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>Is there no way to get to communist society more directly
from relative scarcity, as might be the case in the wake of war or "natural"
disaster? A dogmatic economic-determinist interpretation of Marx suggests not,
but I think that's too narrow, at least in the present and likely future
circumstances: communism could be a political necessity for survival not a
luxury we can afford thanks to material development of the forces of production,
much as that would be appreciated.
many more comments to make on your critique of K&K on
"socialism betrayed" but just passed through some fever dreams (might have been
my brush with West Nile) and have a lot of work to catch up on keep on pushin'
<
d
Reply Keep on Pushin . . . Can't stop now . . . move a little
higher!
I do hope you feel better "D" and recover quickly.
"Socialism Betrayed" by Roger Keeran and Thomas Kenny covers a
lot of ground. I enjoyed this book because it consolidates a lot of events and
key figures in Soviet history in an easy to read format . . . without being to
"ideologically thick."
It is true that I come from a different body of politics and
theory development and gained some real world experience as a machinist/job
setter. All industrial machinery operating on the basis of electromechanical
processes run in the same direction or operate on the same universal principles
in every country on earth. And all of them have the same red, white, yellow and
green buttons that governs the transfer process and cutting, machining and
stamping.
The new technology is different and I remember the first
advanced robot places at our plant (which is not advance by today's technology).
We called the robot "Henry" and he was a sight to see. "Henry" was not accurate
but had "vision" . . . and his real problem was that he was built by a company
using old technology and Chrysler would have done better going to Japan, where
the extensive and intensive development of their heavy industry and robotics
producers took place on a different curve of development than the incremental
industrial development in America.
Being a union guy . . . I had no interest in eliminating jobs
and gave less than a fu*k about the companies rate of profits . . . to a degree.
I was not going to cut off my nose in arguing with my face. The bond between
labor and capital that is the basis of the industrial system ties the worker to
capital by a million threads. No one can magically leap outside this
relationship and become a super revolutionary. It is not possible.
Not being able to leap outside the structures of a society
that form the two basic social classes as the economic logic and driving
impulses of a system of production is a theory proposition. The workers are not
going to one day "wake up" and overthrow capital because they can compel capital
- through the bond that binds them together, to meet their basic needs . . .
even while ever greater section of labor are ousted from the production process
as meaningful employed labor.
It ain't happened and ainât going to happen because it can't.
The two basic classes of a social system are never free to overthrow the system
of production they composed and it has never happened in human history.
Something else must happen for a social system to be overthrown.
I have a duty to bring an understanding of extensive and
intensive development and evolution . . . in its concreteness, . . . to
bear on this subject. Perhaps that is my purpose.
This is not your "father's Marxism."
"Socialism Betrayed" contains an economic approach that
attempts to unravel the economic essence of Soviet socialism and how various
leaders fought over direction. Keeran and Kenny traces the inner party
struggle over economic policy and pinpoints Nikolai Bukharin as representing
what would later emerge as the policy of Khrushchev and subsequent Soviet party
leaders.
Several real theory problems emerge in any discussion over the
economic basis of communist society. These theory problems are legitimate in as
much as Marx's clearest statement concerning the economic basis of communism is
perhaps contained in his Critique of the Gotha Program.
By communist society I specifically mean a society that has
completed . . . completed . . . the transition Marx calls "between
capitalism and communism." In this sense my basic proposition is that one cannot
leap to communist society on the basis of an industrial mode of production. From
this point of view my proposition can be called economic determinists or
techno-communist. I do not object to these labels because history is the supreme
arbiter of theoretical disputes . . . And it is understood that I am putting
forth a radically different conception of communist experience and viewpoint
based on American history and personal experience.
What has been called the communist movement for the past 150
years has not really been an economic movement of people or classes in society,
but rather an intellectual movement of revolutionaries who believe in the theory
and ideology of communism. This was an ideological movement not very different
from the early Christian communists on one level.
There is no shame in this because people always fight for an
ideas even before . . . and especially before its time has come. We communists
are people of a special mold and disdain the idea of dying on ones knees . . .
genuflecting to tradition. It is better and more loftier to leap into the
unknown than rest content with convention and cave into the force of habit. No
one has ever won freedom caving into tradition.
During the past period of our communist history . . .
communists have conceived of the future communist society based on their
boundary of development of the industrial system.
Economic Communism - not the transition called socialism, is
inconceivable with 20-30% of the population tied to the land as producers no
matter how they are organized. That is to say . . . whether they are in state
farms or other farms of collectives, these producers are still within the vortex
of the value relationship. They alienate their products on the basis of exchange
and these are in fact "their products" - on various levels.
Even on a "State Farm" it is called a state farm because the
state is the property holder. Fu*k the state. If the means of production belong
to the state then you are entering an exchange relationship with the state as
mediator. When you are in an industrial society without individual property
owners - Soviet industrial socialism, the state must be the supreme arbiter or
holder of property because everyone's property rights and exclusion from
property rights must be enforced and protected.
On the banner of Socialism - an industrial system, is
inscribed "he who does not work shall not eat." That is to say, inheritance of
property and ownership of wealth does not allow one not to enter production and
exchange relations or the value system. We are speaking of an exchange
relationship . . . a property relationship . . . a value relationship. Today our
vision is a lot higher than the Stalin Constitution of 1936.
After the transition between capitalism and communism the
State is not the property holder because the State is no longer an instrument of
mediation of class antagonism. This means that the sum total of individuals as
class . . . people as individuals . . . are not bumping into one another -
colliding, on the basis of equitable shares of the social product or
distribution and exchange. Society is no longer moving in antagonism.
Further . . . the direction of the changes in our means of
production today . . . in America . . . must alter our vision of communist
society because roughly 3% of the population is involved in agricultural
production and the industrial system - as electromechanical process, is
undergoing enormous change.
In other words labor has been ousted from agricultural
production in a fundamental way and this is possible due solely to the state of
development of the productive forces and science. Yes, . . . I heavily lean
towards technology and fighting in the streets to implement this technology on
behalf of society and the individuals that make up society . . . because that is
the world I see in real time.
Communism is a political necessity and a matter of survival of
earth . . . but the economic basis of a communist society is a somewhat
different question. Industrial society by definition perpetuates the value
relationship . . . and this really became clear as society entered post
industrial development.
In this sense none of us could have known the boundary and
limit of industrial society or electromechanical production + labor + a specific
energy infrastructure . . . before that which transforms the industrial system
emerged.
The economic basis of communism does not mean "communist
revolution" or "the overthrow of bourgeois property" and the beginning of
communist reconstruction of society. The economic basis of communism means the
reconstruction is completed ... the transition is completed and society is now
evolving on the basis of a different economic law system made possible by a
gigantic leap in the development of the means of production.
The question of scarcity is even more complex in my opinion
because we are dealing with "absolutes and relatives" and defining human needs
from Marx standpoint as opposed to the needs that evolve on the basis of
bourgeois property and the industrial system. The industrial system as a
distinct mode of production needs certain things that allows itself to reproduce
itself as a method of production or to expand extensively and intensively in
relations to the manufacturing process.
I would venture to say that 80% of all the products -
commodities, consumed in our every day lives are not human needs but "needs"
inherited by bourgeois property and created in the quest for profits. Then there
is a set of needs generated as the means and basis to reproduce the industrial
system itself as a specific logic of production that is electromechanical
process.
The problem in conceptualizing socialism during the industrial
period was that ideologists looked at Soviet socialism and said . . . "they have
bad environmentalists problems and why did they build that ugly industrial
complex " . . . and you get my drift. The working of the industrial system was
blamed on whoever was in power because that is where the buck stops.
The problem is that there is no such thing as a sane
industrial policy or a sane feudal policy . . . because we are striving to leave
the last stage of human barbarism. As ignorant and wrong concerning economic
policy that Nikita was . . . he was ignorant and wrong in a specific context of
the industrial system. If Nikita was perfect and a genius . . . it was not like
he was going to magically leap to communism and out of the value relationship on
the basis of being "right."
By the economic basis of communism is not meant the political
revolution but a mode of production based on the universal implementation of the
new emerging technological regime that is ousting huge section of labor from
material production . . . as it has developed . . . say 100 years from today.
These are difficult questions that we are probably going to
grapple with for at least the next century.
"Socialism Betrayed" by Roger Keeran and Thomas Kenny contains
an underlying theory grid that evolved from the evolution of the Communist Party
USA . . . in my opinion . . . and limited to the industrial phase of
development.
Still the book is worth purchasing and reading . . . despite
the fact that it is a solid twenty years behind the curve of development in
America.
Peace.
Melvin P.
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