rational choice marxism, eds terrell carver and paul thomas

introduction

(2): AM distinguished by critique of methodological distinctiveness of Marxism

(2): RCM as subset of AM

(6): Elster statement of MI -- all social phenomena are explicable in terms that only involve individual subjects

what is analytical marxism, EOW

(15): critical, a realist view of science--an attempt to identify mechanisms. our observations are shaped by the fact of observation, of course; this is why we are not naive empiricists. but neither are we anti-realists, who think that the world is wholly constituted by our categories of thought.

(20): Prezeworski critique of SD -- not getting an electoral majority, if sticks to principles; getting an electoral majority, only if it forfeits its principles

RCM: is the game worth the candle, EMW

(82): RCM as a response to Althusserian structuralism--methodological individualism an attempt to bring back the individual, amidst anti-humanism of Althusser

(83): exploitation as defined by a resource re-allocation game

(84): this, fundamentally, is a 'distributional theory of exploitation'

(85, 92): key--EMW arguing that even discarding the LTV, you can have an account of exploitation that is rooted in surplus labour appropriation. the measure of the surplus being appropriated doesn't matter; it's just the fact that their is a relationship between producers and appropriators generated under given historical conditions.

(86): imp--for the 'game' to make sense, at all, Roemer has to 'secrete in' structure by way of the starting points (resources, endowments, etc. can only be distributed according to some understanding of structure)

(87): imp--moreover, compulsions can't be derived simply from optimizing strategies of agents--there are imperatives unique to specific historical conditions (i.e., Brenner's 'rules of reproduction')

(98): 'class formation' for RCM is ahistorical--not the processes that produce class relations, but just the way in which classes become collective actors in class struggles

(99-100): key, why is class fundamental? not b/c other forms of conflict don't exist, but because class concerns access to the conditiosn of existence--it implicates the very basis of existence on which all other struggles unfold.

(109): Rational Choice, for EMW, rightly means something historical specific (again, here 'rules of reproduction' is the example)

(111): fundamentally, the 'functionalism' of Cohen's account depends on a 'transhistorical' conception of rationality that belies Brenner's insights. this is why it can't be salvaged (but this is not what the RCM people tweak, in it)

(125): Elster cedes to a crude Benthamite utilitarianism--'guilt'/'shame' become utility fines, etc.

(128): socialism becomes motivated in terms of the ideals of capitalist society--an improvement on what capitalism already offers [this is less important, though interesting]

(130): interesting--the trajectory of the RCM'ers has parallels to the trajectory of Althusserians.

(131): RCM as an odd mix of voluntarism (individuals choose their social relations) and determinism (individuals are given resources, and optimizing on the basis of those endowments leaves very few options)

(132): it can only claim explanatory power to the extent that it 'secretes in' the insights of other accounts of history. otherwise lost to contingency.