Richard D. Wolff

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Richard D. Wolff
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    Richard David Wolff (born April 1, 1942) is an American

    University of Paris I (Sorbonne), and The Brecht Forum
    in New York City.

    In 1988 Wolff co-founded the journal

    City Lights Books), Contending Economic Theories: Neoclassical, Keynesian, and Marxian, with Stephen Resnick, and Democracy at Work (Chicago: Haymarket Books). In 2019 he released his book Understanding Marxism.[8]

    Wolff hosts the weekly 30-minute-long program, Economic Update, which is produced by the non-profit Democracy at Work, which he co-founded. Economic Update is on YouTube, FreeSpeech TV,

    Pacifica Radio), CUNY TV (WNYE-DT3), and available as a podcast. Wolff is featured regularly in television, print, and internet media. The New York Times Magazine has named him "America's most prominent Marxist economist".[9] Wolff lives in Manhattan with his wife and frequent collaborator, Harriet Fraad
    , a practicing psychotherapist.

    Early life and education

    To escape Nazism, Wolff's parents emigrated from Europe to the United States during World War II. His father, a French lawyer working until that point in Cologne, Germany, gained employment as a steelworker in Youngstown, Ohio (in part because his European certification was not recognized in the United States), and the family eventually settled in New Rochelle, New York, just outside New York City. His mother was a German citizen.[10] Wolff's father was acquainted with Max Horkheimer. Wolff states that his European background influenced his worldview:

    "[E]verything you expect about how the world works probably will be changed in your life, that unexpected things happen, often tragic things happen, and being flexible, being aware of a whole range of different things that happen in the world, is not just a good idea as a thinking person, but it's crucial to your survival. So, for me, I grew up convinced that understanding the political and economic environment I lived in was an urgent matter that had to be done, and made me a little different from many of my fellow kids in school who didn't have that sense of the urgency of understanding how the world worked to be able to navigate an unstable and often dangerous world. That was a very important lesson for me."[10]

    Wolff earned a

    heart attack in 1964 and Wolff transferred to Yale University, where he received a second master's degree in economics in 1966, a Master of Arts in history in 1967, and a Doctor of Philosophy in economics in 1969. As a graduate student at Yale, Wolff worked as an instructor.[1] His dissertation, "Economic Aspects of British Colonialism in Kenya, 1895–1930",[11] was eventually published in book form in 1974.[12]

    Academic career

    Wolff taught at the City College of New York from 1969 to 1973. Here he started his lifelong collaboration with fellow economist Stephen Resnick, who arrived in 1971 after being denied tenure at Yale for signing an anti-war petition.[13] Both would then be part, along with Samuel Bowles, Herbert Gintis, and Rick Edwards, of the "radical package" that was hired in 1973 by the Economics Department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where Wolff has been full professor since 1981. Wolff retired in 2008 but remains professor emeritus and that year joined The New School as a visiting professor.

    The first co-authored academic publication by Wolff and Resnick was "The Theory of Transitional Conjunctures and the Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism,"

    business cycles, social formations, the Soviet Union
    , and comparing and contrasting Marxian and non-Marxian economic theories.

    Wolff's work with Resnick took

    surplus labor
    . While there could be an infinite number of forms of surplus appropriation, the Marxist canon refers to ancient (independent), slave, feudal, capitalist, and communist class processes.

    Marx used the word "exploitation" to focus analytical attention on what capitalism shared with feudalism and slavery, something that capitalist revolutions against slavery and feudalism never overcame.

    — Richard D. Wolff[15]

    In 1989, Wolff joined efforts with a group of colleagues, ex- and then current students to launch Rethinking Marxism, an academic journal that aims to create a platform for rethinking and developing Marxian concepts and theories within economics as well as other fields of social inquiry. For more than two decades, he served as a member of the editorial board of the journal. Currently, he continues to serve as a member of the advisory board of the journal.

    Wolff was a visiting professor in spring 1994 at

    University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne. Wolff continues to teach graduate seminars and undergraduate courses and direct dissertation research in economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and, most recently, in the graduate program in international affairs (GPIA) at The New School
    .

    A founding member of the

    Green Party of New Haven, Connecticut, Wolff was the party's mayoral candidate in 1985.[16] In 2011, he called for the establishment of a broad-based left-wing mass party in the United States.[17] Wolff, especially since 2008, gives many public lectures throughout the United States and other countries. He is regular lecturer at the Brecht Forum. Wolff is often a guest on television and radio news programs, and, within the U.S., has appeared on a variety of programs, as well as writing for a number of publications and websites.[18] Wolff hosts a weekly radio/TV show and podcast on economics and society, Economic Update, at WBAI in New York City.[19]

    One of his students,

    economic crisis, George Papandreou has reversed himself and, faced with a debt crisis, called in the International Monetary Fund and imposed the most brutal austerity program the country has ever seen."[21]

    Projects

    Wolff is a co-founder of Democracy at Work, a non-profit that produces media and live events opposing capitalism and promoting workplace democracy.[22] The organization is based on his 2012 book, Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism. Wolff also hosts the nationally syndicated program Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff, which is produced by Democracy at Work.[23]

    Reception

    In a review of Wolff's book Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism, Hans G. Despain, writing for Marx and Philosophy, argued that the ideas presented in the book "deserve wide support and wide debate to repoliticize the American population and rejuvenate the American workforce and citizens."[24]

    Personal life

    In addition to his native English, Wolff is fluent in French and German.

    psychotherapist. They have two children.[18]

    In an interview on

    The Jimmy Dore Show in January 2021, Wolff stated that he is a distant relative of the German political activist Wilhelm Wolff, to whom the first volume of Karl Marx's Das Kapital was dedicated.[25]

    Works

    Films

    References

    1. ^ a b c d e f Wolff, Richard D. "Wolff C.V." (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on January 1, 2007. Retrieved October 5, 2011.
    2. YouTube
    3. ^ Extended interview with prof. Wolff on how Marxism influences his work Archived October 18, 2015, at the Wayback Machine, Democracy Now!, March 25, 2013
    4. ^ "Prof. Wolff at the Rosa Luxemburg Conference Opening Night, 08/21/15 | Professor Richard D. Wolff". Archived from the original on October 27, 2015. Retrieved October 24, 2015.
    5. ^
      ISBN 978-0226710235
    6. ^ "On Moyers & Company" Archived March 30, 2013, at the Wayback Machine by Richard D. Wolff, February 22, 2013
    7. ^ "Richard Wolff – Guests". Archived from the original on April 25, 2019. Retrieved May 14, 2019.
    8. ^ Rampell, Ed (May 22, 2019). "Understanding "Wolff-ism": Prof. Richard Wolff's Take on Karl Marx in New Text". Hollywood Progressive. Archived from the original on June 4, 2019. Retrieved May 23, 2019.
    9. ^ Davidson, Adam (February 5, 2012). "It Is Safe to Resume Ignoring the Prophets of Doom ... Right?". The New York Times Magazine. Archived from the original on January 3, 2013. Retrieved August 3, 2013.
    10. ^ a b Goodman, Amy. "Democracy Now! March 25, 2013 Watch Extended Interview with Economist Richard Wolff on How Marxism Influences His Work". Pacifica Radio. Archived from the original on October 18, 2015. Retrieved December 23, 2013.
    11. OCLC 682061093
    12. ISBN 978-0-300-01639-0
      .
    13. S2CID 145284702. Archived
      from the original on March 11, 2021. Retrieved November 4, 2020.
    14. ^ Resnick, S. and Wolff, R. (1979). "The Theory of Transitional Conjunctures and the Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism," Review of Radical Political Economics, 11:3, 3–22 and 32–36.
    15. ^ Richard D. Wolff (May 26, 2015). Critics of Capitalism Must Include Its Definition Archived May 27, 2015, at the Wayback Machine. Truthout. Retrieved May 27, 2015.
    16. ^ "Green Party of Connecticut: Election History". Connecticut Green Party. Archived from the original on November 9, 2011. Retrieved October 5, 2011.
    17. ^ Wolff, Richard D. (March 13, 2011). "What's left of the American left?". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on June 17, 2018. Retrieved December 13, 2016.
    18. ^ a b Wolff, Richard D. "About Professor Richard D. Wolff". Rdwolff. Archived from the original on August 4, 2017. Retrieved August 4, 2017.
    19. ^ "Economic Update – Richard D. Wolff". WBAI. Archived from the original on October 4, 2011. Retrieved October 5, 2011.
    20. ^ Interview in "To Vima" Newspaper – Greek Publication Archived March 15, 2013, at the Wayback Machine, January 24, 2011, translated by and uploaded on RDWolff.com
    21. ^ "Capitalism, Socialism, and Economic Democracy: Reflections on Today's Crisis and Tomorrow's Possibilities" Archived November 5, 2016, at the Wayback Machine, by Costas Panayotakis, Envisioning a Post-Capitalist Order, December 2010
    22. ^ "About – Democracy at Work". Democracy at Work. 2013. Archived from the original on June 17, 2018. Retrieved November 17, 2016.
    23. ^ "Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff". Liberated Syndication. Archived from the original on August 31, 2018. Retrieved August 30, 2018.
    24. ^ "'Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism' reviewed by Hans G Despain". marxandphilosophy.org.uk. November 10, 2013. Retrieved July 3, 2023.
    25. ^ Wolff, Richard D. (January 13, 2021). "Capitol Insurrection Caused by Capitalism Failure & Rapacious Donor Class -- Dr. Richard Wolff". The Jimmy Dore Show (Interview). Interviewed by Dore, Jimmy. YouTube. Timestamp: 34:00. Retrieved July 26, 2023.

    External links

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    Interviews

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