Capitalism, State Formation and Marxist Theory by Philip Corrigan Review by: Robin Wylie Labour / Le Travail, Vol.

12 (Autumn, 1983), pp. 439-442 Published by: Canadian Committee on Labour History and Athabasca University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25140390 . Accessed: 08/07/2013 12:53
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REVIEWS 439
ings ? not of reflection heroic ? as the necessary Reflection will. Simi Sorel shared utopianism, and apocalyptic vision. its absolutism

springs weakens

action. and heroic

the activist

Jacques University ed., Philip Corrigan, and Marxist Formation Quartet Books 1980).

was actually freedom larly, "Bergsonian" a self in war-like state, transcending a self-righteous became which personality ? a of absolute instrument surely good con narrow of Bergson's understanding ception of freedom. righly emphasizes the authoritarianism vision of Sorel's inherent soci in

Kornberg of Toronto State (London:

Capitalism, Theory

Stanley of critique the Utopian

CONTEMPORARY CAPITALISM
crisis ter, and, it now given looks

is

in

a conflict-free

its oligopolistic charac to the state to solve the

even in is he, as Stanley ety. Yet suggests, of Camus' of part the progenitor critique to be their revolutionaries, tendency because dazzled about means, by and Utopian end? Although splendid an eschatology of ends, he Sorel rejected an eschatology of embraced nevertheless means. In the personality created through cavalier a of the war-like mythology struggle, and absolutist, heroic, uncompromising, men over decadence. triumphed Heralding the "new made whole man," through heroic visionary. Stanley's be, weighted which through of Six the book down the is longer with reader For than it should in in digressions, must wade action, Sorel remained a Utopian

of stagflation. This world crisis problems to impose aus has led a number of nations on its native classes in terity working order to restore investor confidence and the rate of profit itself. In Can ultimately the federal ada, for example, government a two year package has imposed of wage on its own restraints the employees, infamous land, where three million six and five formula. unemployment the mark, has passed state assault In Eng the on

class has been on working living standards to how since the early 1970s. In response the state has taken on capital's bloodlet ting functions, after itability marxists forms lution tion. book in restoring crisis has capitalist prof struck, English to analyze state to the evo of this produc is the of six

search Chapter discussion tivism's Chapter Sorel's correct,

thesis.

the analysis of Sorel's

example, of Sorel's forays

have begun in relation and practices of the capitalist mode One under recent review. collection first example

into biblical scholarship add little to the

critique of demystification the discussion One, of posi In religion. of whether

of

Corrigan's The essays. theoretically writings. This

consists to

was of Xenophon interpretation is at best a historical curiosity. is comprehen-^ scholarship Stanley's

attempts the state inMarx is followed

situate

on the Reflections extending beyond to a wide-ranging of Violence analysis Sorel's works. This book will be essential sive, for students of reading to raise Sorel the effort critic Sorel. to the However, rank Sorel of had a

the qualitative tracing forms over time; beginning through the Glorious Revolution, the eighteenth-century 1688, to economy, provisions period examine of of the 1830s. the modern and labour Reformation,

and Engels' by two papers in state breaks with the Tudor

the

Cromwellian Revolution attack on of the Bill essays the sex

the Reform other

is unpersuasive. major none of the theoretical range a Max Weber. Beyond his

Two state's

prevailing ideologies, offer. with Concerned son, Sorel proposed Troubled

or subtlety of idee fixe about to had Sorel little the abuses of rea

reproduction

capital

only by the

its wholesale dangers of

of feminine regulation and such uality through as unemployment legislation Finally, there

power through and "deviant" social

welfare insurance.

rejection.

is a penultimate

essay

by S.

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440 LABOUR/LE TRAVAILLEUR

Yeo working-class and practices in cooperatives, embodied forms and local on alternative after trade 1850 state as lish Revolution, the eighteenth argues, There of the and Edward Thompson by period, two disen and a set

on

marginalized gle over the state. In "The tion," P. State

alternatives politics; in the course of as a Relation

unions, that were strug

Corrigan phenomena. gagement

This century. was marked was state a gradual from

class

of Produc

rule personal of comprehensive, which serves

religious to the development of as systematic an arena of

institutions intra

H. Ramsay, and D. Corrigan, of ways in how look at a number Sayer to the capitalist the state form relates start with quotes from Marx order. They and Engels the Then on the how the state form capital's working wage source of materially of labour surplus out

class conflict in the eighteenth bourgeois and early-nineteenth The other century. feature notes is how the major Corrigan change, the way for prepared capitalist as in expropriating the peasantry enclosure. The rather than state, through was economic used "reflecting" change, tool to create In Paul and Class Richards' a bourgeois order. "State Formation state

reproduces power, valuer

from Gramsci, reproduces form neutral argue They formable capitalism's ence and and note dividing

they examine, how the state itself as an the above that this state

ideologically and

as a class

independent class struggle. of

projection is possible of daily fetishization thus

the re given experi

a more 1832-48," Struggle, case is empirical study charting presented the agrarian and urban legisla capitalist econ tive offensive the provisions against omy class must class trying in 1832-35 confrontation As Richards seen be and the retreat with the from rise of open the

oppression, working-class

fragmenting perceptions Lastly, views they about

and organizational how Marx the state

cal

to their politi changed from centralizers experience, moving to smash to seeing the need the bourgeois in order on workers' to establish a new order

responses. and Engels' in relation

Chartists.

argues, in its context of

this period

between purposes, to regulate the advance

contending a working class of industrial

state based

as shown power by the Paris Commune. This last point is seen as out the in bearing particularly significant redefinition ? lytic categories relations productive tional manner. Sayer such a authors' of Marx's basic ana and rela forces productive ? in a unitary,

as in the case of the handloom capitalism, and a capitalistic weavers, class, spread a spectrum across and urban of agrarian a free and united bent on creating capital, national class over labour market. of the little To struggles the state had 1830s Richards, and the 1840s the ori as histo are

to do with state

To Corrigan,

and things in overcoming vital

redefinition, to both powers crude

and Ramsay, in attributing categories, marxism's is ina

welfare gins of the present rians of the administrative so apt to claim. the fate Once omy had been

revolution

of sealed

econ the provisions the failure of by

bility
essence;

to distinguish
between power such as

between
and in such

form and
substance "People's or China.

the form as Russia

new class Chartism, struggles emerged to both over the needs of industrial capital the transmission itself through reproduce its self expan and to secure of property of labour the commodity sion through power. examine capitalism freedom Rachel Harrison and Frank Mort the ambiguous had on the industrial

of worker's Democracies" The in state first, by two forms and

on qualitative breaks papers are more The descriptive. is on early modern Corrigan, for the

impact

England discussion certain

relies on a historiographical of major authors marxist on breaks: Anderson Perry Christopher Hill on

Reformation,

the Eng

for sexual struggle of this process. example how the sexual pat They begin by noting tern of inheritance in response to changed as one

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REVIEWS 441
the male to, changing character of capital, landed from these there is a essays Throughout constant on alter emphasis working-class from those who defended the pro natives, to the Chartists, economy, through to the present for the right day demand S. Yeo work. looks at one strand of this alternative 1900 when animated tradition a concept working-class societies, These in the period 1850 of self-emancipation to visions

primogeniture capital inheritance female 1882, by partible this same under industrial During capital. from 1857 to of legislative reform, period and working-class access to divorce, greater in a highly class spe though administered and homosexuals, cific way. Prostitutes obtained under of the increased see new state this and Mort regu in part of middle-class

under

1882, women

came however, lation. Harrison as the result

cooperative local politics. ational porated tury;

in the practice trade unions, and institutions of associ were twentieth incor cen

ideologies particularly national effi

and imperialism, domesticity in the latter's concern with ciency choice not and "race to have

by such

however, self-help, the state in the as the Workers' the in the into So, insurance

Educational societies of in the in draws

recognized

contradictory ual legislative had ation trial to do with of labour

suicide." The personal sex was non-reproductive in law until recently. The of sex results of this period reform, the authors the next to meet argue, gener indus reproducing and power

Association, and 1911, cooperatives the 1930s. our

transformation businesses usefully

capitalist while Yeo

attention to a neglected working anti-statist he still does class, tradition, not come to terms with the failure of these radicals to of own recognize the bourgeois the interventionist state or make leading incorpora us aware for democ on reform a parallel of Jimmy to

need sexual for a modified capital's a new patriarchy. division of labour, In "The State and Social C. Policy," Jones and T. Novak of social form also draw out the con in a to tradictions humanitarian capital's emphasize welfare class tating 1906 apply reform while

nature their tion. of

marginalization Yeo does However, tradition socialism a tradition Canadian one of or

presented harnessed

this

racy

the struggle from below which example finds

Instead needs. reproductive they the economic of social purpose in renovating reform working after a bout of devas as Act in the Bever in the (to competition, Workman's few) and

grounds, in the Simpson. The these

labour

power international

unfortunate with

feature

papers,

Unemployed to a skilled

and Novak, character. It often have sacrificed to to of flow of

the exception is their excessively appears of clarity theoretical not

marring of Jones abstract and in The

that the authors structure qualification reductive.

the radical for idge Report (blueprint Labour of also 1945). government They its definition reveal how the state, through and monopoly and the of expertise, of class the shapes its "clients;" internally

readability an effort problems also

appear structure and from an

perceptions dividing between Social become that class

strategies

may

accessibility insufficient devel redefinition of

working and deserving these Welfare, a subtle form carefully strategies.

poor. undeserving authors has argue, of social control alternative the remark, class cannot at will. and class

opment Marx's an

their

unitarian

philosophical

This

marginalizes But, British they ruling

of overemphasis has led to problems tion of subjects and the of socialist

or from categories, the relational side. in the prioriza lack of an explicit for strategies

discussion

contemporary manipulate Economic

the welfare recession, all set youth

system

rioting manoeuvres.

disloyal experts, to ruling limits

in fighting the capitalist state. change If at times this book of essays seems or disjointed, too abstract to be hopefully remedied modern when state the second appears, volume have on the two it does

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442 LABOUR/LE TRAVAILLEUR

major raises about practices Secondly, spective workers' the First, strengths. some very important of state the class nature in collection questions and forms councils pation ship west. of rather in states than mere based formal partici the dictator upon east or whether

the bourgeoisie,

periods. specific capitalist it raises the philosophical per from of of socialism below; power based on freely associated

Robin Wylie
Carleton University

Social
Department
'Social History superior

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