Marx's Capital

An Introductory Reader

Contributed by Vijay Prashad, Venkatesh Athreya, Prasenjit Bose, Prabhat Patnaik, Jayati Ghosh, T. Jayaraman, R. Ramakumar

Paperback
Ebook

978-93-80118-00-0

LeftWord Books, New Delhi, 2011

136 pages

5.5" x 8.5"

https://mayday.leftword.com/catalog/product/view/id/22022

INR 200.00

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There's really no escaping it: if you want to understand capitalism, you simply have to read Karl Marx's 'Capital'.

But this is easier said than done. 'Capital' is Marx's magnum opus consisting of more than 2,000 pages, over three volumes. It is a masterpiece of analysis, of relentlessly methodical and logical reasoning. So is 'Capital' only for the expert? No. 'Capital' can be read and understood by beginners as well, provided they are guided into it. Which is exactly what this volume does. Seven leading Marxist scholars lay out the conceptual framework of 'Capital' as well as investigate its various themes in essays written specially for this Reader.

Moreover, each of the authors has taken care to not limit him/herself to only preliminary explication of concepts, and has also gone into matters of advanced theory. The volume as a whole also has a broadly similar trajectory the first couple of essays lay the foundation, the middle four essays graduate from basic concepts to theoretical discussion and debates, and the last essay does not go into basic concepts at all, but applies the method of 'Capital' to theorise about contemporary capitalism.

This introductory Reader, then, does two things: it equips new readers with the basic conceptual keys that could unlock the vast treasure trove of Marx's analysis and insights, as well as offering fresh insights into Marx's magnificent work to the initiated.

Jayati Ghosh

Jayati Ghosh is Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She has authored and co-edited several books and more than 120 scholarly articles. She is Executive Secretary of International Development Economics Associates (IDEAS - www.networkideas.org) and Trustee of Economic Research Foundation (www.macroscan.org).

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Prabhat Patnaik

Prabhat Patnaik retired as Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He is the author of Time, Inflation and Growth (1988), Economics and Egalitarianism (1991), Whatever Happened to Imperialism and other essays (1995), Accumulation and Stability under Capitalism (1997), The Retreat to Unfreedom (2003), The Value of Money (2008) and Re-Envisioning Socialism (2011). He is the Editor of the journal Social Scientist.

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R. Ramakumar

R. Ramakumar is an economist, with a Ph.D. from the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. His areas of work are agricultural economics, agrarian studies and rural development. He is presently Associate Professor at the School of Social Sciences at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

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T. Jayaraman

T. Jayaraman is currently Professor and Chairperson, Centre for Science, Technology and Society, School of Habitat Studies at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Trained as a theoretical physicist and having worked for several years in that discipline, he has subsequently shifted his academic interests to questions that broadly relate to science and society. His current particular interests include climate change and climate policy, science and technology policy in India including nuclear policy and particular aspects of the philosophy and history of science and technology, with special reference to the Indian context.

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Venkatesh Athreya

Venkatesh Athreya, a chemical engineer-turned-development economist, served as Professor of Economics at Bharathidasan University, Tamil Nadu, for nearly three decades. His earlier works include Barriers Broken (co-authored with Djurfeldt and Lindberg, 1990) and Literacy and Empowerment (co-authored with Sheela Rani Chunkath, 1996). He was the lead author of The Report on the State of Food Insecurity in Rural India (2008) and The Report on the State of Food Insecurity in Urban India (2010). He has written extensively on issues of agrarian change, literacy, gender, infanticide, food security, human development and political economy.

Vijay Prashad

Vijay Prashadis director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, editor at LeftWord Books, and chief correspondent for Globetrotter Independent Media Institute. He is the author of forty books, including Untouchable Freedom: A Social History of a Dalit Community, Washington Bullets, Red Star Over the Third World, The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third
World and The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South. The Darker Nations won the Muzaffar Ahmad Book Prize. He lives in Santiago, Chile.