This book illustrates the continued value of Marxism as a method for analyzing contemporary capitalism, despite the new Post-Fordist variant termed "lean production" that is spreading the globe. Characterized by knowledge work, lean production also includes the mass customization of commodities to consumer desires, and the close cooperation of firms within extended networks of production and distribution. Its proponents argue that it can unite companies, workers, and consumers in the harmonious pursuit of common interests, thereby making the Marxian perspective hopelessly outdated. However, this book is the first to defend Marxian political economy against the claims made by lean production advocates.

Tony Smith is Professor of Philosophy and Political Science at Iowa State University. He is the author of three other books published by the SUNY Press, The Logic of Marx's Capital: Replies to Hegelian Criticisms, The Role of Ethics in Social Theory, and Dialectical Social Theory and Its Critics: From Hegel to Analytical Marxism and Postmodernism.