Re: Which Marxism? (fwd)

> capitalism meant, for Marx, accumulation of wealth at the expense of
> others, whether in England or elsewhere.  capitalism bothered Marx in
> every context because it caused unequal distribution of wealth everywhere.
> he did NOT mean by development that the British model was ideal (without
> any problems) and that every country should imitate it to reach a certain
> level of prosperity. what you suggest above is a modernization perspective
> like Rostow's, which takes capitalism for granted, not Marx's views. marx
> was a critic of capitalism. he was not ALSO happy with the British model.
> he knew that the factory system in England was sucking. he knew that this
> developoment was a development benefitting the capitalists. he was QUITE
> awere that whoever goes under a same process will be subject to these
> unhuman conditions. capitalism is a universal problem for Marx regardless

For goodness sakes, no one is suggesting that Marx was happy with England.
This isn't the WW. Rostow Listserv.

> what the world system theory contributed was that the
> conditions in the periphery were much worse than the conditions in the
> core (coerced labor, slavery). i agree with this, of course. but i do not
> think Marx was totally blind to this problem. he was the one who first
> pronounced slavery in native America, talking about the development of
> capitalism and colonialism there.

Nani kore?  Sociology 101 tells us that the core conditions are better
(geez, I thought we were well past this).

The point here, as I mentioned in my response to Austin, is that Marx did
not have a theory of underdevelopment.   I'm sure Marx was not the first to
pronounce (or even to  denounce) "slavery" in North America.  From my
reading of Marx, I agree he had many pregnant ideas on underdevelopment and
imperialism, but no expectation of the persistant and growing gap between
what we now call the periphery and core.