PRAGOTI

The rhetoric of the market has been a fundamental and central component of ideological struggle - the struggle for the legitimation or delegitimation of left discourse. The surrender to the various forms of market ideology - on the left, not to speak of everybody else, - has been imperceptible but alarmingly universal. This is the second shoe of the destiny of that older piece of discourse, 'nationalization' - which it follows some twenty years later, just as in general full postmodernism (particularly in the political field) has turned out to be sequel, continuation and fulfillment of the old 50s 'end of ideology' episode. 'The market is in human nature': this is the proposition that cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged. That is, the most crucial terrain of ideological struggle in our time, Fredric Jameson had argued in 1990 in the Socialist Register.

Pragoti reproduces this seminal article where Jameson holds that nothing is served by substituting for one inert institutional structure (bureaucratic planning) another inert institutional structure, namely the market itself.

Pragoti has regularly brought to its readers articles which expand the understanding of our contemporary world using Marxist methods. In the present article, Canadian academic and Marxist David Bedford, explores the reasons why Aboriginal politics has not allied itself with Marxist politics in Canada. He sees global parallels in this hesitation to ally with Marxist politics on the part of people who are variously termed aboriginal, tribal and primitive. It also addresses the issue of how Marxist political practice could deal with issues relating to culture in this context.

 This interview with Louis Althusser, first published four decades ago in the height of the radical movements in Europe and beyond, has had a lasting influence on Marxist writers, thinkers and communist parties. Positions have been taken for and against the ideas which Althusser expressed here and in his other writings. Pragoti republishes this seminal interview of Althusser to rekindle some of the debates within Marxism with regard to science and ideology, the relation of theory to practice and the very definition of Marxism as a science or ideology. 

The role of the mass media (MM) in influencing mass and class behavior has been a central concern among critical writers, especially since the turn of the Twentieth century. Debates and studies on the MM have focused on its political bias, ownership and links to big business, relationships and ties to the state, relative openness and diversity, promotion of wars and corporate interests among other major issues affecting the relations of power, wealth and empire. Of particular interest to writers opposing and supporting the role of the MM is the impact of the MM in influencing mass outlook, opinions and behaviors. Essays, monographs and empirical studies have been published as to the extent of MM influence, the time frame in which it retains control, the ‘depth’ of loyalty to MM inculcated opinions, and the ‘place’ in which MM messages have the greatest influence in inducing mass opinion in conformity with ruling class interests.

An understanding of the role and power of the MM in contemporary capitalist society requires us to organize the debate according to three major schools – conservative, liberal and Marxist – before proceeding to a critical analysis and finally presenting notes towards setting alternatives to elite-controlled communications networks.

Interview

“There is no Alternative but Socialism”: Samir Amin

[Prof. Samir Amin, eminent Marxist scholar and Director, Third World Network was in New Delhi on 17th November 2008, to address a Symposium on the Global Economic Crisis. He spoke about the current crisis and the way forward for the progressive forces, to Prasenjit Bose and Senthil Babu from the CPI (M)]. Interview courtesy India News Network.

Marxists were for the defense of the national state in the bourgeois revolutionary epoch because it furthered the proletarian cause. Marxists can be for national defense today, upon a basis that furthers the interests of the proletariat against those of the bourgeoisie. In this lies the key to our agitation in the daily political struggle – our agitation to expose the “national defense” of the bourgeoisie and reveal its fraudulent character.

Ernest Erber wrote in 1940.

An article from the June 1996 issue of Monthly Review

Most contemporary feminist theory has owed at least some of its substantive content to the works of Marx and Engels. And yet a closer examination of the "marriage" of Marxism and feminism - to use Heidi Hartmann's now well-known phrase - indicates a troubled relationship.

This is the text of the Safdar Hashmi Memorial Lecture (organised by Jana Natya Manch) delivered by eminent Marxist economist Prof. Prabhat Patnaik, on 8th November 2008 in New Delhi. In this lecture Prof. Patnaik argues that Marxist theory should not be viewed as a closed isolationist knowledge system. On the contrary, It is important for Marxist theory, especially today, to break out of isolationism, to engage vigorously with the world of ideas in general, and thereby to enrich itself to cope with the unfolding reality of the world capitalist crisis.

''There are two opposing approaches to the analysis of ecological destruction and the emergence of Indian movements in Latin America: the liberal and the Marxist.

Marxist class analysis highlights the centrality of property ownership, specifically the class nature of the ownership of the means of production and control over state power as central to understanding the destruction of the environment and the complex politics of Indian society''.

James Petras concludes ''Ecology and Indian liberation are essentially and inextricable part of the class struggle''. (Courtesy: Dissidentvoice)

Is the intellectual opinion of capitalism changing? Eric Hobsbawm on the financial crisis.

Courtesy:BBC Radio 4 Today