[Xmca-l] Re: If economics is immune from ethics, why should exploitation be a topic of discussion in economics?

[Bill Kerr]

It's a while since I looked at this but Vanessa Wills has her PhD thesis
"Marx and Morality" on line:
http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/10867/1/VWills_ETD_2011.pdf

On Thu, Jul 19, 2018 at 9:57 AM, Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org> wrote:

> Yes. The 1844 Manuscripts contain more obviously ethical language and
> ideas than *Capital* does at first sight, but we still have the same
> contradiction that wherever Marx addresses Ethics he dismisses it. In the
> later works he seems to be advocating a "scientific objectivism" which is
> not so much the case with 1844. I neglected to mention in responding to
> Harshad, that Marx also rejected with justified contempt "emotivist"
> approaches to Ethics, i.e., the reduction of Ethics to feelings and
> preferences, which became very fashionable in the decades after his death.
> As you could see from that link I posted, the Social Democracy made a lot
> of efforts to fill this gap, but this was all swept away with the Russian
> Revolution and the Third International. I think it is only via Hegel that a
> Marxist Ethics can be recovered, but it is challenging.
>
> Andy
> ------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
> On 19/07/2018 11:12 AM, Greg Thompson wrote:
>
> Sorry, I misread your post Andy. Don't think my question really makes
> sense in light of your meaning. (I assume that you'd agree with the
> sentiment of my question...).
> -greg
>
> On Thu, Jul 19, 2018 at 1:09 AM, Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Thanks Andy, that's very interesting/informative. Would you say that this
>> is true for his 1844 economic and philosophical manuscripts as well? I'm
>> thinking of the notion of "species being" as an ethical concept.
>>
>> This is all well over my head, but I thought I'd try the question.
>> -greg
>>
>> On Wed, Jul 18, 2018 at 5:17 AM, Andy Blunden < <andyb@marxists.org>
>> andyb@marxists.org> wrote:
>>
>>> Harshad,
>>>
>>> According to Marx, "exploitation," as he uses the concept in *Capital*,
>>> is not an ethical concept at all; it simply means making a gain by
>>> utilising an affordance, as in "exploiting natural resources." Many
>>> "Marxist economists" today adhere to this view. However, I am one of those
>>> that hold a different view. And the legacy of Stalinism is evidence of some
>>> deficit in the legacy of Marx's writing - it was so easy for Stalin to
>>> dismiss ethics as just so much nonsense and claim the mantel of Marxism!
>>>
>>> Much as I admire Marx, he was wrong on Ethics. He was a creature of his
>>> times in this respect, or rather in endeavouring to *not* be a creature
>>> of his times, he made an opposite error. He held all ethics in contempt as
>>> if religion had a monopoly on this topic, and it were nothing more than
>>> some kind of confidence trick to fool the masses. (Many today share this
>>> view.) In fact, contrary to his own self-consciousness, *Capital* is a
>>> seminal work of ethics.
>>>
>>> The problem stems from Hegel and from Marx's efforts to make a positive
>>> critique of Hegel. As fine a work of Ethics as Hegel's *Philosophy of
>>> Right* is, it had certain problems which Marx had to overcome. These
>>> included Hegel's insistence that the state alone could determine right and
>>> wrong (the state could of course make errors, but in the long run there is
>>> no extramundane source of Right beyond the state). This was something
>>> impossible for Marx to accept. And yet Hegel's idea of Ethics as something
>>> objective, contained in the evolving forms of life (rather than Pure Reason
>>> inherent in every individual as Kant held, or from God via His agents on
>>> Earth, the priesthood), Marx wished to embrace and continue.
>>>
>>> So the situation is very complex. The foremost work on Ethics was
>>> authored by a person who did not believe they wrote about Ethics at all.
>>>
>>> Here is a page with lots of resources on this question:
>>> https://www.marxists.org/subject/ethics/index.htm
>>>
>>> Andy
>>> ------------------------------
>>> Andy Blunden
>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>>> On 18/07/2018 2:54 PM, Harshad Dave wrote:
>>>
>>> Why do we discuss on exploitation?
>>> As per Marx's views, ethics has no influence on economic processes. Does
>>> exploitation have no link with ethical feelings? The sense of exploitation
>>> is absolutely linked with our ethical feelings. If economics is immune from
>>> influence of ethics and sense of *exploitation* is founded on our
>>> ethical evaluation, then discussion on *exploitation* should not find
>>> place in the topics of economics/political economics.
>>> Harshad Dave
>>> <hhdave15@gmail.com>hhdave15@gmail.com
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Harshad Dave
>>> ​ <hhdave15@gmail.com>hhdave15@gmail.com​
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
>> Assistant Professor
>> Department of Anthropology
>> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
>> Brigham Young University
>> Provo, UT 84602
>> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
>> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Anthropology
> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> Brigham Young University
> Provo, UT 84602
> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>
>
>
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