The Last Gorz and the Value Criticism

Abstract At the of the 2000s, André Gorz (1923-2007) met with enthusiasm the “Value Criticism”, an heterodox interpretation of Marx, and seemed to find arguments to support his own radical critique of capitalism. The article questions the philosophical status of this link and defends the idea that the Gorz’s Existentialist Marxism is not, fundamentally, compatible … Continue reading The Last Gorz and the Value Criticism

Capital read by Moishe Postone: Alchemy or astrology?

Abstract Moishe Postone’s book Time, Work and Social Domination (Postone 1993), is meant to be a Hegelian interpretation of Marx’s Capital. Capital is the great subject that moves itself under the impulse of value. Its “movement” is related not to class relations, nor to the market, which is supposedly external to labor, but to the temporal constraint inherent in … Continue reading Capital read by Moishe Postone: Alchemy or astrology?

Hermeneutics and economics: The valued, valuable and usable

The aim of this paper is to identify the conditions (and limitations) of the extension of the hermeneutic paradigm to economic science. The discussion focuses on the project that looks for an epistemological matrix capable of countering the positivist ambitions of neoclassical economists in the textual sciences. Rather than explaining market mechanisms based on the model of natural sciences to identify principles, we must understand their meaning, based on the model of a text that must be interpreted. The price to pay for this epistemological extension is to sacrifice the explanatory part of economic science and the place of institutions.