2/Triumph of the method of Marx
General Overview part 2
Melvin P.
The place of antagonism in contradiction or rather the development of
contradiction as movement in antagonism has been the cliff from which man
"Marxist theorist" leaped to their theoretical death. Under our current
conditions where there exist no more reforms left in capital, and new
qualitative features have arisen in the production process, this movement in
antagonism can be more easily witnessed and articulated. After all noting
ventured, nothing gained.
The contradiction of any process is resolved on the basis of the development
of the contradiction itself, while its manifestation - form is conditioned by
the environment surrounding its field of operation. The development of the
singularity (contradiction) identified as man and woman means generations
development (babies) and inheritance. In respects to this singularity the
external factors are all the things outside, but interactive with the life
creation process. The successive generations progression is not an
antagonistic development. The premise of development of the singularity
identified as man and women can be isolated as - not simply a penis and
vagina, but rather, a genetic disposition whose polarity - unity and
opposition, is the basis for human life. Development takes place on the basis
of the preservation of the genetic premise, its intermingling and synthesis.
Antagonism as a theoretical construct means that in the development of a
singularity - contradiction, at every stage of its "evolution" and partial
resolution only the premises for its resolution are preserved, ripened and
further developed. In a contradiction that is antagonistic, development can
never past beyond the stages of its partial resolution. What is required and
distinguish antagonism, as a form of development/self movement is the final
abolition of a previous polarity by abolishing one of the poles or rather
conditions of existence of a previously dominate pole.
Periodic crisis of capitalist means of production are a violent form in which
the contradictions of a given cycle of capitalist reproduction find
resolution, but in relations to private property relations as a whole -
totality, these crises emerge as landmarks of the further intensification of
the contradiction whose general mode of expression is identified as labor and
capital.
Antagonistic contradictions are resolved by the kind of leap - transition, in
which the internal opposites, - labor and capital, emerge as relatively
independent opposites, external to each other, and begins a developmental
process, wherein the abolition of the formerly dominant pole - capital, must
take place in order for labor to further developed upon the basis of its own
internal qualitatively acquired distinct features. In this development of
labor, which was once dominated by the power of capital - its previous polar
opposite, now becomes dominant and preserves a number of modes of expression
from its previous developmental phase, but it now capable of developing
further because "its polar opposite has been shattered."
In contradictions that are not antagonistic - or rather lack do not move in
antagonistic as process development, the development or self movement of the
contradiction signifies not only the growth of the forces making for its
final resolution, but each new step in the development of the contradiction
is at the same time also its partial resolution. Synthesis takes place not on
the basis of the separation of poles - "externalization" and the separations
of the modes of expression from itself, but as a partial "merging" and break
down of the mode of expression and the achievement of a new unity.
The antagonistic character (short speak for movement as antagonism) of the
contradiction between labor and capital is expressed in a numbers of
contradictions within capitalist production relations. We are familiar with
the contradiction expressed in the market, and called the crises of
overproduction. Capitalist property relations create a market mechanism based
not simple on exchange, but exchange on the basis of profitability for the
ownership of means of production. Market exchange periodically collapses -
enters a crisis and crisis is defined as the interruption of a process,
because the means of production create more commodities than can be consumed
by labor on the basis of the cost/price mode and production slows down and
"collapses" until the mass of commodities can be sold, destroyed or dispensed
with. This contradiction cannot pass beyond the stages of its partial
resolution and its resolution exist in its polar opposite - labor, achieving
dominance and abolishing the inherit limitations of modes of operation
peculiar to capitalist production and capitalist market exchange. Thus, the
contradiction within capitalist commodity production, continues to reemerge
in cycles until the conditions of living for its polar opposite - labor, are
achieved.
On the general plane of theory, the contradiction between means of production
and relations of production appear confusing until relations of production
are defined as the relationship one has to property and property is defined
as ownership and control of the means of production - not simply "proximity"
in a system of production devoid of ownership rights. Contradictions that are
not antagonistic, or rather do not move in antagonism exist within the means
of production proper and is expressed and resolve on the basis of
technological development and the extension of commodity production and the
market. Contradictions exist within the realm of instruments of production -
machinery, but their "character is not antagonistic."
Early machines were constructed of wood and in the process of aiding in the
production of material wherewithal broke down, disintegrated and basically
destroyed themselves as part of the creating process. This contradiction
received partial resolution by the construction of machines made of metals,
alloys, steel, etc. Antagonism is a specific "form" of developmental process,
within contradiction where the mode of expression of a polarity is abolished.
The contradiction between the landed property class of the "Middle Ages" -
feudal social, political and economic infrastructures, and the emergence of
the bourgeoisie as the dominant pole in a new productive relations, demanded
the abolition of landed property as governing form of property relations. The
abolition of feudal property relations as the governing form of property
relations set that basis for the emergence of new property relations whose
development process required reconfiguring property relations and the
corresponding infrastructure on a new basis that regulated feudalism to
antiquity. Class society moves in antagonism based on property relations.
Not only is it desirable and possible for society to exist without property
classes, as owners of the wealth of society and the "right" to appropriate
the societal product and dispose of them as they see fit, new qualitative
developments in the technology of society clarifies why one set of property
relations "break down" and give rise to new property relations. The proof is
the rise and decay of various property relations in human history.
Historical inevitability or consequence attempts to examine the entire field
of operations of a singular process and establishing its conclusion as a
distinct process. Capitalist commodity productions end is historically
inevitable because technology destroys the basis of all forms commodity
production by radically and fundamentally reducing and destroying the living
labor content - value, of products as commodities. Stated within the
framework of Marx Capital, the organic composition of capital expresses one
field of expression of antagonistic as movement in the absolute domination of
dead labor over living labor. Dead labor dominates - in the form of
machinery, and destroys the capacity of living labor to sell its labor power
to secure the means for exchange. As living labor is driven towards relative
zero ("towards" and "relative" are operative) in the composition of capital,
the inability of capitalist to further develop commodity exchange to everyone
in society intensifies and assumes an exceptionally violent character.
In the process of production the polarity between living labor and dead labor
is historically resolved, not by destroying all machinery, but establishing
the domination of living labor over dead labor. It is the task of the social
revolution to liberate the productive forces from the limitation place on
commodity production by capitalist property relations, so that commodity
production can develop on its own basis under new property relations. Freed
from private property relations, commodity production develops towards
disintegration and its emergence as production of useful products.
In as much as human knowledge moves from the absurd to the less absurd, the
method of Marx will continue to triumph because it is less absurd than other
general systems of explanation and its exploratory power is verifiable. The
previous ideological forms that constituted the mode of expression of the
Marx method will most certainly yield and seek new modes of expression. Such
is life and the movement of knowing.
