This textbook offers a comprehensive guide to the systematic structure of capitalism, while at the same time introducing readers to all three volumes of Marx’s Capital. Based on his extensive expertise on Marx’s critique of political economy, the author reveals the specific structure of production in capitalist societies and explicates what sets this system apart from other modes of production. Marx’s political economy is explained in a systematic and easy-to-understand manner, using numerous illustrative diagrams to complement the text. This textbook will appeal to all students and scholars looking for a more comprehensive, systematic and theoretical explanation of capitalism, equipping them with a solid theoretical understanding of its core structure.

This book challenges the notion that the Marxian approach is no longer relevant to the problems of contemporary society in the post-Soviet world. The first part of the book deals with the distinctive method of Marx's political economy, with an emphasis on its origins and the problems that arise out of misinterpretations of Capital . The second section applies this method to some of the key contemporary issues including unemployment, globalization and the crisis of the welfare state, and suggests that the approach of Marxist political economy remains a highly relevant and intellectually sound method of analysis.

"This edition of The political economy of Marx, Second edition is published by arrangement with Longman Group UK Limited"--T.p. verso.

This collection makes a valuable theoretical and empirical contribution to the study of Political Economy. The book covers a wide range of approaches currently in vogue, coupled with an exploration of areas in commonality, thus rendering it a more effective introduction to Political Economy than many of the purpose written, but highly partial, existing texts. The individual papers, while summarizing the established literature in each field, also contribute much that is new and of considerable value to the further development of the subject.

These essays by the author of The Political Economy of Growth and co-author of Monopoly Capital cover the working range of a strong and original mind. They are as diverse as his well-known discussion of Marxism and psychoanalysis, and his expert handling of the politics and economics of development.

The first volume of this critical history covers the social, political, and theoretical forces behind the development of Marxian economics from Marx's death in 1883 until 1929, the year marking the onset of Stalin's "revolution from above," which subsequently transformed the Soviet Union into a modern superpower. During these years, Marxists in both Russia and Germany found their economic ideas inextricably linked with practical political problems, and treated theory as a guide to action. This book systematically examines the important theoretical literature of the period, including insightful works by political functionaries outside academia--journalists, party organizers, underground activists, and teachers in the labor movement--presented here as the primary forgers of Marxian economic thought. Beginning with Engels's writings, this book analyzes the work of leading Marxist economists in the Second International, then concludes with a review of the intellectual movements within the Marxian political economy during the 1920s. A second volume treating the period from 1929 to the present will follow. Originally published in 1989. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

This book, first published in 1997, is a history of economic thought from Adam Smith to John Maynard Keynes.

Selfishness is essential to capitalism—or so both advocates and opponents claim. In Infinite Greed, Adrian Johnston argues that this consensus is mistaken. Through a novel synthesis of Marxism and psychoanalysis, he reveals how the relentless pursuit of profits is not fundamentally animated by human acquisitiveness. Instead, capitalism’s strange “infinite greed” demands that individuals sacrifice their pleasures, their well-being, and even themselves to serve inhuman capital. Johnston traces the mechanisms that compel capitalist subjects to obey the cold imperative to accumulate in perpetuity and without limits—and also without regard for the consequences for everyone and everything else. Facing crises such as spiraling wealth inequality and the profit-driven prospect of a looming ecological apocalypse, the rational self-interest of the majority would seem to dictate putting a stop to capitalist accumulation. By bringing together the Marxian critique of political economy with psychoanalytic metapsychology, Johnston shows why and how capitalism, rather than being responsive to people’s rationally selfish interests, disregards and overrides them instead. Unlike previous syntheses of Marxism and psychoanalysis, Infinite Greed pairs Freudian and Lacanian concepts with the economic heart of Marx’s historical materialism. In so doing, Johnston brings to light the complex intertwining of political and libidinal economies keeping us invested and complicit in perpetuating capitalism and its ills.

This book rejects the commonly encountered perception of Friedrich Engels as perpetuator of a 'tragic deception' of Marx, and the equally persistent body of opinion treating him as 'his master's voice'. Engels' claim to recognition is reinforced by an exceptional contribution in the 1840s to the very foundations of the Marxian enterprise, a contribution entailing not only the 'vision' but some of the building blocks in the working out of that vision. Subsequently, he proved himself to be a sophisticated interpreter of the doctrine of historical materialism and an important contributor in his own right. This volume serves as a companion to Samuel Hollander's The Economics of Karl Marx (Cambridge University Press, 2008).

Karl Marx wrote extensively on crisis but never presented a coherent theory of crisis. Samezo Kuruma, a Japanese Marxian economist, aimed to complete Marx’s unfinished theory. Starting from Marx’s observation that the crises of the world market are the 'real concentration and forcible adjustment of all the contradictions of the bourgeois economy', Kuruma seeks to grasp the inherent contradictions that drive forward and limit capitalism. His focus on the contradictory dynamics of capitalism sets him apart from Marxian thinkers who try to identify a single, primary cause of crisis. This volume brings together all of his writings related to crisis.