Value and Crisis: Essays on Marxian Economics in Japan

by Makoto Itoh

Marxian economic thought has a long and distinguished history in Japan dating back to World War I. During the 1920s the main focus was on two areas--the theory of capitalism expounded in the three volumes of Marx's Capital, and the particular characteristics of Japanese capitalism as it developed after the Meiji Restoration of 1868. Rival schools of thought emerged and staged brilliant debates at a time when interest in Marxism in the United States was still almost nonexistent. Since World War II the economics faculties of major Japanese universities have taught both Marxist and neoclassical approaches, and many of the most important writings of U.S. and European Marxists have been translated and are widely used in Japan. There has not, however, been a comparable familiarity with the rich Japanese Marxist tradition in the West. Professor Itoh's book makes an important beginning in rectifying this lopsided situation. It opens with a long and highly informative essay on the development of Marxian economics in Japan, and contains a number of the author's important and original contributions to this stream of thought.

Genres: Japan, Economics

296 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1980

Reviews

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Makoto Itoh's The Basic Theory of Capitalism: The Forms and Substance of the Capitalist Economy was the first book about Marxism I read when I was young, and it was a both an excellent introduction and a great overview.

Value and Crisis is a more focused work. First off, it introduces the particulars of the historical development of Marxism in Japan. Japanese Marxists struggled with many of the same issues as their Western counterparts, but their relative isolation, combined Marxism's far greater acceptability in Japan (particularly post-WWII), has allowed them to offer quite distinctive contributions from a more or less unique perspective.

And this book is an excellent example. It is about two of Marx's theories (the pair being foundational, in Itoh's scheme) that happen to be among those with the most complications: the interlocking concepts of value and crisis—neither of which Marx fully fleshed out in his work, and have proven to be the thorniest, if not most controversial, subjects that Marxists have attempted to round out ever since.

As a project with decades of research behind it, this second edition having even been revised to include our contemporary economic situation, I don't see how this book cannot be portrayed as anything but a classic of its field.