Shorter Marx
My takeaway is that Marx made a couple critical errors which are not just defects in his work, but which extrapolate to some of the excesses to which his ideas contributed.
First, the idea that there's a historical imperative, that there's an arrow of inevitable progress, is the kind of shocking mistake that leads to fanatical extremism. It isn't just wrong, it is the sort of Messiah-complex wrong that can get you Stalin or Pol Pot. It doesn't have to, but a big helping of humility and feeling like those who disagree maybe don't belong in re-education camps would be awesome.
Second, the idea that value is related to labor investment, is not just wrong-headed and delusional, it is the kind of error that gets you aggrieved victim kinds of reprisals. The absurd thought that participating in trade is exploitation rather than opportunity is pretty hard to overcome no matter how clear-eyed your economic history is. This mistake doesn't just implicitly set up class warfare and retaliation (with the accompanying messianic belief that opposition is evil), it pretty much explicitly endorses it.
So while it might be said that Marxism, like capitalism, is one of the two biggest social theories that have never been tried, I'm not sure that's really true. I think an honest assessment has to conclude that while these defects in Marx may not inevitably lead to gulags, they are the seeds out of which this kind of extremism grows. ¶ 10:38 PM
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Brad DeLong has a nice article about Marx as political and economic theorist.
My takeaway is that Marx made a couple critical errors which are not just defects in his work, but which extrapolate to some of the excesses to which his ideas contributed.
First, the idea that there's a historical imperative, that there's an arrow of inevitable progress, is the kind of shocking mistake that leads to fanatical extremism. It isn't just wrong, it is the sort of Messiah-complex wrong that can get you Stalin or Pol Pot. It doesn't have to, but a big helping of humility and feeling like those who disagree maybe don't belong in re-education camps would be awesome.
Second, the idea that value is related to labor investment, is not just wrong-headed and delusional, it is the kind of error that gets you aggrieved victim kinds of reprisals. The absurd thought that participating in trade is exploitation rather than opportunity is pretty hard to overcome no matter how clear-eyed your economic history is. This mistake doesn't just implicitly set up class warfare and retaliation (with the accompanying messianic belief that opposition is evil), it pretty much explicitly endorses it.
So while it might be said that Marxism, like capitalism, is one of the two biggest social theories that have never been tried, I'm not sure that's really true. I think an honest assessment has to conclude that while these defects in Marx may not inevitably lead to gulags, they are the seeds out of which this kind of extremism grows. ¶ 10:38 PM
