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Die Ungleichheit der Welt

May 2022
Leviathan 44(249, 2 / 2022):25 - 30

Project: Global Political Economy Dynamics

Authors:

Michael R Krätke

Lancaster University

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Project

The long road towards "Capital"

Michael R Krätke

Thanks to the ongoing work on the second MEGA and after the publication of all volumes of its second section, devoted to the manuscripts and publications pertaining to Marx' "Capital", it is now fo r the first time possible to follow in all details and based upon written evidence the long road towards "Capital", from the beginnings in 1844 towards the end in 1883 (or 1894). My focus is upon the logic and the vicissitudes of the research process, its many detours, its dead ends and the many problems left unsolved. Based upon the still largely unpublished notebooks by Marx, I am concentrating upon the logic of enquiries and discoveries, not so much upon the logic of presentation. I regard the efforts to present results as one of many experimental stages in Marx' research process. The knowledge of the manuscripts and notebooks allows us to take into account the hitherto ignored facts - for instance Marx' knowledge about progress made by contemporary economists like Jevons and J.St. Mill - and to evaluate the many anticipations of later discoveries that we can find in Marx' work - for instance his anticipations of later macroeconomic devices like Sraffa's 'basic goods' in his manuscripts of the 1870s. The real challenge of course will be to show when, how and why Marx failed to identify and / or solve the problems he ran into. In my view, the unsolved problems left in Marx' work, the true Marxian (not Ricardian or Smithaian) problems of political economy, are what constitutes the real heritage of Marx in this field. ... [more]

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Project

The greatest crisis of the capitalist world economy

Michael R Krätke

The debate on the causes and consequences of the great crisis during the period 1929 to the 1940s is well documented and well researched, but some important lacunae remain. One of the biggest and o ne of the most important is the lack of research on and documentation of the many contributions to the diagnosis of the great crisis that were made by Marxist political economists belonging to the socialist and social democratic camp in Europe and America. A main goal of this project is to publish and to comment upon several larger book manuscripts dealing with the explanation of the great crisis of the 1930s. The major contributions, hitherto unpublished, are Otto Bauer's book on the Great Crisis (a manuscript of more than 600 pages), Karl Kautsky's effort to reformulate the Marxian theory of crisis from the beginning (an unfinished manuscript of 80 pages), Louis B. Boudins book on the great crisis (a manuscript of more than 400 pages), plus several dissertations that were defended during the 1930s but never published. The most remarkable of those is the dissertation on Marx' theory of crisis by Richard Löwenthal. I have worked on these manuscripts for quite a while. They are now ready for publication. The Bauer book and Kautsky's shorter essay will be published together in a book. Bauer's effort to understand the causalities leading from the post - World War I crises in the capitalist world to the great crisis of the 1930s and explaining why this crisis was a "great" crisis, comparable only to the great depression of the years 1873 to 1895 and different from the 'normal' cyclical crises of capitalist development in the 19th and 20th century, is by far the most original of all the major contributions written by Marxist economists at that time. In the introduction, I will compare Bauer's approach to Preobrashensky, Varge, Louis Corey, Maurice Dobb, Léon Sartre, John Strachey and some others, including Rudolf Hilferding. ... [more]

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Project

Global Political Economy Dynamics

This project takes a previously finished simulation project on global macroeconomic financial networks to a new and more general level. It starts with a series of policy papers. Here is the descrip tion of the previous simulation project: We developed an agent-based simulation of European banks and macroeconomic entities. Six major countries are modelled in detail - including a module for technical progress - as well as the ECB and the EU level. The goal is to understand Europe's development and provide consulting for further, civilized European welfare increase. ... [more]

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Project

The other Austrian school

Michael R Krätke

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Materialien zum Historisch-kritischen Worterbuch des Marxismus

Michael R Krätke

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On the Beginnings of Marxian Macroeconomics

January 2016

Michael R Krätke

This chapter offers the first comprehensive account of Rosa Luxemburg’s critique of Marx and the impact it had on the development of Marxian economics. Luxemburg was actually the first to criticise Marx’s theory of accumulation as presented in the famous ‘reproduction schemes’ at the end of Volume II of Capital. Her critique triggered a long-lasting debate among Marxists (Bauer, Pannekoek, ... [Show full abstract] Bukharin, Sternberg and others) which eventually also attracted the attention of many non-Marxist economists. Krätke presents the course of this debate in a series of ‘rounds’ in which the defenders of Marx and critics of Rosa Luxemburg engaged in lively exchanges. Thanks to Luxemburg’s critique and in spite of its weaknesses, Marx’s ‘reproduction schemes’ were transformed into a cornerstone of Marxian macroeconomics.

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