The Bichler & Nitzan Archives

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The Bichler & Nitzan Archives contain works by Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan, as well as related publications by others. Most works in the archives deal with the theory of Capital as Power, or CasP for short. CasP offers a radical alternative to mainstream and Marxist theories of value and capitalism. It argues that capital symbolizes and quantifies not utility or labour, but organized power, and that capitalism is best understood and challenged not as a mode of production and consumption, but as a mode of power.

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Open Access
Call for Papers: "Capitalizing Power: The Qualities and Quantities of Accumulation"
(2011) Cochrane, D. T.; Hynes, David; McMahon, James; Nitzan, Jonathan; Singh, Morgan
Keynote speakers: * Jeffrey Harrod, University of Amsterdam -- Global Weimarism: The Demise of Cohesive Global Power? * Herman Schwartz, University of Virginia -- Intellectual Property Rights, Collective Action, and the Continuing Power of "Finance" * Justin Podur, York University -- Nature, Capital and Commodification: Ecology and the Capital as Power Framework * J.J. McMurtry, York University -- Community Capital: The Pitfalls and Promise of Local Power * Jonathan Nitzan, York University -- No Way Out: Crime, Punishment and the Limits of Power With the global crisis lingering, many now wonder how capital has become so powerful, and what should be done about it. Although we are eager to provide answers, the problem starts with the question itself: what exactly do we mean by ‘capital’, and what does it mean to say that capital is ‘powerful’? The theme of the 2012 conference is the capitalization of power. The focus is the conversion of qualities to quantities: to theorize and research how the qualities of power – the multifaceted interactions of command and obedience, force and submission, violence and resistance – are universalized and discounted to the quantities of capitalization. The conference will comprise two parts: public presentations open to all (September 28), followed by a closed workshop for the conference participants (September 29-30). The workshop will consist of longer presentations, allowing more time for debate, discussion and contemplation. Financial assistance: we may be able to assist presenters by partly covering the cost of travel and accommodation. This possibility is still tentative; it is conditional on our ability to secure sufficient funding. Deadline for abstract submissions: July 21, 2012.
Open Access
Call for Papers: "Crisis of Capital, Crisis of Theory"
(2010) Brennan, Jordan; Cochrane, D. T.; Starrs, Sean
This is the first in a series of conferences in heterodox political economy, seeking to develop new ways of understanding capitalism and power. The conference will be held at York University in Toronto on October 29-31, 2010. The deadline for abstract submission is July 31, 2010.
Open Access
Capital as Power: An Audio Interview with Jonathan Nitzan
(2010) Cochrane, D. T.; Nitzan, Jonathan
THE QUESTIONS: 1. Why do we need a theory of capital at all? (00:51 minutes) 2. Why do we need a new theory of capital? (10:28 minutes) 3. What does your theory of capital do that the other problematic theories do not? (21:57 minutes) 4. Where do other power institutions such as the military or the police and other government organs fit within this cosmology? (06:32 minutes) 5. You have described capital as "finance, and only finance." This would seem to be an explicit inversion of Marx who considered finance to be fictitious capital. Can you describe the role of finance in capitalism? (19:30 minutes) 6. Marx's system of thought was a total system. What consequences, if any, does your theory have for other important Marxian concepts, such as alienation? (23:25 minutes) 7. Marx’s emphasis on production and labour gave workers a central role in both capitalist society and the communist society to come. What are the consequences for your understanding of the worker’s role in accumulation on the one hand and a humane post-capitalist society on the other? (20:57 minutes) 8. What, if anything, does your theory tell us about either resistance against capitalism today or the creation of a humane post-capitalist society? (06:20 minutes) Duration of the complete interview: 1:51 hours
Open Access
"Capitalizing Power: The Qualities and Quantities of Accumulation": Conference Programme and Videos
(2012) Cochrane, D. T.; Hynes, David; McMahon, James; Nitzan, Jonathan; Singh, Morgan
This is the third in a conference series organized by the Forum on Capital as Power. The present meetings explore the capitalization of power. There are 24 presentations, including keynote addresses and guest presentations by Jeffrey Harrod, Herman Schwartz, Justin Podur, J.J. McMurtry and Jonathan Nitzan. The conference is sponsored by a SSHRC Connection Grant and York University. Attendance is free and all are welcome.
Open Access
Castoriadis, Veblen and the 'Power Theory of Capital'
(2011) Cochrane, D. T.
A critical examination of value theories, capital accumulation and organized power
Open Access
"Crisis of Capital, Crisis of Theory": Conference Program and Videos
(2010) Brennan, Jordan; Cochrane, D. T.; Starrs, Sean
This is the first in a conference series organized by the Forum on Capital as Power and sponsored by Routledge and Springer. The present meetings explore the dual crisis of capital and theory. There are 21 scheduled presentations, including keynote addresses by Herman Scwhartz and Randall Germain and guest presentations by George Comninel, Leo Panitch, David McNally and Jonathan Nitzan. The conference closes with a roundtable interrogation of capital, power and the future of political economy. Attendance is free and all are welcome. DATE/TIME/PLACE: October 29-31, 2010
Open Access
Death Grip: Scapegoating the Subprime Loser
(2010) Cochrane, D. T.
Capitalizing morality and accumulating through crisis.
Open Access
Differentiating Diamonds: Transforming Knowledge and the Accumulation of De Beers
(2017) Cochrane, D. T.
In 1939, the De Beers diamond company faced a dire situation. The company’s accumulation had been dwindling for decades. The Great Depression not only pushed diamond sales to historic lows, it shifted American attitudes around consumption and thriftiness to the detriment of the luxury object. In this article, I bring together Liz McFall’s assertion that advertising needs to be studied as a “specific commercial device” with Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler’s capitalas-power theory of value (CasP), which emphasizes differential accumulation. Both McFall and CasP challenge analyses that treat capitalism as an undifferentiated totality. It is from this perspective of differentiated commercial struggle that I analyze De Beers’ early advertising campaigns as well as the market research by N.W. Ayer that preceded them. My analysis focuses on an educational component intended to transform the diamond knowledge of the masses. The analysis demonstrates how the research informed the campaign that emerged in contingent relation with various facets of American society and was transformed by changes emergent with WWII.
Open Access
Disobedient Things. The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Accounting for Disaster
(2016) Cochrane, D. T.
Analysis of the Deepwater Horizon disaster and the accumulatory decline of BP demonstrates both the analytical efficacy of the capital-as-power (CasP) approach to value theory, and the irreducible role of objects in the process of accumulation. Rather than productivity per se, accumulation depends on control of productivity. Owners’ control is over both the human and non-human components of systems of production, which transcend the standard categories of culture/politics/economics/technology. Capitalization translates the irreducible social order, things and all, that bear on accumulation into commensurable units of capital. The decline of BP in the wake of the disaster expressed the market’s falling confidence in the obedience of the entities that bear on its profits, including the things that comprise its productive capacity.
Open Access
Disobedient Things: The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Accounting for Disaster
(2020) Cochrane, D. T.
Analysis of the Deepwater Horizon disaster and the accumulative decline of BP demonstrate both the analytical efficacy of the capital-as-power approach to value theory, and the irreducible role of objects in the process of accumulation. Rather than productivity per se, accumulation depends on (1) control of productivity, and (2) the evaluation of control. Capital-as-power focuses on capitalization as an expression of the evaluation by owners of their own power. In this article, I argue that the power of owners translated into capital values is power over both the human and non-human components of systems of production. Power is actualized through entities defined as cultural and political, as well as economic. Capitalization translates into the commensurable financial units of capital the irreducible social order—including objects—that bears on accumulation. The decline of BP’s capital valuation in the wake of the disaster expressed the market’s falling confidence in the expertise, experience and equipment that comprised the company’s productive capacity.
Open Access
Fight to Win! Tools for Confronting Capital
(2012) Monaghan, Jeffrey; Cochrane, D. T.
Anarchists have generally rejected the idea that there is or ought to be a pure or inherently revolutionary strategy or tactic. In this chapter we make use of the capital-as-power theory of value and capital in a way that informs and supports the ad hoc perspective on struggle and fighting to win. Our primary purpose is to propose a method based on this theory as a means for social justice activists to assess political-economic disruption campaigns (PEDCs). Such an analysis is a needed component of an anarchist economics.
Open Access
From Colonialism to Climate Change: The Power to Externalize - Video
(2017) Cochrane, D. T.
The history of capitalism is a history of externalization. While benefits were tallied, costs were routinely excluded from accounts. In this presentation I examine the history of externalization as a power process. A history of brutality and destruction marketed as innovation and efficiency, externalization has been the shadowy counterpart to accumulation. From colonialism to climate change, I will describe how negative effects of economic activity are systematically imposed on vulnerable communities via the interconnected processes of production and accounting. Finally, I will consider how externalities have made their way back onto the books through uprisings, court rulings and environmental disasters. Refreshment will be served and everyone is welcome. WHERE: Verney Room, South 674 Ross Building, Keele Campus, York University WHEN: 2:30 - 5:30 pm, Tuesday, 24 October 2017
Open Access
Messing with the Normal Rate of Return: A Discussion
(2012) Bichler, Shimshon; Cochrane, D. T.; Martin, Ulf; Nitzan, Jonathan
Thoughts on 'objective value', power and the normal rate of return.
Open Access
Peak Oil? Oil Supply and Accumulation
(2008) Cochrane, D. T.
FROM THE ARTICLE: Peak oil will come. When it does, its effects on the global economy are uncertain. In the meantime, the oil companies must keep the following plates spinning: faith in oil as the energy source of capitalism, a high enough price to remain on top of the corporate world, a low enough and steady enough price to avoid contributing to a lengthy recession, or even a depression. While the differential perspective on accumulation makes it clear that growth is not synonymous with the corporate interest -- as long as everyone else is declining faster than you, then you are differentially accumulating -- depressions are dangerous for their unpredictability and their potential to threaten the capitalist status quo. . . . Undoubtedly, one of these plates will drop. The question is: which one? The consequences of the answer to that question will come more immediately than the geologically necessary peak in production and should be of greater concern.
Open Access
Review of Nitzan and Bichler's "Capital as Power: A Study of Order and Creorder"
(2010) Cochrane, D. T.
FROM THE REVIEW: "The authors of Capital As Power wish, as they said in their own words at a recent Rethinking Marxism conference, to perform a ‘ctrl-alt-del’ on current political economy. The basis for this extreme assertion is the sorry state of value theory and the concepts that depend upon that theory, including capital. In place of the two standard theories of value (the neoclassical ‘utility theory of value’ and the Marxist ‘labor theory of value’), both of which have serious analytical and ontological problems, Nitzan and Bichler offer a theory that capital is nothing but quantified power."
Open Access
Speaker Series on the Capitalist Mode of Power -- Programme and Videos
(2013) Nitzan, Jonathan; Brennan, Jordan; McMahon, James; Cochrane, D. T.
OVERVIEW: Existing theories of capitalism, mainstream as well as heterodox, view capitalism as a mode of production and consumption. The purpose of this speaker series is to interrogate capitalism as a mode of power. The talks are organized by The Forum on Capital as Power (www.capitalaspower.com) and sponsored by the York Department of Political Science and the Graduate Programme in Social and Political Thought. There will be refreshments and all are welcome. WHERE: York Lanes, Room 305, York University, Keele Campus PRESENTATION SCHEDULE: Jonathan Nitzan -- Can Capitalists Afford Recovery? Economic Policy When Capital Is Power (Tuesday, Oct 29, 2013, 2:30-4:30) Jordan Brennan -- A Shrinking Universe: How Corporate Power Shapes Inequality (Tuesday, Nov 5, 2013, 2:30-4:30) James McMahon -- I've Seen This Movie A Thousand Times: Risk and the Hollywood Film Business (Wednesday, Nov 13, 2013, 2:30-4:30) D.T. Cochrane -- The Power of Love: Diamonds and the Accumulation of De Beers (Tuesday, Nov 19, 2013, 2:30-4:30)
Open Access
The Capitalist Mode of Power: Second Speaker Series
(2015) Bichler, Shimshon; Cochrane, D. T.; Fix, Blair; Hager, Sandy Brian; Nitzan, Jonathan
Existing theories of capitalism, mainstream as well as heterodox, view capitalism as a mode of production and consumption. This speaker series interrogates capitalism as a mode of power. The five presentations deal with the past, present and future of the CasP project (Bichler & Nitzan), the historical connection between economic growth and the formation of social hierarchy (Fix), the role of blockbuster cinema in reducing Hollywood's risk (McMahon), the external-internal power dynamics of the U.S. public debt (Hager), and General Electric’s staying power and what can be learned from it for the study of capital accumulation (Cochrane). The speaker series is organized by the Forum on Capital as Power and sponsored by the York Department of Political Science and Graduate Program in SPT. LOCATION: Verney Room, 674 South Ross, Keele Campus (open to all, with refreshments) DATES: October 20, 27; November 3, 10, 17, 2015 TIME: 3:00-5:00 PM
Open Access
The Enduring Power of GE
(2015) Cochrane, D. T.
General Electric (GE) has demonstrated extraordinary longevity in the upper echelon of U.S. corporations. From 1925 to 2013, the company has never fallen below 10th in the rankings of firms by market capitalization. The only other firm to match this feat is the oil giant ExxonMobil. GE’s durability is remarkable given the political, cultural, and technological tumult of the 20th century. In this presentation, I will consider possible reasons for GE’s dominance. This study of GE is part of an effort to develop a new field of Accumulation Studies. *** D.T. Cochrane. PhD student at the Graduate Program in Social and Political Thought, York University (dt.cochrane@gmail.com) This presentation is the fourth in the Second Speaker Series on the Capitalist Mode of Power, organized by capitalaspower.com and sponsored by the York Department of Political Science and the Graduate Program in Social and Political Thought. Refreshments will be served and all are welcome. WHEN: Tuesday, November 17, 2015, 3:00-5:00 pm WHERE: Verney Room, 674 South Ross, Keele Campus of York University
Open Access
The Power of Love: Diamonds and the Accumulation of De Beers -- Video and Chartbook
(2013) Cochrane, D. T.
Through the early-20th century, the power of the De Beers’ diamond cartel was dwindling. Its resurrection came with WWII. The company’s reversal of fortune required the construction and maintenance of relations with romantic couples, industrial diamond users, multiple government agencies and diamonds themselves. This presentation will examine De Beers’ accumulation and the translation of these qualitative relationships into capital. This presentation is the fourth in a four-part Speaker Series on the Capitalist Mode of Power. The series is organized by capitalaspower.com and sponsored by the York Department of Political Science and the Graduate Programme in Social and Political Thought.
Open Access
The Rise of Corporate Profits in the Time of Covid
(2022) Cochrane, D. T.
SUMMARY In recent months, Canadians have seen significant price increases in everyday goods. New analysis shows that along with prices increasing, so too have corporate profit margins, which is not a coincidence. In 2021, when Canada was in the middle of the covid pandemic, large corporations in all major sectors of the economy saw their profit margins substantially exceed 20 year averages, with many hitting record levels. The Finance, Insurance & Real Estate Sector (FIRE), which already had the highest sectoral profit margin over the last two decades, also had the biggest increase in 2021—reaching a profit margin of 22%. As the federal government considers its 2022 budget, it is critically important that both rising profit margins and all-time lows in corporate taxation be addressed. Our previous research shows that in 2021, corporations enjoyed their lowest ever effective income tax rate of 16.6%, which contributed to the sharp rise in corporate profit. However, the key contributor to the jump in corporate profits is increasing prices. This report indicates that in 2021 corporations brought in unprecedented levels of profit largely by increasing what they charge for their goods and services. This allowed corporations to almost double profit margins in 2021 to 16%, compared to the 9% average for 2002 to 2019. When corporations choose to raise their prices in order to boost their profit margins, they drive up inflation. While much emphasis is put on inflation being caused by government spending, the corporate pursuit of higher profits through price increases is a much simpler explanation, though more poorly understood and less discussed. This misunderstanding plays into the hands of individuals, organizations and lobby groups pushing an austerity agenda. Such an agenda would have a range of negative repercussions on the Canadian economy, while benefiting only the very rich. The more Canadians understand what causes prices to rise, the better we can respond in a manner that helps the overall economy, as opposed to enriching only a fortunate few. Beyond driving inflation and reducing the affordability of goods and services, higher corporate profit margins also contribute to rising inequality. The overwhelming majority of corporate owners are part of the 1% and they receive the majority of capital income. Fortunately, a number of reasonable, immediately applicable solutions exist, including bringing corporate income tax rates closer to where they used to be, applying an excess profits tax on top pandemic profits, closing the most egregious tax loopholes, and improving corporate financial transparency.