Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis: Evidences of Fette...
DV: re: the above, what if productive forces are destroyed by war or natural disaster? is retrogression to something akin to earlier mode of production possible? given, the development of social and political consciousness is related to the development of productive forces, but people tend to respond collectively in altruistic cooperation (a variant of primitive communism) or, less commonly, with predatory individualistic behavior (a variant of primitive accumulation?) depending on circumstances. To what degree is class consciousness a factor in human solidarity under duress? *** WL: You warm support is always kind and appreciated. Hurricane Rita posed no real threat to my family and I, but I still evacuated from about 90 minutes outside Houston, on a wave roughly 4 hours in front of what turned out to be a movement of more than two million people. I really need to find time to write about this and our bourgeois mode of living and thinking. The role of the automobile in our society as a bourgeois need and not simply transportation was striking. To the issues. Even the devastation of war, as in the First and Second World Imperial Wars, did not really constitute a retrogression in the mode of production, at least in its evolutionary aspects. Society is always reconstructed with a certain level of science intact as well as productive forces. Brother D . . . I am aware of the different theoretical proposition being put forward and contained in my question. Socialism is not a mode of production in the meaning being attached to the productive forces. For instance the word feudal + ism, or feudalism implies a mode of production, but actually refers to the corresponding social and political forms of class rule of a society (superstructure) founded on landed property relations, handicraft, manufacture and then the growth of heavy manufacture and later . . . a transition that witnesses new classes corresponding to the growth of the productive forces. This society founded on landed property relations, handicraft, manufacture and then the growth of heavy manufacture, and with this growth the quantitative and qualitative expansion of new classes corresponding to the growth of the productive forces (bourgeois and proletariat), . . . does at a certain stage, witness an external collusion between the old classes (nobility and serf, clergy, etc.), social structures and legal forms stabilizing the property relations of feudal society and the new classes. What is fairly standard in the arsenal of Marx is the recognition that the new classes - bourgeois and proletariat, are the product of what reveals itself to be a new mode of production and not a reconfiguration of the infrastructure, and productive artifacts and under lying energy grid of feudal society. Soviet socialist relations of production, needs to be described concretely. I am saying that the concrete material relations of production in the former Soviet Union were in their fundamentality industrial relations of production - with a different property relations within, rather than the old description of socialist relations of production that happened to be industrial. Production relations are the real people and how they deploy the existing implements of production and energy resources upon which is built the self movement of a given society and not simply the property relations or the laws defining ones ownership rights. Industrial relations cannot be de-evolved into the mode of production from which it emerged and society cannot be de-evolved back into economic, social and political feudal relations. It is simply impossible because of the dialectic of transition and the emergence of a new qualitative definition. 1). The bourgeois property relations could be restored in the Soviet Union because industrial society is by definition hostile to economic communism. Today we can define economic communism much better than Marx, Engels, Lenin and Comrade Stalin. 2). Socialism is a transition period between the bourgeois property relations and the abolition of private property. In real life this socialism was a description of the political content of the proletarian revolution or the property relations rather than a material assessment of the concrete economic features of a transition to economic communism. Allow me to back up a little. When the generation of communists of the Third International spoke of communism its economic content was basically limited to its political content which was To each according to their need, from each according to their ability. This economic vision of communism did not and could not exceed or transcend the boundary of the industrial system because human beings cannot see around the corner before emergence of a new qualitative definition begins. Most certain Marx, Engels and Lenin and neither Comrade Stalin or all generations of
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis: Evidencesof Fette...
CB, I'd also like to read how you justify this theory. Victor - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 2:06 Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis: Evidencesof Fette... The trend in U.S. property relations is to move the factories further and further from the locus of the owners, as a byproduct of running the plants away from the U.S. workers. Effectively, this is fettering the development of the material productive forces _in_ the U.S. national territory. I understand - perhaps incorrectly, you to say that moving factories away from the owners in America is restrain the development of the material power of production or the productive forces in America. the material productive forces = material power of the productive forces. How does moving factories halt the technological advance or the qualitative development of the productive forces? Just a question. Waistline ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis: Evidences of Fette...
Waistline2 CBThe trend in U.S. property relations is to move the factories further and further from the locus of the owners, as a byproduct of running the plants away from the U.S. workers. Effectively, this is fettering the development of the material productive forces _in_ the U.S. national territory. WL:I understand - perhaps incorrectly, you to say that moving factories away from the owners in America is restrain the development of the material power of production or the productive forces in America. CB: The plants are run away overseas more to run them away from the working class in the U.S. I said the plants are moved away from the owners as a byproduct as in indirect result, of running them away from the U.S. workers. Note they run them over to some other workers in other countries. Thus, things are not post-industrial. We are still very industrial. The U.S. national territory has been deindustrialized relative to its level of industrialization in the recent past. I said: Effectively, this is fettering the development of the material productive forces _in_ the U.S. national territory. The development of the productive forces _in the U.S. national territory._ the material productive forces = material power of the productive forces. How does moving factories halt the technological advance or the qualitative development of the productive forces? ^ CB: fetters the development within the U.S. national territory. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis: Evidences of Fettering of the Productive Forces
Emmanuel Todd's comments excerpted here might be said to characterize U.S. domestic industrial decline as property relations fettering development of the material productive forces. The Katrina phenomenon might be a microcosm of the larger U.S. system. The trend in U.S. property relations is to move the factories further and further from the locus of the owners, as a byproduct of running the plants away from the U.S. workers. Effectively , this is fettering the development of the material productive forces _in_ the U.S. national territory. Todd says this was why the U.S. was not ready with material forces to defend people from Katrina. Charles Clip- What really resonates with my representation of the United States - as developed in Apres l'empire - is the fact that the United States was disabled and ineffectual. The myth of the efficiency and super-dynamism of the American economy is in danger. We were able to observe the inadequacy of the technical resources, of the engineers, of the military forces on the scene to confront the crisis. That lifted the veil on an American economy globally perceived as very dynamic, benefiting from a low unemployment rate, credited with a strong GDP growth rate. As opposed to the United States, Europe is supposed to be rather pathetic, clobbered with endemic unemployment and stricken with anemic growth. But what people have not wanted to see is that the dynamism of the United States is essentially a dynamism of consumption. -clip- What has characterized the United States for years is the tendency to swell the monstrous trade deficit, which is now close to 700 billion dollars. The great weakness of this economic system is that it does not rest on a foundation of real domestic industrial capacity. American industry has been bled dry and it's the industrial decline that above all explains the negligence of a nation confronted with a crisis situation: to manage a natural catastrophe, you don't need sophisticated financial techniques, call options that fall due on such and such a date, tax consultants, or lawyers specialized in funds extortion at a global level, but you do need materiel, engineers, and technicians, as well as a feeling of collective solidarity. A natural catastrophe on national territory confronts a country with its deepest identity, with its capacities for technical and social response. Now, if the American population can very well agree to consume together - the rate of household savings being virtually nil - in terms of material production, of long-term prevention and planning, it has proven itself to be disastrous. The storm has shown the limits of a virtual economy that identifies the world as a vast video game. -clip- ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis
http://www.lefigaro.com/debats/20050912.FIG0354.html?083700 Emmanuel Todd: The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis By Marie-Laure Germon and Alexis Lacroix Le Figaro Monday 12 September 2005 According to this demographer, Hurricane Katrina has revealed the decline of the American system. Le Figaro. - What is the first moral and political lesson we can learn from the catastrophe Katrina provoked? The necessity for a global change in our relationship with nature? Emmanuel Todd . - Let us be wary of over-interpretation. Let's not lose sight of the fact that we're talking about a hurricane of extraordinary scope that would have produced monstrous damage anywhere. An element that surprised a great many people - the eruption of the black population, a supermajority in this disaster - did not really surprise me personally, since I have done a great deal of work on the mechanisms of racial segregation in the United States. I have known for a long time that the map of infant mortality in the United States is always an exact copy of the map of the density of black populations. On the other hand, I was surprised that spectators to this catastrophe should appear to have suddenly discovered that Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell are not particularly representative icons of the conditions of black America. What really resonates with my representation of the United States - as developed in Apr=E8s l'empire - is the fact that the United States was disabled and ineffectual. The myth of the efficiency and super-dynamism of the American economy is in danger. We were able to observe the inadequacy of the technical resources, of the engineers, of the military forces on the scene to confront the crisis. That lifted the veil on an American economy globally perceived as very dynamic, benefiting from a low unemployment rate, credited with a strong GDP growth rate. As opposed to the United States, Europe is supposed to be rather pathetic, clobbered with endemic unemployment and stricken with anemic growth. But what people have not wanted to see is that the dynamism of the United States is essentially a dynamism of consumption. Is American household consumption artificially stimulated? The American economy is at the heart of a globalized economic system, and the United States acts as a remarkable financial pump, importing capital to the tune of 700 to 800 billion dollars a year. These funds, after redistribution, finance the consumption of imported goods - a truly dynamic sector. What has characterized the United States for years is the tendency to swell the monstrous trade deficit, which is now close to 700 billion dollars. The great weakness of this economic system is that it does not rest on a foundation of real domestic industrial capacity. American industry has been bled dry and it's the industrial decline that above all explains the negligence of a nation confronted with a crisis situation: to manage a natural catastrophe, you don't need sophisticated financial techniques, call options that fall due on such and such a date, tax consultants, or lawyers specialized in funds extortion at a global level, but you do need materiel, engineers, and technicians, as well as a feeling of collective solidarity. A natural catastrophe on national territory confronts a country with its deepest identity, with its capacities for technical and social response. Now, if the American population can very well agree to consume together - the rate of household savings being virtually nil - in terms of material production, of long-term prevention and planning, it has proven itself to be disastrous. The storm has shown the limits of a virtual economy that identifies the world as a vast video game. Is it fair to link the American system's profit-margin orientation - that neo-liberalism denounced by European commentators - and the catastrophe that struck New Orleans? Management of the catastrophe would have been much better in the United States of old. After the Second World War, the United States assured the production of half the goods produced on the planet. Today, the United States shows itself to be at loose ends, bogged down in a devastated Iraq that it doesn't manage to reconstruct. The Americans took a long time to armor their vehicles, to protect their own troops. They had to import light ammunition. What a difference from the United States of the Second World War that simultaneously crushed the Japanese Army with its fleet of aircraft carriers, organized the Normandy landing, re-equipped the Russian army in light materiel, contributed magisterially to Europe's liberations, and kept the European and German populations liberated from Hitler alive. The Americans knew how to dominate the Nazi storm with a mastery they show themselves incapable of today in just a single one of their regions. The explanation is simple: American capitalism of that era was an industrial
