Reply To Melvin P

[Hari Kumar]

Dear Cmde Melvin: First, my sincere apologies – you are right that I do indeed have shame on me. Not however for asking the questions – for I do NOT think it is so obvious what the reality is. But shamed for having been too lazy to explicate myself properly, so that you would not either think that I was shameless or that I trying to label you. E-Formats have the tendency to be terse. Notwithstanding Rakesh’s views on ‘politesse’, I think that when one objects to views in person – one can always ameliorate the potential angst by many ways eg. a hand-shake or a twinkle in the eye etc. These are far less easy to  convey in this medium. Therefore I was lazy in not explicating myself to avert a potential mis-understanding; also I confess that do not feel quite comfortable on this list being a non-economist. You are also right in that I have a considerable amount of grey on my head – regrettably it is mainly on my beard since my top-knot has been shedding aggressively! However, my comrades and I do try to keep up with changes –  “all is change” being fundamental to a Marxist view of the world. Let me try to explain my viewpoint more clearly. 1) However I do not think I should have to explain myself any further, for asking a question - any further. After all Marx writes: “If it is scientific task to resolve the outward & visible movement into the inward and actual movement….. the conceptions…… will differ widely from the real laws..” He is talking here of  “the laws of production” – but I truncate the quote for convenience to utilise its thrust that it is in fact “mandatory” for Marxists of all stripes – to ask questions. This is necessary in the question of the Labour Aristocracy. Since Engels first put his finger on the strategy of capital in bribing the highest echelons of labour lieutenants; and then Lenin took the analysis further – there has been an interesting phenomenon. That is to say that there is a tendency amongst a certain section of the left to extrapolate Lenin and Engels to the entire ‘working class’. Indeed elements of the Maoist left deny there is an actual working class – except that in the USA it be black and the most down-trodden. This why I used the term Maoists – by the bye, I did not really accuse you of being one! However, it is indeed a relic from the Three Worlds Theory – but this can be put aside for the time being. To return to the Labour Aristocracy. The problem is how can such a conception of the entire working class being bribed, aid us in the strategy of change? To my mind, there are relatively few studies on the ML-ist left (I am no economic academic – as my pathetic forays will have by now made clear – I am trying to glean some pearls here – although the Eureka moments seem rather few to me thus far! But that is life I guess! So perhaps the analysis has in reality been made in some obscure & dusty tome that I am blithely unaware of……?) that address the question. Here is one ML-ist study, that was written by W.B.Bland in the UK in the 60’s, when indeed he was still a Maoist. It argues using official figures, that in the  UK of that time, the amount of total “bribe” to the workers was very low; and that the number of actual aristocrats in the working class was also very low. See: http://www22.brinkster.com/harikumar/CommunistLeague/ALLIANCE46_3WORLDS_WBB.htm There is naturally an evolution from the times of any of our previous great leaders (I hope no one here can deny that there were such - & thus not object to the term? I myself do not genuflect to any - but due credit.....). In the period of the last 50 odd years, there has become a huge problem in my view, with the ‘sociological’ attempts to explain class. This has infected the left with – in my view – revisionist attempts to further narrow the class of workers by for instance, denying that ‘intellectual workers’ are workers. [This is attempted to be dealt with in more detail at this web-address. http://www22.brinkster.com/harikumar/AllianceIssues/All24-CLASS97.htm ] Conclusion to this part of my reply: Deciding who are the class forces that will bring the revolution is a critical part of the strategy and tactics of moving from our current situation to the phase of re-invigorating the working class movement and creating the subjective force required for change. I cannot therefore apologise for asking the questions of: How big is the labour aristocracy, and of whom it is composed; of what does that mean in terms of strategy for revolution in the so-called developed world?. 2) You say that “virtually all of us with a little gray in our heads developed a conception of Marxism based on boundaries within capital that no longer exist.” I think as a vestigial die-hard, that the fundamentals have NOT changed, & that all economic avenues for capital are ultimately doomed. Because capital is failing & has had some leeway from the benefits of Keynsian rescue therapies – but this is ultimately sterile for capital. I do not think in any way that this is controversial amongst the left [ The view of our grouping is at: http://www22.brinkster.com/harikumar/AllianceIssues/ALLIANCE3ECONOMICS.html ] And of course the car industrial workers are crunched and are (apparently) less important currently than  other sectors of workers. I am not going to deny that the unemployment of car workers reflects massive changes in where profit is highest and into which sectors capital will shunt part of its booty in order to get more. But this is decidedly not the same as saying that the industrial proletariat is irrelevant in today’s economy in the Western world. Setting workers apart on the basis of what transparently is petty differences between them in wage-renumeration – AS COMPARED to the amount of profit they create for the ruling class – seems to play into the hands of those that would “divide & rule”.  Indeed it seems to me that you well agree with that since you yourself write: “Right now the auto industry is in the process of shedding between 150,000 and 200,000 autoworkers world-wide. Where will these workers go? Where every they go into society they take with them a sense of organization and a superior conception of what is possible due to their combination.” I agree with that.  3) You wrote: “A new qualitative development must take place within the working class whose growth and development is prevented by the framework of capital. Electronic-digital production is its trajectory of development is absolutely incompatible with a system based on the buying and selling of labor, further depresses wages driving greater sections of the class into destitution, polarized society into a camp of wealth and poverty and engenders a "new class" of proletariats who cannot live based on the purchase and sell of labor and consequently driven along a logic of fighting for their needs.” Perhaps indeed ‘objectively’ the working class is hampered from developing – in the long run - & that is why objectively revolution is needed. But while indeed wages are depressed etc; it is manifestly not true that “Electronic-digital production is its trajectory of development is absolutely incompatible with a system based on the buying and selling of labor”.  I have not seen the revolution yet in North America. 4)  You write: “Trying to win over trade union leaders is the road to fascism. For communist to attach themselves to the political motion of the trade union leaders and not the motion of the lowest sector of the working class is the road to fascism,  which we might have to experience to find out. Trying to win over the millions of trade union members to our righteous cause is the road to social change.” I fully agree with you. In my opinion the policy of trying to win over the (truly) aristocratic section of labour ie the leaders is the social-democratic way. I should say that in my view, trying to set up “red Trade unions’ as the Comintern tried in the mid 1930’s under the revisionist influence of Karl Radek & others was also wrong. All that does not get away from the business of accurately assessing who is on our side and who isn’t. I believe that this then comes back to defining what/who the class is composed of. Comrade, I hope that this explication at least succeeds in letting you know that I was not labelling you or trying to denigrate your viewpoint. (Ps Some of my best friends are Maoist!). Sincere Fraternal Greetings, Hari