Friedrich Engels and Marxian Political Economy [Hardcover]

Rejects the perception of Engels as perpetuator of a 'tragic deception' of Marx, and the body of opinion treating him as 'his master's voice'.This book perceives Engels's early contribution to Marxian economic analysis as providing the vision and several of the processes at play in the working out of that vision. It justifies his defense of Marx against charges of plagiarism regarding surplus-value doctrine; rationalizes his objection that the utopian socialists ignored the price mechanism while he himself proposed a central-control system; and analyzes his so-called revisionism in the light of constitutional and welfare reform within capitalism.This book perceives Engels's early contribution to Marxian economic analysis as providing the vision and several of the processes at play in the working out of that vision. It justifies his defense of Marx against charges of plagiarism regarding surplus-value doctrine; rationalizes his objection that the utopian socialists ignored the price mechanism while he himself proposed a central-control system; and analyzes his so-called revisionism in the light of constitutional and welfare reform within capitalism.This book rejects the commonly encountered perception of Friedrich Engels as perpetuator of a tragic deception of Marx, and the equally persistent body of opinion treating him as his master's voice. Engels's claim to recognition is reinforced by an exceptional contribution in the 1840s to the very foundations of the Marxian enterprise, a contribution entailing not only the vision but some of the building blocks in the working out of that vision. Subsequently, he proved himself to be a sophisticated interpreter of the doctrine of historical materialism and an important contributor in his own right. This volume serves as a companion to Samuel Hollander's The Economics of Karl Marx (Cambridge University Press, 2008).Prolegomena; 1. Engels' early contribution; 2. The surplus-value doctrine, Rodbertus' charge of plagilƒR