Lou Proyect asked me to forward this. Both he & I ask you not to take that as an implied endorsement. Far from it in fact.... Doug ---- >Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:44:04 -0500 (EST) >From: Louis N Proyect <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Subject: M-I: Michael Leibowitz on Market Socialism >MIME-Version: 1.0 >Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Precedence: bulk >Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Yesterday I took the 1991 Socialist Register up on the train with me to >Jon Flanders big birthday bash up in Albany, New York. Jon's 50th birthday >party brought out all of his relatives from near and far. Since he has 7 >(or is it 8?) brothers and sisters, he needed to rent a church basement to >make room for everybody. It was reassuring to see that old New England >stock like his can produce a family that is just as dysfunctional, radical >and operatic as any second generation Eastern European's like my own. > >That is all I will say publicly on the Flanders family. So there. > >Getting back to Socialist Register 1991, this was an issue devoted to >"Communist Regimes: The Aftermath". Our very own Justin Schwartz has an >article on Gorbachev in there, but it's odd that there's no mention of the >magic elixir of market socialism in the whole piece. This must have been >before he found religion. > >I want to spend the next couple of days commenting on some interesting >articles in the journal. This is part of my ongoing effort to explore what >went wrong in the former Soviet Union. After I am finished with this >project, I want to start reading Neil Harding's "Leninism" and report on >that. > >Today I want to examine Michael Leibowitz's "The Socialist Fetter: A >Cautionary Tale". Leibowitz teaches economics at Simon Fraser University >in Vancouver, Canada. He is on the PEN-L list and I remember once in the >middle of a flame war I was having over there about market socialism, he >asked me whether I had done any new original research on the NEP, a >subject that I knew entirely from secondary literature like Deutscher and >Carr. I couldn't admit to him that the only Russian I knew was a few curse >words that I picked up from the old man Korniloff who used to sell minnows >at Silver Lake in my home town where I used to fish for pickerel. That's >when I decided that PEN-L was too refined a place for a lout like me. > >Michael (yes, I will call him Michael; that seems more intimate, doesn't >it; like the second person familiar in Latinate languages) discusses some >of the literature of market socialism in the light of the collapse of what >he calls AES (actually existing socialism). > >He turns his attention first to "The Austrian Challenge". The core of the >challenge of Ludwig von Mises and Frederick Heyek, according to Michael, >is their argument that socialism lacks enterpreneurship. "Human beings >tend to notice that which is their interest to notice," says a Viennese >theorist by the name of Israel Kirzner. And guess what, the profit motive >tends to make people even that much more on the lookout for what is more >productive. > >I always had trouble understanding what the profit motive had to do with >innovation and productivity myself. The Internet is an example of >innovation devoid of the profit motive. I also have done my most creative >work in my non-professional life. I virtually ran an employment agency out >of my apartment in the 1980s matching volunteers to projects in Nicaragua. >When I presented this evidence to Justin Schwartz, he said no problem. All >of these efforts represent enterpreneurship just the way that Bill Gates' >cutthroat drive to kill all competition does. Sigh! I just didn't get this >at all. What Justin calls enterpreneurship, I call plain old-fashioned >civic duty. I get my inspiration from Thoreau, Helen Keller and Dr. Spock, >not John D. Rockefeller. > >The socialist rebuttal to the Viennese supposedly came from a certain >Oscar Lange, who I've heard of but never read. Lange was a market >socialist who tried to convince the world that workers could be just as >"entrepreneurial" as the capitalist class. > >After AES started to fall apart, some market socialists found that Lange's >arguments lacked the power that was needed and so they started to go back >to the Viennese school for further inspiration and guidance. Two Polish >economists, Brus and Laski, came to the conclusion that the problem with >market socialism up till now is that it didn't go far enough. They argued >that a labor market and capital market were necessary as well. The capital >market would supply "access to venture capital and new spheres of >activity." A labor market is necessary for the achievement of a *rational* >price for labor. > >Is all this starting to sound fishy, like just another word for >capitalism? Yes, dear reader, that's what comes next in the person of one >Janos Kornai, a Hungarian economist and one-time market socialist who >dumped socialism altogether. Kornai wrote a book called "The Road to a >Free Economy" which is a full-blown sales presentation for capitalism in >the Hayekian mold. Kornai has no mercy for those Hungarians who are >reluctant to embrace the wonders of the free market. He says, "Respect >should not go to those who moan the loudest, but to those who stop >whining. The old adage 'God helps those who help themselves' has never >been more appropriate." What a disgusting pig. > >Now Michael's survey is okay up to this point. Where the wheels fall of >his wagon is when he wraps up with (wow! Look at all them "w's" in one >sentence) his own speculations on the possibility of socialism. While >wrestling with the Hayekian critique, he begins to question the viability >of socialism with an imperfect humanity. He quotes Che Guevara favorably, >"The pipe dream that socialism an be achieved with the help of dull >instruments left to us by capitalism (the commodity as the economic cell, >individual material interest as the lever, etc.) can lead into a blind >alley. And you windup there after having travelled a long distance with >many crossroads, and it is hard to figure out just where you took the >wrong turn. Meanwhile, the economic foundation that has been laid has done >its work of undermining the development of consciousness. TO BUILD >COMMUNISM IT IS NECESSARY, SIMULTANEOUS WITH THE NEW MATERIAL FOUNDATIONS, >TO BUILD THE NEW MAN." > >Of course, what Che was talking about was developing new human beings >concomitant with the development of the dictatorship of the proletariat. >It is no sense to talk about the development of communist man prior to the >abolition of the capitalist system. That was the silly notion that was >popular during the days of the New Left and was reflected in the growth of >communes in places like Park Slope, Brooklyn and Vermont where >marijuana-smoking, sex-orgies and vegetarianism were encouraged. Mitchel >Cohen wants to turn the clock back to those days, if one is to believe his >Z Magazine review of the dreadful documentary "Che Guevara in Bolivia" >that was cross- posted here a while back. > >Michael Leibowitz concludes his article with his own little paean to the >counterculture. He says: > >"More than simply a focus on the centrality of human needs, however, what >is critical is that the necessity to engage in collective solutions to >their satisfaction become recognized as a responsibility of all >individuals. Where a sense of community and a confidence in the benefits >of acting 'in full awareness as a single social labour force' are called >for, a state over and above civil society cannot produce the people who >have these characteristics. Rather, only through their own autonomous >organizations--at the neighborhood, community and national levels--can >people transform both circumstances and themselves. What is called for, in >short, is the conscious development of a socialist civil society." > >Aaak! Civil society. Another nostrum imported from Eastern Europe in the >dying days of state socialism. Civil Society is bunk. Bunk, I tell you. >The great need today is not for institutions like the YMCA, coffee shops, >and food coops that do not challenge the capitalist state power. What the >workers and peasants need are *political* instruments that can unite and >coordinate all of their local struggles. They need socialist parties with >revolutionary programs, just as much as in the days of Marx. > >The best guarantee for a "healthy" socialist society with a productive and >efficient planned economy is one in which the working-class as a class has >as much power as can be realized. A successful revolution in Germany in >1919 led by Luxemburg and Liebknecht would have produced just such a >society. The state led by the workers would have come immediately to the >aid of the encircled and isolated USSR. Thus a genuine socialism would >have become at least possible and all of the silly Hayekian ideas would >not have gotten the kind of occurrence they eventually did. I should add >that there will always be a need for Hayek's ideology in the ruling-class >since the idea of worker's running the economy is anathema to them. What >would have been less prevalent is radicals like Schweickart and Schwartz >running around urging "enterpreneurship" on the rest of us. > >Louis Proyect > > > > > > --- from list [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---
