WL :
What are these relations of production in their totality? YOU STATE PROPERTY
as class. Is it not clear that property is an aspect of relations of
production. What I wrote is that relations of production or production
relations or social "relations of production are the laws defining property
and the relationship of people to property in the process of production."
^^^
CB: I'm using "relations of production" as Marx uses it in the passage
below, which we had been discussing at length. Since he says the relations
of production and property relations are the same thing, I am saying
relations of production and property relations are the same thing.
When he says "...with the existing relations of production, or -what is
but a legal expression of the same thing - with the property relations...",
he says directly that relations of production are the same thing as property
relations ? It is this passage , much discussed on this list, by which I
have been saying that Marx uses "relations of production" as synonymous with
"property relations".
("At a certain stage of their development, the
material productive forces of society come in conflict with the existing
relations of production, or - what is but a legal expression for the same
thing - with the property relations within which they have been at work
hitherto.")
Yea, property is the laws ( literally , laws in the sense of rules backed by
the state power) that define the relationships between people with respect
to things. Property defines ownership. It defines the different
relationships to the means of production. Different relationships to the
means of production define _classes_ in the Marxist sense.
To say it another way, the rules for who appropriates the results of
production ( ownership or property rules) are not the same thing as the
technical organization of production "on the shopfloor" , so to speak. The
configuration of the human workers in a factory ,their physical relationship
to the non-human forces of production, to the instruments and means of
production, is not the property relations or is not class relations. Class
relations refer to who appropriates and controls the product , who exploits
and whose exploited, not to the different categories of technical workers :
stockmanpicker, foreman, tool and die maker, etc. These are not classes.
They are not property categories.
The bourgeisie have altered the technical organization of production many
times in their constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production over
the centuries. A shift from steam to oil causes a change in the physical
setup of production. But through all the technological revolutions of the
bourgeoisie, the _property_ relations have remained, none other than,
bourgeois, capitalist, wage-labor/capitalist.
The computer and chip revolution is another in the long line of revolutions
in the instruments of production. So far, rather than triggering a
revolution in the property relations ( the goal of communists being to
revolutionize the property relations; see The Manifesto), the chip-computer
revolution has been accomodated within bourgeois property relations. Perhaps
, as you say, this rev in the instruments of production will trigger the rev
in property relations. But it hasn't so far, and several previous
revolutions in the instruments of production ( and attendant technical
organization of production, the physical configuration of workers) , such as
steam to oil, or electrification , or the assembly line of Ford, have not
triggered a revolution from bourgeois to socialist property relations.
In my opinion , Communists do not rely or depend on the revolutions in the
instruments of production to make the change in property relations.
Communists seek to inspire the working class to seize state power and change
the property laws (literally) and directly. If a rev in the instruments of
prod. causes an uproar that leads workers to overthrow the bourgeois state,
fine. We'll take it. But our role is to propagandize the masses of workers
so that they respond to something like the computer and chip revolution in
technology (and its attendant changes in types of jobs, numbers of jobs) by
taking state power. Scientific and technological revolutions in the
instruments of production do not automatically cause a revolution in the
property relations, do not automatically abolish private property ( which
today is bourgeois property). Only class conscious and socialist conscious
masses of workers, humans, can abolish bourgeois ,private property.
That's my opinion of what Marx, Engels and Lenin say and mean on these
issues, or the logic of what they say as applied to the most recent
revolution in science and technology, the CAD/CAM etc. revolution in the
instruments of technology ( with attendant change in the physcial
organization of the human workers in production).
CB
^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^
WL:
Here what what Marx writes . . . AGAIN!:
"In the process of production, human beings work not only upon nature, but
also upon one another. They produce only by working together in a specified
manner and reciprocally exchanging their activities. In order to produce,
they
enter into definite connections and relations to one another, and only
within
these social connections and relations does their influence upon nature
operate
i.e., does production take place.
These social relations between the producers, and the conditions under which
they exchange their activities and share in the total act of production,
will
naturally vary according to the character of the means of production. With
the
discover of a new instrument of warfare, the firearm, the whole internal
organization of the army was necessarily altered, the relations within which
individuals compose an army and can work as an army were transformed, and
the
relation of different armies to another was likewise changed. We thus see
that the
social relations within which individuals produce, the social relations of
production, are altered, transformed, with the change and development of the
material means of production, of the forces of production. The relations of
production in their totality constitute what is called the social relations,
society, and, moreover, a society at a definite stage of historical
development, a
society with peculiar, distinctive characteristics. Ancient society, feudal
society, bourgeois (or capitalist) society, are such totalities of relations
of
production, each of which denotes a particular stage of development in the
history of mankind. "
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/ch05.htm
All I have done is virtually stated Marx words verbatim:
"The relations of production in their totality constitute what is called the
social relations, society, and, moreover, a society at a definite stage of
historical development, a society with peculiar, distinctive
characteristics."
What are these relations of production in their totality? YOU STATE PROPERTY
as class. Is it not clear that property is an aspect of relations of
production. What I wrote is that relations of production or production
relations or
social "relations of production are the laws defining property and the
relationship of people to property in the process of production."
Here is what you repeatedly state:
>>>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.<<<
Waistline
PS. This exact passage was quoted September 17, during are yearly recurring
discussion on classes and changes in the means of production at the
following
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism-thaxis/2005-September/019052.ht
ml
_______________________________________________
Marxism-Thaxis mailing list
[email protected]
To change your options or unsubscribe go to:
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
