Marxism as a capitalist tool

Just as the two sides in the Cold War agreed that Capitalism and Communism were “the” two alternatives, so the two sides in the intellectual Great Debate agreed on a common framing of questions with the defenders of capitalism taking one side and Marxists taking the other. From the viewpoint of economic democracy (e.g., a labor-managed market economy), this late Great Debate between capitalism and socialism was as misframed as would be an antebellum Great Debate between the private or public ownership of slaves. The Great Debate between capitalism and socialism is now in the dustbin of intellectual history, but Marxism still plays an important role in sustaining the misframing of the questions so that the defenders of the present employment system do not have to face the real questions that separate that system from a system of economic democracy. In that sense, Marxism has become the ultimate capitalist tool.

Research highlights▶ Shows how Marxism has become the ideal intellectual foil for capitalist apologetics by agreeing to the bogus framing of the questions. ▶ Critique of capitalism requires a property theory, not a price theory, but Marxism only develops the labor theory of value, not the labor theory of property. ▶ Modern labor theory of property based on juridical principle of imputing legal responsibility according to de facto responsibility (an attribute only of human actions, not services of things). ▶ Framing of public versus private ownership of means of production is as bogus as framing of slavery debate about public or private ownership of slaves. ▶ Critique of voluntary contract for renting people based on inalienable rights theory of abolitionist and democratic movements.