No abstract

This paper provides a feminist critique of market socialism. I argue that two important socialist values, equality and freedom, can only be realised by a form of socialism that adequately distributes and values tasks associated with social reproduction. My argument proceeds in five steps: first, I outline of the main characteristics of market socialism. Second, I provide an understanding of social reproduction and show that its current organisation raises a feminist concern. Third, I discuss the relation between markets under market socialism and social reproduction and draw implications from this for the market socialist project. Finally, I show that market socialism has the potential to bring about a more equal distribution of responsibility for social reproductive work.

Bilateral investment treaties constitute an important instrument to facilitate global investment. Recent discussions in political theory have highlighted several normative concerns raised by bilateral investment treaties. One worry is that investment treaties undermine national self‐determination as they grant investors far‐reaching protections that can be legally enforced. Another worry is that the benefits and burdens entailed in bilateral investment treaties are distributed unfairly in a way that benefits investors at the expense of states and disadvantaged groups within states. Instead of critiquing bilateral investment treaties from a perspective of global (distributive) justice, in this article I develop a class‐based critique. This involves a twofold departure. First, the article shifts the focus from distributions to the power relations that are built into the global capitalist economy and that come into sharp relief in the practice of global investment. Second, rather than focusing on the relation between states and investors, I claim that in a class‐based critique the relation between workers and investors should take centre stage. I argue that bilateral investment treaties are effectively an instrument of class domination, insofar as they reproduce and increase the power of transnational corporations while at the same time decreasing the power of workers.

No abstract

No abstract