Again, sorry about the slow reply. I really have to drop this LIFO approach to e-mail.
me: >> The slogan [about limiting work hours] did not drop from the sky, not was it >> innate in Marx's (or Dilke's or Chapman's or Steward's) mind. Instead, it >> was the labor movement that spawned the slogan for workweek reduction. Then, >> the slogan helped unite the movement. I think it's a mistake to think that >> somehow the slogan alone will help revive the movement.<< Sandwichman responded: > Well, no. it was the demand for shorter work time that spawned the labor > movement! < Gee, nothing else did this? there were no authoritarian and unsafe work conditions or inadequate wages? there was no deskilling of labor? no lock-outs and Pinkerton goons? there was no destruction of traditional ways of life and safety nets? The focus on the demand for shorter work-time seems one-dimensional. > It is true that resurrecting the slogan alone will not revive the labor > movement. < good, we agree. > However, consciousness of the historical role of the slogan is essential if > there is to be any hope of reviving the movement.< yes, but remember that the conditions right now are not the same as when the 40-hour week slogan arose. To revive the labor movement, I'd recommend concrete analysis of current concrete conditions (to dredge up an old phrase). >Below is a passage from Raya Dunayevskaya's the American Roots of Marxism that >I just stumbled across this morning. I quote it not because I am an adherent >to her thought or because I got my ideas from it. I'm not and I didn't. I >quote it because of convergence -- she came to very similar conclusions as me >regarding Capital -- and what is vital within it -- following an entirely >different course of inquiry.< I've left the quote from Dunayevskaya out (since I've read it before somewhere). My question: why was limiting the working-day so unimportant to "News & Letters," the group she led and inspired? -- Jim Devine / "Nobody told me there'd be days like these / Strange days indeed -- most peculiar, mama." -- JL. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
