During the 1970s, Holloway was an influential member of the Conference of Socialist Economists, particularly in his support of an approach to the state as a social form constituted ultimately by class struggle between capital and the working class. This approach was developed primarily through the critical appropriation of aspects of the German state derivation debate of the early 1970s, in particular the work of Joachim Hirsch, and led him and Sol Picciotto to publish "State and Capital: A Marxist Debate", an anthology of texts from the German debate with a critical introduction. This conception of state, social form and class struggle, within the Conference of Socialist Economists developed current that ultimately gave rise to the Open Marxismschool of thought in which Holloway remained a significant participant. This current rejects both traditional Marxist ideas of state monopoly capitalism and innovations such as Poulantzas' Althusserian state theory, and the Regulation school, and affirms the centrality of the class relation between capital and working class, as a struggle. His 2002 book, Change the World Without Taking Power, has been much debated in Marxist, anarchist and anti-capitalist circles, and contends that the possibility of revolution resides not in the seizure of state apparatuses, but in day-to-day acts of abject refusal of capitalist society – so-called anti-power, or 'the scream' as he puts it. Holloway's thesis has been analysed by thinkers like Tariq Ali and Slavoj Žižek. Critics and supporters alike consider Holloway broadly Autonomist in outlook, and his work is often compared and contrasted with that of figures such as Antonio Negri. His 2010 book Crack Capitalism carries on with the political ideas developed in Change the World Without Taking Power. Holloway sees the problem of political activism, in terms of people struggling “in-and-against” the system, as one of continuing to perpetuate capitalism through their commitment to abstract labour. He argues that from the Marxist stand-point of “two-fold nature of labour” or abstract labour and concrete labour, that anti-capitalist struggles should be about concrete doing against labour, and not a struggle of labour against capital.
Influences on culture
Music
Composer Reynaldo Young acknowledges in the performance notes of his piece "" that Change the World Without Taking Power is the "theoretical source which the strategic principles of this score came from." Both Holloway and the composer attended the world premiere of the piece, which took place on 26 July 2002 in Bretton Hall, West Yorkshire.
Books in English
State and Capital: A Marxist Debate,, ed. with Sol Picciotto
Social Policy Harmonisation in the European Community,
Post-Fordism and Social Form: A Marxist Debate on the Post-Fordist State,, ed. with Werner Bonefeld
Global Capital, National State, and the Politics of Money,, ed. with Werner Bonefeld
Open Marxism: Emancipating Marx,, ed. with Werner Bonefeld, Richard Gunn and Kosmas Psychopedis
Zapatista!: Reinventing Revolution in Mexico,, ed. with Eloína Peláez
Change the World Without Taking Power,
Negativity and Revolution: Adorno and Political Activism , ed. with Fernando Matamoros & Sergio Tischler
Crack Capitalism Pluto Press
PM Press
We are the Crisis of Capital: A John Holloway Reader
Chapters in English
"The Grammar of Capital." In The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx.
