This is why I grumble about graduate school

In the history department, there is a student newslist. People can post upcoming events, articles of interest, job postings, fellowships, etc. Often, people manifest their most pedantic side on this list, I have found over the last few years. There was the great T-shirt crisis of 2008 (who knew that the proposal of a department T-shirt could spark so much controversy?), the issue of the Olympics, and now, the issue of banks. Unsurprisingly, all of these things come back to capitalism and Marx. And while I like Marx a lot (a whole lot, actually), I'm sick of people using him to dichotomize theory and practice. As Tyson has said to me, "Have they ever read the Theses on Feuerbach?" And even when I ideologically agree with the writers of these posts, why can people not keep their mouths shut in improper forums? So, with no further ado, I invite you to the petty debates that plague what is meant to be a list for social organization. NOTE: Don't read on if you get bored with or pissed off at arguments that should remain unargued.

First email:

Protest the American Bankers Association
October 27 Tuesday

Even though bank deregulation and financial speculation
plunged the economy into its worst crisis since the
Depression, attempts to impose real regulation are being
gutted by the banking lobby as we speak. Even though we threw
trillions of dollars at the banks to save them, they’re still
foreclosing on people, they’re still gouging consumers in a
thousand different ways, and now they’re handing out billions
of dollars in bonuses for new speculative trading even as
unemployment rises.

The economic crisis is a huge opportunity for progressive
change, but instead debate has been dominated by “tea parties”
and unproductive blanket condemnations of the government. This
protest is our best chance – maybe our last chance – to focus
attention on the real problems. Join thousands from Chicago
and around the nation in what should be the biggest protest in
Chicago in years.

Buses will return to campus by 1pm, but if you need to leave
earlier CTA will by happy to oblige.

Endorsed by: Action Now, AFL-CIO, Albany Park Neighborhood
Council, Americans for Financial Reform, ARISE Chicago,
Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, Change To Win, Chicago
Coalition of the Homeless, Citizen Action, Grassroots
Collaborative, Housing Action Illinois, Illinois Alliance for
Retired Americans, Illinois Hunger Coalition, Jane Addams
Senior Caucus, Jobs with Justice, Northside Action and
Justice, Northside POWER, National People's Action, SEIU
Illinois State Council, Southsiders Organized for Unity and
Liberation, UE, Workers United

Second Email: 

"This protest is our best chance – maybe our last chance – to focus
attention on the real problems."

Are banks actually the real problem? Is speculation?

Marx argued that the first place that a crisis appears-- in this case the banks involved in real estate-- in actuality was the *last* place it existed and that speculation is a symptom of an *already existing crisis.* In other words, a banking crisis is a fetish form, it misrecognizes that the fundamental problem lies in production and in the relationship between the new value added into the system aka "living labor" and the organic composition of capital. This may well be the best chance for the left to bring to consciousness the "real problems" but the real problems are not problems of finance.

Third Email:

"Did Marx know what a "derivative" was?"

Fourth Email:

"Did Marx know what a "derivative" was?"

I assume that this was meant to be snide, but I also assume
that all people posting to this site are historians, so I may
be wrong on one account, or both. Insofar as we are mostly
historians, we should probably realize that while names change
and "derivatives" become more complex, the idea of futures,
options, and speculative investment did not originate in 2008.

In fact, as anyone familiar with the history of "modern" trade
knows, stock futures began trading in the early 1600s with the
rise of the East India Company. And while the process has
undeniably gotten far more complex in the recent past, the
basic tendency to invest (when the bubble is growing) or
"speculate" (after the bubble has popped) in these options has
been around for centuries.

As has the critique of "speculative practices," "speculation,"
and "speculators." Go read Daniel Defoe, Adam Smith, Charles
Fourier, or a host of other writers who considered the
recurrent crises that have accompanied the modern capitalist
era. They all have interesting things to say about
"speculation." And they all have interesting things to say
about stock-jobbers, cheats, profligates, swindlers, and the
like. Much of it (with the exception of Smith), carries a
distinct anti-Semitic bent.

I think xxx's point is that we can continue the line of
simply protesting the phenomena of the crisis at its most
apparent level (with signs, if necessary), and take up and
continue the critique of contemporary swindlers,
stock-jobbers, and the like. Or we can begin to ask ourselves
why these crises replicate themselves with ever greater
intensity in the modern era.

And to get to that question, you probably should crack open
that Marx and see for yourself what he has to say on the subject.

Just my 4.5 cents o the subject matter. Inflationary pressure
makes words more expensive.


Fifth email: 

"Insofar as we are historians," we actually ought to
historicize "futures" instead of assuming an underlying
transhistorical constant. The changing complexity and form of
finance is very relevant to understanding the historical
particularity of types of domination in capitalism.

Also, a more nuanced understanding of Capital is that it
doesn't make sense to dichotomize between a "real" economy and
a "speculative" economy. The forms of domination under
capitalism are characterized by an intricate connection
between finance and production/labor. Of course, you might
also take a look at Moishe Postone's work for a discussion of
how domination in capitalism is abstract, i.e. the fetish is
the real.

The logic behind protesting banks' role in the economic crisis
is precisely to draw attention to the heart of capitalism, the
enablers, the institutions that allow for the increasing size
and sophistication of domination in all spheres of capitalism.


And I guarantee you that the debate is not yet finished.