Reviving the Cambridge Controversy by Combining Marx with Sraffa

Abstract

For the present situation in the teaching of economics, a field where the method of historical materialism is not employed, the mutual dissent between the theories of Marx and Sraffa represents a controversy of a scholastic character. The confirmation of the redundancy of the labor theory of value for the quantitative determination of prices contributed to diverting the attention of theoreticians from the concrete aim of Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities . As a result, the two Cambridges debate was abandoned before real changes in economics textbooks could occur. Although there are other reasons for the lack of a Sraffian impact on the mainstream, this article argues that it is possible to combine the critiques of Marx and Sraffa as a way to focus attention on the Capital Controversies.