نقد و تجزیه و تحلیل رایت از بهره برداری

We critically assess Erik O. Wright's recent contributions to the conceptualization of exploitation. We discuss three different exploitation processes that are discernable in his discussion. In applying them to the analysis of capitalist society, Wright maintains the traditional Marxist assumption of the overriding importance of the conflict between capitalists and workers. We argue, however, that Wright's approach is problematic. It is overly constrained by Marxist presuppositions, unclear about the relationship between interest payments and exploitation, and inadequate in defining the value of labor. Due to the latter shortcoming, Wright's definition of exploitation cannot be measured and his claims about what processes generate exploitation cannot be empirically investigated. Wright's analysis of exploitation therefore remains primarily normative and empirically unsubstantiated.

Normative sociology, the study of what the causes of problems ought to be, greatly fascinates all of us. If X is bad, and Y which also is bad can be tied to X via a plausible story, it is very hard to resist the conclusion that one causes the other. We want one bad thing to be caused by another… we happily leap to the conclusion that the second evil is caused by the first. Robert Nozick (1974, p. 247) The tenure system at elite universities is an example of market closure that promotes the wages, working conditions, and fringe benefits of a privileged class stratum known as professors. Their demand for and consumption of conventional Marxist statements will likely remain high despite the limited relevance of the latter to understanding exploitation and social inequality in an economy where “the working rich have replaced the rentiers at the top of the income distribution” (Piketty & Saez, 2003, p. 1). Children from poor and working-class backgrounds are less likely to attend universities due to their spiraling costs (Kane, 2004). The latter serve to increase professors’ salaries that continue to outpace the Consumer Price Index (Fogg, 2003). In order to legitimate these rising costs and the heightened educational credentialism in an increasingly unequal labor market amidst a declining American economy, academics often seek to justify their class privilege by asserting their moral superiority and by denying the significance of market competition and efficiency. In this context, traditional Marxist dictums about exploitation will continue to appeal to many professors but will rally few others. In sum, we conclude that Wright, 1997, Wright, 2000 and Wright, 2002 does not adequately develop exploitation into an analytical concept that is useful for sociological theory or research. There is still no published research in modern sociology that has quantitatively measured or empirically studied exploitation in a systematic manner.16 Our understanding of what processes increase exploitation remains inherently speculative. Normative sociology “greatly fascinates all of us,” but sociologists need to do better than that if we are to be effective in influencing public policy and other avenues of social change that can reduce exploitation in capitalist societies as they actually exist in the real world.