Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capitalism

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In the process the reader is also exposed to the nitty-gritty of a materialist historiography. The winds of history and culture may change many things, but not human constitutions. We use cookies to enhance your experience. Dismiss this message or find out more. Don't have an account? Sign up here for discounts and quicker purchasing. Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital. A provocative intellectual assault on the Subalternists' foundational work.

Verso Books 03 September In addition, the editor s did not address the glaring omission of subject matters fundamental to postcolonial theory, but simply re-published what was already out there virtually as is. Hence, the book seems more of a marketing ploy. Again, we know the type: In other words, the mantle of radicalism is claimed while presuming commonalities that are in fact obviated by the precarious, difficult, and essentially historical task of building coalitions. Building coalitions is one of the most crucial ways to bring about change.

Hence, workers of the world are already united by way of universalized capital. Chibber himself repeatedly makes this charge in his book and in his responses in the edited volume 17, The claim falls flat. It is an overused canard that presumes Chibber and Vanaik are the standard-bearers of what counts as clarity of expression. Moreover, it sounds whiny. Please just do the arduous and sustained work of reading a text on its own terms. Every field has its neologisms and specialized vocabularies.

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Chatterjee and Spivak are hardly junior scholars in the field. These are actually thinkers with a track record of scholarship, activism, and innovation across several generations. Indeed, laughably, Michael Schwartz likens Chibber to Engels! Spivak and Chatterjee as metonyms for the entire field of postcolonial theory are charged with rookie mistakes like nativism, essentialism, cultural determinism, particularism, relativism, etc. So, the question emerges: This is not what I expect in an introduction to an edited volume.

Obviously, Chibber grossly overstates the influence and presence of postcolonial theory in the academy. He disparages the intellectual abilities of critics: In his interview, Chibber takes on the identity of embattled victimhood. In his view, the entire academy is apparently on the side of postcolonial theorists who reject the notion that people anywhere might have some things in common.

Such caricatures read like limp-wristed, right-wing culture war angst. He alone has discovered the great con and the massive conspiracy afoot. Again, he makes false accusations. He says that Spivak tells him that he cannot criticize primary texts has he read Critique of Postcolonial Reason? The shift to a liberal form of rule has not come from the top to the masses. It came from a two centuries long struggle by the masses to extract power away from the masses. It is a blunder to say that a real capitalism has a liberal bourgeoisie. Bourgeoisie capitalists have been forced to accept capitalism, but have never fought for it.

In the global south, we have capitalists who do not recognize he rights of the poor; this is not a deviation from the norm. A real capitalism has forms of power that is fundamentally different from what you have in the global south. Governance relies on formal equality. They rely on equality in the courts in some sort of republicanism. Real capitalism revolutionized all of the social relationships in that particular part of the world.

It changes culture ideology and every nook and cranny of the society. Yet, in the East, you have the persistence of all traditional beliefs i. The political culture, too, stays in a backward looking cycle.

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The political culture is so different from the West that you cannot call it capitalism. They end up obfuscating the realities of these countries, becoming a hindrance on these societies. Marx was another European theorist. You need an authentic social science that is attune to the particularities of that local society.

It abandons universalization in favor of localization. Each place will have its own social science. Capitalism does not explain the entire gamut of social practices, but only for the economy. What is specific to capitalism is a shift away from production for use to production for exchange. There has never been a society for production to exchange until about the 16th century. This transformation of economic practices has been carried out through different cultural practices. The idea that a proper capitalism revolutionized all aspects of society does not describe the capitalism that we have seen anywhere.

Just want them to make their profits. It is an empirical question how far the transformation and the consequences associated with it. Postcolonial theory is empirically wrong and conceptually flawed. Radicals have tried to find ways to find a way out of capitalism, but this seeks to find a way for better capitalism.

The Debate on Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital

It is not carrying out what it was assigned to do, or what it promised to do for the people. There is a history in Marxism about arguments against the bourgeoisie. In the USSR, Stalin said that there was a bourgeoisie stage that every country had to go through, but that the bourgeoisie would help set the stage for this historic mission. It strives to bring a social and political motivation that was imported straight from the liberal historians. The history of this idea in the left has been in various countries. Countries that have communist parties still function with the idea that we need to help the bourgeoisie.

This has nothing to do with progressive politics, but that there is a deep and flawed problem. For its entire history, if it is one thing that Marxism did, it was to focus unrelentingly on social differences. The communist parties tried to understand why their countries looked so different from the one that Marx laid out. Lenin had a theory of imperialism and how imperialism generates weaknesses and revolution comes from breaking the weakest in the link.

But what separated Marxism from post colonialism theory is that they did not reify the difference. There was recognition that there are different types of capitalism, but they are not departures from capitalism. Labor and capital still defines these countries. They still need to organize capital, rather than bemoaning that they do not have capital. Capitalism may not look like Wall Street, but they are propagated by the same ideas that run Wall Street. The key point is to understand what the differences or departures from a certain social kind are, not to pretend that there are no differences.

Capitalism has globalized, but it has also universalized. The first task of any radical today is to understand what capitalism is. Any theory that does not realize this has no place in the left. As the left reconstitutes itself, these theories will have to be rejected. The popularity in the left today is the defeat of the left and subject to conceptual confusion. It is a responsibility for the left to clarify this confusion. An interesting book, certain sections are far more valuable than others. Chibber is a compelling writer however and the book certainly does deserve the attention it has received thus far.

Admittedly this book requires a good amount of supplemental material - Chibber is not writing to audience unfamiliar with subaltern theory or Marxism in India looking up works by Ranajit Guha is all but a necessity by the midway point of the book.

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Take notes and read carefully - the book is dense and filled w An interesting book, certain sections are far more valuable than others. Take notes and read carefully - the book is dense and filled with lots of complex details that can be missed easily if skimming. Jun 13, Danijel Brestovac rated it liked it Shelves: Oct 19, Debarun rated it liked it.

Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital by Vivek Chibber

Lot of things to be set straight in this book. That said, Chibber deploys a Marxism so flexible that it risks losing its substance. Dec 08, oquays added it. Aug 05, Andrew added it. A complex book made more complex by the animus surrounding it and, it should be added, contained within it.



I will try to have more to say at a later date, but I'm still digesting.