Showing posts with label Capitalism. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 14, 2023

Some Thoughts on Science, Dialectics and Capital - After Luis Arboledas-Lerida

Some Thoughts on Science, Dialectics and Capital - After Luis Arboledas-Lérida

This is a critique of Luis Arboledas-Lérida's article, The Gap Between Science and Society and the Intrinsically Capitalistic Character of Science Communication—https://doi.org/10.1080/02691728.2022.2111670—for the Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective.

It is now online at:

ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/367077773_Some_Thoughts_on_Science_Dialectics_and_Capital_-_After_Luis_Arboledas-Lerida

Academia: https://www.academia.edu/94894824/Some_Thoughts_on_Science_Dialectics_and_Capital_After_Luis_Arboledas_L%C3%A9rida

Arboledas-Lérida's article was published in 'Social Epistemology' online on 21 September. This critical review was published in Social Epistemology Review & Reply Collective on 11 January 2023.

See: https://wp.me/p1Bfg0-7uV Cite as: Rikowski, Glenn. 2023. Some Thoughts on Science, Dialectics and Capital—After Luis Arboledas-Lérida. Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 12 (1): 13-21. https://wp.me/p1Bfg0-7uV.

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski:

@ Academia: https://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

@ ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn-Rikowski

Thursday, June 8, 2017

Reading Capital: Wealth In-Against-And Beyond Value - John Holloway in Lincoln

John Holloway

READING CAPITAL: WEALTH IN-AGAINST-AND BEYOND VALUE – JOHN HOLLOWAY IN LINCOLN

Research in Critical Education Studies (RiCES)

School of Education

University of Lincoln

Brayford Pool

16 June 2017

1:00-4:00pm

Room: Minerva Building, MB1012

Professor John Holloway will be speaking about his new work, ‘Reading Capital: wealth in-against-and-beyond value’ at the University of Lincoln, on 16th of June.

John’s reading and writings on Marxist social theory are highly influential as a way of rethinking Marx in terms of ‘Change the World Without Taking Power’ (2005) and abolishing the social relations of capitalist production through acts of resistance, as ways to ‘Crack Capitalism’ (2010). In this new work, ‘Reading Capital’ John points out that Capital does not start with the commodity, as Marx and probably all commentators since Marx have claimed. It actually starts with wealth: “The wealth of societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails appears as an ‘immense collection of commodities’ …” Seeing wealth and not the commodity as the starting point has enormous consequences, both theoretically and politically. To say that Capital starts not with the commodity but with wealth is both revolutionary and self-evident. The challenge is to trace this antagonism through the three volumes of Marx’s Capital. This is the theme of the talk.

Free Buffet lunch is included.

Register for this event: https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/home/campuslife/whatson/eventsconferences/crack-capitalism.html

Research in Critical Education Studies (RiCES): https://criticaleducation.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/

***END***

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski

Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Friday, October 16, 2015

Seminars on Contemporary Marxist Theory

Karl Marx's Grave

SEMINARS ON CONTEMPORARY MARXIST THEORY

Wednesday 21 October

Stathis Kouvelakis

Lessons of the Greek Crisis

6pm

S-1.04 Strand Building (NB in basement), King's College London, Strand WC2R 2LS

Monday 9 November

Riccardo Bellofiore & Alex Callinicos

A Dialogue on Alex Callinicos's book Deciphering Capital: Marx's Capital and Its Destiny

5pm

K0.20, King's Building, King's College London, Strand WC2R 2LS

Wednesday 25 November

Nicholas De Genova

Theorising the 'Crisis' of the European Border Regime

6pm

342N Norfolk Building, King's College London, Strand WC2R 2LS

The Seminar in Contemporary Marxist Theory is a collaboration among scholars in the departments of European & International Studies, Geography, and Management at King's College London.

For further information contact Stathis Kouvelakis & stathis.kouvelakis@kcl.ac.uk

First Published in http://www.historicalmaterialism.org/news/distributed/london-seminar-on-contemporary-marxist-theory

***END***

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Ruth Rikowski at Serendipitous Moments: http://ruthrikowskiim.blogspot.co.uk/

Karl Marx

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work

INVENTING THE FUTURE: POSTCAPITALISM AND A WORLD WITHOUT WORK

Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams

Book Launch

At Housmans

Housmans Bookshop, Peace House, 5 Caledonian Road, King’s Cross
London, N1 9DX
Tel: 020 7837 4473
e: shop@housmans.com

Wednesday 28th October, 7.00pm

Entry £3, redeemable against any purchase

Launch of Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work

By Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams

Verso, 2015

ISBN-13: 978-1-78478-096-8 (paperback)

Despite the profound crisis of capitalism and the mass mobilizations of people around the world in response, there has been no successful contestation of neoliberalism’s hegemony. Inventing the Future is a major new manifesto that argues for a novel set of alternatives for the future—alternatives which seek to rekindle a popular modernity.

Against the confused understanding of the high-tech and neoliberal world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, the authors envisage a post-capitalist economy is capable of advancing living standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies which free us from biological and environmental constraints.

Reviews

“Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams' project dares to propose a different way of thinking and acting. Given the fizzling of the Occupy moment, a radical rethinking of the anarchic approach is badly needed but just not happening. This book could do a lot of work in getting that rethink going.”

– Doug Henwood, author of Wall Street

“The Left has lost its grip on the future. In retreat from technological modernity, too many leftists have fled to the local, the organic and the spontaneous. Inventing the Future shows why these strategies are misguided, and offers a vision of how left-wing politics can be rebuilt for the 21st century.”

– Mark Fisher, author of Capitalist Realism: Is there no Alternative?

Events at Housmans: http://www.housmans.com/events.php

Housmans – radical booksellers since 1945: http://www.housmans.com/

***END***

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Ruth Rikowski at Serendipitous Moments: http://ruthrikowskiim.blogspot.co.uk/

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Back to the Future: Launching the Left Book Club

BACK TO THE FUTURE: LAUNCHING THE LEFT BOOK CLUB

November 17^th

Conway Hall

25 Red Lion Square

London, WC1R 4RL

7.00pm

With: Ken Livingstone, Kevin Ovenden, Natalie Bennett, Kate Osamor MP and others

Suggested donations, £5, concessions £3

To book your place email: admin@leftbookclub.com

The original Left Book Club was founded in 1936 as a means of promoting radical debate in Britain. It swiftly became a phenomenon, distributing over 2 million books and forming 1,200 reading and discussion groups across the country. It engaged in political activity, including solidarity work (e.g. with Spain), political agitation and much else. The LBC is considered a factor in the creation of the Welfare State and in Labour’s landslide election victory of 1945. It closed in 1948.

Today we face a similar crisis to that of the 1930s, with capitalism breeding inequality, suffering and violence around the world. As then, however, the global left remains mobilised and committed to the creation of a fairer society, free of the repression and austerity that has defined the modern era.

The re-launch of the Left Book Club will help us rise to the challenge posed by the global crisis. The LBC will publish four books a year covering a range of progressive traditions, perspectives and ideas focused on the UK, Europe and the rest of the world.

Our aim is for these books to form the basis of a wide network of reading circles, discussion groups and other educational and cultural activities relevant to constructing the conditions for progressive social change in the interests of working people.

Jeremy Corbyn:

The relaunch of the Left Book Club is a terrific and timely idea, and will give intellectual ballast to the wave of political change sweeping Britain and beyond, encouraging informed and compassionate debate.

The work will open minds and inspire. I have a large collection of Left Book Club publications collected by my parents and me.

I support the LBC wholeheartedly.

The Left Book Club: http://www.leftbookclub.com/

***END***

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Ruth Rikowski at Serendipitous Moments: http://ruthrikowskiim.blogspot.co.uk/

Monday, January 19, 2015

Never Work

NEVER WORK

Cardiff University Conference

Friday 10 July 2015

Call for Papers

“A corpse rules society – the corpse of labour.” – Manifesto Against Labour, Krisis-Group

Since the 1970s modern societies have been increasingly faced with social issues caused by a reliance on a form of life that technological development is making redundant: work. Competition drives companies to eject human beings from the labour process even while it relies on those people as consumers and producers of value. Equally, more human beings than ever before depend upon the capitalist production process for their survival, yet at this historical juncture it appears no longer to have need of them. It is this contradiction that some contemporary social critics have diagnosed as the basis of a crisis of civilisation through which we are currently living. The symptoms of this crisis are manifold and, one can argue, affect every aspect of society: privatisation, financialisation and economic crises, mass unemployment, the casualisation of labour and austerity programmes, regional conflict, the rise of political extremism, growing wealth inequality, individualisation, school shootings and the ever-growing number of people suffering from narcissistic personality disorders, to name but a few.

Despite the sheer scale of problems that society currently faces, the dominant social discourse has rarely considered that a crisis of the very categories of capitalist society could be the source of the problem. Work, in particular, is central to modern notions of individual and collective identity, of morality and even of human nature. It is the means through which individuals are expected to realise themselves and to gain access to social wealth. It is perhaps for this reason that, while work is often seen as central to resolving the current crisis – either through calls for higher wages and the right to work or through attacks on immigrants and the unemployed – it is rarely seen as the problem in itself. The aim of this conference is therefore to ask what might a critique of work usefully offer us in addressing contemporary social issues and, if one will allow it, the possibility of a greater crisis of modern civilisation.

Contributors might consider:

· What kinds of critique of work are necessary, on the basis of what criteria and in the name of what alternatives?

· What hampers such a critique and how can we remove, go around or through these barriers?

· What critical theories can usefully contribute to a contemporary critique of work?

· How can contemporary social movements benefit from a critique of work?

· How might a theoretical critique of work manifest itself practically and how might critiques of work in practice inform theoretical critiques?

· What lessons can we learn from historical and contemporary social movements against work?

· What might a critique of work tell us about the political, economic and psychological forms and changes that society is currently experiencing?

· What are particularly unexamined aspects of the critique of work that need addressing?

· How widespread and persistent are critiques of work in contemporary social movements and what kinds of critique of work have they developed?

· What useful relationship might the critique of work have with critiques of the state, patriarchy, politics and other social forms?

· What alternatives to work still exist, have existed and might exist?

Confirmed keynote speakers will be: Anselm Jappe (author of Guy Debord, Les Aventures de la marchandise, Crédit à mort) and Norbert Trenkle (author of Die Große Entwertung, Dead Men Working). Both of our keynotes are members of the wertkritik, or “critique of value”, school of Marxian critique.

Abstracts of 350 words, with a small bio, should be sent to Dr Alastair Hemmens (hemmensa@cardiff.ac.uk) by 20 February 2015.

The conference itself will take place at Cardiff University, Wales, on 10 July 2015.

This research is funded by the Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship: Dr Alastair Hemmens, “‘Ne travaillez jamais’: The Critique of Work in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century French Thought, from Charles Fourier to Guy Debord.”

Website: http://www.marblepunk.com/2015/01/never-work-cardiff-university.html

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski?ev=hdr_xprf

Online Publications at The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Sunday, January 11, 2015

What is Capitalism? An How to Abolish It?

WHAT IS CAPITALISM? AND HOW TO ABOLISH IT?

SUNDAY, JANUARY 18, 2015

6:00-8:30 PM

Westside Peace Center

3916 Sepulveda Blvd., near Venice Blvd. (free parking in rear)

Suite 101-102, press #22 at door to get into building

Culver City (LA area)

SPEAKERS:

Matt Owen, labor and Latin America solidarity activist

Sarah Mason, former Occupy LA activist

As we view the current crises – over racist police murder and brutality, endless war, poverty wages, and environmental destruction – activists are increasingly looking at capitalism as the underlying source of these problems and the obstacle to their solution. While many point to neoliberal capitalism as the culprit, this implicitly suggests that another, more humane and just capitalism is possible. This meeting will take a different tack, examining capitalism as such, as a system in need of total uprooting.

Background readings for those interested these questions are almost limitless, but for starters we suggest Marx’s “Wage Labor and Capital,” a short text written for workers.

Sponsored by the West Coast Chapter, International Marxist-Humanist Organization

More information: <arise@internationalmarxisthumanist.org> and http://www.internationalmarxisthumanist.org/

Join our Facebook page: "International Marxist-Humanist Organization" https://www.facebook.com/groups/imhorg/

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ ResearchGate: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Glenn_Rikowski?ev=hdr_xprf

Online Publications at The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Saturday, May 10, 2014

Historical Materialism Sydney Conference 2014

HISTORICAL MATERIALISM SYDNEY CONFERENCE 2014

CALL FOR PAPERS

STATES, SOCIAL REPRODUCTION, CAPITAL

We call this conference in a historical moment marked, at the level of public discourse, above all by uncertainty in the face of a continuing crisis of both capitalist production and the ideological, political and social forms that have hitherto underpinned it. This uncertainty is expressed, implicitly or explicitly, not just by the managers, functionaries and prognosticators of capital and state, but also by those movements that claim to systemically oppose it. Additionally, our conference coincides with the centennial of the outbreak of World War I.

Eulogies to bravery aside, this conjuncture – of present distemper and historical disaster – allows us to ask again, and hopefully ask differently, many of the questions considered central to the broad Marxist tradition. The Great War, for many in that tradition, marked the spectacular limit point or exhaustion of a particular configuration of capital accumulation, the result of which – as figures as preeminent as Engels had prophesied – could only be bloody. To what extent do we face a similar limit point today, even if we have thus far been spared the scale of sacrificial slaughter of that previous one?

This question cannot be answered by scholars and activists operating in isolation; instead, it requires sustained theoretical and practical activity across virtually the entire field of Marxist research and practice: the critique of political economy opening out to critiques of the state; examinations of the relationship between the state, capital, and the social movements that contest both; investigations into the specificity of class and its relation to other structural forms of oppression; considerations of the nature and form that a communist revolution will take today (1914 marking too, of course, the failure of one such conception); interrogations of the relevance of imperialism and settler colonialism to the current conjuncture; and critical analyses of the production of nature on a world-scale. To answer or even just correctly pose these questions requires an engagement with Marxism’s multifarious inheritances, but will also imply openness to new data, integration with the experience of new social struggles, and fresh theoretical perspectives informed by these.

We ask for submissions of 250 word abstracts for papers on these and other topics that engage with this broader tradition, critically or otherwise; panel proposals should include short abstracts for each paper coupled with an outline of the panel as a whole. We especially welcome contributions from activists and scholars outside of (or peripheral to) the academy.

All submissions should be emailed to hmaustralasia [at] gmail.com.

Website: https://hmaustralasia.org/2014/04/15/historical-materialism-australasia-2014-states-social-reproduction-capital/

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Monday, April 7, 2014

Marx's Early Writings on Transcending Capitalism

MARX'S EARLY WRITINGS ON TRANSCENDING CAPITALISM

SUNDAY, APRIL 20, 2014

6:00-8:00 PM

Westside Peace Center

3916 Sepulveda Blvd., near Venice Blvd. (free parking in rear)

Suite 101-102, press #22 at door to get into building

Culver City (LA area)

Speaker:

ALI KIANI, Iranian Marxist activist and translator

In contrast to the traditional view that Marx's work is restricted to a critique of capitalism and does not contain a detailed or coherent conception of its alternative, this presentation will focus on aspects of his early critiques of political economy, from the POVERTY OF PHILOSOPHY (1847) through the GRUNDRISSE (1857-58). We will discuss the notion, developed recently in Peter Hudis's MARX'S CONCEPT OF THE ALTERNATIVE TO CAPITALISM, that Marx was committed to a specific concept of a post-capitalist society that informed his critique of value production, alienated labor, and capitalist accumulation. Instead of focusing on the present with only a passing reference to the future, Marx's emphasis on capitalism's tendency towards dissolution is rooted in a specific conception of what should replace it. We will critically re-examine that conception in the context of the quest for an alternative to capitalism, something that has taken on increased importance today.

Suggested reading: Ch. 2 of Peter Hudis, MARX'S CONCEPT OF THE ALTERNATIVE TO CAPITALISM (Haymarket Books, 2013)

Sponsored by the West Coast Chapter, International Marxist-Humanist Organization

More information: arise@internationalmarxisthumanist.org

http://www.internationalmarxisthumanist.org

Here is the link to the online announcement of the meeting for posting via email, Facebook, etc.: http://www.internationalmarxisthumanist.org/events/los-angeles-marxs-early-writings-transcending-capitalism

Join our new Facebook page: "International Marxist-Humanist Organization" https://www.facebook.com/groups/imhorg/

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski at Academia: http://independent.academic.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Monday, March 17, 2014

Understanding Neoliberalism

UNDERSTANDING NEOLIBERALISM

With Neil Davidson and Anwar Shaikh

Friday, March 21 * 7pm * RSVP on fb.

Puck Building 4th floor * 295 Lafayette St (at Houston)

Neoliberalism is a term often used, yet rarely in the same way twice.

We are very excited to welcome Neil Davidson and Anwar Shaikh to a discussion that can help establish just what we mean when we say "neoliberalism".

Our speakers will help untangle the complicated -- and often contradictory -- understandings of neoliberalism.

Aspects covered will include:

*neoliberalism as a period in the history of capitalism;

*the long-term effects of capitalist globalization;

*the short-term impact of capitalist crisis;

*and social neoliberalism as a regime of consolidation.

Readings to prepare:

The neoliberal era in Britain: Historical developments and current perspectives - Neil Davidson

The Economic Mythology of Neoliberalism - Anwar Shaikh

Presented by Haymarket Books and the NYC International Socialist Organization, as part of their Socialism Series.

* * *

About the Speakers

Neil Davidson lectures in Sociology in the School of Political and Social Science at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. He is the author of several books, including:

"Holding Fast to an Image of the Past: Essays on Marxism and History" (http://bit.ly/1gdq5zQ) -- forthcoming; "How Revolutionary Were the Bourgeois Revolutions?" (http://bit.ly/1iEw6sJ); and "Discovering the Scottish Revolution," (http://bit.ly/1fyNdxn) for which he was awarded the Deutscher Prize.

Anwar Shaikh is a Professor of Economics at the Graduate Faculty of The New School in New York City. He has written on international trade, finance theory, political economy, U.S. macroeconomic policy, the welfare state, growth theory, inflation theory, crisis theory, inequality on the world scale, and past and current global economic crises.

Shaikh's many books and publications include "Globali zation and the Myths of Free Trade: History, Theory and Empirical Evidence"; "The Economic Mythology of Neoliberalism" and "Explaining Inflation and Unemployment: An Alternative to Neoliberal Economic Theory"

**END**

‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski at Academia: https://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Immiseration, Capitalism and Education: Austerity, Resistance and Revolt - A New Edited Collection by Dave Hill

IMMISERATION, CAPITALISM AND EDUCATION: AUSTERITY, RESISTANCE AND REVOLT – A NEW EDITED COLLECTION BY DAVE HILL

Immiseration, Capitalism and Education: Austerity, Resistance and Revolt

Edited by Dave Hill

Institute for Education Policy Studies

Brighton

http://www.ieps.org.uk

2013

ISBN: 978-0-9522042-3-7

This is an important and astonishing book. It is a Marxist book. It systematically charts and critiques the havoc being wreaked by neoliberal and neoconservative Capitalism on society, on schooling/ schools and on higher education, across five countries: the USA, England, Turkey, Ireland and Greece. Following a theoretical chapter on Immiseration Capitalism, the first part of the book examines in detail the destructiveness and degradation effected by national and transnational Capital within these five societies, and the privatising, marketising, commodifying, degrading and impoverishing impacts within these five countries’ broader society, within/on the schooling system and within / on higher education.

Very importantly, the book goes beyond critique, beyond deconstruction, beyond anger and analysis. In Part Two of the book, leading Marxist analysts and activists from these five countries examine the Resistance to neoliberalising/neoconservatising policy and practice. In each case writers answer the question: What is the ‘Resistance’? Where is the Resistance? How is it Organised? How Successful is it? What are the Barriers to its Effectiveness? How can it be Developed to be more Effective?

In the Third and Final section, writers look to past and contemporary successful examples of Socialist Education, in the former Soviet bloc, and in Latin America, Venezuela. Again, writers, while noting the varied successes of such socialist or Marxist education, always remain critical- and self-critical.

The Conclusion, building on the critique within, summarises, and looks to the future, in terms of building the disparate resistance within schooling, higher education, communities and within the national societies- learning internationally. This book, written by noted and leading Marxist authors and activists, is an important contribution to Marxist education and broader theory- but also a spur to revolutionary anti-capitalist praxis-in education and beyond.

CONTENTS

Foreword by Peter McLaren

Introduction: Dave Hill

PART 1: Austerity Capitalism, Immiseration and Education

1. Immiseration Capitalism Curry Malott, Dave Hill & Grant Banfield

2. Austerity Capitalism and Education in Greece Panagiotis Sotiris

3. Austerity Capitalism and Education in Ireland Martin Power, Micheal O’Flynn, Aline Courtois & Margaret Kennedy

4. Austerity Capitalism and Education in Britain Dave Hill, Christine Lewis, Alpesh Maisuria & Patrick Yarker

5. Austerity Capitalism and Education in Turkey Fevziye Sayilan & Nuray Turkmen

6. Austerity Capitalism and Education in the USA Curry Malott & Faith Agostinone-Wilson

PART 2: Activism within/ against Immiseration Capitalism

7. Resistance in Greece Leonidas Vatikiotis and Maria Nikolakaki

8. Resistance in Ireland Micheal O’Flynn, Martin Power, Conor McCabe & Henry Silke

9. Resistance in Britain Joyce Canaan, Dave Hill, & Alpesh Maisuria

10. Resistance in Turkey Kemal İnal & H. Tuğba Öztürk

11. Resistance in the USA Curry Malott & Faith Agostinone-Wilson

PART 3: Peripheries

12. Immiseration Capitalism or Twenty-First century Socialism? Mike Cole & Peter McLaren

13. A view from the post-socialist ‘new periphery’ Bill Templer

14. Conclusion: Capitalism, Resistance and Dave Hill, Bill Templer, Panagiotis Sotiris,

What is to be Done? Grant Banfield & Faith Agostinone-Wilson

Price £22 inc post and packaging

Available from: http://www.ieps.org.uk/subscriptionsandpurchasing

Dave Hill is a Marxist academic and political and educational activist. He has fought ten elections in England at local, national and European levels, been an elected trade union regional leader and, when the Labour Party was left-wing, was a Labour Group (Council) Leader. In terms of Direct Action, he has recently been tear-gassed while on anti-government demonstrations in Athens and Ankara and is an activist in TUSC (the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition) and in Left Unity. He co-founded the Hillcole Group of Radical left Educators in 1989 and chaired it until 2001, founded the Institute for Education Policy Studies (www.ieps.org.uk) in 1989 and set up the Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies (www.jceps.com) in 2003. Since then, it, a free online peer-reviewed journal, has been downloaded a million times- free of charge. The journal went into print production in 2012 (available for purchase). He is Research Professor of Education at Anglia Ruskin University, England, and Visiting Professor of Critical Policy and Equality Studies at the University of Limerick, Ireland, and Visiting Professor of Education at the Universities of Middlesex, London, England, and Athens, Greece.

**END**

'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski at Academia: https://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski

All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Friday, February 21, 2014

Capitalist Markets in Higher Education

CAPITALIST MARKETS IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE)

Capitalist Markets in Higher Education: Utopias or Possibilities

Date - Wednesday, 16 April 2014: 14.00-16.00

Venue - University of Bath, Bath, UK

Network - South West Regional Network

Speaker: Professor Simon Marginson, Institute of Education

For more than two decades, governments around the world, led by the English-speaking polities, have moved higher education systems closer to the forms of textbook economic markets. Reforms include corporatisation, competitive funding, student charges, output formats and performance reporting. But, no country has established a bona fide economic market in the first-degree education of domestic students. No research university is driven by shareholders, profit, market share, allocative efficiency or the commodity form. There is commercial tuition only in parts of vocational training and international education. At the most, there are regulated quasi-markets, as in post-Browne UK. This differs from the experience of privatisation and commercialisation of transport, communications broadcasting and health insurance in many nations. The article argues that bona fide market reform in higher education is constrained by intrinsic limits specific to the sector (public goods, status competition), and political factors associated with those limits. This suggests that market reform is utopian, and the abstract ideal is sustained for exogenous policy reasons (e.g. fiscal reduction, state control, ordering of contents). But, if capitalist markets are clearly unachievable, a more authentic modernisation agenda is needed.

BIOGRAPHY

Simon worked as a Professor of Higher Education at the University of Melbourne in Australia prior to starting at the Institute of Education in October 2013. His research and scholarship draw broadly on the social sciences and political philosophy, and are focused primarily on higher education policy, systems and institutions. Most of his projects are in comparative and international higher education. In the last decade he has conducted extended inquiries into higher education and globalization, and higher education and research in East Asia. His current research includes a comparative project on the role of higher education in constructing public good, which examines the intersection between on one hand state traditions and political cultures, on the other hand educational practices. In 2014 Simon will deliver the biannual Clark Kerr lectures on higher education in the University of California system. He is Joint Editor-in-Chief of the journal Higher Education.

Too book a place please email Rajani Naidoo at R.Naidoo@bath.ac.uk

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Sunday, September 22, 2013

The Communism of Capital?

THE COMMUNISM OF CAPITAL?

Ephemera Volume 13 Number 3 (August 2013)

Ephemera is at: http://www.ephemerajournal.org

ISBN 9781906948207

Current Issue

The communism of capital? What could this awkward turn of phrase mean, and what might it signify with regards to the state of the world today? Does it merely describe a reality in which communist demands are twisted to become productive of capital, a capitalist realism supplemented by a disarmed communist ideology? Or does the death of the capitalist utopia mean that capital cannot contain the antagonism expressed by Occupy and other movements any more, and therefore must confront communism upfront?

The 12 contributions to this latest issue of ephemera explore the valances of the paradoxical and seemingly incoherent expression that is ‘the communism of capital’. Collectively they stake out new territory for the theorisation and organization of political struggle in a context in which capital has become increasingly aware that its age-old nemesis might today be lurking at its very heart.

You can order a print copy of the whole issue now at your local bookstore!

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editorial

The communism of capital?

Spectre of the commons: Spectrum regulation in the communism of capital

Rachel O’Dwyer

article

Infecting capitalism with the common: The class process, communication, and surplus