In order to stage a sustained encounter between literary theory and Marxian political economy, this paper initiates a dialogue between Walter Benjamin’s "The Task of the Translator" on one hand, and Marx’s Capital, on the other. I will theorize the two-fold transition from the...

Henri de Man is the author of the dissenting “Au-delà du Marxisme†(1926) and of the Belgian Plan du Travail (Labor Plan) of 1933. Later he became a Belgian social-democratic leader. He published between 1931 and 1935 18 economic articles in the Bulletin d’Information et de...

Harriet Taylor has been long forgotten as an economist and political philosopher, while merely remembered as John Stuart Mill’s friend and belatedly wife. Never was fate more unjust: we only need to recall that Taylor - whose liberal background soon led her to be fascinated by socialist...

One frequently quoted passage from the work of John Maynard Keynes is that "the best way to destroy the capitalist system [is] to debauch the currency." The passage, attributed to Vladimir Illyich Lenin, appears in Keynes' book <em>The Economic Consequences of the Peace</em>, which became an...

This paper attempts to place the economic analysis of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels's Communist Manifesto in historical perspective. The author begins by summarizing the analysis of capitalist economic development in the Manifesto, and showing how it was strongly influenced by developments in...

The recent theoretical works of the authors mentioned in the title of the paper provide thorough insights into the workings of contemporary capitalism. Derivatives are the key issue involved here. They comprehend financialization as a development within, rather than a distortion of, capitalist...

This paper argues that Marx’s law of the falling rate of profit applies to the problematic of choice of technique in the context of accumulation of capital, and not to the problematic of choice of technique in the context of technological change or new innovation as such. In this context,...

An analysis of Marx’s alienation theory is the starting point for establishing if alienation would actually be cancelled in a system of self-managed firms. As Marx held that alienation comes at various degrees and is strongest in capitalistic systems with hired labor, the author argues...

I formulate and calibrate a small 3D classical growth cycle model to explain the rise of income inequality, growth stagnation and the persistence of unemployment in South Africa between 1970-2005. This model exhibits interactions between economic growth, the employment rate, and the rate of...

From 1825 to 1832 the Saint-Simonians advocated an evolution of the economic and social order which resulted from their analysis of property right and its effects on the functioning of a society in which the property owners exploit the labourers. Improving the lot of labourers and economic...