The Return Of The Other

1. The Return Of The Other Eurocentrism vs. Globalism Presentation by Juliana and Judit

2. PLAN • Eurocentrism – I round: • Civil society as a Western concept • Eurocentrism – II round: • Euromarxism as a context • Brenner’s argument • Critique • Synthesis

3. DEFINITION EUROCENTRISM: • Form of ethnocentrism • Being centered on Europe or the Europeans, especially reflecting a tendency to interpret the world in terms of western and especially European values and experiences • The belief that European culture  is superior to all others • An inability to appreciate Non-European cultures • An inability to see a common humanity and human condition facing all women and men in all cultures and societies beneath the surface variations in social and cultural traditions

4. Civil Society EUROPEAN CONCEPT • Free market and Democracy • Representation • Parliamentary government • Pluralistic – individualistic • Justice and laws • Human rights • Rationality and • Modern knowledge system

5. Civil Society WESTERN CONCEPT OF THE OTHER • Formulated as “lack”, which means: • Authoritarian • Absolutist regime • Static • Despotism • Irrational • Stagnant and oriental mode of production

6. Goody’s Critique on Eurocentism • Extreme universalism vs. cultural relativism • Achievements of Mesopotamia and Arab Near East • Indian and Chinese trade systems in Antiquity • Eastern knowledge systems – Sung encyclopedias • Different kinds of democracy and representation • Not identical but similar regimes • Examples: • Civil society in pre-colonial Africa • Communities with alternative lifestyle in Asia

7. Euromarxism as a Context • Post Vietnam radical thought • Reactionary Euromarxism • Brenner’s article needs to be placed in the context of this debate

8. Brenner on Capitalism • "Agrarian class structure and economic development in pre-industrial Europe” (1976) • Marxist critique • "The origins of capitalist development: A critique of Neo-Smithian Marxism” (1977) • restatement of the theory about the European origins of capitalism • critique of "Third-Worldist" deviations in modern radical scholarship Two main characteristics: eurocentrism and diffusionism

9. R. Brenner’s “Agrarian Roots of European Capitalism” • Social-property systems (class & property): • Historically developed • Impose the course of the economic evolution (income distribution & productive forces development) • Feudalism case – economic stagnation and involution: • Class reproducing strategies, incompatible with requirements of growth • Declining productivity and socio-economic crisis

10. Feudalism mechanism of class reproduction MORE! lords [surplus extraction by means of extra-economic compulsion] classes FOOD, MASTER… peasants [production for subsistence] No specializations of productive units No systematic reinvestments of surpluses No technical innovation

11. The Breakthrough • SELF-SUSTAINING GROWTH • Breakthrough of the system of lordly surplus extraction by means of extra-economic compulsory • Undermining the process of full peasant ownership of the land

12. Novel social-property system ORGANIZERS OF PRODUCTION MEANS OF REPRODUTION/SUBSISTENCE (especially land and labor) MARKET/COMPETITION SELL/BUY DIRECT PRODUCERS Specializations of productive units Systematic reinvestments of surpluses Technical innovation

13. Differences within Europe • Different long-term processes of class formation in the various regions • Demographic growth and declining labor productivity • Various property settlement in different places • Different forms and outcomes of the class conflicts as response to it • There was no simple “unilinear drift” towards capitalism by economic evolution – no trans-historical laws

14. England • Aristocracy • High level of solidarity • Self-organization (military obligatory) • Common interests • Need of their mutual relationship regulation • Total law domination on peasantry • Monarchy • Increasing capacity as a reflection on the aristocracy coherence • King’s law to freeman (exception of the unfree peasants) • Reintensification of the seigneur power • Decentralized surplus extraction by extra-economic compulsion

15. England • Peasantry • Highly dependant on aristocracy • Even density of the population • Separated from the land • Economy development • Competitive rates of land • Export (wool, cloth production) • Industrial employment based on wage labor • Increase of agricultural production • Economic differentiation of the peasantry – no choice but compete and innovate • End of political and economical fusion

16. France • Aristocracy • Competing feudal lords • Involved in the king’s court as employed • Conditional domination over the peasantry • From monarchy to absolutism as new form of centralism • Extreme fragmentarisation • Lack of effective political organization • Centralized system of surplus extraction over the aristocracy (king’s household) • Accepting peasants’ appeals on lords • Custom laws • Tax office state • Loyalty through private proper rights – private property in public sphere

17. France • Peasantry • United peasantry community which can not be expelled from land • Peasant mobility • Royal taxes, collected by peasantry • Greater consumption possibilities – more surplus of their own to reinvenst • Population growth • Strengthening of the peasantry brought renewal of the old peasant-base economy • Pulverization and leveling of the peasantry

18. ENGLAND Capitalistic-agricultural system Commercial economy based on high quality production Export - import economy Independent regional specialization Once and for all improvement and innovation FRANCE Peasant possessors Static type of agricultural system No qualitative agricultural development for economic growth Economy Comparison

19. Criticism • Dobb-Sweezy debate • Blaut • Andre Gunder Frank

20. Jim Blaut • England is nothing special • Asia, Africa showed the same level of development in terms of: • Untied peasantry, cash tenancy, rural wage labor, large scale production for sale, peasant struggle, urban processes, commercial activities • Why Europe? • Location and accessibility • Colonial accumulation was the basic external cause of European emergence

21. Andre Gunder Frank • Key point: Belief in the continuous history and development of a single world system in Afro-Eurasia for at least 5,000 years. • Emphasis on • trade relations • process of capital accumulation • center-periphery structure is one of the characteristics of the world system • alternation between hegemony and rivalry • long economic cycles of ascending and descending phases

22. Wallerstein versus Gunder • Discontinuity versus continuity ”The West first bought itself a third class seat on the Asian economic train, then leased a whole railway carriage, and only in the nineteenth century managed to displace Asians from the locomotive” (Gunder)

23. Implications • European exceptonalism is a myth • It is no use to talk of modes and transitions • "The ceaseless quest of modern historians looking for the 'origins' and roots of capitalism is not much better than the alchemist's search for the philosopher's stone that transforms base metal into gold." Indeed, that is the case not only for the origins and roots, but the very existence and meaning of "capitalism." So, best just forget about it, and get on with our inquiry into the reality of "universal history, wie es eigentlich gewesen ist.” (Chaudhuri)

24. Has capitalism ever been born? • The rise of Europe represented a hegemonic shift from East to West • It is impossible to specify what sets the present world system apart from previous ones • Ceaseless accumulation • Trinity of center/periphery, A/B phased cycles, and hegemony/ rivalry

25. How to do history? • Gunder’s recommendations • And yours? What do we gain and lose with each approach?

26. Thank you!