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Kevin's Reviews > The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
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Kevin's review
bookshelves: econ-imperialism, 1-how-the-world-works, econ-development, econ-land, econ-inequality
Aug 22, 2021
bookshelves: econ-imperialism, 1-how-the-world-works, econ-development, econ-land, econ-inequality
2020 debates on imperialism, from Global South perspectives�
The Good:
--So much of theorizing imperialism involves detailing the actions of the Global North (i.e. British and now the U.S. empires). Global North theorists are therefore well-positioned to research this. However, this leads to structural bias, where theory is assumed to originate from the Global North while the Global South only contribute with survivalist guerilla manuals.
--To counter this, LeftWord Books (New Dehli) and Tricontinental Institute for Social Research have compiled an All-Star group of theorists centered on Global South perspectives. One well-known disagreement is with David Harvey's use (misuse?) of “imperialism�; see exchanges between Harvey and Vijay Prashad: . For the more economic debate with the Patnaiks, see A Theory of Imperialism.
...Note: Michael Hudson also comes from what seems like conflicting perspectives (esp. Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage Destroy the Global Economy), so it is curious when he shares so many similar geopolitical conclusions with Prashad:
The Missing:
--Although the essays are meant to introduce theories, the theories themselves are advanced; a beginner not familiar with political economy theories (esp. Capital: A Critique of Political Economy, Volume 1) might be lost for 3/4 of the book.
--Slogging through Marx and the rest of academic political economy has made me more cautious given the mountain of assumptions, abstractions and varying interpretations on deep topics like value and systemic crisis; meanwhile, “progressive� reformists have been churning out accessible and pragmatic(!) presentations for much-wider audiences (ex. Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist). I’m not sure how best to remedy this.
--Below is my attempt to make this more accessible; feel free to comment for clarifications! And if this is too much theory but you'd still like a historical overview, the go-to is The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions.
Highlights:
1) “Value of money� and imperialism:
--Power couple Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik summarize their theses from A Theory of Imperialism and The Value of Money:
i) Capitalism is a money-using system.
Note: Marx identifies in Vol. 1’s Ch.3 (maybe the best part in a problematic chapter) that money is both (a) “measure of value� (thus can be a store of value) and (b) “means of circulation� (i.e. exchange); these two functions can conflict.
ii) As a measure of value, much wealth is stored as money/money-denominated assets. Thus, stability of the “value of money� must be preserved i.e. should not decline relative to commodity prices, or else the wealthy will move away from storing money and onto storing commodities, threatening the money system of exchange.
iii) Imperialism plays a key role in the preservation of the “value of money�: firstly, the reserve army of labour (think colonized/globalized workforce) keeps down both the South’s money wages (thus keeping down the prices of their raw material exports, i.e. commodity prices) and North’s money wages (threat of outsourcing). This reserve army is preserved via primitive accumulation (i.e. dispossession) and income inequality/South’s jobless growth.
iv) Secondly, income deflation in the South keeps down their demand for South’s scarce commodities. The Patnaiks stress the importance of South’s scarce agricultural capabilities/land and Classical political economists� fears of increasing commodity prices from “diminishing returns� in agriculture (see: The Agrarian Question in the Neoliberal Era: Primitive Accumulation and the Peasantry). This scarcity is made worse because imperialism prevents South state infrastructure/technologies from improving yields.
...Colonialism used “drain of wealth� via colonial taxes (see Utsa Patnaik’s “British Raj siphoned out $45 trillion from India� article) and deindustrialization. This gave the British empire a free ride to pay for goods from newly-industrializing US, Germany, etc.
…US imperialism uses neoliberal globalization policies (primitive accumulation/income inequality labour reserves/fiscal austerity, etc.)� “Value of money� is an even greater concern now due to Financialization! (I’d be curious how this can be synthesized with Hudson’s post-1971 US dollar-debt imperialism: )
v) Solution? de-link from neoliberal globalization’s capital + trade flows, which requires revitalizing nation state autonomy. (I see a strong synthesis with the geopolitical regionalism/multi-polarity of de-dollarization …and perhaps later an international trade currency like Keynes� bancor described in Another Now: Dispatches from an Alternative Present).
…as you can see, every connection made results in a myriad of questions. See Patnaiks' magnum opus: Capital and Imperialism: Theory, History, and the Present
2) â€Âٳܱè±ð°ù-±ð³æ±è±ô´Ç¾±³Ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ôâ€� of imperialism:
--Independent researcher John Smith unleashes a flamethrower on Marxists soft on imperialism (the full-length inferno is Imperialism in the Twenty-First Century: Globalization, Super-Exploitation, and Capitalism's Final Crisis); I assume I’m on board with much of Smith’s accusations, but right now I’m delirious from the fumes of his scorched-earth campaign.
i) Several factors from Marx’s Capital project have left a vacuum (and thus confusion) in theorizing imperialism by subsequent Marxists: Marx’s assumption of a uniform global development of industrial capitalist production + Vol. 1’s assumption of ideal markets (buy/sell at value) + unfinished Capital project.
ii) Smith’s main target are Marxists who downplay imperialism (imperialism = North/South differences in rate of exploitation); a key assumption is that Global North labour are more productive (thus supposedly more surplus value generated, so perhaps more exploited!). While imperialism should be blatantly visible, it takes effort to synthesize real-world observations with abstract theory. Smith dives into Vol. 1’s value theory to raise misinterpretations and fill in gaps, in particular for the rate of exploitation (s/v) and distinguishing value generated by labour-power (‘s�, based on length of time worked) vs. value of labour-power (‘v�, necessary time to produce labour’s means of subsistence, i.e. a plethora of social factors that Marx breezes through in a few pages in Ch.6).
iii) â€Âٳܱè±ð°ù-±ð³æ±è±ô´Ç¾±³Ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ôâ€� in its most economized (narrow) definition is labour-power bought/sold (i.e. wages) below its value. Vol. 1’s assumption of ideal markets results in the absence of this third method of increasing surplus value (relegated to footnotes), instead focusing on method 1 (Absolute surplus-value, i.e. increasing length of work) and method 2 (Relative surplus-value, i.e. increasing productivity).
iv) Smith expands super-exploitation beyond under-remuneration of wages to consider the sociopolitical suppression of the South’s value of labour-power via reducing consumption, i.e. surplus labour, structural unemployment, repression/borders, lack of social security etc.
v) The conclusions are familiar with anti-imperialist Marxists: South’s higher exploitation allows South elites to live like North elites, while still generating greater outflows to the North. This privileges the North to lower domestic exploitation for a more-stable class compromise (welfare state).
vi) Productivity? Smith mines Marx regarding illusions of productivity differences between “skilled vs. unskilled� workers as well as capital composition (capital-intensive vs. labour-intensive), where bourgeois economists assume machinery generate more value when it is actually a transfer of value from labour-intensive sectors. I enjoyed the debunking of North’s higher qualifications/“cultural enrichment� arguments, with the example of Indian truck-driver vs. British counterpart (I believe I first heard this example from Ha-Joon Chang). Productivity arguments are further derailed since much of production have been outsourced to the South.
3) Competition and imperialism:
--E. Ahmet Tonak, co-author with Anwar Shaikh in Measuring the Wealth of Nations: The Political Economy of National Accounts, focuses on: “real competitionâ€� (as opposed to bourgeois “perfect competitionâ€� or heterodox “imperfect competitionâ€�/“m´Ç²Ô´Ç±è´Ç±ô²ââ€�); this was a key framework in Shaikh’s Capitalism: Competition, Conflict, Crises (which seems epic, but I'm uncomfortable with its focus on “developedâ€� capitalism, i.e. how does it engage with the necessity of imperialism?). The “real competitionâ€� relies on empirical data (but mostly “developedâ€� countries?) and is described as war.
4) Geopolitics of imperialism:
--The remaining 2 scholars focus on the geopolitics, first the significance of Latin American resources and finally the rise of China.
--On China, a comrade recommended a useful article by the first essay's co-author Prabhat Patnaik comparing China’s revolution with India, in particular China’s semi-colonial preconditions, unique peasant revolution led by working class and its legacies/contradictions:
-Vijay Prashad on a Marxist analysis of China:
-aforementioned Vijay Prashad + Michael Hudson on China/US:
The Good:
--So much of theorizing imperialism involves detailing the actions of the Global North (i.e. British and now the U.S. empires). Global North theorists are therefore well-positioned to research this. However, this leads to structural bias, where theory is assumed to originate from the Global North while the Global South only contribute with survivalist guerilla manuals.
--To counter this, LeftWord Books (New Dehli) and Tricontinental Institute for Social Research have compiled an All-Star group of theorists centered on Global South perspectives. One well-known disagreement is with David Harvey's use (misuse?) of “imperialism�; see exchanges between Harvey and Vijay Prashad: . For the more economic debate with the Patnaiks, see A Theory of Imperialism.
...Note: Michael Hudson also comes from what seems like conflicting perspectives (esp. Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage Destroy the Global Economy), so it is curious when he shares so many similar geopolitical conclusions with Prashad:
The Missing:
--Although the essays are meant to introduce theories, the theories themselves are advanced; a beginner not familiar with political economy theories (esp. Capital: A Critique of Political Economy, Volume 1) might be lost for 3/4 of the book.
--Slogging through Marx and the rest of academic political economy has made me more cautious given the mountain of assumptions, abstractions and varying interpretations on deep topics like value and systemic crisis; meanwhile, “progressive� reformists have been churning out accessible and pragmatic(!) presentations for much-wider audiences (ex. Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist). I’m not sure how best to remedy this.
--Below is my attempt to make this more accessible; feel free to comment for clarifications! And if this is too much theory but you'd still like a historical overview, the go-to is The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions.
Highlights:
1) “Value of money� and imperialism:
--Power couple Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik summarize their theses from A Theory of Imperialism and The Value of Money:
i) Capitalism is a money-using system.
Note: Marx identifies in Vol. 1’s Ch.3 (maybe the best part in a problematic chapter) that money is both (a) “measure of value� (thus can be a store of value) and (b) “means of circulation� (i.e. exchange); these two functions can conflict.
ii) As a measure of value, much wealth is stored as money/money-denominated assets. Thus, stability of the “value of money� must be preserved i.e. should not decline relative to commodity prices, or else the wealthy will move away from storing money and onto storing commodities, threatening the money system of exchange.
iii) Imperialism plays a key role in the preservation of the “value of money�: firstly, the reserve army of labour (think colonized/globalized workforce) keeps down both the South’s money wages (thus keeping down the prices of their raw material exports, i.e. commodity prices) and North’s money wages (threat of outsourcing). This reserve army is preserved via primitive accumulation (i.e. dispossession) and income inequality/South’s jobless growth.
iv) Secondly, income deflation in the South keeps down their demand for South’s scarce commodities. The Patnaiks stress the importance of South’s scarce agricultural capabilities/land and Classical political economists� fears of increasing commodity prices from “diminishing returns� in agriculture (see: The Agrarian Question in the Neoliberal Era: Primitive Accumulation and the Peasantry). This scarcity is made worse because imperialism prevents South state infrastructure/technologies from improving yields.
...Colonialism used “drain of wealth� via colonial taxes (see Utsa Patnaik’s “British Raj siphoned out $45 trillion from India� article) and deindustrialization. This gave the British empire a free ride to pay for goods from newly-industrializing US, Germany, etc.
…US imperialism uses neoliberal globalization policies (primitive accumulation/income inequality labour reserves/fiscal austerity, etc.)� “Value of money� is an even greater concern now due to Financialization! (I’d be curious how this can be synthesized with Hudson’s post-1971 US dollar-debt imperialism: )
v) Solution? de-link from neoliberal globalization’s capital + trade flows, which requires revitalizing nation state autonomy. (I see a strong synthesis with the geopolitical regionalism/multi-polarity of de-dollarization …and perhaps later an international trade currency like Keynes� bancor described in Another Now: Dispatches from an Alternative Present).
…as you can see, every connection made results in a myriad of questions. See Patnaiks' magnum opus: Capital and Imperialism: Theory, History, and the Present
2) â€Âٳܱè±ð°ù-±ð³æ±è±ô´Ç¾±³Ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ôâ€� of imperialism:
--Independent researcher John Smith unleashes a flamethrower on Marxists soft on imperialism (the full-length inferno is Imperialism in the Twenty-First Century: Globalization, Super-Exploitation, and Capitalism's Final Crisis); I assume I’m on board with much of Smith’s accusations, but right now I’m delirious from the fumes of his scorched-earth campaign.
i) Several factors from Marx’s Capital project have left a vacuum (and thus confusion) in theorizing imperialism by subsequent Marxists: Marx’s assumption of a uniform global development of industrial capitalist production + Vol. 1’s assumption of ideal markets (buy/sell at value) + unfinished Capital project.
ii) Smith’s main target are Marxists who downplay imperialism (imperialism = North/South differences in rate of exploitation); a key assumption is that Global North labour are more productive (thus supposedly more surplus value generated, so perhaps more exploited!). While imperialism should be blatantly visible, it takes effort to synthesize real-world observations with abstract theory. Smith dives into Vol. 1’s value theory to raise misinterpretations and fill in gaps, in particular for the rate of exploitation (s/v) and distinguishing value generated by labour-power (‘s�, based on length of time worked) vs. value of labour-power (‘v�, necessary time to produce labour’s means of subsistence, i.e. a plethora of social factors that Marx breezes through in a few pages in Ch.6).
iii) â€Âٳܱè±ð°ù-±ð³æ±è±ô´Ç¾±³Ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ôâ€� in its most economized (narrow) definition is labour-power bought/sold (i.e. wages) below its value. Vol. 1’s assumption of ideal markets results in the absence of this third method of increasing surplus value (relegated to footnotes), instead focusing on method 1 (Absolute surplus-value, i.e. increasing length of work) and method 2 (Relative surplus-value, i.e. increasing productivity).
iv) Smith expands super-exploitation beyond under-remuneration of wages to consider the sociopolitical suppression of the South’s value of labour-power via reducing consumption, i.e. surplus labour, structural unemployment, repression/borders, lack of social security etc.
v) The conclusions are familiar with anti-imperialist Marxists: South’s higher exploitation allows South elites to live like North elites, while still generating greater outflows to the North. This privileges the North to lower domestic exploitation for a more-stable class compromise (welfare state).
vi) Productivity? Smith mines Marx regarding illusions of productivity differences between “skilled vs. unskilled� workers as well as capital composition (capital-intensive vs. labour-intensive), where bourgeois economists assume machinery generate more value when it is actually a transfer of value from labour-intensive sectors. I enjoyed the debunking of North’s higher qualifications/“cultural enrichment� arguments, with the example of Indian truck-driver vs. British counterpart (I believe I first heard this example from Ha-Joon Chang). Productivity arguments are further derailed since much of production have been outsourced to the South.
3) Competition and imperialism:
--E. Ahmet Tonak, co-author with Anwar Shaikh in Measuring the Wealth of Nations: The Political Economy of National Accounts, focuses on: “real competitionâ€� (as opposed to bourgeois “perfect competitionâ€� or heterodox “imperfect competitionâ€�/“m´Ç²Ô´Ç±è´Ç±ô²ââ€�); this was a key framework in Shaikh’s Capitalism: Competition, Conflict, Crises (which seems epic, but I'm uncomfortable with its focus on “developedâ€� capitalism, i.e. how does it engage with the necessity of imperialism?). The “real competitionâ€� relies on empirical data (but mostly “developedâ€� countries?) and is described as war.
4) Geopolitics of imperialism:
--The remaining 2 scholars focus on the geopolitics, first the significance of Latin American resources and finally the rise of China.
--On China, a comrade recommended a useful article by the first essay's co-author Prabhat Patnaik comparing China’s revolution with India, in particular China’s semi-colonial preconditions, unique peasant revolution led by working class and its legacies/contradictions:
-Vijay Prashad on a Marxist analysis of China:
-aforementioned Vijay Prashad + Michael Hudson on China/US:
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Quotes Kevin Liked
“The old imperialism had the ‘advantageâ€� that the leading metropolitan power of the time, Britain, could keep its economy open to the goods of the then newly-industrializing countries, without getting indebted (on the contrary it became the largest capital exporter in the years before the First World War). For at least four decades up to 1928, India had the second largest export surplus in the world (second only to the USA); and this despite the imports of goods that caused domestic de-industrialization. But this export surplus was entirely appropriated by Britain not only to pay for its current account deficit with continental Europe, North America and regions of recent European settlement, but also to allow it to export capital to these regions.”
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
“In contemporary capitalism, in contrast to the colonial period, the enforcement of neoliberal policies is the chief means of imposing income deflation on the working people of the periphery.”
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
“Imperialism as an arrangement, however, has remained largely invisible to the discipline of economics, even to its best practitioners and even in the colonial period. No less a person than John Maynard Keynes, in his classic work The Economic Consequences of the Peace (1919), where he talks of the ‘economic Eldoradoâ€� that prewar Europe represented, fails to mention that this Eldorado rested upon an elaborate framework of imperialism. Europe’s accessing of food from the ‘new worldâ€�, an important aspect of this Eldorado, would not have been possible if this food had not been paid for, through an intricate arrangement, by Britain’s appropriation gratis of a part of the surplus of its colonies and semi-colonies (‘drain of wealthâ€�), and by its export of manufactured goods to its colonies and semi-colonies at the expense of their local producers (‘de-industrializationâ€�).”
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
“Economists have always been haunted by the spectre of ‘diminishing returnsâ€�. Ricardo had famously seen ‘diminishing returnsâ€� in agriculture leading to a progressive fall in the rate of profit, a progressive shift of the terms of trade between manufacturing and agriculture in favour of the latter and the eventual denouement of a stationary state where further growth became impossible. Even Keynes in the aforementioned work saw ‘diminishing returnsâ€� in food production as undermining the Eldorado even if the war had not done so. And yet none of these fears have come true. The terms of trade between manufacturing and agriculture have shown a secular tendency to shift against, rather than in favour of, the latter; and while the growth rate under capitalism has come down of late, this has nothing to do with any fall in the profit rate caused by ‘diminishing returnsâ€�. Likewise, the advanced capitalist world has no difficulty to this day in meeting its food requirements, belying the fears of Keynes. How then do we explain this contrast between fears and reality?”
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
“Such an increase in supply price [i.e. raw materials from the Global South], however, creates serious problems for capitalism. These arise not because of a diminishing rate of profit or a slide towards a stationary state as Ricardo had feared. Such fears relate in any case to long-run prospects. Increasing supply price, in so far as it gets translated to an increase in price, undermines the value of money, and that is a very serious and immediate issue for capitalism. If wealth-holders believe that the value of money in terms of commodities is going to fall over time, then nobody will hold wealth in its money-form.”
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
― The Veins of the South Are Still Open: Debates Around the Imperialism of Our Time
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Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and contextualise a bit more about ho..."Sharp eyes Gustav, indeed there's numerous gaps I'd like to fill to synthesize the Patnaiks (Global South perspective on imperialism, with lots of research on colonialism of India) vs. Hudson (Global North perspective on Finance Capitalism, with all those contradictions I've described elsewhere).
The Patnaik's conception here of "value of money" vs. commodity prices seems like an abstract framework where we would then have to layer on and test economic/geopolitical history. Judging by their one-liner, their point regarding "Financialization" seems to be that money is now even more volatile (I'm thinking speculative asset-price inflation bubbles, etc.), thus preserving the stability of money ("value of money") is even more crucial (they mention the "current obsession with 'inflation targeting'").
I wonder how to apply this to the uses of domestic currencies vs. international (i.e. thinking about how to preserve economic sovereignty/MMT). And for geopolitics, how does US dollar from WWI-to-1960s (when US was world creditor) vs. after 1960s (esp. after 1971 Nixon Shock, when US became world debtor) fit into this?
While the specific actors may be unexpected, the roles themselves seem to fit with the Patnaik's framework. For example, US post-1971 debt empire means the US floods the world with US dollars, receiving in return productive goods + buying out foreign assets + paying for military bases. Now, it seems that it's not the US that preserves the "value of money" but the rest of the world (via their central banks), basically taken hostage to preserve global trade stability (since US dollar became international reserve currency and there's not enough mass to get off it yet) by sending surplus US dollars back to US (exchange for Treasury bonds) to prevent too much devaluation of US dollar (which hurts export countries) etc.
Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and contextualise a bit more about ho..."Great and satisfying answer! I don't have much to contribute to the discussion, but I seem to remember that Varoufaki writes about this asymmetry in his Another Now (or Our Now). But it's an interesting turn of events if the value of the dollar is now preserved by the countries (for dubious reasons) dependent on it. Stepping into yet another terrain in which I have little knowledge of, perhaps it is then a logical development for some states in South America (e.g. El Salvador) to adopt Bitcoin as a legitimate legal tender as partly a way to escape this dependency?
Although in terms of financialization and volatility, Bitcoin (even if ultimately just a trend) seemingly represents an even higher stage of this development..?
Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and contextualise a bi..."Varoufakis indeed wrote all about dollar imperialism in "Global Minotaur", although for whatever reason he did not cite Hudson's 1972 classic "Super Imperialism". Reminds me of Varoufakis recommending Atwood's Debt lectures despite the obvious "Debt: The First 5,000 Years" by Graeber smh.
Crypto-currency: Ah, there's a lot in your question that I'm also not familiar with, and recently I was discussing this with a comrade. Firstly, this goes back to what I raised about domestic currency vs. international trade ledger:
a) domestic currency: I believe in MMT, i.e. state theory of money where you aim to have a sovereign currency where the value comes from the state accepting it to pay taxes.
...Cryptocurrency might have uses as regional parallel currency, but I'm not sure how it would work as "state money". As of right how it's just "commodity money" thus speculative (all my favorite Finance Capitalism critics say this, i.e. Varoufakis/Hudson/Ghosh etc.)
..."The State" sounds spooky but democracy is a contestation of power where I'm more confident when it's applied to say regional public assemblies + public banks rather than technocratic currency (although there could be synthesis here).
b) international trade ledger: here I'm not so sure how to synthesize Keynes' bancor/Varoufakis' cosmos ("Another Now") with domestic currency (MMT) or with crypto. Indeed, Hudson praises gold as international reserve is more peaceful given that its limited quantity means it's more difficult to finance wars (where the warring nation risks balance-of-payment crisis as they lose their gold reserve).
...so as for El Salvador adopting Bitcoin to de-dollarize, as of now that sounds like a very volatile currency. I'm personally more interested in political de-dollarization (ex. ALBA's "SUCRE" or BRICS or today's China/Russia etc.) but once again I haven't synthesized the technical aspects of blockchain/crypto with theories of domestic/international money.
Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and contextualise a bi..."Kevin wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and con..."
Great analysis of the Bitcoin phenomenon in relation to our topic!
a) I like the term 'commodity money' and your observation regarding the difference between a public bank or technocratic management of it. Many points to the emancipatory potential in cryptocurrencies; however, I do not think this is what China had in mind when they created theirs, so your distinction is an important one.
b) yes, a lot is going on here. But like gold, I heard that at least bitcoin would only have a limited quantity in existence (however, this might, of course, change). One friend of mine reflected on the potential in having Bitcoin instead of gold as a standard, although the practicalities around this are, to me, still vague.
Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you develop and con..."For sure, the one thing China has been careful with is regulating finance. And with the limited quantity of Bitcoin, once again I think of what it is used for. For domestic money, Varoufakis warned this is deflationary. For international ledger, Hudson praises gold's limits as constraining war spending. But Hudson also sees bitcoin in its current form as "commodity money" comparing it with bad art that the rich speculate with lol.
Going back to Patnaik's "value of money", it's not surprising how money is so obscured under capitalism. Also thinking of M-C-M' becoming M-M'. I always chuckle at this brief video of Graeber explaining money because I have no idea why he keeps saying "everyone really knows this" haha.
I'm also still vague on how to synthesize "state money" (which at its most concrete form is Gov spending into economy, and then Gov taxing some of it back) with the overwhelming "credit money" conjured up by private banks when they make loans. It is curious to note how the public is made to be so concerned with the former's risk of inflation and not the latter (which is in much greater quantities and is rent-seeking thus tied to high interest/penalties).
Regardless, neither are "commodity money" especially in today's digital realm. Of course, state and private are all tangled up to reproduce capitalism; if we use the US example, it gets murky with the rentier bondholder class inserted in the middle (i.e. instead of Gov providing money directly to public) and the interactions between Gov (ex. US Treasury) and Feds (quasi-state/private) and private banks (bonds, bailouts, etc.).
Kevin wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curious to hear you ..."Bitcoin really being an M-M process is mind-boggling, it's hard enough understanding and explaining the transition from C-M-C to M-C-M . Great video of Graeber; yes, of course, "everyone knows this" haha, let me just watch it again...
This is a whole new area for me, and I'm still really taking it slow with Debt: The First 5,000 Years to process that aspect of the terrain. Looking forward to diving into Hudson, any other reads (or vids) you would recommend on the topics discussed in this thread?
Gustav wrote: "Kevin wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Gustav wrote: "Great job unpacking this heavy Marxist-theoretical read, Kevin! While many points raise further questions, as you point out, I'd be curiou..."I guess for those who appreciate the centrality of debt in capitalism (capitalism's reliance on state money + credit money, and the triviality of commodity money), cryptocurrency's intrigue is in the "crypto" part, not the "currency" part.
Relevant lectures (I'm a slow reader haha) by Hudson:
-state money/MMT (after Wray lecture, which is also useful):
-public banking:
-monetary imperialism, de-dollarization:
-history of debt (esp. religion):
Stephanie Kelton (advised Bernie) has popularized MMT in the US (ex. ), but for us she is too focused on US monetary policy, which is obviously very unique (dollar imperialism)! Kelton has worked with Hudson, and Hudson was asked about this:
The section I am referring to:
…US imperialism uses neoliberal globalization policies (primitive accumulation/income inequality labour reserves/fiscal austerity, etc.)� “Value of money� is an even greater concern now due to Financialization!
Cheers!