On Other Campuses: Cornell University

[Cornell University letterhead]; [Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer];

Dear

The postmarxist, i.e. antimarxist, insulation here is quite thick, and not simply, I think, because of ludic commonsense. There's also a "materialist" commonsense that short-circuits systemic critique while presenting itself as the true opponent of Poststructuralism & Co. This means that a large portion of the English department (same in comp. lit., German, etc.) presents itself as "Marxist" while at the same time denying the relevance of class, economic system, relations of production, exploitation, and other "old-fashioned" categories.

For these reasons, the past year in Finland was a good one, winter darkness excepted. My wife and I read and wrote fairly productively most of the year. We were able to travel a hit in eastern Europe and Scandinavia, and it was a bit blinding to the senses for an American. It took great effort to recall that the Finnish and Swedish welfare-states are not socialist, despite the apparent humaneness of the systems compared to here. And it took even greater effort to remind oneself that the devastation of eastern Europe is not simply Stalinism-Brezhnevism run amok, but the outcome of a long global war. The biggest shock was seeing fairly sharply defined class-consciousness in most places. The welfare-state and now the EU may be selling out the working class, but the working class seems to know what it has achieved and that there are threats coming that must be met with solidarity.

I've enclosed a short pamphlet written by three communist economists, one of whom, Jan-Otto Andersson, I briefly met in Turku (Abo in Swedish). Andersson is part of the Vasemmisto Litto, the Leftist League, a red-green organization, and has been a significant presence in the EU referendum debate, arguing for policies that would take Finland away from the "productivity" trap of the EU and toward a system of citizens' wages, sharply reduced workhours, and greatly reduced consumption. This pamphlet discusses the welfare-state crisis in Finland in the context of structural changes throughout Scandinavia.

I'm now at work on my dissertation, reading American history, early American literature, some Marx and Engels, and Habermas. I am hoping to offer a Marxist critique of Habermas's work in my dissertation, along the lines of getting at the pseudo-materialism mentioned above.

Sincerely,

/s Ed White