In this special, hour-long edition of Economic Update, Professor Richard Wolff begins by analyzing the choice between reform and revolution through two historical discussions: the anti-slavery fight in the mid-19th century and the anti-Depression fight in the U.S., during the 1930s. He then explains the stakes in choosing reform or revolution as goals for social change and outlines how and why both options are now back on the working class’s agenda in the U.S. He concludes the discussion by suggesting that revolution is the necessary guarantor of the duration of reforms in the U.S., offering an alternative perspective to consider when choosing reform over revolution.
In the second half of the hour, Professor Wolff discusses a built-in feature of capitalism: systematically uneven economic development. From Marx’s original criticism of capitalism for producing and reproducing unevenness to the many historical examples, today’s program argues that there are heavy social costs that flow from capitalism’s uneven development. Those costs then become bases for arguing the need to move beyond capitalism.
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