The Political Economy of

Gender, Race,  and Class

Econ 243, Wellesley College, Spring 2004

 

Julie Matthaei                                                               Office Hours:

PNE 423                                                                                  Mon. 2-3, Tu. 11:30-

X2181                                                                         12:30   & by apptmt

 

 

No problem can be solved by the consciousness that created it.

            -- Albert Einstein

 

 

“Another World is Possible”      

Slogan of The World Social Forum

 

 

 

What is your purpose? Why are you here on this planet at this time?

What is your gift, the special genius that you were born with?

What are your values and principles?

 

                       -- Questions posed at onset of organizational consulting                                                sessions  by Dee Hoch, Founder of VISA

 

 

Course Description: 

            This course offers an introduction to political economy or radical economics, an alternative to the textbook, neoclassical way of looking at the capitalist or market economy.  “Radical economics” or “political economy” describe a diverse strain of economic theorizing that has existed since the nineteenth century.  Rooted in the theories of Karl Marx, Thornstein Veblen, and others, and focussed at first predominantly on an analysis and critique of class dynamics, it was transformed in the second half of the twentieth century by anti-racist, anti-colonial, feminist, lesbian/gay, and ecological movement. 

            Radical economics views the economy as first and foremost a set of social relationships, relationships which construct us, and which are often asymmetrical and exploitative.  Radical economics is often called radical political economics, perhaps because it is intrinsically and unashamedly political; from Marx on, it has been deeply critical of essential capitalist institutions, and has advocated qualitative transformation of these institutions and the ways of being that they sustain.  In the first two parts of the course, we will study radical economists’ analyses and critiques of existing economic institutions and practices, starting with Marx.

            At the present moment, the world is experiencing a flowering of radical social movements, exemplified by the World Social Forum..    Working together in a loose and leaderless network, these movements are developing a shared vision of a more humane, sustainable, democratic, and egalitarian economy – as well as concrete proposals for how to get from here to there.  Many new postcapitalist practices are being tried, with success.  In the third part of the course, we will study some of these movements, especially focussing on their visions and their experiences actualizing them.     

            The course structure which I describe below is not set in stone.  Students should feel free to make criticisms or suggestions, and if a serious problem with the class is identified, either now or during the term,  we can discuss it and try to solve it as a class.

 

Course Structure, Assignments, and Grading:

             READINGS, RESPONSE/EVALUATIONS, AND JOURNAL ENTRIES:  The class will be reading- and discussion-intensive; I will keep lecturing to the minimum needed to clarify the concepts. Readings should be done before the class in question so that students will be prepared for class discussion. So that students can begin the process of taking in and reflecting on the readings, they will complete a short response/evaluation sheet on each set of readings; these will be the springboard for class discussion.  Students will also do 3, one-page or more “journal entries” which record responses to the readings and to the class in a freer, less directed and segmented way. These will be due more or less monthly (2/19, 3/18, and 4/15).

            CURRENT EVENTS:  The first 10 minutes of each class will be open to discussion of current events.  You are encouraged to bring them in, and we’ll discuss them from a radical economics perspective.  The following are radical media websites:  Znet: http://www.zmag.org/ZNET.htm; Indy Media: http://www.indymedia.org/en/index.shtml;   The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/., or other radical/alternative media sources. 

            TAKE-HOME EXAMINATIONS:  There will be a take-home examination on the first part of the course– the theoretical foundations -- and a second take-home on the second, problems, part.  If you hand your exam in on time, you can rewrite these examinations to raise your grade (hand in the original and the rewrite).  Rewrites are due one week after graded exams are handed back.

            RESEARCH PAPER AND PRESENTATION:  Each student will choose a radical group or movement to research,  present on in the third part of the course (classes 9-13), and write a paper on it.  We will try to assign students to topic areas so that each of these classes has some presentations.  Students can work alone, in pairs, or in groups of 3; group work is encouraged.    They should touch base with me on their paper topics before finalizing them.  Papers should be 8-12 pages (longer if they’re done by groups), with full references;  they will be due the last day of exam period, 5/18.   Students who want peer feedback on their papers will be organized into groups.  I will read and comment on any drafts that  are presented to me through the last day of class.     

            GRADING:  Your response papers and journal entries are required, but ungraded  (since they are required,  grades will be docked if they are not completed).  For your final grade, your first and second take-home will count for 30% and 35% of your grade, respectively.  Your research paper will count for 35%.  If you choose to rewrite one or both of your take-homes, the rewrite will count for 30% of your take-home grade, and the original for 70%.  Class participation can affect a borderline grade. 

            I use a numerical grading system where A = 93 or higher, A- = 90, B+ = 87-89, B = 83-86, B- + 80-82 and so on.

            CLASS DISCUSSION AND “COLD CALLING:”  Sometimes I may call on students who do not have theirs hand up.  I do this to create greater participation in the classroom. If you have difficulty with this method, please contact me and we’ll see if we can work out another way for you to participate in class discussion.

 

Class Outside of Class:

            COMMUNICATING OUTSIDE OF CLASS:  Our class conference is a key way for all of us to communicate with one another outside of class.  We can set up subconferences as the need arises (please let me know your suggestions re this).    Emails to me can be posted on the conference, but if you need to reach me ASAP, you should also email your post directly to me. Calls are also welcome, and are top in my response queue.

            OFFICE HOURS, LUNCHES, AND GETTING TO KNOW ONE ANOTHER:  I have office hours on Monday  from 2-3 and Tuesday  from 11:30-12:30 pm.  If these times don’t work for you, please make an appointment.  Please try to come in and see me at least once or twice during the term – your learning experience (and my teaching experience) can be enhanced by such individual meetings.  I will also set up some lunches with students in the dorms where we can talk informally, and students can get to know one another better. 

 

Readings

            Below is a detailed course ouline with readngs; readings with an * are recommended but not required.  Books that are required for the course are Julie Schor, The Overspent American, David Korten, The Post-Corporate World: Life After Capitalism, and The International Forum on Globalization, Alternatives to Economic Globalization.  These books will also  be available on reserve at Knapp.  All other readings will be available at our class conference on first-class, and via the web.  If you have a problem finding a reading, post on the course conference – but also email me directly.

 

THE POLITICAL ECONOMIC OF GENDER, RACE, AND CLASS

Econ 243, Spring 2004, Outline

* denotes additional, recommended reading

 

I.  INTRODUCTIONS

 

1.  Introductions (1/29)

 

Introductions to one another

Critical evaluation of mainstream economics by students and teacher

bel hooks on critical thinking, agency, and transformation

 

MOVIE:  bel hooks, Cultural Criticism and Transformation, Part I..  Media Education Foundation, 1997.

 

2.  Introduction to Marxian Economics  (2/5)

 

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto (1848), I, pp. 3-16.

Karl Marx, Capital (1887),  Vol. 1, Ch. I, “Commodities,” pp. 35-39, Ch. III, “Money,” pp. 106-7, 110; Ch. 4, “The General Formula for Capital,” pp. 146 and 149-155, Ch. VI, “The Buying and Selling of Labor Power,” pp. 167-70 and 176, and Ch. XXXII, “Historical Tendency of Capitalist Accumulation.”  

Karl Marx, “First Manuscript:  Alienated Labor” (1843), pp. 83-109, in Eric Fromm, Marx’s Concept of Man.

 

Discussion of data needed for Class 3; assignments to students individually or in groups

 

Students post FACT SHEETS by Monday, 2/9

 

3.  Race, Class and Gender Differences and Inequality:  The Data. and a Conceptual Framework (2/12)

 

Read fact sheets posted by students on course sub-conference

Teresa Amott and Julie Matthaei, Race, Gender and Work:  A Multicultural Economic History of Women in the United States, Ch. 2, “A Conceptual Framework.”

Julie Matthaei and Barbara Brandt, “From Hierarchical Dualism to Integrative Liberation,” Wellesley College Working Paper, May 2001, excerpt 1.

* William Dugger, “Four Modes of Inequality,” in Dugger, ed., Inequality.

* Check out the website of United for a Fair Economy at www.ufenet.org

 

4.  Race, Class, Gender, and Community:  Theory and History (2/19)

 

Randy Albelda, Unlevel Playing Fields, Ch. 6, “The Basics of Political Economy,” and Ch. 8,”The Political Economy Model of Discrimination.”

Joe Feagin and Clairece Booher Feagin, “Theoretical Perspectives in Race and Ethnic Relations,” in Charles Gallagher, ed., Rethinking the Color Line.

Ellen Mutari, “Feminist Political Economy:  A Primer,” in Ron Baiman et al, Radical Perspectives on Economic Theory and Policy.

Herman Daly and John Cobb,  For the Common Good, Ch. 8, “From Individualism to Person-in-Community,” pp. 159-165 only.

* Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege:  Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack,” Peace and Freedom, July/August 1989

 

Journal Entries Due

First Take-Home Examination Handed Out:  Due 2/26

 

II. RADICAL ANALYSIS OF CONTEMPORARY GLOBALIZING CAPITALISM:  PROBLEMS AND CRITIQUES

 

5.  Critique of the Corporate-Driven Capitalist Economic System 2/26

 

David Korten, The Post-Corporate World, Prologue and Part I, “The Deadly Tale.”

Richard Edwards et al, The Capitalist System, 3rd edition, Chapter 5, “Class Conflict and the State,” pp. 167-172

Victor Bremson, “Corporation Predators of the Suicide Economy,”

http://www.pcdf.org/Living_Economies/Supporting_Essays/predators.htm

Take a look at either CorpWatch www.corpwatch.org, and Infact www.infact.org websites

* Stephen Pizzo, “George and Dick’s Amazing Corporate Misadventures,” CorpWatch, http://www.corpwatch.org/issues/PID.jsp?articleid=2988

* Greg Palast, “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy:  The Bushes and the Billionaires Who Love Them,” http://www.gregpalast.com/bestdemocracymoneycanbuychapter2.pdf

* Jim Lobe, “US: The Ten Worst Corporations of the year 2000,” http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/worst.htm

 

MOVIE:  Controlling Interest, California Newsreel 1978; 45 minutes.

 

6.              Affluenza:  The Disease of Consumerism  3/4

 

Paul Baran and Paul Sweezy, Monopoly Capital (1966), Ch. 5, “The Sales Effort,”

         pp. 114-119, 124, 126-131.

Juliet Schor, The Overspent American:  Why We Want What We Don’t Need, Introduction and Chs.  2-4.

Cornell West, “The Ravages of the Culture of Consumption,” in Prophetic Thought in Post-Modern Times, Vol. 1, pp. 16-17.

Adbusters assignment:  Skim through one of the issues of Adbusters on reserve at Knapp.  Then copy a real ad, and write its hidden message on it. 

Go to the Affluenza website, http://www.pbs.org/kcts/affluenza/

         Read the page, then click on Diagnosis and read through

* David Korten, When Corporations Rule the World, Ch. 11, “Marketing the World.”

* J.K. Galbraith, The Affluent Society, Ch. XI, “The Dependence Effect.”

 

MOVIE:  Advertising and the End of the World; Media Education Foundation, 1998  

 

7.  Capitalism and Ecology  3/11

 

John Bellamy Foster, The Vulnerable Planet, Ch. 1, “The Ecological Crisis,” Ch. 5, “Imperialism and Ecology,” Ch. 6, “The Vulnerable Planet,” and Ch. 7, “The Socialization of Nature,” pp. 125-129 only.

Laura Westra and Peter Wenz, eds., Faces of Environmental Racism, “Introduction.”

Karen Warren, Ecofeminist Philosophy, Ch. 1, “Nature is a Feminist Issue.”

* International Forum on Globalization, Papers on Industrial Agriculture/GMO’s, http://www.ifg.org/sac/medpack.htm

 

8.  Radical Critique of Free Trade, Globalization, and Development Policies 3/18

 

The International Forum on Globalization, Alternatives to Globalization:  A Better World is Possible, Ch. 1, “A Critique of Corporate Globalization,” and pp. 172-177.

Herman Daly and John Cobb, For the Common Good, Ch. 11, “Free Trade versus Community.”

J.K. Gibson-Graham, The End of Capitalism (as we knew it): A Feminist Critique of Political Economy, Ch. 6, “Querying Globalization,” excerpt 1, pp. 120-134 only.

Arundati Roy, Power Politics, “Power Politics:  The Reincarnation of Rumpelstiltskin.” OR Vandana Shiva, Stolen Harvest, Introduction and Ch. 1, “The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply.” (CHOOSE ONE)

Check out the Third World Network, http://www.twnside.org.sg/econ_4.htm

Or The International Forum Globalization, http://www.ifg.org

* Robin Hahnel, Panic Rules: Everything You Need to Know about the Global Economy, Ch. 2, “Deconstructing the Neoliberal Myth.”

* Greg Palast, “Joe Stiglitz:  The Globalizer Who Came in from the Cold,” http://www.wrm.org.uy/actors/WB/Stiglitz.html

 

Journal Entries Due

MOVIE:  Life and Debt.  Stephanie Black, producer, for Tuff Gong Pictures, 2001, 86 minutes.

 

!! SPRING BREAK !!

 

II. Emergent Solutions and Movements

 

9.  Integrating the Self, Integrating the Economy: The Evolution of Individuality 4/1

 

Julie Matthaei and Barbara Brandt, “From Hierarchical Dualism to Integrative Liberation: Thoughts On a Possible Non-Racist Non-Classist Feminist Future,” excerpt 2.

David Korten, Post-Corporate America­, Ch. 11, “Culture Shift,” and Ch. 12, “The New Storytellers.”   

International Forum on Globalization, Alternatives to Globalization, pp. 1-14

Elizabeth Martinez, Des Colores Mean All of Us, pp. 4-8 and 41-48.

Henry Rosemont, Jr., “Organizing in the Spirit of Aloha:  Discussing Hawaiian Sovereignty with Hayden Burgess,” Resist Vol. 7#7, Sept. 1998.  www.resistinc.org, newsletters, Sept. 1998.  Skim then read carefully from  “Do you think the several sovereignty movements…”

CHECK OUT AT LEAST ONE OF THESE WEBSITES:

Coop America website, advocates socially responsible consumption, investing, etc., www.coopamerica.org  

The Graduation Pledge, advocates for and facilitates socially responsible work, http://www.graduationpledge.org/index.html

         especially I and III;

ACORN’s Living Wage website, http://www.livingwagecampaign.org/

United Students Against Sweatshops, http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~fragola/usas/index.html

Jubilee, advocates for debt relief for poor countries http://www.jubileeusa.org/

 

Second Take-Home Examination Handed Out; Due 4/8, in class

 

 

10.  Liberating the Consumer 4/8

 

Juliet Schor, The Overspent American, Chs. 5, 6, and Epilogue.

Maria Mies, Ch. 17, “Liberating the Consumer,” from Mies and Vandana Shiva, Ecofeminism.

Vandana Shiva on McDonalds, Exploitation, and the Global Economy, http://www.mcspotlight.org/people/interviews/vandana_transcript.html

Go to the Affluenza website, http://www.pbs.org/kcts/affluenza/

         Click on the treatment page. Try to think of other ways you could cure yourself, if you think you have it.

* Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robins, Your Money or Your Life

* Check out on of these websites:  Center for a New American Dream www.newdream.org; or Simple Living Network www.simpleliving.net

 

Second Take-Home Examination Due

 

11. Sustainable Solutions  4/15

 

Herman Daly, “Introduction to the Steady State Economy,” in Economics, Ecology, and Ethics.

International Forum on Globalization, Alternatives to Globalization, Ch. 6, “Alternative Operating Systems.”

The Earth Charter, http://www.earthcharter.org/ (click view charter at bottom of home page)

William Greider, The Soul of Capitalism:  Opening Paths to a Moral Economy, Ch. 5, “Consuming the  Future.”

* Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives website, http://www.zeri.org/ 

* Joel Salatin, “Pastured Poultry:  The Polyface Farm Model,” http://www.westonaprice.org/farming/pasturedpoultry.html

* Rocky Mountain Institute Website, www.rmi.org

* List of political advocacy groups on the environment: http://www.csuchico.edu/~kcfount/environ.html

*  Charter Statement of the Green Party, International, http://www.global.greens.org.au/charter.htm

‘

Journal Entries Due

 

NO CLASS ON 4/22 (Monday Schedule)

 

12.  Taming the Corporation:  Creating Socially Responsible Firms and Local Living Economies  4/29

 

David Korten, The Post-Corporate World, Part III, “Envisioning a Post-Corporate World.” 

The International Forum on Globalization, Alternatives to Globalization:  A Bettter World is Possible , Ch. 5, “Corporate Structure and Power.”

Judy Wicks, “Local Living Economies:  The New Movement for Responsible Business” http://www.livingeconomies.org/_uploads/docs/Wicks%20Why%20LLEs.PDF

* William Greider, The Soul of Capitalism, Ch. 3, “Work Rules,” and Ch. 4, “Imperious Capital.” 

* Alec Nove, Feasible Socialism, Conclusion.

* Victor Bremson,”Seattle Area:  Elements of  a Living Economy,”

http://www.pcdf.org/Living_Economies_Documentation/Seattle.htm

* Check out the Program on Corporations, Law, & Democracy, www.poclad.org; Cooperatives  http://cooperatives.ucdavis.edu/; Businesses for Social Responsibility, http://www.bsr.org/BSRResources/ExternalResources.cfm#49142; Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, http://livingeconomies.org

 

13.  Beyond Globalization  5/6

 

J.K. Gibson-Graham, The End of Capitalism (as we knew it), Ch. 6, “Querying Globalization,” Excerpt 2, pp. 134-147.

Alternatives to Globalization,  Chs. 2, 3, 4, 7 and 8.

* Fair Trade Federation, “What is Fair Trade?” http://www.fairtradefederation.com/2002trends.htm

* Check out one of these websites:  International Forum on Globalization,  http://www.ifg.org/sac/medpack.htm; The People-Centered Development Forum, http://www.pcdf.org/; The Center for Alternative Development Initiatives, http://ww.cadi.ph/