Proposal for a session at the ESSHC 23-26/04/2014 in Vienna, Linda Clarke and Jörn Janssen
CFP: Approaches to the Historical Process of Social Transformation
Deadline: 15/05/2013
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels suggested in their 'Manifesto of the Communist Party' that "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggle" (KM&FE 1848). Conversely, in his main opus, Capital I-III, Karl Marx interpreted history rather as a process of capital accumulation under the regime of private property. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Charles Robert Darwin and Robin George Collingwood, to mention just these three, in very different ways interpreted history as an evolutionary process. Liberal economic theory of the 20th century interpreted Adam Smith with its doctrine of productive growth as a result of innate individual competitive incentive. Since the collapse of financial capitalism neo-liberal theory is in tatters. As a contrast, the new international journal on strikes and social conflict 'workers of the world' - especially in Vol. 1/2, 1913 - has reignited the debate about class struggle and the form of class society. The panorama of approaches to the historical process of social transformation is vast and diverse indeed. We propose, therefore, to restrict the debate in this session on those which focus on labour as a determinant agent. Apart from this restriction we would suggest, however, to remain open in other respects, e.g. with regard to
- the historical scope and period,
- geographical scope and locality,
- theoretical or empirical methodology,
provided that papers try to contribute to the overarching question how the historical process of social transformation can be understood or explained.
This session may well be regarded as moving in the orbit of 'Global Labour History' by discussing its theoretical foundations, and in accordance with this project, as contemporary history in the sense that it is inspired by the experience of the present crisis of capitalism and socialism trying to understand its historic dynamic.
If you would like to join this session please let us know before 15/05/2013:
Linda Clarke / clarkel [at] wmin.ac.uk
Joern Janssen / joern.janssen [at] btinternet.com