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Explaining the Crisis: A Marxist Re-Appraisal
Book by Harman, Chris
183 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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About the author
Chris Harman
122 books186 followersBritish journalist and political activist for the Socialist Workers Party.
Harmann was involved with activism against the Viet Nam war but became controversial for denouncing Ho Chi Minh for murdering the leader of the Vietnamese Trotskists.
Harman's work on May 1968 in France and other student and workers uprisings of the late 1960s, The Fire Last Time, was recommended by rock band Rage Against the Machine in their album sleeve notes for Evil Empire.
Harmann was involved with activism against the Viet Nam war but became controversial for denouncing Ho Chi Minh for murdering the leader of the Vietnamese Trotskists.
Harman's work on May 1968 in France and other student and workers uprisings of the late 1960s, The Fire Last Time, was recommended by rock band Rage Against the Machine in their album sleeve notes for Evil Empire.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 19, 2020
Zombie Capitalism is the updated version of this book, but this was worth a skim.
July 15, 2009
Explaining the Crisis by Chris Harman is a comprehensive analysis of world capitalism written in 1984 that looks at the preceding decades and proves that capitalism continues to be prone by crisis and is unable to resolve itself.
Harman wrote Explaining the Crisis as world capitalism was hitting another crisis. He was mainly arguing against a common idea that the post-war boom that went on longer than expected proved the capitalism had resolved itself. Today, as we are in amongst another economic crisis, this idea seems completely alien.
The book is quite difficult to read, very technical and requires a decent amount of prior knowledge of Marxist economics such as Sandra Bloodworth’s A Crime Beyond Denunciation and another of Harman’s books, Economics of the Madhouse.
But the technical detail applied is needed to comprehensively explain the long boom and how Marx’s laws of economics still apply today, mainly how the rising organic composition of capital (Investment in new technology) leads to a long term trend of the rate of profit to fall, but that countervailing tendencies can hold off this trend or a crisis but that holding it off through shifting investment or speculation in fact exacerbates a crisis that will inevitably happen sooner or later.
The main crux of his argument is how the emergence of permanent investment in arms led to a slowing of investment in productive industry, hence drawing out the boom in capitalism’s cycle of boom and bust.
The only criticism was that the conclusion of the book is a bit too apocalyptic and looking at it today, his prediction that the crisis could not resolve itself, that it would go on continuously, didn’t eventuate. Whilst his overall arguments were still correct, he failed to see capitalism’s ability to save itself again as it did in the 90s, only to eventually drop into another deeper crisis.
Harman’s book is a must-read for anyone grappling with Marxist Economics and the Global Financial Crisis today.
http://www.benjaminsolah.com/blog/?p=...
Harman wrote Explaining the Crisis as world capitalism was hitting another crisis. He was mainly arguing against a common idea that the post-war boom that went on longer than expected proved the capitalism had resolved itself. Today, as we are in amongst another economic crisis, this idea seems completely alien.
The book is quite difficult to read, very technical and requires a decent amount of prior knowledge of Marxist economics such as Sandra Bloodworth’s A Crime Beyond Denunciation and another of Harman’s books, Economics of the Madhouse.
But the technical detail applied is needed to comprehensively explain the long boom and how Marx’s laws of economics still apply today, mainly how the rising organic composition of capital (Investment in new technology) leads to a long term trend of the rate of profit to fall, but that countervailing tendencies can hold off this trend or a crisis but that holding it off through shifting investment or speculation in fact exacerbates a crisis that will inevitably happen sooner or later.
The main crux of his argument is how the emergence of permanent investment in arms led to a slowing of investment in productive industry, hence drawing out the boom in capitalism’s cycle of boom and bust.
The only criticism was that the conclusion of the book is a bit too apocalyptic and looking at it today, his prediction that the crisis could not resolve itself, that it would go on continuously, didn’t eventuate. Whilst his overall arguments were still correct, he failed to see capitalism’s ability to save itself again as it did in the 90s, only to eventually drop into another deeper crisis.
Harman’s book is a must-read for anyone grappling with Marxist Economics and the Global Financial Crisis today.
http://www.benjaminsolah.com/blog/?p=...
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews