Author: alanjjohnstone
Where do profits come from?
Capitalists are the products of social conditions where the means of living are privately owned and production is for profit; they are not the makers of these conditions. So it is essential to understand how capitalism works. Let us first consider the explanation of profits that is provided by orthodox economics. Orthodox economic theory takes…
Sin Precios, Sin dinero, Sin salarios
Muchas personas piensan que el dinero siempre ha existido y siempre existirá, eso es Incorrecto. Los seres humanos han vivido en este planeta durante cientos de miles de años sin usar dinero. Cuando tenían hambre, comían. Cuando tenían sed, bebían. Todo lo que estaba disponible para cualquiera estaba disponible para todos. Muchas personas ven el…
LA IDENTIDAD Y LA POLÍTICA DE LA ESCASEZ
Vivimos en una sociedad que incluso sus partidarios admiten que se basa en la “escasez”, incluso si su definición de escasez es bastante excéntrica (la ausencia de “pura abundancia”, como la definen sus libros de texto de economía). La escasez existe en el sentido normal en el sentido de que no se está produciendo lo…
Marx’s Conception of Socialism
As Marx envisaged society moving forward from capitalism to socialism, anything he had to say about the society of the future is of interest, but it is important to notice two things about what he said. Firstly, he never set out a comprehensive outline of socialist society. Secondly, he made scattered incidental references to the…
No es el neoliberalismo el culpable, es el capitalismo.
En los días de Marx, la doctrina de que el gobierno no debía interferir en el funcionamiento de la economía capitalista se conocía como “Manchester ismo” por la ciudad en el norte de Inglaterra donde la industria capitalista estaba entonces más desarrollada y cuyos capitalistas querían ser libre para poder producir ganancias como ellos lo…
The Labour Theory of Value
What we’re dealing with is value and price and I would remind you that the only way you can test the validity of Marx’s theories or the theories of any other economist is to apply the test as to whether they satisfactorily explain what goes on in the modern world. We should ask the question…
KARL MARX Y LA COMUNA DE PARÍS
Lo que sucedió en París en marzo de 1871 debe haber parecido en ese momento una tremenda agitación política. El gobierno francés perdió el control de París durante unos meses a manos de un consejo municipal, o “comuna”, formado por republicanos extremos cuya bandera era la Bandera Roja y que proclamaban la Emancipación del Trabajo. De…
Who was Karl Marx
Karl Marx died on the 14th of March 1883. The work he did lives on. An enormous amount has been written about him as an individual and about his materialist philosophy; less has been written about his work on economics. His theory of surplus-value is still largely ignored. Of those few who have written on…
The Myth of Red Clydeside
“Red Clydeside” first put itself on the map in the agitated years of the First World War. Since then, it has received plenty of examination. It has been portrayed as a possible revolution in the making; one that could have formed a link with the Bolsheviks and the Spartacists. The Clyde Workers’ Committee was the main body…
The Materialist Conception of History
In opposition to the conventional notion that the present form of society has always existed, the Socialist points out that it has existed for not more than a few centuries, and was preceded by other forms of society. In point of fact, the life history of the human race is made up of a series…