Re: Thinking out loud

> From:          Louis Proyect <lnp3@panix.com>
> It appears to steer a mid-course between Sweezy-Wallerstein-Frank and
> Dobb-Laclau-Brenner-Genovese by positing something called "articulations of
> modes of production" which includes unfree labor as "an anomalous
> necessity" in the development of capitalism. That strikes me as
> Althusserian jargon, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt for the
> time being since it has some valuable empirical research on the Caribbean,
> Australia, South Africa and Western Europe.

Just a warning, comrade Louis. The main 1970s proponent of the 
articulations of modes of production theory as applied to SA, Harold 
Wolpe, renounced it once he was attacked for chronological 
inconsistencies. His 1988 book (for the UN) changed the earlier line 
that the articulation between capitalism and apartheid (implying 
pre-capitalist relations in the Bantustans) was "necessary," into a 
much more "contingent" and historically-delimited relationship.
Patrick Bond (pbond@wn.apc.org)
home: 51 Somerset Road, Kensington 2094 South Africa
phone:  (2711) 614-8088
work:  University of the Witwatersrand
Graduate School of Public and Development Management
PO Box 601, Wits 2050, South Africa
work email:  bond.p@pdm.wits.ac.za
work phone:  (2711) 717-3917
work fax:  (2711) 484-2729
cellphone:  (27) 83-633-5548