Conversations with History: David Harvey 

David Harvey is precise, concise and clear. These qualities is what makes his strength.

Excellent!

holy shit this guy is awesome

Amazing interview and thanks to everyone.

These serie of interviews are more than interesting. Bravo for the organiser and especially for the uploader.

Love this guy, wish there were more people with his clear-sighted, cool rationality and there were more major professors who uploaded their lecture courses onto youtube.

Great interview David.

Also, I laughed out loud at your Handle and the icon accompanying it. Very Good, Sir.

Just recently discovered him... Ordered his books!

That is very true, making it difficult to discuss class politics with people from the USA and, worse, making the politics of class very confused in the USA. One of the preconditions for the achievement of a classless society has to be an understanding of the problem.

Love his gilet

42:45 is prescient (OWS), given that this is 2004.

Bravo Dr. Harvey. Marx and Engels did their share. They provided us with the tools; Historical Materialism.

I live roughly four miles from where he lived as a kid !

@GeoHistPol You nailed it what the problem is with America and its peers.

what, huh? not sure what you're saying with all the typos. please explain.

@amet1980 Isnt Harvey British?

great interview. full of insight into the nature of capitalism and US imperialism. not sure i agree with the claim that vietnam was a 'defensive' war (at 34:07). though it was different from iraq and afghanistan - it wasn't meant to be a war to occupy the country.

When David Harvey said pre-emptive strikes are new for this century, I think he was talking exclusively about US foreign policy , as the British had done so during the Napoleonic war in 1807 against the kingdom of Denmark which was seen to be a potential threat to England's then ally Sweden. Or maybe Wiccapedia is full of misinformation.

My goodness, he's sharp

Esto podría alguien subtitularlo al castellano? idioma que hablamos acá en Argentina

@wotnuhellizdis " When David Harvey said pre-emptive strikes are new for this century, I think he was talking exclusively about US foreign policy , as the British had done so during the Napoleonic war in 1807 " lol i think the qualifier "new for this century" means we are not looking back to premodern 1807.

The whole interview is pretty damn prescient! If only Charlie Rose would have given an interview of this depth instead of cutting off points...

long live synthesizer theme music

You're right in saying that the USA is a mixed economy- almost all 'capitalist' countries today are (in fact, I can't think of any that aren't off the top of my head), but I don't see why this means they aren't capitalist. Private ownership of property and means of production are the basis of the economy- isn't this what it means to be capitalist, even if there is some government intervention?

There is no actual "housing" problem. The reason there is an insufficient supply of decent, affordable housing is that land markets, absent the public collection of the rent of land, are not responsive to competitive forces. Rather, the low effective rate of taxation on land rent allows owners of land to hold land idle for decades or even longer. Investment in land is as often made for speculation as for development. The "housing" issues will be solved only when we solve the land problem by shifting taxation to land (i.e., location) rental values.

Oh really? Explain to me, I want to learn!

Have we become comfortably numb?

@amet1980 Harvey isn't post marxist.

"What Marx wrote and what self-appointed 'Marxists' interpreted are two different things" In think single quotes could have gone around 'interpreted' too! You make a good point. I think Chomsky probably has it right too: watch?v=WsC0q3CO6lM

10 years later. Brazil exports 19% to China, 13% to US, 6% to Netherlands, 8% to Argentina

You're pretty mature for a 57 year old. What year did u drop out of high school?

we're solving problems that arise from language here, kid

Now you're just talking about a different thing. I would disagree that a completely hands-off approach is the best way, but in any case my point was that having a mixed economy does not mean it's not capitalist. Especially considering that pretty much every country in the world, successful or not, has a mixed economy, and the vast majority of those are capitalist mixed economies.

it's a fucking jam, bro

Long live historical materialism.Long live socialism.Now more than ever

@hjemkomst Sorry for the late reply. Yes I am serious. These are the facts: When people in a country are growing more and more in favor of "taxing the rich" in the name of fair share, you can come to the conclusion that they are not in any way capitalist other than claiming to be in name only. The problem is that the US is not a capitalist nation; it is a mixed economy. If we were capitalist we would not be in the mess we are right now.

Long live historical materialism.Long live socialism...

You didn't even understand my point. My point is that the BRIC's left their socialism and Communism behind and are becoming functional economies through capitalism (no, not fully capitalist, but more capitalist than they were which is why they have boomed), their booms would be bigger if they were fully capitalist. Actually the closest thing to capitalism would be Andorra which has no income tax, or now there is a section of Honduras that is 100% privately owned (no government roads nothing).

@colourmegone well as you understand it is wrong. whats your next concern?

Hello. What's "obscuntarism"? You used this word in your comment here one month ago. Or was it a Freudian slip? Ha ha if it was.

That is not hte point: This is a product of the forfilling of Capital's hunger, not, by any means, hte expression of someone's will.

i agree. i think its good to add his deep geographical expertise with some other theorists in the philosophical/critic studies. I like Zizek, I have found many of his ideas on global capitalism very crucial. he tries to write clearly, and is the enemy of obscuntarism, but he uses a philosophical framework as well as marxist and lacanian theory, so this synthesis may be polarizing. This causes some passionate detractors, but he speaks on some very fascinating, far-reaching paradoxes

My whole point is that socialism is so inferior to capitalism it is impossible to take one serious who espouses it. I used the BRICs as an example in their somewhat embrace of capitalism and not communism! If you took the trouble to look at the areas of an economy where the government is involved the least, and the free enterprise is allowed to happen (within the rule of law!) it is the most prosperous part of an economy. While the areas still under control of government are the worst.

You know, that is a kind of disingenuous response. You can't say "child labor became unnecessary because of capitalism", an abstract term that consolidates a variety of concrete realities and of processes, a multitude of causes. Even if you could, that would be a logical fallacy, a false cause. It seems you give agency to an empty phrase. At least as a historian, Marx engages in a lucid exposition of Child labor in London during the 19th century, shows the bitter fight to abolish it.

What Marx wrote and what self-appointed 'Marxists' interpreted are two different things. Marx's understanding of 'class struggle' is dialectical. He sees the proletariat as constitutive of capital, classes are not identities but degrees of alienation from capital. The class struggle is supposed to achieve a *classless* society in which the categories of bourgeoisie/proletariat become meaningless, rather than a marxist-leninist 'workers state'.

Poaching is illegal . . . not legal . . . unless you legalize it.

Empire abroad, tyranny at home

Is he the author of Neoliberalism?

lol this guy emigrated to America - to teach Marxism lol!

Ha ha.

hahahahahaha

boss hog . . . your fired

thanks taxpayers

@richard1917 hahahahaha

This crazy old prof hasn't touched down to reality for quite a number of years now! Woo, flying high in his own imaginary world!

Yes, exactly, that's not capitalism you genius. Capitalism follows the rule of law, i don't know if you are aware of that.

He states his report on housing conditions in general included recommendations on wealth distribution and racial issues. Hardly sticking to housing. But this is typical of socialist idealist intellectual thinking. Things are portrayed as either racism, class, or income distribution usually as a result of the realization that they themselves are useless or impotent. the racist,social structure, income equality card is more often played as a 'safe haven' than any useful suggestion.

this poster is lame

Niet!

The problem with Marxism, as I understand it, is that it aims at "the dictatorship of the proletariat". I don't want to live in a dictatorship. The great problem is that many dictators ARE proletarians (the urge to tyranny knows no class distinction) and frankly I am not impressed.

You should be illegal.