Democracy against Capitalism: Renewing Historical Materialism

Ellen Meiksins Wood argues that with the collapse of Communism the theoretical project of Marxism and its critique of capitalism is more timely and important than ever. Current intellectual fashions of the left which emphasise ‘post-modern’ fragmentation, ‘difference’, contingency and the ‘politics of identity’ can barely accommodate the idea of capitalism, let alone subject the capitalist system to critique. In this book she sets out to renew the critical programme of historical materialism by redefining its basic concepts and its theory of history in original and imaginative ways, using them to identify the specificity of capitalism as a system of social relations and political power. She goes on to explore the concept of democracy in both the ancient and modern world, examining the concept’s relation to capitalism, and raising questions about how democracy might go beyond the limits imposed on it by capitalism.

• Wide-ranging study of Marxism and democracy, covering history from ancient Greece to the US Constitution, and thinkers from Weber to Thompson • Wood is a controversial but interesting figure and will have some personal following for this book formerly on editorial board of New Left Review • More accessible than most writing in the field; Will appeal to historians, philosophers and sociologists as well as political theorists

Introduction; Part I. Historical Materialism and the Specificity of Capitalism: 1. The separation of the ‘economic’ and ‘political’ in capitalism; 2. Rethinking base and superstructure; 3. Class as process and relationship; 4. History or technological determinism?; 5. History or teleology? Marx v. Weber; Part II. Democracy against Capitalism: 6. Labour and democracy, ancient and modern; 7. The demos v. ‘we, the people’: from ancient to modern conceptions of citizenship; 8. Civil society and the politics of identity; 9. Capitalism and human emancipation: race, gender and democracy; Conclusion.