Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
On Thursday, February 6, 2003 at 07:49:04 (-0800) Michael Perelman writes: I am not sure that distribution should be at the center. An auto worker with 30 hours of overtime makes a good wage, but probably does not lead a good life. Marx said that all economics comes down to the economics of time. Actually, mostly what all so-called liberals (and we might as well just get it over with and use the imprecation fuckheads or some other equivalent) want is to repair the forced mal-distribution that has come about through massive, non-market state intervention that gives privileges away to the powerful, helping them to avoid competition and allowing them to amass fortunes that they otherwise could not have obtained without the shield of the corporate form. The more radical want to convert economic institutions from the current self-centered form to a public form, but of course such an avowal will likely incur more imprecations and childish, irrelevant whining. Harry Glasbeek has made a very firm contribution to economic justice in his book *Wealth by Stealth: Corporate Crime, Corporate Law, and the Perversion of Democracy* (Between the Lines, 2003). The corporate form, granted by and propped up by the state, bestows enormous advantages upon those shielded by it. It's basically a right to exercise totalitarian rule and to avoid personal responsibility, an arbitrary convention that is solely designed to aid in unequal wealth accumulation. Other forms are available, but have not been chosen solely for political reasons. Bill
Re: Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
Carrol Cox wrote: blunting working-class power in the imperialist center. I don't think Lenin was right about super-profits providing a bribe for imperialist workers, but that is quite secondary to his core perception that imperialism, _in some way_, underwrites opportunism in the working class. This seems to me to point in the right direction. Vulgarized theories of a redistribution of surplus from third-world workers to the workers of the core simply distract from the serious business of analyzing imperialism as a whole. Over on Marxmail we've been having a very interesting discussion on the notion of a labor aristocracy. Here's a contribution from Anthony, a subscriber in Colombia and a long-time Marxist. I invite PEN-L'ers to look at the Marxmail archives for other interesting contributions. --- A few notes on the social conscious, historical formation, relation to imperialism, etc. - of labor aristocracies. I think the recurring discussion on labor aristocracies is very important, especially in light of the impending war by the USA against Iraq and the world. The fact that privileged layers of workers exist, and have strong short term material interest in maintaining the status quo, is unassailable. If you have a three bedroom house, a car - or two, electricity and the appliances that go with it, a university education for your children, a high probability of a pension, affordable medical care and dental care - you can not think of yourself as a person, or a member of a class, with nothing to sell but your labor. You have strong reasons to fight to keep things as they are. The fact that many, possibly the majority of, workers in imperialist countries have most or all of these things makes them a labor aristocracy - compared to the workers in their own countries who do not have these things, and compared to the vast majority of the workers of the world who do not have these things. The fact that in the rest of the world important privileged minorities of the working class have some or all of these things - the house, the car, the electric appliances - makes those minorities into labor aristocracies also. However, the fact that these privileged layers exist, and that they have a conservative stake in the status quo, does not determine directly the role they will play in the class struggle, nor the social and class consciousness they acquire. To see my point, you only have to look at the labor aristocracies of Colombia and Venezuela, and the very different roles they are now playing in the class struggle in these two countries, and the very different social consciousness expressed by their different roles in struggle. In Venezuela and Colombia the oil workers, teachers, and bank workers are well organized into strong unions. They constitute labor aristocracies if any sectors ever did: much higher pay than other workers, much better benefits, much higher standards of living, etc. However, in Colombia these unions are the backbone of the left and of the opposition to the right wing government of Alvaro Uribe Velez. They have suffered more than anyone else from the governments neo-liberal program of privatization, tax increases, and cuts in pensions, benefits and social programs. They have suffered the most from the paramilitary death squads. However, in Venezuela those unions actively support the business strike organized and led by the reactionary cabal of the Cisneros family and their friends and allies against the leftist government of Hugo Chaves. The very different social consciousness expressed by these two very similar labor aristocracies (in terms of wages, living conditions, and social relations with other sectors of society), have been historically determined. Social consciousness is not directly determined by economic relations, but social consciousness directly determines a person or group, or social layer, or social classs role in the class struggle. Whether or not a particular labor aristocracy sides with the capitalist class, or with the oppressed masses of their own country, or of the world, is a key question in the modern class struggle. The most important labor aristocracy of the world in terms of numbers, economic power, and potential political power is the labor aristocracy of the United States. What it does in relation to the oppressed of the world - especially and most immediately in relation to those in the Middle East and the coming war in Iraq, is one of the most important political issues facing the world today. If the labor aristocracy of US imperialism supports the war, it will happen. If the labor aristocracy of the United States opposes the war, it will not happen. At least for the moment the labor aristocracy of the United States supports the war - passively. On the one hand, they are not lining up to join the army. On the other hand, they are not planning a nationwide general strike to stop the
Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
Michael Perelman wrote: I am not sure that distribution should be at the center. An auto worker with 30 hours of overtime makes a good wage, but probably does not lead a good life. Marx said that all economics comes down to the economics of time. It has always seemed to me that what demarcates marxism from other working-class trends, liberal, social democrat, anarchism, etc., is its focus on the social relations humans enter into in the production and reproduction of the conditions of their existence. That is what makes sense of the passages in the Manifesto in which ME discuss the relationship of the communists to other working-class parties. And that is also what makes sense on Lenin's focus on the role of imperialism in blunting working-class power in the imperialist center. I don't think Lenin was right about super-profits providing a bribe for imperialist workers, but that is quite secondary to his core perception that imperialism, _in some way_, underwrites opportunism in the working class. Yoshie posted recently on the Socialist-Register list as follows: Subject: Burdens of Empire on the Working Class Date: Wed, 05 Feb 2003 15:58:39 -0500 From: Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] I've been looking for theories, conjunctural analyses, and/or empirical studies of the burdens of imperialism on the working class _of imperialist nations_ (especially of the United States but not limited to it). Could you suggest readings relevant for my research? Please e-mail me your suggestions offlist or share your thoughts on the list. Thanks in advance. Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] This seems to me to point in the right direction. Vulgarized theories of a redistribution of surplus from third-world workers to the workers of the core simply distract from the serious business of analyzing imperialism as a whole. And of course Lenin differed from social-democratic theorists -- and differs from the contemporary theorists of Empire -- precisely in arguing (a) that imperialism was NOT a policy of imperialist nations but the very mode of existence of developed capitalism and (b) the capitalist system remained fundamentally contradictory (no super-imperialism). A concern with redistribution or with imperialism as theft implicitly accepts the naturalness of capitalism: it takes us back to Smith and the natural tendency of humans to trade and barter. Carrol
RE: Re: redistributionist liberals
I thot it was surplus value that was redistributed in the first place. love me, love me, love me, I'm a RD liberal . . . mbs On Thu, Feb 06, 2003 at 10:21:50AM -0500, Drewk wrote: Well, thank god someone -- Chris Burford -- got to the point: whether left wing political economy should primarily be about fairer distribution. In emphasizing liberalism with his caps -- redistributionist LIBERALS -- Alois was right. Andrew Kliman -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
Tom Walker wrote: Holy Nassau Senior, Perelman! What will become of the morals of our children and young people if those auto workers are turned out of the warm, pure atmosphere of the factory into the heartless and frivolous outer world? What constitutes the alienation of labour? Firstly, the fact that labour is external to the worker i.e., does not belong to his essential being; that he, therefore, does not confirm himself in his work, but denies himself, feels miserable and not happy, does not develop free mental and physical energy, but mortifies his flesh and ruins his mind. Hence, the worker feels himself only when he is not working; when he is working, he does not feel himself. He is at home when he is not working, and not at home when he is working. Karl Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org
Re: Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
- Original Message - From: Bill Lear [EMAIL PROTECTED] Harry Glasbeek has made a very firm contribution to economic justice in his book *Wealth by Stealth: Corporate Crime, Corporate Law, and the Perversion of Democracy* (Between the Lines, 2003). = An excellent book Ian
Re: RE: Re: redistributionist liberals
- Original Message - From: Max B. Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] I thot it was surplus value that was redistributed in the first place. love me, love me, love me, I'm a RD liberal . . . mbs = Appropriated.. Quite apart from this crude tearing-apart of production and distribution and of their real relationship, it must be apparent from the outset that, no matter how differently distribution may have been arranged in different stages of social development, it must be possible here also, just as with production, to single out common characteristics, and just as possible to confound or to extinguish all historic differences under general human laws. For example, the slave, the serf and the wage labourer all receive a quantity of food which makes it possible for them to exist as slaves, as serfs, as wage labourers. The conqueror who lives from tribute, or the official who lives from taxes, or the landed proprietor and his rent, or the monk and his alms, or the Levite and his tithe, all receive a quota of social production, which is determined by other laws than that of the slave's, etc. The two main points which all economists cite under this rubric are: (1) property; (2) its protection by courts, police, etc. To this a very short answer may be given: to 1. All production is appropriation of nature on the part of an individual within and through a specific form of society. In this sense it is a tautology to say that property (appropriation) is a precondition of production. But it is altogether ridiculous to leap from that to a specific form of property, e.g. private property. (Which further and equally presupposes an antithetical form, non-property.) History rather shows common property (e.g. in lndia, among the Slavs, the early Celts, etc.) to be the more [8] original form, a form which long continues to play a significant role in the shape of communal property. The question whether wealth develops better in this or another form of property is still quite beside the point here. But that there can be no production and hence no society where some form of property does not exist is a tautology. An appropriation which does not make something into property is a contradictio in subjecto. to 2. Protection of acquisitions etc. When these trivialities are reduced to their real content, they tell more than their preachers know. Namely that every form of production creates its own legal relations, form of government, etc. In bringing things which are organically related into an accidental relation, into a merely reflective connection, they display their crudity and lack of conceptual understanding. All the bourgeois economists are aware of is that production can be carried on better under the modern police than e.g. on the principle of might makes right. They forget only that this principle is also a legal relation, and that the right of the stronger prevails in their 'constitutional republics' as well, only in another form. When the social conditions corresponding to a specific stage of production are only just arising, or when they are already dying out, there are, naturally, disturbances in production, although to different degrees and with different effects. more: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1857/grundrisse/ch01.htm Ian
Re: Re: redistributionist liberals
I am not sure that distribution should be at the center. An autoworker with 30 hours of overtime makes a good wage, but probably does not lead a good life. Marx said that all economics comes down to the economics of time. The "economics of time" provides an entry point into the logic of the era we have entered. A growing section of the American workforce has lots of time on their hands because they are unemployed, semi-employed and marginal. A larger section of the working class have less time from work on their hands because of the universal fall in the value of commodities and the price form of wages. One simply must work longer hours to maintain yesteryears existence. Actually, the whole damn family has to work longer and harder. In the last era of history, the worker owned his labor power - innate biological ability, and it was sold - be it to capitalist or the state power/authority as under the old socialist societies, to an external "power." That is the labor power is sold to someone outside the worker, in order to enter the world of the exchange of products or as we say today "to consume." Once this labor power is sold and put to work it is called labor or the laboring process. I believe - if memory serves me correct, that it was the Stalin Constitution of 1936 that gave the Soviet peoples the right to work and coined the motto, "he who does not work shall not eat." "He who does not work shall not eat," is extremely revealing because it defines the basis of distribution of the social products. What is being stated is that industrial society is driven by "certain logic" no matter who owns the means of production. There is no qualitative difference between any industrial society as production relations, and the term "capitalism" and "socialism" confuses the issue of distribution. "Ism" means belief system or a certain political and societal mode of organization that expresses belief system. The (political) mode of organization is not the actual technological infrastructure that drives production. Under industrial socialism of the Soviet era, the workers sold their labor power to themselves by way of the state authority. This means that labor-power was sold and purchased. It also means you were subject to the control of an external power that owned the things that dominates the individual. No one in his or her right mind would want to go back to the industrial period of history and this includes industrial socialism. What do production relations or social relations of production mean? Production relations mean how people are organized to engage the productivity infrastructure. The productivity infrastructure is the sum total of tools, machines and technology that rivets society to a way of life. What organizes people is a historically distinct level of development of the productive forces and the energy source that underlie the infrastructure grid. All societies that use a plow, as the fundamental device for the maintenance of life, will be organized on the same qualitative basis. All societies using steam power will be organized on the same qualitative basis. Variations occur but the fundamentality remains the same. The economy of time is real and measurable. This economy of time is being stood on its head, since the time of Marx. What alters the value system - the measure of time increments in the process of production, is the injection into the productivity infrastructure of a new ingredient that cannot consume but can produce. The bottom line is that the economy of time means the duration one must labor to consume a magnitude of products. The worker as a biological being must by definition possess the capacity to produce and consume or buying and selling cannot take place and consequently distribution cannot take place. What alters the value system is the injection into the production process of a new technology that cannot consume and disrupts the time equation by driving the amount of labor congealed in products towards zero as opposed to more labor magnitude. I am referring to advanced robotics, computerized production process and digitalization. This new development polarizes distribution and production and make them appears as independent entities unconnected to one another or in Marx speak, to exist in an external relationship to one another. This alters the economy of time and stand it on its head because a mass of people have appeared who need products and services but are no longer needed to engage the productivity infrastructure to produce cups, vegetables and an assortment of things. The reason 47 million people cannot secure consistent health care is because they do not have money or an avenue to work an amount of time to make the money to get the medical care. It's only 24/7 in a week. The value system means a system of buying and selling all services period. It takes money to live and even drink water in America today. Pretty soon the bourgeoisie is going to try
