Using Marxism to Understand the Ukraine War - Richard Wolff & David Harvey

If you read most mainstream media’s explanations of the war in Ukraine, you hear a lot about freedom, decency, and equity. You hear personalized psychological profiles of Mr Putin or Mr Zelensky. But what is missing is an explanation of how the functions and contradictions of capitalism are driving and fueling this conflict in many interconnected ways.
Last week we held an event, “Marxism for this Moment,” featuring a conversation between Richard Wolff and David Harvey, experts with long histories of applying Marx’s ideas to our current politics in insightful and educational ways. In this video, the professors addressed some of the international conflicts that are often at the top of our minds, such as the war in Ukraine.
"What Marxism does is say, 'there needs to be an underlying explanation.' You have to root what you're saying about Ukraine, China, and so on in the Marxian apparatus which puts the question of capitalism, and how it works, and why it works that way right in the core of the explanation. It's not the only thing, it's not it's not meant to exclude all manner of other subjects. But the exclusion of the capitalism feature is what our counterparts, what our conservatives and liberals, are busy doing." - Richard Wolff
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[@GeraltBosMang]

Is there a way to watch the full conversation?

[@democracyatwrk]

Please send us a message on our website www.democracyatwork.info/contactus if you're interested in watching the full conversation

[@alexandernovikov5963]

Have you read the works the works of young Russian Marxist scientists such as Oleg Komolov? In April 2021, they released a scientific report "Deglobalization: the crisis of neoliberalism and the movement towards a new world order"

[@-BUILT_LIKE_A_BAG_OF_MILK]

@@democracyatwrk why don't you just post it here? Any particular reason you are unable to do so?

[@slorter10]

As David once said you do not have to only change the economics you also have to change the elements that neoliberalism has entrenched into our global society: # Our daily life # Our mental perceptions # Our technology # Our social relations # Identifying that production is not just about things but production of a whole way of life; from ecological and environmental to how cities are structured; the role of our institutions; governance and legislation

[@jgalt308]

All of which is a total fantasy requiring perfect knowledge of complex and chaotic systems while reducing humans to automata. Easy to pontificate...inspired by "perfect hindsight" which was and is never perfect. But get to work and let us know when you have a "perfect system" for anything that produces the optimum results every single time.

[@cesarcalderonvalles]

As he has explained on his segment about "overdetermination" recently and a few times before. It's a complex matter.

[@lennysandroff8168]

Blackwater alone is managing 21 trillion dollars through computers. All the militarized privatized contractors are all part of the trillion dollar hedge funds and stock markets. What will they do with the money? Use the environmental crisis to accumulate capital. Sell carbon credits, swaps, neo enclosure movements that destroy life. This is their plan. Capital must grow and in a shrinking world that is in severe crisis the answer from the capitalist is always to put profits first even if it means tightening the noose. The material conditions are here, ripe for socialism, but it is the menticide fomented by the corporate media and Silicon Valley anti-social media that has made the subjective conditions, i.e. class consciousness, almost impossible.

[@profe3330]

WOW. You don't often see this kind of clarity and concision. What a powerhouse duo!

[@superstarajl]

these two are great - they should talk every week together!

[@X3R0D3D]

i agree, i follow both their weekly shows on D@W

[@JM-xd9ze]

David and Rick: please have these discussions more often!

[@antimattv]

Agreed. Perhaps next time they can have a specific challenging topic? They can chew on it for 45 minutes.

[@virgomoon6400]

The local electric company here in CT. is going up 50% in rates blaming it on gas prices that they pay in producing electricity! Blaming it on Russia-Ukraine war.

[@leopoldocapparelli9434]

Que inmenso placer intelectual, ver y escuchar a el dr. Wolf y Dr.Harvey con sus analisis cientificos, y a mis 82 años sigo aprendiendo sobre estos grandes problemas humanos, planteados por estos dos intelectuales marxistas.

[@VernonNickersonSCHOOLCOACH]

Mr. C, at 63, your sharing gives me hope for my future.🎉❤

[@-BUILT_LIKE_A_BAG_OF_MILK]

At 30 I feel like I've just entered school 😂

[@ernstthalmann4306]

The economics version of Michael Jordan and Larry Bird on the same team. Wonderful!

[@philiphewett2803]

Excellent dialogue - great to hear the views of two of today's eminent Marxist scholars

[@LONEWOLF..314-S-T-L]

GREAT TALKING POINTS PROFESSOR WOLFF AS USUAL SIR 👍🏾💯🌄

[@AlexanderKoryagin]

Thank you very much for this Prof. Wolff and Prof. Harvey! Prescient and stimulating!

[@jgalt308]

Yes the combined ignorance is very stimulating.

[@georgelayton6641]

@@jgalt308 That's the view of someone who would rather enhance their vanity then to tamp it down.

[@kevinschmidt2210]

@@jgalt308 No, your ignorance is not very stimulating at all.

[@jgalt308]

@@kevinschmidt2210 Still proving you have the intellect and arguing skills of a child.

[@kevinschmidt2210]

@@jgalt308 Still talking to yourself, while the irony is escaping you.

[@X3R0D3D]

Wow! this was awesome, i am interested in like 5 more hours of this...

[@geoffreynhill2833]

I think this is the most dangerous moment ever in human history.

[@anarchimedes7]

Richard and David together?! Well, Merry Christmas!

[@ashm3697]

Amazing how David can talk so much without using the words US imperialism , the primary contradiction

[@bradbell4022]

US is an ally of Britain in the same sense the ruling class are an ally of the British working class, ie. not at all

[@TheTalkWatcher]

Has anyone studied the petroleum industry for signs of decline in the rate of profit? I ask this question in regards to American imperialism. It appears to me that the US is using it's military to prop up it's domestic petroleum industry and to control the global petroleum market. Would US petroleum and gas be profitable, if countries like Iran, Iraq, Libya and Venezuela had not been sidelined by wars and sanctions? I think it is clear that US petroleum could not compete, if the market was free from US military intervention. It would not be profitable. The US fracking industry crashed in April 2020 when the Saudis and Russians crashed the price of oil. Prior to this in 2019 many fracking companies were going bankrupt. The proxy war in Ukraine and the destruction of pipeline infrastructure should make US fracking of oil and gas profitable. That's my take looking at it through a Marxist lens.

[@NavidKhan84]

Excellent point…Many fail to see this

[@marywest6844]

This man knows his stuff. A lesson, easy to understand for the economics trying to understand and befuddled like me.

[@hazelwray4184]

Which man?

[@jamesmurphy9426]

It's about American Hegemony in Europe

[@mauriziomoretti5392]

How about explaining whether and how Rosa Luxembourg’s theory in “The Accumulation of Capital” fits in the picture

[@guapodesperado2822]

Yes. Please.

[@VickiNikolaidis]

Thank you!

[@iloveamerica4891]

Thank you for teaching. Please discuss Tax havens, shell corporations and law, and how #Capitalist 1% pay no income tax get government incentives to do business and carry on getting richer. Middle class is paying income tax therefore is dying. #WallStreet always wins.

[@mehmetpolat6024]

excellent conversation, thank you for this!!

[@jmatsonheininger7760]

Thank You.

[@NuisanceMan]

That very last bit by Wolff was great.

[@JeffreyStHill-wo3li]

A question. How much does the dependence on the military industrial complex to drive the U. S. economy feature in the Ukraine war.

[@markward3981]

Now you are thinking. Weapons testing , display, trying to demonstrate that the U.S is the sole super power (by defeating Russia using Ukrainian as a proxy); indirectly threaten and demonstrate to China that that western under U.S leadership is in control. Howbeit It is not going according to plan. It is about to spin out of control

[@cesarcalderonvalles]

Excellent discussion! No doubt this is an economic capitalist war. Shared.

[@LunaticTheCat]

The West started this war? Oh wait, no, that was Russia... and don't even try that 'Russia was threatened NATO' bs lie.

[@cesarcalderonvalles]

@@LunaticTheCat ...I just heard there's a sick neo-nazi BS as well! Thanks for your input! Don't forget to like and comment to make this channel grow!

[@cavanoneill7454]

Thank you. No surplus (labour surplus) in neoliberal capitalism, no negative externalities. Why? Because taught economics in uni in the west can never reflect social reality, only social power.

[@philipangelo595]

Yes, unless one understands the economic pressures for policies one doesn't really understand why the policies are enacted. Definitely why a Nation State chooses to go to war has much to do with economic considerations.

[@dandelobo9284]

Great interview!

[@cartermclaughlin2908]

Professor Wolf: please do commentary on Magic the Gathering 30th anniversary kerfuffle. Hasbro kinda-sorta reprinted collectable that they promised 25ish years ago would not be reprinted. They have been saturating the market with new cards, scooping value from the secondary market that used to be a large motivation for people to buy their products in the first place. Some say they are trying to destroy physical cards so that people start playing computer game version. Magic is a lifestyle and it's interesting to see a company who has very high dependece on PR shoot themselves in the face in the name of the next quarter. They are even selling cards on Amazon for less than their cost to distributors! It's like they are TRYING to destroy their business model! I have a conspiracy theory: i experienced the destruction of my local coffee shop by real estate company passing smoking bans via city hall 10 years ago. I think there is an organized effort to destroy our ability to congregate outside of digital platforms. I have kids now, but when I get more free time IDK where to seek out a place to loiter with ideologically heterogeneous people. One of my strategies was to start haunting card shops, but I suspect those will no longer exist in 5 years!

[@lawsonj39]

Interesting thoughts. I doubt that a city ordinance banning smoking necessarily reflects a conspiracy to destroy brick-and-mortar congregation opportunities: smoking is detrimental to health and ought to be banned in public spaces. But I get what you're saying about the logic of forcing everyone online, whether that tendency represents an intentional strategy or is simply the result of various kinds of economic pressure. The result is more power being concentrated in the hands of big capital.

[@cartermclaughlin2908]

@@lawsonj39 the smoking ban is just the one that wounded me. You're right - economic pressures exist that make loitering undesirable. LIke Lee Camp says, it's the gravity of capitalism. BUT this could be reversed - certain businesses could get tax breaks for creating social spaces. Non-residential areas could require a certain density of public bath rooms, cheap public snack dispensers, wi-fi, benches that don't hurt your back, etc. We used to have public pools in every neighborhood. Anti-ergonomic furniture, missing bathrooms, missing garbage cans, parking meters, etc. The list of ways to make people spend money then GTFO are legion. The difference now is that economic inequality is so extreme that the idea of encouraging the poors to talk to each other must be terrifying to the rich. Congregation is a right. If we have a right you best believe it's to protect us from the rich, and you best belive it is under attack today. On a side note - there is NO research linking outdoor second hand smoke to disease. It's annoying maybe, exacerbates asthma certainly but IMO anything more than indoor bans and limited proximity to entrance bans are not justifiable. Isolation also has negative health impacts comprable to smoking as we saw during covid. I would argue isolation is worse - all smoking does is kill you, maybe limit your ADLs as you get older; isolation make life not worth living.

[@HM-hu4hu]

Banning smoking is good because it is harmful not only to the smoker, but second hand smokers too. Tobacco companies are evil. The worst of capitalism.

[@PEPPYY22]

this makes up for the thom hartmann interview

[@ramayanprakash1678]

Excellent.

[@hugoevers749]

Great, Thank you

[@alexsartre2453]

Excellent analysis!

[@lancehilt7536]

Anyone know the title of the article from Ecole de Guerrero Economique the Prof Wolff references? I looked for it on their site but could not find it.

[@AdamGeest]

Any available links to the école de guerre économique article?

[@EnGammalAmazon]

David, I hear you speaking and I agree with much of it. What I need is some evidence when you make some sweeping statements.

[@James-os9ku]

Where is the full video of this ? And why have Prof Wolff and Prof Harvey apparently never appeared together until now ?

[@yu-jd5jg]

Yes, because Western Capitalism, the US in particular, is rapidly failing now, and suffering people at large are desperately looking for a viable solution

[@michstockholm1164]

Thanks!

[@tanujSE]

Marxism was solution after capitalist accumulation rather than prediction of those times that capitalism is coming down It's good to listen to these two valuable Professor

[@melaniel.s8990]

Prof Wolff makes great points about capitalism, it's unstableness and downward spiral.

[@jgalt308]

Now if only it was capitalism?

[@kevinschmidt2210]

@@jgalt308 Now if only you take your meds.

[@SvalbardSleeperDistrict]

@@jgalt308 🤡

[@theprotagonist8755]

Hahahah I love seeing you commies cope sooo FUGGIN hard!

[@kevinschmidt2210]

@@theprotagonist8755 Last time I looked, the US no longer commands a unipolar hegemonic world, and the Petro Dollar has been shattered by BRICS, most of which are socialist countries. Hahahah, indeed!

[@martyfeldman2101]

Brilliant analysis. Especially the part about weakening the EU and the economic power of Europe to benefit the USA and the part about capitalism and surpluses.

[@zaneslocombe8008]

In 1962 former US secretary of state Dean Acheson delivered a speech at which created turmoil across the Atlantic in Westminster at the time:- " Great Britain has lost an Empire and has not yet found a role. To attempt to play a seperate power role - that is a role apart from Europe, a role based on a 'special relationship' with the US, a role based on being the head of a 'Commonwealth' which has no political structure, unity or strength and enjoys a fragile and precarious economic relationship by means of the Sterling area and preferences in the British market - this role is about to be played out. Great Britain attempting to work alone and be be a broker between the United and Russia has seemed to conduct policy as weak as its military power.' 61 years on we are still trapped in the the same Churchillian dogmatic paradigm propounded by the likes of Boris Johnson the US born Old Etonian who led us disastrously into Brexit like lambs to the slaughter. SInce the break up of the former Yugoslavia with the aid of NATO bombing I have had not a moment of doubt that the US has been intent on dividing Europe and fragmenting the EU. The EU was at the time the only economic bloc with a greater GDP than the US. This has been overtaken by BRICS and if the countries currently wanting to join BRICS are successful and these include Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, meaning we have a huge pivot away from the incumbent hegemon. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, president of Turkey, and home to NATO's biggest army after the USA, knows exactly the risks of betrayal and has warned the Turkish people of the dangers in a recent address, when he recalled the first coup of the Turkish Republic in 1960 which ousted the government of‎ Adnan Menderes. The coup was US backed and took place after Menderes approached Russia for economic when assistance from US aid via the Truman doctrine and the Marshall Plan was dwindling. The USA is fast running out of friends. Everyone is fully aware that US loyalty is bound strictly to the usefulness of an ally. When an ally ceases to be useful they abandoned regardless of sacrifices made. Russia in Syria it seems was 'Emperor's New Clothes' moment for the US. Russia was the little boy blurting out fearlessly that the Emperor was parading around naked.' The pretence of US supremacy it seems was discarded in that moment. Russian intervention stopped the US created, trained and funded terrorists of the Northern Alliance in their tracks and prevented regime change in Syria. I still am struggling to understand how leaders across Europe effectively sacrificed the welfare and prosperity of their own populations to prop up the US economy but Richard Wolff's theory that Germany is seeking to replace the UK as US intermediary goes some way in explaining this. The US appears to be grooming Germany for this role in its change in policy to permit Germany to play a bigger role militarily in the global arena is a policy which is not without obvious risk historically but pan European conflict worked out well for the US the last two times.

[@ranjitchoudhury4977]

What is the weakness of global capitalism on which one should hit?

[@henrywong1486]

EU should put a price cap on US gas instead of one on Russian orl to alleviate economic difficulties brought about by US price four times of Russian gas.

[@Berzinstube]

Great discussion. Now, what to do?

[@screenarts]

Never find a maga, interested in discussions any of this. No crazy comments from them here.

[@elcondedelafere8751]

While China is an economic superpower, let's not ignore ru$i4 is the other military superpower. This is a tri-polar world now

[@truthaboveall7988]

Great book “Overthrow” about US coups globally

[@jacpratt8608]

I wouldn't describe supporting a big armaments industry as getting rid of surplus. Its more like a scheme to cover up debt.

[@yvonnecamacho9902]

This is a MUST for all the ignorant knuckleheads I speak with or have spoken with in recent years. Marxism is the essential analytical tool for understanding our world, yet here in America just try imploring people to give that a try! What are we to do?

[@BellyrubsMan]

I think Henry Kissinger once said that the United States does not have allies but only interests. So true.

[@user-pj6ch6cc4d]

De Gaulle said this is true for all nations.

[@julierozo]

Of course the US doesn’t want it to end!

[@nowthenzen]

except for the bit of sophistry at the beginning a refreshingly thoughtful discussion with elements of insight.

[@andrewzhou4228]

"At a certain point the surplus which is used to generate more surplus is problematic. and so there have to be some 'sinks'." Would the housing market, stocks and bonds, be an example for such a sink to get rid of surplus? And is it because so much surplus is going in to the sink without leaving, that the housing prices keeps going higher? Then are inventions like financial derivatives, cryptocurrencies and NFTs, be a way of creating a new sink? What are the risks of building sinks upon sinks, like in the case of financial derivatives? Also, when the cold war ended in capitalist victory over the socialist world, did the reintegration of the socialist world into the capitalist order, are the ex-socialist countries a huge sink for surplus, through foreign direct investment for example? What about with large predatory financial institutions that look to short a developing country, is their plan taking away the accumulated surplus in the developing country. For example, in the case of the 1997 Asia financial crisis, which saw the destruction of ASEAN economies? Same with South America I think, their economies were growing very fast, but then it stagnated. Finally, are we at a point in which all these sinks are saturated, and there's no way of dealing with these unabsorbed surplus anymore? Would this be a reason why we are going to war, that the capitalist system cannot have any new sinks? War destroys social wealth so certainly it can deal with those surplus.

[@barquerojuancarlos7253]

Putin's "vision" as perceived by western Putin mind readers, not by listeners of Putin himself, who, like Gorbachev and Yeltsin before him, criticized the expansion of NATO

[@StephenSchleis]

Freud uses the word unconscious not subconscious. In the beginning, he use the words interchangeably, but he stuck with the former.

[@hazelwray4184]

Interesting. I prefer the latter but will "delve deeper"

[@vincentzwijsen7271]

I think the reason why almost all eastern European countries willingly joined NATO and Ukraine wants to align with the West is because being under the Russian yoke is a great deal worse than being under the capitalist one. Later part of the discussion is more interesting.

[@jeffrutledge1789]

No their leaders were bought off. The US comes in everywhere with large sums of money. Which of those days are about over

[@alexa.9446]

It was the secretary of defense who said that the aim was knock Russia back to a point where it could not invade any more neighbors. Which is wrong because....?

[@EbalObamuIEgoMamu]

An intellectually heavy loaded talk.

[@l.t.2780]

At around 8:25 Harvey says Ukraine has to open up for foreign investors in order to get some debt relief...does anybody know of a source for that?

[@rogbrogb5341]

I don't have a source, but try searching "Ukraine privatization". I think they've become a virtual lab for privatization, complete with union busting.

[@TheVanillatech]

Douglas McGregor asked rhetorically "What is Russia doing that it deserves to be destroyed?". Russia has committed the primal sin of having the worlds 3rd largest Gas and Oil reserves, and huge amounts of minerals and ores from the Arctic to Siberia. When oil was discovered in Nigeria in the 1960's, they found the 5th largest reserves in the world. The multi-nation and international oil companies moved in and have since given less than 1% of the wealth of that oil BACK to the Nigerians, and the 1% they give goes directly into the pockets the government officials and no further. Russia game is simply an energy grab, a wealth grab, a resource grab. Just as Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan etc.

[@Handy1s]

You don't mention that Russia has grabbed Ukraine's oil and gas fields along with its industrial area

[@TheVanillatech]

@@Handy1s What are you blabbering about? Russia has had monstrous oil and gas resources, and minerals and ores and coal and countless trees and land, since it's existance. You think that Russia set it's eyes on a tiny pittance of oil and gas in Ukraine as a reason to invade their country and liberate the terrorized people of the East of Ukraine? Don't be so STUPID, you stupid little man! It's peanuts compared to their absolutely huge supply of fuel, so large that - given their relatively tiny population in relation to landmass and resources, it would hardly add a single integer percent to their reserves! WE CAN SAY however, with ultimate certainity and with all the blood stained proof in the world, that the 1,000,000+ dead Afghan, Iraqi, Libyan people (women and children included), DID allow the Americans and NATO to take hold of, steal, and exploit those nations oil and gas reserves. Because it happened. For the last 30 years, it's happened. And it's still going on today. In those three countries, AND in Syria and Haitii. With the way things are going, possibly soon in Saudi Arabia and Venezuela too. We CAN say that, can't we? Because it's facts. Try to pull your head out from your ass.

[@Handy1s]

Ah the Orc shows his true colours! I merely stated a fact but you resort to personal insults and Russian propaganda

[@TheVanillatech]

Sorry, if you could do us all a favour and tell me exactly what parts of my comment were propaganda. That is, tell us all which parts were NOT facts. I'd be very grateful. Thanks!

[@Handy1s]

Well, you replied to yourself, but I assume you aimed at me, so the last line of your initial statement is obviously not fact because Russia is the invading country and the one grabbing Ukraine's territory, natural resources and people. Russians also forget that they have had wars with Finland Chechnya Georgia and Afghanistan. Ukraine is almost 9 times more heavily populated per square Kilometer than the Russian Federation. Since Russia has had 3 attempts to control Afghanistan it would appear that it is Russia was intent on controlling the oil and gas there, particularly since they developed the oil fields there (the gas and oil in Afghanistan is a miniscule amount, making your mention of it an attempt at rhetoric) Ukraine's reserves are equally small showing that Putin's invasion is imperialism, after all he compares himself to Peter the Great and Medvedev says Ukrainian must be liquidated. Freeing East Ukrainians from terror is propaganda created in 2014 following the invasion of Crimea and the Russian backed separatist movement in Donbas. The Asov Battalion didn't exist until 2014 and was a response to Russian action You connect NATO with countries where there was never a NATO operation and only some of its members played a role

[@saramuhumphries9225]

👍💐

[@billsolow2829]

It's Capital fighting for Commodities.

[@vinniep01]

I've not studied economics, nevertheless I have a question. Dr Wolf makes clear that every few years vast amounts of people are thrown out of work. Now apparently this is to lower inflation as a result of lowering the bargaining power of labour ; by creating a labour pool and thus driving wages down. But we already know, via Marx and IMF report etc, that wage demands do not cause a wage inflation spiral. Wages in reality only ever try to keep pace with inflation. So why the contradiction and why does, if indeed it does, inflation fall when unemployment rises?

[@bigbillhaywood1415]

When ppl lose jobs = loss of purchasing power = loss of demand = lower prices. In this instance the inflation isn't caused by wage increases, they just like to use unemployment as a solution to it.

[@vinniep01]

@@bigbillhaywood1415 thanks

[@nodice8312]

Is this a conscious effort , if so..exactly who are those ..the persons ...pulling the strings????

[@vthilton]

Share and Save the World

[@davydacounsellor]

Ukrainian farmer's were protesting a couple of years ago about land reforms, 27 people were injured in the protests, basically zelensky as said, wants to open up Ukraine farmland to foreign investors, but this has been going on for over 20 years, I drove a taxi in Belfast in 2009 and meet two yanks going to Ukraine to buy farmland, they said there was lots of US corporations buying up farmland in Ukraine, now here's the kicker, zelensky also wants IMF loans to as he says, for land reforms, why would Ukraine need land reforms if it's so productive, Ukraine doesn't, it's to line the pockets of the investors pockets, and tax the Ukrainian farmer's, that's why they were protesting, along with as the average Ukrainian farmer's are being outbid by large multinational corporations, and we all know where their from. The USA is trying to protect what they have bought up already, but also we're getting greedy as they wanted the commercial sector in Eastern Ukraine but the ethnic Russians didn't want the land reforms nor the USA outbidding local farmers and business's, plus the extra tax burden placed on the people by paying back IMF loans for the next 2 generations, the people of eastern Ukraine asked Russia for help. Simple!

[@michaelmcgoldrick7909]

💯🍀✌️

[@indonesiamenggugat8795]

🌹🌹

[@johnperniciaro785]

There he (David H) said it!--- paraphrasing " We'll let you slide on the debts for now but later...later buddy you got to sell---& all you got is that wonderful ice-age created soil --- & now with 20 million less people (from over 50 million during Soviet Times)...it's a perfect opportunity!

[@livondiramerian6999]

Capital is an inhumane thing how could humans depend on inhumane factors? This is why the world is living in crisis always, what humans should depend on is justice which will provide humanity with a better future than we had for a long period of time. Justice is a humane factor because the essence of humanity is justice.

[@jgalt308]

Well since FDR discarded the "constitution" the expectation of "justice" as well as the continued ignorance of the people regarding these facts will never happen.

[@kevinschmidt2210]

@@jgalt308 When did you discard your meds?

[@jacpratt8608]

9 to 90M in 70 years, considering the population increase and ecology effects, 9-90 is not very much. It might be going backwards. But someone else can do the arithmetic. Who is indebted to who you might ask.

[@VichoBandido]

Question about surplus. It is said that US dollars feed the military and military industrial complex, this gets U$ to other countries which then is used to fuel internal growth, and in turn US growth. But since 71, the US does not need surplus to do this, it's prints currency with little consequence while it is the global trade/ exchange currency. How does Marx account for this imperial strategy? Is this really a matter of surplus?

[@user-btmbangalore]

Growth rates were necessary to justify the system, the rest of the industrial world was honest in admitting they had lost faith in the top men to work miracles. Private capitalism, the advancement over feudal methods, could not be solution to all human crises, it had to sell faith as an commodity to avoid being rejected. Printing currency to create the illusion of superfluous wealth was an attempt to deny the communists legitimacy. In a capitalist paradise there is always plenty, the cheap communist could not give that plenty to anyone or all. Surplus was created by institution, however institution was never allowed to own the surplus. Surplus belonged to few, the few or one who run the institutions, you create institutions to glorify one or few. A propaganda is circulated around one person, a clever deception created to discredit collective identity. You create a lie, you deliberately repeat it a hundred times, no one questions it after certain point of time. Now, Crony Capitalism is totally dependent on lies not facts. The strength of capitalism is impersonal, these obstinate guys dislike Capitalism as it has its own agenda.

[@alexa.9446]

The parts about the war in Ukraine are almost comical from a Central and Eastern European perspective. Seriously, boys, put your feet back on the ground.

[@jean-pierredevent970]

For a while, greedy capitalists could squeeze profits out of low paid jobs in developing countries or from exploiting natural resources without paying enough. The arms trade and war is still profitable. Green investments are possible but perhaps not so profitable and risky. Some dream of course of drilling oil in the arctic and again making huge profits as if there is no climate threat. But all in all we already see another world coming with much less return on investment. So I wonder if capitalism will change too.

[@rojavabashur6455]

Wolff underestimate the will of Europeans to defeat Russia in this. I dont know what report he brought up from France but its not the USA driving this war, Ukraine would still be heavily supported by the europeans even without the USA. I dont think Americans understand the impact of having 12 million ukrainian refugees all over Europe right now.

[@judithferraris]

Cargill Dupont and montanto already own 17 million hectares of Ukrainian land

[@rogbrogb5341]

The boom/ bust cycles produce crises of overproduction and underconsumption.

[@victors4333]

Marxism really discussed ecology?

[@stevennurahmed5105]

Does capitalism approximate natural growth processes? If so, does it simply mirror nature? If yes, is it impossible to eradicate capitalism?

[@l.w.paradis2108]

1. No, unless you are thinking of a disease vector that reproduces so rapidly and massively that it kills the host. 2. No (but see 1). 3. It contains the seeds of its own destruction. More to the point, don't confuse metaphor with science. Your questions are actually far too vague.

[@rogbrogb5341]

Roughly even trade can be functional capitalism, but we are in Late Capitalism, and Lenin said that Imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism. I liken it to the uncontrolled growth of cancer. We need radical surgery, revolution, to stop this before it takes us over the cliffs of nuclear war, environmental disaster, or an ever- worsening hell on earth.

[@stevennurahmed5105]

@@rogbrogb5341 But how would Marx explain Bronze and early Iron age imperialism? Would both be classified as monarchical capitalism? If so, might it be plausible to conclude that maybe after a certain stage of social development capitalism is inevitable and is the end? What I mean is that capitalism is only stopped by a natural growth curve to an environmental capacity limit? There is no progression after capitalism. Maybe on regression to a primitive economy.

[@stevennurahmed5105]

@@l.w.paradis2108 What I mean by 'mirror nature' is the trophic structure of all organic life forms and the predatory relations of life forms at every level even down to a blade of grass and dead carcasses.

[@l.w.paradis2108]

@@stevennurahmed5105 Every economic system could be characterized as "mirroring nature" in that way, long before the Industrial Revolution and the rise of modern social classes. Or, each such system could be characterized as an example of one organized attempt humans have devised to obviate the most brutal features of nature through collective effort. Nature places constraints on every economic system; our primary material needs are not determined by us.

[@spanky7277]

Greece's economy is In the tank because of Bush' 4 time Crash of the market What caused the Greek economy to crash? The Greek debt crisis is due to the government's fiscal policies that included too much spending. Greece's financial situation was sound when it entered the EU in the early 1980s, but deteriorated substantially over the next thirty years.

[@marywest6844]

Was it because people thought they had so much value in their properties? Went out and remortgaged to get the latest BMW wagons and all the gadgets? Then took a skate.

[@takismaratzas9937]

With this proxy war in 🇺🇦 , 🇺🇸 just lost "one" big of the few friends that had been left with. 🇪🇺 Europe 🇺🇸 has been left with only with 2 last friends. 🇬🇧 and 🇦🇺 I am curious what will be happened when 🇺🇸 lose these 2 remaining allies.

[@hazelwray4184]

Western Europe perhaps. Eastern Europe, especially Poland, is more closely aligned with US geopolitical aims...unfortunately.

[@justinbozeman9279]

Will you guys meet me for lunch one day!?

[@PCH12r]

Russia wages classic colonial war in the Ukraine assimilating it's economic and human resources under the flag of denazification and Russification. Excuse me but if Marx was born in Russia he would write same capitalism not about western colonialism but Russian expansive imperialism.

[@andresamplonius315]

Lenin plantea la cuestión del caso de un conflicto bélico entre Inglaterra y Brasil, a cuál deberían apoyar los revolucionarios. Y su respuesta es que entre una "democracia" imperialista como Inglaterra y un país atrasado y no democratico, los revolucionarios deben apoyar al segundo, ya que su triunfo provocaría el despertar de las masas mientras que la victoria de la potencia imperialista, por el contrario, únicamente fortalecería al sistema imperial.

[@hazelwray4184]

Support BRICS; the Shangai Cooperation Organisation SCO, and a reformed UN, which empowers Latin America and Africa.

[@jacpratt8608]

Could you unpick profit and surplus? sometime.

[@vague57]

A bit like Chomsky, these 2 seem incapable of engaging with the dynamics of the Ukraine conflict on a political level. This leaves their analysis seeming isolated from human reality, it gives the impression of a cold economic determinism that actually seems incapable of providing a fully rounded materialist outlook.

[@vague57]

The sterility of this pseudo Marxist position is characterized by a complete failure to engage with any Ukranians, let alone the left in Ukraine.

[@StephenSchleis]

How is there a such thing as a just war?

[@l.w.paradis2108]

Defense, such as the Vietnamese fighting the French and the American invaders.

[@rogbrogb5341]

StephenSchleis War of liberation. War on the side of the poor, the working class, or indigenous people. Bloodshed is certainly not something to be happy about, but self defense is a natural impulse and a right.

[@X3R0D3D]

sometimes good people do bad things to stop bad people from doing more bad things. its a basic trait of primate morality.

[@jaredgreathouse3672]

Self defense. Iraqi and Vietnamese resistance was justified. And Ukrainian resistance against Russia today is also okay. Because well.......... you're allowed to kill others to defend yourself.

[@jgalt308]

@@jaredgreathouse3672 So the killing of ethnic Russians in the Donbas was okay? For 8 years?

[@ivanoleaanimator]

What about the working class in Russia, UK, Germany, Ukraine, USA, and China. It’s in the working class that we see an end to this war.

[@iloveamerica4891]

Tax havens, shell corporations and law, and how #Capitalist 1% pay no income tax get government incentives to do business and carry on getting richer. Middle class is paying income tax therefore is dying. #WallStreet always wins.

[@oswarz]

The Americans aren't? I'm feeling it hard at the grocery store.

[@giagotua2294]

So no single word about Russian imperialism, its economic basis , Russian capitalism. "It is not about Ukraine, this country is just proxy state, people defending their houses are just blind, they should go and read marx" etc. mode of thinking. so pitty, dear proffesors.

[@aidanboz9196]

And when that neoliberalisation of the Ukraine capital and labour market is complete, watch the standard of living skyrocket. So many European examples over the last 30 years of countries shrugging of soviet Marxism and never looking back. It will be staggeringly expensive to build back Ukraine and I’m to sure who will pay for it. I just can’t see Marxism as a useful lens to understand anything that is going on.

[@cheeto8960]

The EU wants to use $300 billion from russians it stoled from some international banks to rebuild ukriane.

[@solamoten]

[If you are intelligent] The Fact is The Fact, without anyone or any group of people acknowledge or not. It should be obvious that the Atoms exist as they do as the forever active immortal beings. It is the Miracle by the fact they exist. If you want to think yourselves are intelligent, you need to understand and acknowledge what the named concept "God" actually is. Doing so makes you to understand what is your own existence. In doing so You could understand what yourself is.

[@kevinschmidt2210]

Stop getting high right before posting a comment. You're so far off the topic that you are out in space.

[@jacpratt8608]

I don't think the US would even want to consider China (or Russia, dont forget Russia) as an equal power who could stop the war. Who are the "Bothe Sides" you're talking about? Russia - Ukraine? Russia NATO? Russia - USA?(with Nato and ukraines proxies) Russia - NATO + Ukraine. And it IS important to talk about who started what, when where how!!

[@ThatsMrPencilneck2U]

The US is not in decline. China has been allowed to rise, because the Chinese government is so incompetent that it cannot capitalize on all the business we have given them. Supporting them is no longer affordable, so the US is going to let them collapse. It amazes me that economists haven't connected the rise of China as part of the US isolation of the USSR, and that China is absolutely dependent on the US to keep global trade open. When India retaliates for all those damns China is building upstream of India's water supply, the US is simply going to allow India to close off all trade with China.

[@petermautner1644]

Certainly the school system and the fantasyland religion don't try to influence people in birth control. The mantra perhaps should be less is more .

[@lawsonj39]

Ukraine would be insane to agree to peace while a) it has the military initiative and b) Putin remains in power. Russia has demonstrated that it's going to continue chipping away at Ukraine's territory and its independence. No doubt the US, China, and the EU all have their reasons for supporting one side or the other, and the military-industrial complex is cashing in big-time, but the background of Russian aggression makes it almost impossible to sell the pacifist argument that the battle should end on almost any terms asap. The left should pick its battles, and this one isn't worth the candle.

[@theprotagonist8755]

Shhh you will mess up these commies narrative.

[@hazelwray4184]

Ukraine doesn't have the 'military initiative'. It's hubristic and 'insane' to have been so belligerent towards Russia.

[@cheeto8960]

Nah, the war would had been avoided if Ukraine or the US declared that urkaine wouldn't join NATO and Ukraine would give semi autonomy to donbas. Putin's peace settlement is still the same but that donbas should be independent since donbas don't want to join the entho nationalist state of Ukraine.

[@Flynnmiv]

Hey bubble heads, explain to us now what a just war is ? What are the criteria ?