The first defense of Marxian political economy against the common interest claims of "lean production."
This book illustrates the continued value of Marxism as a method for analyzing contemporary capitalism, despite the new Post-Fordist variant termed "lean production" that is spreading the globe. Characterized by knowledge work, lean production also includes the mass customization of commodities to consumer desires, and the close coop...(Read More)
Establishes that dialectical social theory retains practical importance today and is, in fact, crucial to interdisciplinary attempts to construct a viable theory of the social world.
That there is a "Hegelian legacy" in Marx's writings is not in dispute. There is great controversy, however, over the extent to which this legacy should be affirmed or rejected. In fact, the Hegelian orientation toward Marx and toward...(Read More)
This book defends the derivation of the ethical principle of universalizability presented by Jurgen Habermas, and illustrates the importance of this principle for both social science and social policy. Beginning with a comprehensive analysis of social theory, Smith divides the theory into nine distinct branches, each devoted to a fundamental question; three branches fall under social science, three under social ethics, and the last three make up so...(Read More)
"Tony Smith has now written a book that conclusively demonstrates that Marx's commitment to Hegelian dialectic is much more thoroughgoing, fundamental, and central to Marx's thought than anyone had previously seen. He has done a brilliant job in demonstrating the Hegelian dialectical logic that structures Capital. No one had ever worked this out in such detail, with such rigor, and with such convincing arguments. This is thus a scho...(Read More)
