CB: How was the concept of antagonism deployed by the Marxists and
communists of the period of the Third International ?
How was antagonism employed by the CPC during the period of the
Sino-Soviet split ?
WL: See Textbook of Marxist Philosophy 1939 for the theoretical exposition.
Perhaps a
I of course sided with and link my most personal and group history with the
Stalin polarity in the world communist movement. Many comrades wonder why and
this frightens them and conjures up visions of the gulag, Moscow Trials,
purges, assassinations and liquidation of generals in the military.
Bunch of syndicalism.
Waistline
^
CB: What's wrong with syndicalism?
WL: I don't understand the question as formulated.
Syndicalism and anarcho-syndicalist trends within Marxism are very old. Some
of Lenin's greatest polemics after the October Revolution, concerning
Socialist
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/21/AR20051021023
20.html
Workplace Tremors
How Chapter 11 Is Demolishing Employee Expectations
By Mark Reutter
Sunday, October 23, 2005; B01
The scene in Lower Manhattan was reminiscent of teenagers rushing to
the front of a concert
Those recruited into the Prince Albert sector of the Mason - as best as I
could tell in Detroit, tend to be of the middle strata (class) and that strata
called the labor lieutenants of capital, and this for me includes
organizations like the NAACP, PUSH as well as the upper strata of the trade
The Prince Hall lodges include a number of distinguished gentlemen on their
rosters such as Supreme Court Justice Marshall, Mayor Tom Bradley of Los
Angeles, Dr. Benjamin Hooks of the NAACP, Mayor Andrew Young of Atlanta, and
Mayor
Coleman Young of Detroit. Of course, none of these black
CB: CB: I have said that computerization does qualitatively alter the
industrial
process. It makes it super-industrial,not post-industrial. It also does not
automatically, or shall we say robotically, burst asunder the capitalist
relations of production. It is a qualitative change in the
The degree of technological advancement in the middle ages is also
underestimated. These are the people who built those cathedrals, invented
three-field
crop rotation, and a good many technological advances. Years ago I read a
book by Lynn White on medieval technology. True, technological
CB: I guess the practical critical question is do you expect there to arise in
the near future a new class formation other than capitalist/bourgeoisie due
to developments in science and technology, or centralization and
monopolization of the instruments of production and other forces of
production
CB: Marxist unity of theory and practice is intended to be the theory and
practice united in communist workers.
However, it doesn't seem too plausible that many U.S.workers have a whole
Marxist theory of capitalist production.
***
WL: Communist workers are a rare breed and Marxist
X-INFO: INVALID TO LINE
WL :The focus of revolutionary activity - politics, is a very different
subject
matter and doctrine than political economy, which arose during the
manufacturing period as a theoretical science.
CB: For Marx there is unity of theory and practice on this. _Capital_
CB: Even the form of the fettering thing is a _metaphor_. The forces of
production that are not human can't act as subjects. The non-human forces of
production do not develop themselves. The instruments of production can't burst
asunder the relations between people. It has to be people who
In manufacture, the revolution in the mode of production begins with the
labour-power, in modern industry it begins with the instruments of labour. Our
first inquiry then is, how the instruments of labour are converted from tools
into machines, or what is the difference between a machine and
CB: You apply _Capital_ in practice when you propagandize the industrial
workers that part of the loss of total number of jobs is due to greater
efficiency of instruments of production due to CAD/CAM, robotics,
computerization.
WL: Interesting concept. I of course am not a trade
From the desk of Tobin Smith
ChangeWave Investing
October 11, 2005
Dear Investor,
At ChangeWave Investing, we’re buying energy stocks until the price at the
pump hits $5.20 per gallon of gasoline.
Gas north of five bucks, Toby? Please tell me you’re kidding!
I kid you not.
As long as the
V2: Right, but he reiterated these very same ideas in the preface of
Contribution to Critique of Political Economy in 1859.
CB: Very same ? I'll have to read it again.
Do you agree they are contradicted by the formulaions in the Communist
Manifesto ?
WL: Marx is fairly clear
V: Marx's most negative discourse on private property are found in his
earlier
works (most unpublished until recent times). The Manifesto itself is hardly
an analysis but, rather, an emotional a call for action at the very heights
of the Europe-wide rebellions of 1848. Finally, the fact that
No society has been overthrown by the primary social or economic formation
within the system, that makes a given social system what it is. This is because
the unity of the primary class of a social system, cannot on the basis of
their unity and strife, detach from one another, or magically
V. Any effort to develop theories of social change, cannot be based on
half (assed?) theories. To understand the likely trajectories of evolving
classes and of changing class relations we must understand how the material
conditions of production are impacted upon by social organization of
Victor: He (Marx) did however, reason in a fashion similar to your argument
that invention is a phenomenon not given to analysis and as such
technological development should be regarded as a sort of un-analysable natural
force that
gathers steam and then blows off decadent social systems that
My comments are below (labelled V2:)
Victor
- Original Message -
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu
Sent: Friday, September 30, 2005 13:09
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fettering - Restriction
Comment
Actually, I just returned home from a poker game and read
Aspects of the decline of modern capitalism are all too evident today -
most notably the law of value, which is fundamental to the system. We see the
constant tendency to replace the law of value with administration, resulting in
increasing bureaucracy, both private and public, managerialism
CB: The spontaneous development of the material productive forces is the
activity of human beings - engineers, technicians, industrial workers,
physicists - the activity of discovery, experimentation, invention, theorizing,
sciencing, practice . The material forces do not develop themselves.
Here is what you state, which is simply syndicalism:
CB: The fettering of the development of the forces of production is in
relation to the beneficial use of the working masses, whose property relation
to
those forces of production is that of wage-laborer.
There is no Marxist logic in
V: Marx most famous statement on the productive forces coming into conflict
with the existing relations of production as Marx's great 'cop out' rather
than his greatest contribution to the history of the development of the
relation
between the forces of production and of the relations of
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
WL: It gets deeper. The actual workers engaging production are capital during
the epoch of the bourgeoisie . . not just capital, but capital in the hands
of . . or rather capital operating on the law system that corresponds to
individuals privately owning production.
V: First, the worker is
(From 1993) Nelson Peery Entering an Epoch of Social Revolution
Marx states, At a certain stage of their development, the material
productive forces of society come in conflict with the existing relations of
production.
The contradictory relationship between the material forces of
(From 1993) Nelson Peery Entering an Epoch of Social Revolution
Marx referred to the conflict of the productive forces with the relations of
production. He makes it clear that the spontaneous advance of the forces of
production which increasingly conflict with the static productive relations
The productive forces in their unending development are the basis of the
complex, extended and constantly changing economic relationships in society.
These
relationships are between classes, between groupings within classes, between
the sexes and age groups. They are the relationships between
4). Antagonism as a society movement means the destruction - liquidation, of
the primary social classes underlying a social system of production. Or better
yet, the destruction of the specific form of the primary social class
underlying a social system. What liquidates primary classes is not an
CB: If Marx had thought changing the technological regime were the focus for
revolutionary activity , _Capital_ would have been a book of
engineering-physics, not political economy.
The following demonstrates that followers of Marx and Engels would focus on
changing property relations,
Correction
The issue in discussing Marx meaning of the productive forces in conflict
with the relations of production, and what it means for us at our moment of
history, has never been the form, content, or substance of ones revolutionary
activity as communist or Marxists.
Should read
The
CB: The computer revolution might become a fettering of productive forces
that generates social revolution, if the runaway plants made possible by
computers fetters the development of productive on the U.S. territory to the
point that the U.S. labor aristocracy bolts its collaboration with the
CB: Relations of production or property relations are class relations. The
organization of material productive forces, including the organization of
people on the shop floor, the technical division of labor, is not class
relations. The capitalist owner is not even there overseeing the shopfloor
CB: In other words, the bourgeoisie doesn't fetter the development of the
material productive forces outside of the U.S.national territory where it
runs the plants away to. It buildsup the productive forces in Mexico, Korea,
and other places to which industrial production has been moved. It has
V: Restriction itself is either a function of recognized need
(self-restriction: what Hegel and Marx regard as the real nature of freedom)
or of coercion by others to realize their needs in contradistinction from
one's own. Of course the subject of restriction is here is that of human
History is the progressive accumulation of productive forces (Engels). What
this means is that history is the accumulation of productive forces and what
constitutes its progressiveness is its spontaneous qualitative development
and expansion. This qualitative development has at its center the
V: You are assuming of course that we know how or what kinds of productive
forces WILL prevail in communist society.
If you take your model of the communist mode of production from the late and
mostly unlamented People's Democratic Republics and Soviets as well as from
the various more
In a message dated 9/15/2005 1:57:04 PM Central Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
CB: How you gonna say with a straight face that the Industrial Revolution
was the Industrial Social Revolution, or that Marx treated it as a social
revolution ?
:)
Comment
Obviously you are joking. The
1. No capitalist can afford to fetter the development of the forces of
production without going down. Marx made the point that in order just to
maintain a stable rate of profit capitalist enterprises must at very least
conform to the general state of development of the means of production and
CB: The high tech , chip and computer technological revolution has _not_ been
fettered or prevented from developing by the bourgeois property relations.
The success of the high tech rev within bourgeois property relations means that
it is not likely to cause a change in those property
CB: What is suggested by Marx is that the bourgeois property relations will
not be revolutionized and overthrown by the successful development of the
productive forces, but by the failure to develop the productive forces.
WL: The issue under discussion is not the bourgeois property relations
CB: What do u mean by the Marxist standpoint ?
WL: The standpoint of the class struggle. The class struggle is shortspeak
for how society moves in class antagonism and on what basis this takes
place.
What do u mean by stating that viewing relations of production as more than
simply
CB: The Marx quote focused on here would seem to suggest that the social
revolution begins when the property relations or relations of production
prevent development of the productive forces,
WL: I believe you explain the exact nature of our discussion in the above.
Social Revolution begins as
Pardon, my misquoting your definition of an epoch.
An epoch in the Marxist standpoint is a historical period of time
distinguished in its geenral framework on the basis of the mode of production,
rather
than by more than one generation. In my estimate this more accurately pays
homage to the
Pardon, my misquoting your definition of an epoch.
An epoch in the Marxist standpoint is a historical period of time
distinguished in its geenral framework on the basis of the mode of production,
rather
than by more than one generation. In my estimate this more accurately pays
homage to the
1. CB: What do you mean by infrastructure ?
Reply
Infrastructure: infra: below or within when used in referring to parts of a
text or in contradistinction to super - as in superstructure, existing below
or within as supporting framework of a structure, as in infrastructure.
The failure of U.S. capitalism to prepare its productive forces, which are
the levies in New Orleans, to deal with the hurricane disaster was the
capitalist relations of production acting as fetters on the development of
those productive forces. :0 Contrast this with the ability of the relations
But science cannot be determined by a particular prejudice, a particular
philosophy, but by science itself. Such a situation can distort the
scientific enterprise and even obstruct its progress.
The quest for knowledge is not the science but a striving and in this case
the subject is
The problem is that Marx never gave an explicit definition of class. It
must necessarily be reconstructed from his writings. A class definition is
arbitrary in the sense that depends on the questions one asks. The Marxist
definition of classes is in strictly economic terms; as 'agents' or
--
--
All oil producers need to keep information on oil reserves confidential for
obvious reasons. Not to hide there is no enough oil but to hide the fact that
there is too much. All recent talks about peak oil is part
(Full Quote is at: autodidactproject)
Let’s go back a couple of months. To that day in December 1955 when Rosa
Parks had had enough.
She was 43 years old, and she worked as a seamstress. She took her seat on
the Cleveland bus. As always, the bus ride was humiliating. When whites
entered,
I have written on line for about five years and little by little have
discovered and evolved a form of presentation consistent with who I am, have
been and
hope to become. A current discussion on [EMAIL PROTECTED] The
Two Souls of Socialism confirms my belief that it is impossible for an
Modified Rewrite 8 - 20 - 2005
The dialectic of social revolution fifteen years after the Marxist
reformulation.
The speculation over whether or not the trade union federation - AFL-CIO,
would split has answered itself. The AFL-CIO is a federation rather than a
union
and the trade union
As for arguments, given your past defense of Engel's nonsense about the
square root of minus one and the seed-plant-flower viz. negation of
negation, I am at a loss to carry the discussion further.
CB:
Yes, you certainly are at a loss. If you didn't get my discussions on this,
Writing in a philosophic sense is a challenge and art.
2. The conception of antagonism and its meaning has always been a point of
contention within Marxism and Chairman Mao did not help matters at all on this
specific subject. Actually the issue is much older within Marxism and Lenin
himself
One thing that I have noticed concerning people who lived in the former
Soviet Union or in eastern Europe is that many of
them are bore silly by any disucssion of Marxism.
That seems to me to be due to the way that Marxism
and diamat were taught in the schools and colleges
in the Soviet bloc. It
Your last reply would suggest that you now share my view concerning the
nature of humans. This view is that they form a constituent part of nature just
as much as elephants, crows and chimps. This means that homo sapiens adds
nothing qualitatively different to reality despite the enormous
In a message dated 7/25/2005 1:33:42 AM Central Standard Time, rdumain
writes:
Liu's mystical-nationalist drivel is so similar to the arguments of the
Hindutva fascists, who also have an affinity to neo-pagan fascists in the
West, I neglected to qualify my outburst by specifying that Liu's
In a message dated 7/25/2005 7:35:49 AM Central Standard Time, Waistline2
writes: In a message dated 7/25/2005 1:33:42 AM Central Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Liu's mystical-nationalist drivel is so similar to
the arguments
of the Hindutva fascists, who also have an affinity to neo
This is horseshit. Who's the moron who wrote it?
The Coming Trade War and Global Depression
By
Henry C.K. Liu
Part 4: Scarcity Economics and Overcapacity
Reply
The author name is clearly stated above. The source of the article was
included. Please define horseshit in philosophic terms.
Winston, Henry (2 Apr. 1911-13 Dec. 1986), a leading figure in the
Communist party of the United States for forty years, was born in Hattiesburg,
Mississippi, the son of Joseph Winston, a sawmill worker, and Lucille (maiden
name
not known). Both of his parents were children of slaves.
Comment
1.)The failure of the US communist movement must be criticized and severly
. . . the US communists must also make a self-criticism of our failures as a
movement.
2.) There is no amount of excuses that can justifify our failure to our
responsibilities and duties as Marxist-Leninists who are
Marxism and the National Factor - June 2005
Juneteenth is June 19.
Part 2
What made the South culturally The South was the huge slave class. What
made the North, Northern - in its culture, politics, social and economic life
was not the slave class producing products that underwent conversion
Marxism and the National Factor - June 2005
Juneteenth is June 19.
Part 3
THE SOUTH
In the South was a horribly reactionary secessionists (national) movement.
Here is the National Question for all to see. The South seceding from the
American Union; the desire and economic need of the North
We could have a world not tied to oil
http://www.lrna.org/league/PT/PT.2005.6/PT.2005.6.6.html
This column is a place for revolutionaries to debate why a cooperative
society is a practical solution to the problems people are fighting out. We
welcome
your thoughts about the articles we are
An interview with Maureen Taylor, Detroit's grassroots City Council candidate
http://www.lrna.org/league/PT/PT.2005.6/PT.2005.6.4.html
By People's Tribune Staff
Editor's note: The People's Tribune recently interviewed Maureen Taylor, who
is a candidate for the Detroit City Council.
TONC also takes the Millions More Movements march on Wash. DC on October
15 very seriously and we are already beginning to strategize as to how we can
best unite the struggle against the war with that effort. We dont want the
two
dates, October 15, and Sept. 24, just three weeks apart, to
Part 2
Dialectics of the new class or communist class
I am proud to be part of the communist movement and none of our errors,
mistakes and lapses in judgment comes close on the scale of history to the
murderous actions of the bourgeoisie and my very own imperial bourgeoisie. The
politics of
We have a larger middle class, many more millionaires and a few
billionaires, however, the overall condition of our people is worse. We have
more
entrepreneurs, more college graduates, more persons holding political office,
more
Black mayors, city councilors, aldermen, state representatives,
10 Years After Million Man March, Conveners Announce the Millions More
Movement (BAW, 05-02-2005)
May 2, 2005 Millions More Movement Press Conference WASHINGTON
(FinalCall.com) - A far-reaching national leadership coalition including the
Honorable
Minister Louis Farrakhan, Rev. Willie F.
Over the past 50 years, humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and
extensively than at any time in human history, largely to meet rapidly growing
demands for food, fresh water, timber and fibre, the reports says.
The full costs of this are only now becoming apparent. Some 15 of
The weapon of critique indeed cannot replace the critique of weapons;
material force must be overthrown by material force, but the theory becomes a
material force once it gets hold of men. Theory is capable of getting hold of
men
once it demonstrates its truth with regard to man, once it
CB: If you want to claim that you are taking a Marxist approach to this
issue, you should use modern, biological and ecological science, not obscure
diet doctors' theses, like the one you referred to in a recent , previous
thread on this.
Comment:
WL: I accept how you understand what I wrote
In a message dated 3/31/2005 9:26:36 AM Central Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Human activity is putting such a strain on the natural functions of Earth
that the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future generations
can no longer be taken for granted,
what a lie.
This book changed my sense of the big story of Soviet history as well as
the big story of the Jews in the modern world.* . . . In the top Party
leadership of the 1920s, Jews were the largest single ethnic group . . .
Within the
Party leadership's relatively small contingent of ethnic
It is very simple: To really honor the victims of a given holocaust or
event, the full magnitude and essential dimensions and causes must be
discovered, exposed and used in concrete ways to prevent another holocaust
or event and even more victims. So, for example, when some see the nazi
We tend to fight battles that Marx already won. When Marx wrote that the
philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways, the point is to
change it, this was right on - a good thing and he wrote as a revolutionary.
Today the question has deepened with knowing. In what direction and
The contents of vol. 17, no. 4, include a discussion of the present nature
of the Russian economy; an explanation by the Iraqi Communist Party of its
response to the U.S. occupation and the Party's participation in the recent
Iraqi elections; and two articles on China: David Schweickart's analysis
The sermon this morning: Jesus Walks on the Water. The sermon tonight:
Searching for Jesus.
WL: Very funny. Scores 9 on a scale of 10.
---
Ladies, don't forget the rummage sale. It's a chance to get rid of
The power of the Church is not very different from any other organization.
It's collectivity consists in its fellowship. The humor list reveals an
impressive array of real life activity.
Nice and very funny. The searching for Jesus after he walks on water joke
might be a 10 on the 10 scale.
March Events at Black Star Community Bookstore
March just happens to be Womens History Month. And this month, we celebrate
the life and work of two phenomenal women, Elder Erma Henderson, president
emeritus of the Detroit City Council, and Betty DeRamus, award-winning
journalist and author.
LEARNING FROM CHINA
Why the Western Economic Model Will not Work for the World
www.earth-policy.org/Updates/2005/Update46.htm
Lester R. Brown
Could the American dream in China become a nightmare for the world? For
China's 1.3 billion people, the American dream is fast becoming the
Chinese
For Hegel, and I assume for Marx and Engels, regular incremental changes
(magnitude) does not turn into quality, but rather at some critical point, a
new
quality emerges out of and negates regular incremental change.
^
CB: I said quantitative change turns into qualitative _change_ . I
Lil Joe comment: Actually, there is no Black bourgeoisie because there is no
Black nation: Blacks in the US are either capitalists, professionals,
working class or and chronically unemployed, and in these economic
categories the Black capitalists no different from White capitalists, Black
workers
Evolution punctuated by revolution is another way of saying quantitative
change turns into qualitative change.
Socially, the ebb and flow of reform is evolutionary. It is change without
changing the mode of production out of capitalism. Socialist revolution is a
leap in which the mode of
Updated: 02:51 PM EST
Out of Prison, She's Back on the Job
Domestic Diva Praises Employees at Meeting
By SARA KUGLER, AP
NEW YORK (March 7) - A beaming Martha Stewart praised her employees on her
first day back at work Monday and told the cheering workers who welcomed her
back that she
A copy written story for the AP spoke of a 40th anniversary march at the
Edmund Pettus Bridge - yesterday, in memory of the Selma Alabama Voting Rights
March. The crowd was estimated at 10,000.
Among the marchers was Harry Belafonte, (who demonstrated there 40 years ago,
the Rev. (Big) Jesse
CB: Yes, well this is a point of disagreement. Marx _does_ use mode of
production to mean a set of property relations. I said he uses the term in
more than one way, but one of them _is_ to specfically refer to property
relations. Sometimes, it is sort of a mixture with forces of production
Mode
CB: Note the last question is in recognition of the issue we are debating
here,usage of mode of production. And , yes, I know that Marx is ambiguous in
that usage. However, he does use it to refer to especially property relations
in one of those double usages, and that is the usage connected to
Friends, what are our choices in modifying our position on making these
scandalous payments? This is the same position of power and theft that the
World
Bank and IMF holds over the subjugated countries of the South. Thanks to Diane
and Bankole for their reporting and editing on these articles.
Communism - not socialism, is impossible unless one has the economic legs to
stand on or a revolution in the mode of production (not simply the property
relations) that destroys value by qualitatively reconfiguring the labor process
where the great mass of humanity's labor is not needed in the
The princely paradox of Malcolm X
Forty years on, his legacy offers an example to people of all ethnicities
Jesse Jackson
Tuesday February 22, 2005
The Guardian
As I reflect on the life of Malcolm X 40 years after his assassination, I do
so with a keen understanding of the political, social and
Press Release: Changing Detroit: Past, Present, Future
March 1, 2005
(Please forward to interested parties.)
Detroit's Tsunami
Thursday, March 31, 2005 from 6-9 p.m.
Adamany Undergraduate Library, Community Room, 3rd Floor
Thinking Outside the Box
Thursday, April 28, 2005 from 6-9 p.m.
Thanks. Excellent
___
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According to the materialistic conception, the determining factor in history
is, in the final instance, the production and reproduction of the immediate
essentials of life. This, again, is of a twofold character. On the one side,
the
production of the means of existence, of articles of food
I watched this speech and a few others. But I have to confess to being
one
of these Northerners unwilling to accept the validity of Southern
traditions in any respect--including the traditional notions of Southern
blacks. I find comments such as Jamie Foxx's depressing in the extreme,
CB: To me it's an inference. Capitalism is a mode of production from , for
example, The wealth of the nations in which the CAPITALIST MODE OF
PRODUCTION PREVAILS And he defines capitalism by labor power as a
commodity, or the wagelabor-capital relationship. The latter relationship is
a
WHY DID EASTERN EUROPEAN SOCIALISM FALL?
A CubaNews translation by Maria Montelibre
Edited and this note by Walter Lippmann, February 2005.
Full: http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs075.html
Ariel Dacal. We are talking about authoritarianism, personality cult -
sometimes charismatic -
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