On Marxism, Institutionalism, and the Problem of Labor Exploitation

In Are Worker Rights Human Rights? Ric McIntyre explores the unintended manner in which rights discourse may impede the project to empower labor in today's globally integrated economy, while offering a synthesis of critical insights from the institutionalist and Marxian traditions. In his synthesis McIntyre draws on the related concepts of convention and class, on the one hand, and reasonable value and exploitation, on the other. This essay pursues that synthesis, and raises questions about what is gained and what is lost in the development of a theoretical account that respects the contributions of both traditions.