Callinicos, Zizek, Holloway on the Idea of Communism

Video via http://versouk.wordpress.com/2010/07/07/idea-of-communism-callinicos-zizek-holloway-at-marxism/

Description

"Verso Books have posted a video of the philosopher and cultural critic Slavoj Žižek on his favourite topic -- the "idea of communism". In discussion with Alex Callinicos and John Holloway at this weekend's Marxism 2010 event, he returns to a theme explored at last year's sell-out conference at Birkbeck University.

Callinicos begins the meeting by emphasising the need not just for a critique of the capitalist economy, but for its complete replacement with another system of social relations: "The idea of communism is [principally] about the alternative to the idea of capitalism."

"To grasp today's capitalist dynamic the logic of exploitation is no longer enough," Žižek says. "[We] need to take into account the new role as a source of wealth of raw materials, which for Marx were out of the equation... and intellectual property." (http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/cultural-capital/2010/07/slavoj-zizek-communism-callinicos)