ABSTRACT
The significance of inquiry concerning social value theory can scarcely be overstated. Marxists customarily claim pertinence and significance for their theory because of its perceived applicability in guiding the necessary transformation from an oppressive capitalist social and economic order to a more efficient and less exploitative socialist order and ultimately to a more creative and humane communist order. Mainstream, neoclassical thinkers historically and routinely have affirmed that economics, if it aspires to scientific standing, must be positivistic, not normativistic; it must eschew value judgments. Accordingly, the Marxist principle of social value, the continuing criterion of judgment, is “fulfillment of the Marxist design.” The foregoing characterization of the fundamental law incorporates both positive and normative elements. It discloses Cornforth’s referent for what constitutes “fulfillment of the Marxist design.” William Ash’s most basic normative premise is to achieve fulfillment of the Marxist design in the utility-labor linkage and the creativity of the proletariat.
