Since the mid-1980s, David F. Ruccio has been developing a new framework of Marxian class analysis and applying it to various issues in socialist planning, Third World development, and capitalist globalization. The aim of this collection is to show, through a series of concrete examples, how Marxian class analysis can be used to challenge existing modes of thought and to produce new insights about the problems of capitalist development and the possibilities of imagining and creating noncapitalist economies.
The book consists of fifteen essays, plus an introductory chapter situating the authors work in a larger intellectual and political context. The topics covered range from planning theory to the role of the state in the Nicaraguan Revolution, from radical theories of underdevelopment to the Third World debt crisis, and from a critical engagement with regulation theory to contemporary discussions of globalization and imperialism.
Foreword Stephen Resnick and Richard Wolff Introduction 1.Rethinking Planning, Globalization, and Development from a Marxian Perspective Planning 2. Essentialism and Socialist Economic Planning: A Methodological Critique of Optimal Planning Theory 3. Planning and Class in Transitional Societies 4. The State and Planning in Nicaragua 5. Nicaragua: The State, Class, and Transition Development 6. Radical Theories of Development: Frank, the Modes of Production School, and Amin 7. The Costs of Austerity in Nicaragua: The Worker-Peasant Alliance, 1979-1987 8. When Failure Becomes Success: Class and the Debate over Stabilization and Adjustment 9. Power and Class: The Contribution of Radical Approaches to Debt and Development 10. Capitalism and Industrialization l39