditional Marxist arguments concerning
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the leadership role of the working class. While, as was stated
earlier, class-based forms of mobilization are necessary
given the class obstacles to democratic change and the goals
of radical democracy, this does not imply that radical democratic struggle must focus on workers as the primary agents
of social transformation. Indeed, in the present context, an
insistence on the primacy of worker-led struggle is divisive
and has little possibility of success.
The social movements have been very important in emphasizing the existence of other sites of oppression outside
the work place, and in establishing autonomous organizations for the purpose of mobilizing resistance in a variety
of areas - including resistance against capital.41 Activists
in a number of social movements, such as peace activists
struggling against the military/industrial complex, or environmentalists struggling against corporate pollution, or
feminists struggling against the exploitation of women in
various parts of the world, have been instrumental in
developing opposition to capital. But these struggles are
part of wider agendas that are not strictly concerned with
traditional socialist goals. They are also concerned with social changes, such as more ecologically-sustainable patterns
of development or the creation of more equal relationships
between women and men, that do not necessarily flow from
the establishment of more democratic production relations.
These various organizations are thus not prepared to
redefine themselves primarily along class lines or to subordinate themselves to the primacy of worker-led organizations.
What is required at the present time is a hegemonic strategy against global capital that builds on the existing foundations developed by the social movements and by labour
activists in various countries, rather than a strategy which
systematically alienates large segments of potential support
by insisting on the primacy of the working class in any
process of social transformation. In the current context, especially in light of the democratic failures in Eastern Europe
and in other so-called "worker states," any attempt to subordinate the diverse forms of opposition to capital under
the primacy of worker-led resistance would fail and would
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only weaken existing movements for change. In this regard,
Marxism has something to learn from the radical democratic
theorists and their insistence on the plural character of struggle in the latter part of the twentieth century.
None of this, however, justifies the tendency of the radical democratic theorists to stress continuity between liberal
and radical democracy. The need to integrate a diversity of
struggles into democratic change does not negate the fact
that serious impediments remain between the two types of
democracy. In an era of global capital, it is more important
than ever before to recognize the major obstacles to radical
democratic expansion and the utopian qualities of any vision
which claims that the radical democratic agenda can be
developed as a simple extension of existing liberal
democratic trends.
Notes
This article benefitted greatly from the comments of the reviewers at
Studies in Political Economy. particularly those of Manfred Bienefeld.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
144
Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, Democracy and Capitalism (New
York: Basic Books. 1987). hereinafter referred to as DC; Emesto
Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (London: Verso. 1985). hereinafter referred to as HSS. An important summary and defense of Laclau and Mooffe's position in Hegemony
and Socialist Strategy will also be used extensively in the paper:
Emesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, "Post-Marxism Without
Apologies," New Left Review No. 166 (Nov-Dec 1987), pp. 79-106,
hereinafter referred to as "PMWA."
HSS, p, 176.
HSS, p, 192.
HSS, pp. 159-160; "PMWA," pp. 104-105.
DC, p. 179.
DC, p. 179.
DC, p. 209.
DC, 27-64; HSS, 152-171; "PMWA," 104-106.
HSS, p. 58.
DC, p. 161.
DC, pp. 18-20; "PMWA," pp. 103-104; HSS, pp. 85-88.
HSS, p, 176.
DC, 174-175.
DC, p. 190.
DC, pp. 188-193.
DC, p. 209.
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17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
DC, pp. 179-180.
HSS. p. 190.
"PMWA," p. 105.
"PMWA," pp, 104-105.
HSS, pp. 156-157.
Ellen Meiksins Wood, The Retreat From Class (London: Verso.
1986). See also Nonnan Geras, "Post-Marxism'}" New Left Review
No. 163 (Mayflune 1987). pp. 78-80.
23. Wood, The Retreat from Class. pp. 14-15; Geras, "Post-Marxism'}"
pp. SO-51 and pp. 80-81.
24. DC, p. 161.
25. Gregg Olsen, "Labour Mobilization and the Strength of Capital: The
Rise and Stall of Economic Democracy in Sweden," Studies in Political Economy No. 34 (Spring 1991), p. 114. See also: Leo Paniteh,
"The Tripartite Experience," in K. Banting (ed.), The State and
Economic Interests (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986).
pp.55-63.
26. Olsen. "Labour Mobilization ...••• p. 113.
27. Ibid., pp, 115-136.
28. Ibid., p. 127.
29. For a discussion of these changes, see Nigel Grimwade, International
Trade: New Patterns of Trade. Production and Investment (London:
Routledge, 1989), Chapters 2 and 4.
30. Robert W. Cox, "The Global Political Economy and Social Choice,"
in D. Drache and L. Genler (eds.), The New Era of Global Competition (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1991). p. 337.
31. On the rise and fall of the fordist compromise, see A. Glyn, A.
Hughes, A. Lipietz, and A. Singh, "The Rise and Fall of the Golden
Age," in Stephen A. Marglin and Juliet Schor (eds.), The Golden
Age of Capitalism (Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1990). pp. 39-125.
32. This tenn is used by Cox. "The Global Political Economy and Social
Choice," p. 342.
33. On the changes that have occurred in capital markets, see D.E.
Ayling, The Internationalization
of Stock Markets: The Trend
Towards Greater Foreign Borrowing and Investment (Aldershot,
England: Gower, 1986), and Paul Stonham, Global Stock Market
Reforms (Aldershot: Gower, 1987).
34. For a discussion of the many policy reversals of the Mitterrand
government, see Peter Hall, Governing the Economy (Cambridge:
Polity, 1986). pp. 192-226.
35. For an example of this political agenda in Canada, see Warren Magnusson et, al., The New Reality: The Politics of Restraint in British
Columbia (Vancouver: New Star Books, 1984).
36. Concerning the opposition of capital to pay equity, see Carl Cuneo,
Pay Equity (Don Mills: Oxford University Press, 1990). pp. 30-31.
35-36. 40-41, 55-65, 86-95, 100-102 and 116-119. See also Pat
Annstrong and Hugh Annstrong, "Lessons From Pay Equity," Studies
in Political Economy No. 32 (Summer 1990). pp. 35-37.
37. Toronto Star 26 June 1991, p. D1.
38. DC. pp. 211-213.
145
Studies in Political Economy
39.
40.
41.
146
For a discussion of this theme in Marxist analysis, see Martin Camoy,
The State and Political Theory (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1984).
HSS, pp. 85-88; "PMWA," pp. 105-106; DC, pp. 14-20.
There is a large and growing literature on the social movements.
Only a few examples can be cited here. For a discussion of feminist
activism in several areas of resistance, including resistance against
capital, see Guida West and Rhoda Lois Blumberg, Women and Social
Protest (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). On the antinuclear movements, see Wolfgang Rudig, Anti-Nuclear Movements:
A World Survey of Opposition to Nuclear Energy (Longman, 1990).
Concerning the very active peace movement in Britain, see James
Hinton, Protests and Visions: Peace Politics in 20th Century Britain
(London: Hutchinson Radius, 1989).