Land Rent, Crisis Theories, and Radical Geography

The question of rent as a political economic driver of urban change is not new to radical geography. Yet, it seems curious that while Differential Rents are considered pertinent, absolute rent is almost entirely replaced by (class-)monopoly rent. In Marxian political economy there exist at least two distinctive traditions regarding economic crisis theory. First is Monopoly Capitalism School that is mainly designed by Sweezy from Bortkiewicz’s neo-Ricardian critique of Marx. And the second is the LTRPF School, which refers directly to Marx’s critique of Ricardo. While the latter puts the emphasis on profitability and real competition, the former stresses on effective demand and monopoly. This paper presents a literature review of these two traditions in radical geography and claims that while Monopoly Capitalism has been dominant in radical geography literature, the LTRPF (unlike other disciplines, incl. economic history and economics) has been non-existent in the field. I will further argue that the tendency to question the relevance of absolute rent lies in which of the above-mentioned traditions one would take. The paper’s final argument is that taking either of these two traditions is not arbitrary or a matter of inquisition, it comes with significant implications in terms of practice.