(1917-2012)
According to The Economist, Eric Hobsbawm, who has just died on October 1st, was the last of the Mohicans, I mean Marxists. Its news to me. In my view, the surplus approach which was brought back by Sraffa and builds on Marx is the ONLY coherent economic theory left standing. Marginalism (i.e. neoclassical economics) is nothing but a profession of faith, after the capital debates.
Among other things, because there is a role for historical and institutional analysis in the surplus approach, related to both the theories of distribution and accumulation, the work of Hobsbawm and other surplus approach historians is essential. The obituary was very thin on his contributions to our understanding about key issues in capitalist development.
The review of his contributions in The Economist's obituary was typical of what was written in the press (see also here; the exception here). A lot about his life, and range (yes I know he liked jazz, who doesn't?!), but his research was not quoted at all. Comments on his books were almost always restricted to the surveys on economic growth since the Revolutions, the so-called Age of Trilogy.
The review of his contributions in The Economist's obituary was typical of what was written in the press (see also here; the exception here). A lot about his life, and range (yes I know he liked jazz, who doesn't?!), but his research was not quoted at all. Comments on his books were almost always restricted to the surveys on economic growth since the Revolutions, the so-called Age of Trilogy.
According to The Economist:
"That Marxist tag threatened to tarnish his reputation, when his lucid and scholarly books on what he called the long 19th century, from 1789 to 1914 (“The Age of Revolution”, “The Age of Capital”, “The Age of Empire”), on nationalism and on labour movements deserved, and won, an audience well beyond leftist circles and academe.
Defiant, Mr Hobsbawm championed Marx to the last. For his intellectual force; for his grasp of the world as a whole, at once political, economic, scientific and philosophical; and not least for his conviction, as relevant in 2008 as in 1848, that the capitalist system, with its yawning inequalities and naked greed, would inevitably—irresistibly—necessarily—be destroyed by its own internal tensions, and would be superseded by something better."Marxism not only is not relevant, but it almost tarnished his reputation. There is no mention of what was, in my view at least, his major book, namely: Industry and Empire. His book is part of the tradition that suggests that the Industrial Revolution (IR) was demand driven, not supply constrained (like David Landes used to believe in the 1960s, in his Prometheus Unbound). Further, he argued that external demand (as Phyllis Deane) was crucial, and he insisted that without colonial markets, particularly in India (i.e. without Empire) there would be no Industrial Revolution. Imperialism and the search for global hegemony are joined at the hip with the development of Capitalism.
Also, there is nothing about his views on the standard of living debate during the Industrial Revolution. To modern economic historians like Jeff Williamson and Peter Temin (subscription required) the IR had a positive impact on the living standars of the working class. Hobsbawm, like other Marxist historians, e.g. E.P. Thompson, was on the pessimist side of the debate. For a modern pessimistic view see Charles Feinstein (subscription required too).
Hobsbawm was not just a popularizer of history, he was central for important debates in the Marxist tradition, which should be central for understanding of modern capitalism. Hobsbawm's theoretical underpinnings of his views of capitalist development, by emphasizing demand, are in the tradition of what we refer in this blog as classical-Keynesianism. Marx's views on distribution as conflictive, which are part of the broader surplus approach tradition, are essential for Hobsbawm contributions to economic history, and show why Marx is still relevant and required reading for anybody that wants to understand capitalism (i.e. the world we live in).
PS: Other central Marxists contributions to historical analysis are associated to the transition to capitalism, and Dobb and Sweezy are still required readings. Note that Marxists suggest that the origins of capitalism are associated to institutional changes in the productive structure (which might be pushed by expanding demand), and not as a result of cultural or geographical matters.
