Reading for class

Here’s the link to Adam Morton’s generous—and, in my view, perceptive—review of my book, Development and Globalization: A Marxian Class Analysis.

The main point I want to articulate is that the book is indispensable reading for class in the twofold sense that this phrase can be read. First, as indispensable reading for class in that key chapters in the book shape my classrooms on political economy across the span of undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and research. Second, as indispensable reading for class in delivering a Marxist social class analysis of planning, development and globalisation at a time when many in and beyond the academy are consciously engaged in expunging class as an aspect of radical political economy.

Class acts in political economy

Another event, Class Acts in Political Economy with my friend Kath Gibson, in Australia—to go with my lectures at the University of Sydney and the University of Wollongong.

Utopia after the crash

Another lecture I’ll be giving while in Australia next month. . .

Travel days

I’m off for 3 days or so. No posts then until I return. . .

Tweet this!

I know. I’m a little late to the party. But I’ve finally decided to experiment with Twitter.

I’ve activated my account, which I’ll use to announce posts from this blog and items I find that don’t warrant a full blog post. You don’t need to be on Twitter yourself, although if you are I’m @Dfruccio.

I plan to continue to emphasize my work on this blog (because I prefer the longer writing form) but Twitter may help expand the conversation. We’ll see how it goes. . .

Travel days

I’m off for 12 days or so. No posts then (aside, perhaps, from daily cartoons) until I return. . .

Utopia and the critique of political economy

I’m honored to have been invited to deliver the 9th Annual E. L. Wheelwright Memorial Lecture at the University of Sydney in October.

The title of my lecture will be “Utopia and the Critique of Political Economy”:

In my 2016 E. L. Wheelwright Memorial Lecture paper, I want to present for discussion the thesis that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels had a much more positive assessment and appreciation of “utopian socialism,” especially the work of Robert Owen, than we find in traditional, “scientific” interpretations of Marxism (emanating from both inside and outside the Marxian tradition).

I also intend to connect that debate over utopian socialism to the rich, long history of intentional communities in Australia, beginning with Herrnhut in 1853. Finally, I plan to argue that, while Marxian theory is not a utopianism (unlike, for example, neoclassical economics), it does have what I consider to be a “utopian moment,” which is based on the idea of ruthless criticism.

In my view, it is the twofold critique of political economy—the critique of capitalism and of mainstream economic theory—that needs to be recaptured and rethought, since it is particularly relevant to the debate about the causes and consequences of the crash of 2007-08 and the ongoing crises of capitalism in the world today.