CALL FOR PAPERS: Capital as Power

[sanha926]

CALL FOR PAPERS on the subject of "Capital as Power."

The present global crisis opens the door for theoretical alternatives. The two main paradigms of capital accumulation – the neoclassical utility theory of value and the Marxist labour theory of value – are in disarray. Many leading neoclassicists now concede that their "world is broken" and that their utilitarian "pillars of faith" have collapsed. Marxists have been content to see these confessions, but they remain unable to offer a convincing alternative based on labour values. These failures call for a new theoretical, methodological and empirical framework for rethinking capitalist valuation and accumulation – a framework based not on utility or labour time, but on power.

We are calling for paper presentations to be organized in several related panels under the general heading of "Capital as Power." The papers can be theoretical, methodological or empirical, and they can examine any aspect of capital as power. The panels will be included as part of the upcoming "Rethinking Marxism" Conference, to be held on November 5-8, 2009, at the University of Amherst Massachusetts.

http://rethinkingmarxism.org/conf/index ... rxianTimes

If you wish to present a paper on one of these panels, please write to Jonathan Nitzan (nitzan@yorku.ca). The conference registration deadline is August 1, 2009. In order to set up our panels in a timely fashion, we request your proposal (title and a 200 word abstract) to be sent in to Nitzan by June 1, 2009.

Best wishes,

Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan

[troycochrane]

Who's planning on submitting something to this?

If so, can you give us a sneak peek as to what you're thinking of presenting, if your abstract is accepted?

[Aaron_Muchelle]

I'm planning on submitting a paper to this conference. Perhaps on the application of Capital as Power on the United Kingdom or, were I more ambitious, upon the EU. (Data for the latter however, may be short).

Anyone else attending this?

[troycochrane]

I'm planning on submitting something, although I'm not sure what. I've been thinking about the mortgage crisis and how mortgages are essentially the capitalization of the individual. I'm thinking that after reading N&B's treatment of capitalization in their new book I may pursue this to examine the explosion household debt since the early 80s.

[sanha926]

I'm going to submit something on the 'innovation wave' in financial intermediation in the US since the early 1970s: trying to discern how this has impacted the differential power and accumulation strategies of dominant banks. The challenge will be to put all the broad and very preliminary thoughts I have on the subject into a short abstract by June 1st.