----------------- HES POSTING ----------------- 
 
Peter Stillman again raises the name of Hegel in opposition to my  
account of the change from "political economy" to "economics" In  
particular he raises Hegel's distinction between civil society and  
the state.   
 
But that represents a one-sided reading of Hegel. The first principle  
for Hegel is the unity of the whole. It is only inside that unity that  
the opposition and mutual dependence of the the state and civil  
society can be posited. Civil society and the state are the  
moments of a contradictory internal relation of the whole.   
 
Other writers have emphasised one or more aspects of Hegel's  
formulation.   
 
For the most part, economists, in the last two hundred years, have  
emphasised the separation of the political from the economic. Both  
marxists and neo-classics have done this, by insisting upon the  
dominance of the economic sphere in the relation between  
economics and politics. For both the economic is the underlying  
reality that provides limits to the political. A similar insistence upon  
the separation between economics and ethics can be seen the  
work of Ricard Lipsey. The difference between the marxist and the  
neo-classics, in this context, is on their evaluation of the economic  
possibilities. Generally for the neo-classics, the political  
possibilities are quite limited to a narrow range around the status  
quo. While for the marxist the political possibilities are some what  
broader, and the political status quo represents an anachronistic  
drag upon the economic possibilities.   
 
It is only among the institutionalist that you encounter opposition to  
this view. I am thinking particularly of Gunnar Myrdal and Karl  
Polanyi. For them the economic sphere (or the civil) do not  
dominate. Here you will find much more emphasis on the unity and  
mutual dependence of the two spheres, and a downplaying of the  
division and antagonism between the state and civil society.   
 
Rod Hay 
 
------------ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ------------ 
For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]