One limitation of Marx's analysis of political economy seems to be that he doesn’t explore other aspects of social being and uses class (money) as the main fulcrum of oppression and exploitation. This limitation could be the fact that when it was written (in the 19th century) most of the politics centered on imperialism and industrialization in a feudal and rigidly hierarchical form. Marx’s invaluable contribution given the conditions then is a seemingly indirect yet rigorous analysis of the ethics of capitalism and hence feudalism. This could be said to have initiated the process of dismantling of the assumption of hierarchy in society.
The post WWII world is more connected; there is acceptance of equality and democracy in its myriad forms, so it is natural that the oppression problematic is more complex and not solely based on economics.
By using possibility of multiple relationships among societal subjects and discourses as the basic framework, Laclau & Mouffe bring to fore the idea of negotiation (and hence hegemony) as the fulcrum of social change. While this construct presents with more possibilities to engage with society, a problem is the seeming diffusion of ethical frameworks, which could be said to be corollary to the idea of negotiation.
In Marx’s framework, by viewing society and social relations through the lens of class and the inevitability of markets and exchange and hence concentration of wealth and power - he is also making a point about the ethical issues (primarily equality) in a society largely ruled by Capital. He uses the personification of Capital and direct criticisms of the vanguards of Capitalism in his text to drive home this point. He does use a ‘network of relations’ and in that sense already occupies the domain of relations that later LM’s IDA occupies. But a certain ethic of equality across classes is integral to his analysis and arguments in a fundamental way.
ReplyDeleteThe IDA framework focuses on discourse (and a certain discourse at a given point in time) and hence identities and their relations as the foundation for social analysis and social change. That a certain discourse could exclude some identities of a human being needs to be taken into account. This could mean that there is an aspect of negotiation that is required to even influence the nature of a discourse, to accommodate other identities of the same subjects.
This creates a problem for ethics. In Capital (or in later gender/feminism discourses), the fundamental ethic – be it equality, equity or diversity – are embedded in the discourse itself. Whereas an IDA framework diffuses this and to some extent externalizes ethics. This would mean that a negotiation within a discourse or on the discourse necessitates rearticulation or revisitation of the ethical argument.
My argument is that this leads to a certain dilution of the ethical framework and leads to constant shifting and an era of eternally negotiated ethics. Of course this needs a lot more examination and analysis, which I haven’t done.