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

Thu Jul 19 07:50:39 PDT 2018

Hello,

I have reflected these issue too. Those few ethical lines in Das Kapital - its ethical frame of reference remind very much Adam Smith’s theory of moral sentimentals. Indeed those line kind of revoke Smith’s ethical sentiments of “impartial spectator”.

Greetings from very hot Finland, 32 celsius
Rauno Huttunen

Lähettäjä: Bill Kerr [mailto:billkerr@gmail.com]
Lähetetty: torstai 19. heinäkuuta 2018 14.45
Vastaanottaja: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Aihe: [Xmca-l] Re: If economics is immune from ethics, why should exploitation be a topic of discussion in economics?

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<mailto: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<mailto: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<mailto: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<mailto:hhdave15@gmail.com>

Harshad Dave
hhdave15@gmail.com<mailto:hhdave15@gmail.com>

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Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
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--
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
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http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson

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