Going back to the original article Meszaros says:
> freedom is not something that simply falls out of the sky and hits us,
> and then everything is all right. It is a very complex social
> transformation, and at the same time involves a certain conception of
> humanity and its conditions of existence.
IMO the 'state of nature' debate can never be resolved scientifically
until we have actual communism. Either one has faith in the 'natural
condition of man' being lovely or you don't. Kropotkin and the
anarchist argue very well that man is naturally co-operative, caring
and considerate whereas someone like Hobbes argued that the
condition of man was always to be nasty, cruel, brutish and short.
How one decides scientifically without any concrete empirical
evidence is beyond me. I think we should leave the question to the
future a class-less society with humanity free is the only real test
of how that humanity will operate (to predetermine it would be to
prove that it was not really free).
The quote from Capital Vol 3, London 1981, pp958-9 did not for me
prove his argument. Marx use of the normally moral imperative 'must'
I did not read a a moral direction but as a natural inevitability -
it 'will' happen not it 'should' happen.
> it is value-laden, an aspiration towards which we have to strive.
> Unless society is orientated in the direction
> of overcoming such terrible legacies, such terrible determinations of
> the system, there is no hope that we can move forward.
Talk of aspiration and HOPE (good old hope!) always makes me worry. I
much prefer talk of the inevitability towards which material
conditions are leading, when the contradictions with class-based
society WILL unravel and 'human nature' is given its freedom.
> Labour cannot simply
> emancipate itself, and take over the role of the previous ruling classes
> which subordinated the rest of society.
IMO it must ! Dream of a future society if you must but - unless you
can prove its scientifically inevitability (or even likelihood) -
then do not burden the rest of us with your false hopes. Christianity
has spent the last 2000 years convincing people that the promise land
is just a lifetime away and although millions believe there ability
to achieve their promises is far from realization. If the workers
just want hope then I think religion has had much better practice
than we can ever have. They also get paid for it!
> the individual moral dimension is
> absolutely essential...
He is now sounding more and more like the ultra-Liberalism of the
anarchists tradition which is closely associated with utopian
socialism. They also try hard to plough a course between aspiration
and hard reality.
At which point in order to keep posts down to a manageable length I
will break off now.
I'll be back for more.....
John
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John Walker
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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