Chicago Political Workshop

Andrew Kliman of the News & Letters splinter group The Marxist-Humanist Initiative is right to take to task those on the left who treat all attempts to understand the political economy of capitalism as rank economism-- whatever his problems acknowledging his debts to Moishe Postone. He approvingly cites the critique of this phenomenon from Nitzan and Bichler who write: "many contemporary critics of capitalism seem to believe that they can challenge this social order without ever asking how it operates, let alone why."

It is our sense that Kliman's work thus far is inadequate to his own charge, but that he is right that understanding capitalism is essential to overcoming it. Arguably, an inadequate grasp of capitalism-- or, more precisely, a grasp that misrecognized the liberal phase of capitalism as capitalism's only possible form-- doomed the politics of the Second International and its communist and social democratic splinters in the wake of the First World War when "organized capitalism" began to develop.

CORRECTION: The claim by Principia Dialectica, referenced above, about Kliman acknowledging his debts to Postone has been demonstrated to be inaccurate.

Kliman's response cam be found here.

The CPW apology can be found here.

PDE