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In a message dated 5/13/2004 2:22:54 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Che Guevara had some of the most interesting insights into the problems of socialist construction since the days of Lenin. He is better known as a guerrilla fighter, but his essays on planning and other economic matters deserve to be better known. Comment
I apparently misunderstood what was stated. Your reply spoke of the need f"PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid">Che Guevara had some of the most interesting insights into the problems of socialist construction since the days of Lenin. He is better known as a guerrilla fighter, but his essays on planning and other economic matters deserve to be better known.
The main importance of Guevara is that he provides an alternative to the false dichotomy set up between Stalinist "planning" and the implicitly capitalist logic of "market socialism". During our fierce debate over "market socialism" on the Marxism list, any number of Guevara's statements could have been brought to bear on the discussion. Comment
I apparently misunderstood what was stated. Your reply spoke of the need for a class analysis and the question of bureaucracy. I am of course familiar with Che's as well as Lenin's "Urgent Task." Lenin of course died before the period of 1930 and 1940 you indicate.
I would of course appreciate any information of Che's writing concerning the law of value and the reproduction cycles of the industrial system under different property relations that creates distinct needs peculiar to the different forms of property relations.
This is an economic ments could have been brought to bear on the discussion.
Comment
I apparently misunderstood what was stated. Your reply spoke of the need for a class analysis and the question of bureaucracy. I am of course familiar with Che's as well as Lenin's "Urgent Task." Lenin of course died before the period of 1930 and 1940 you indicate.
I would of course appreciate any information of Che's writing concerning the law of value and the reproduction cycles of the industrial system under different property relations that creates distinct needs peculiar to the different forms of property relations.
This is an economic list and we would like to talk about economics from the stand point of Marx theory of the science of society and commodity production.
The question of "planning" means very different things to different people. By planning - a term I never use, most seem to mean the counting of widgets. Planning needs to be rooted in a specific stage of development of the production of commodities and the property relations.
By property relations what is meant is the specific cycle AND CIRCUIT of reproduction created by ownership rights and not money accumulation or accounting. In this context the question of class analysis - in respect to Mr. Putin, as a guardian of bourgeois property was mentioned.
I have no opinion about how control and accountability is established in a small (tiny) Island and a continent. If I were to compare Cuba with the former Soviet Union I would begin with a concrete comparison of its industrial infrastructure. Even this would produce a distortion because the period of history you identified were 1930s and the 1940, which manifest a different quantitative stage in the industrial system than say 1960.
This difference in the quantitative boundary was mentioned by pointing out that the death of Mr. Stalin happened to coincide (more or less) with the invention of the transistor and later the first semiconductors. We are talking about economic laws, commodity production and how the law of value operates and is altered under the impact of changes in the technological regime that pushes the law of value.
It seem you speak of an ideological concept of the bureaucracy . . . or rather the Soviet bureaucracy and not even the bureaucracy characteristic of every industrial society on earth.
I of course acknowledge my superficial understanding of commodity production, the law of value as it is driven towards zero on the basis of very real chanes in the material power of production every American is familiar with . . . ; the reproduction process as cycles at each distinct quantitative stage of the development of the industrial system.
It seems to me - with my superficial understanding, that accountability and accuracy depends upon a combination of human being and the technological state of development of tools and instruments that govern the flow of information. Political organization is secondary in my opinion. Then we have to keep in mind that we are talking about cycles of reproduction.
This is not what a "planned economy means" from the standpoint of class and property. A planned economy in the Marxist meaning does not mean the structures one creates to do accounting and direct the movement of natural and human resources. This is how matters appear to the bourgeois economist.
Planning in the Marxist meaning implies that you have broken the cycles of reproduction govern by bourgeois property or the unrestricted movement of the law of value by virtue of a different class being able to write the laws and govern who can and cannot own property.
Thus I have to disagree fundamentally with the concept of planning as presented, the nebulous concept of "market socialism" bureaucracy is connected with distribution and not the economic foundation of society.
You state:
>The unplanned character of the Soviet economy forced continuous compensations and administrative controls. If a construction crew would
not work twelve hours a day to complete a road, then additional foremen and cops were necessary to control them. As more and more bottlenecks appeared, more and more "interventions" were required to keep the whole ungainly machine going. Thus a command economy built on a centralized pyramid model grew up in the 1930s. This had nothing to do with Lenin's original intent.< As long as planning is not understood in its Marxist class essence and as an act of reproduction, we are going to have problems. Everyone plans . . . including the wife. You state categorically "The unplanned character of the Soviet economy" and lose credibility as one that is considering matters in the light of economics. It is impossible not to plan and we can debate whether a plan is good or bad.
Let us address the point.
You speak of the cops as an economic force and factor. Cops are of course level of coercion of property in every society and hence, an extra-economic level. I can go into detail on this question on Marxmail and not encumber an economic list with politics that dilute the quest to unravel the important economic questions of the day.
The amount of cops needed to compel the completion of a task has nothing to do with the economic logic of reproduction as it creates its cycles of reproduction on the basis of a property relations. At best ten million cops becomers a burden and pads the offices of the bureaucracy, that emerge to insure and safe guard reproduction.
Comrade, once you request a class analysis you are asking for an economic unraveling of production relations, who owns what or the property relations, the material cycles of reproduction and the political forms. These political forms evolve on the basis of the history of a country and are imprinted by the personality of the individual.
The bureaucracy does not arise in human history from poor planning or the cops - which is what you basically state, but from the division of labor. I have no real interest in fighting political Trotskyism which has no political or economic theory to its merit.
If we stay within the economic theory of Marx at least we can grow and explore the "undiscovered country." Political Trotskyism is pure ideology and can win nothing.
Your question will be answered.
Let us assume that an addition 10 million police are need in society to ensure that a job is completed (road work which is what took place in America in the form of the "chain gangs) - your example. This does not explain the origin of bureaucracy. What it explains is bad accounting and beefing up a preexisting structure.
I am of course not sensitive to ideological proclamations about democracy when in fact 20% of the people incarcerated on earth are in America and I await my jail term. Further, such proclamations offer very little insight into class, property and reproduction . . . much less Marx standpoint concerning economics.
The words "Planned economy" in respect to the class and property factor means the circuit that govern reproduction. Soviet economy was not "unplanned" and no industrial economy is "unplanned" as an abstraction. Everyone draws up plans whether "good or bad."
More fundamental than this - according to Marx, is how a specific property relations creates its own unique set of needs that appear as commodities . . . and on the basis of this . . . and a given state of development in the material power of production . . . reproduction begins to operate and serve as its basis of existence.
Proclamations about form of political democracy offer very little insight into class, property and reproduction . . . much less Marx standpoint concerning economics. Political democracy is important but you asked for a class analysis and this means we have to explore the property relations and economic theory and who people are organized to utilize a given state of development of the means of production.
The word "Planned economy" in respect to the class and property factor means the specific circuit that govern reproduction. "Planned economy" does not mean the 'Planning within' or accounting methods within a distinct property relations. Planning does not mean the role of the bureaucracy, which by definition is charged with the task of accounting for "something."
Soviet economy was not "unplanned" and no industrial economy is "unplanned" . . . except as an ideological abstraction. Everyone draws up plans whether "good or bad."
More fundamental that that - according to Marx, is how a specific property relations creates its own unique set of needs that appear as commodities on the basis of a given state of development in the material power of production and serve as its basis of reproduction.
The problem is that I radically disagree with the economic logic of the argument above because it is devoid of any concept of the law of value (or elementary concepts of political economy) and the economic consequence of commodity production on an industrial basis. In other words there is not an ounce of Marx in the ideological pronouncements. The above arguments is more suited to Marxmail and not a Marxist economic list.
Let us examine the issue - superficially.
Planning is confused with accounting and further confused with the concept of a "command economy." A command economy is an insane concept because every economic formation on earth is historically evolved and you cannot command it as such.
Reproduction . . . as it is driven on the basis of the bourgeois property relations is not planned in the sense that what determines the reproduction (cycle) of commodities is profits motive and its realization. Without question the bourgeoisie makes plans. Planning and accounting takes place but this does not examine the class and property relations you requested. Nor is it the meaning of a planned economy in the economic sense.
Planning, accounting and property are very different concepts in political economy. Everyone plans and accounts even if this planning is done poorly. Planning is not accounting and accounting is not the meaning of accountability. I seek to avoid ideological formulation on an economic list and ideological Trotskyism . . . by definition is not Marxism according to how it describes itself.
Under Soviet Socialism its cycles of reproduction as the growth of the industrial system was not driven by profit motive in the period of history (1930s and 1940s) that you indicated abd place focus on.
The accounting and planning in the Soviet system you speak of is not my understanding of the class analysis or property form you requested or the law of commodity production. Rather the accounting and planning takes place within a very different cycle of reproduction.
The best way to compare this familiar to every one was to use the automobile and the automobile industry which in history evolved as the center piece of industrial capitalism. The extensive development of industrial socialism - with its backwards accounting system merits examination.
Part of the problem is that ideological concepts parade as economic logic. Socialism is not an economic system in the first place but rather a property relations upon which sits cycles of reproduction. Socialism is not a "planned economy" or "command economy" because socialism is not an economic formation.
The industrial system is the economic formation and this needs to be looked at because we are talking about a distinct stage of the development of the material power of production that can be qualified and quantified.
Manufacture is a definable stage of development of the economic production of commodities . . . socialism is not . . . because it is a property relations. Within the manufacturing process is a specific combination of human labor, machinery and enrgy source and planning.
Tiny Cuba of can cannot really be compared with the Soviet Union in the 1930s and 1940, unless we are talking about its need to effect exchange in the world market.
This question of "Market socialism" remains a purely ideological concept until one define the law of value as it operates on the basis of a distinct property relations that govern its circuit of reproduction. Then one has to state and justify the concept of "market socialism."
Socialism is not an economic system but a property relations that emerge as a political force or rule of a class - according to Marx. The industrial system is a historically specific stage of the development of commodity production.
You state:
>The popular notion we have of Stalin surrounded by technocrats planning out every last detail of each five year plan to the last turbine in the last
electrical generating plant is nothing but a myth. Stalin was opposed to planning, accounting and controls.< I cannot say what Mr. Stalin liked or disliked . . .but it was probably the system of accounting. Until one understands the meaning of "planned" from the standpoint of the cycle of reproduction created and altered on the basis of a specific property relations, we leave the realm of economics and enter the world of the subjective fantasy of the individual.
Who for Christ sake cares what Mr. Stalin liked or disliked?
The industrial production of commodities is its own distinct system of production and our challenge is to leave the comfortable womb of ideological formulation and dig into the economic logic of society from the standpoint of Marx.
This is of course a superficial view focused on cycles of reproduction, class as a material category at a definable stage of development of the material power of production and this distinct stage of development of commodity production.
Melvin P.
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