Work · Socialism, Anarchism, Marxism & Critical Theory
System of Economic Contradictions, or The Philosophy of Poverty
Every economic institution – division of labour, competition, credit – both helps and harms; Marx answered with “The Poverty of Philosophy”.
Introduction
Système des contradictions économiques, ou Philosophie de la misère, published in two volumes in 1846, applies a dialectical method loosely inspired by Hegel to political economy. Proudhon treats each economic category – division of labour, machinery, competition, monopoly, taxation, credit, property – as producing a bad side out of its good side, and looks for a synthesis that would keep the good. He attacks both liberal economists and communists. Marx, who had met Proudhon in Paris in 1844, answered in French with The Poverty of Philosophy (1847), ridiculing both his Hegelianism and his economics. The dispute marks an early parting of the ways between Marxist and anarchist socialism.
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