Yanis Varoufakis

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

.. an illuminating article in the now dreadful Graun by the Greek Minister of Finance [if only our pols ... sigh]

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/18/yanis-varoufakis-how-i-became-an-erratic-marxist

[french frank]

.. an illuminating article in the now dreadful Graun by the Greek Minister of Finance [if only our pols ... sigh]

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2015...rratic-marxist

Read with interest (lecture of 2013?), particularly:

"Forging alliances with reactionary forces, as I think we should do to stabilise Europe today, brings us up against the risk of becoming co-opted, of shedding our radicalism through the warm glow of having “arrived” in the corridors of power." No comments on that, please

I wonder how S_A reads it ...

[french frank]

And as a rider on game theory: Varoufakis a couple of days ago.

[aeolium]

I've been following YV's blog periodically for some years now as he seemed to me to have a constructively critical analysis of the 2008 economic crisis, especially as it affected Europe. I probably bored people on the now defunct Politics board with occasional links to short essays and articles there, but anyway here is the link to the blog (which he claims he will still try to keep going though he seems to be otherwise engaged at present):

http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/

[Serial_Apologist]

Read with interest (lecture of 2013?), particularly:

"Forging alliances with reactionary forces, as I think we should do to stabilise Europe today, brings us up against the risk of becoming co-opted, of shedding our radicalism through the warm glow of having “arrived” in the corridors of power." No comments on that, please

I wonder how S_A reads it ...

Well it's more-or-less what I was saying in the quarantined threads; but Richard if probably better placed than me for couching arguments in more easily engageable language.

Where I don't quite understand Varoufakis's concepts is where he talks of Marx's apparent need to quantify his labour theory of value (in order to attain academic respectability) as being in contradiction with labour value being inherently unquantifiable, and therefore in the realm of freedom.

Freedom is useless (outside being a subjective abstraction) if there's no real means of achieving it in the primary realms of wealth creation (as opposed to relative peripheries such as art and home-making). Marx's argument was that the labourer's freedom to commoditise his or her labour power is an illusory freedom in a society in which the odds are stacked on the side of capital in its broadest definition.

The idea of saving capitalism from itself was being put forward by theorists such as Geoff Hodgson in the late 1970s/early '80s. They too saw possibilities for a "third way" much more radical than that of Blair, later, insofar as being prepared to countenance "corporatist" Keynsian solutions that would buy social peace albeit at some expense to capital accumulation; and I think this remains at the back of the minds of Greens and others forlornly waiting for a self-protective section of the Establishment to break away from Monetarism and advocate higher taxation at the top in the interests of philanthropy, 19th century-style, as well as end the de-legitimising vast wealth gap - even though the working class mobilisable for even corporatism to be an option is no longer organised.

If that happens I'll gladly ditch my beliefs. The problems as I see it is that Syriza lacks a power base, and good will has no proven record in history.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

I've been following YV's blog periodically for some years now as he seemed to me to have a constructively critical analysis of the 2008 economic crisis, especially as it affected Europe. I probably bored people on the now defunct Politics board with occasional links to short essays and articles there, but anyway here is the link to the blog (which he claims he will still try to keep going though he seems to be otherwise engaged at present):

http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/

thanks aeolium for that remindre and link!