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On the other hand, it may be said that there are highly developed but historically less mature forms of society in which the highest economic forms are to be found, such as cooperation, advanced division of labour etc, and yet there is no money in existence, eg. Peru Doesn't sound like proletarianised labour, and (as at 1857) doesn't really sound like capitalism for that matter - not if we're trying to keep that tag useful, anyway. I mean, what's C without M? Out of my depth, Rob. It is very likely that Marx was talking about pre-Columbian Peru, which did lack money. If he wrote this about colonial Peru, which was awash in money, then he obviously was talking out of ignorance. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Rob Schaap wrote: I mean, what's C without M? Nothing, right? It's not a C unless it's produced and exchanged for M. Doug
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Rob Schaap wrote: I mean, what's C without M? Doug writes: Nothing, right? It's not a C unless it's produced and exchanged for M. In theory at least, it would be possible to run a capitalist economy using barter. However, transactions costs would be very steep, while finance would be quite difficult. So M is in effect absolutely necessary. BTW, does the double A in Schaap have anything to do with the fact that sheep say Baa? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
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Doug Henwood wrote: Rob Schaap wrote: I mean, what's C without M? Nothing, right? It's not a C unless it's produced and exchanged for M. This may be one of those quibbles that flips bystanders out -- but isn't a product still a commodity even though it is resting unsold in an inventory, provided it was made for, _and only for_, exchange? And is my question of any importance, under any circumstances? Carrol
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Doug Henwood wrote: Rob Schaap wrote: I mean, what's C without M? Nothing, right? It's not a C unless it's produced and exchanged for M. I was just speculating that you can't run a system based on generalised commodity production without a conveniently portable universal measure and store of value. So I'm not saying nothing is produced (of course) or even that nothing is accumulated, just that limits would pertain such as to make a capitalist system untenable. No? Rob.
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Jim, I don't think this truism needs to be repeated in _this_ context, because what is at issue is not whether Marx was right or wrong in this or that particular, or even in this or that major corollary of his thought. The perspective Lou is arguing does not modify or correct Marx, it simply eliminates as garbage everything that makes Marx worth reading at all -- it dissolves the very core of Marx's thought and replaces it with a bourgeois radical critique of the moral evils of capitalism. What remains is neither Marxist nor materialist nor historical. Nor does it offer any serious basis for revolutionary praxis. Carrol A bourgeois radical critique of the moral evils of capitalism? Yes, its true. I am bourgeois to the core. Tonight when I get home I will have my manservant Nigel prepare my bath and make me a martini. Afterwards I will dine with George Soros at Le Cirque. I am moving him ever so slowly in the direction of embracing Marxism. As we know, a real measure of the success of our movement is how many people on Wall Street cite Karl Marx approvingly. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Wow, Radical History Review allowed a Pinochet supporter be their webmaster?! http://chnm.gmu.edu/rhr/rhr.htm http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:YgZV_fFFqcE:chnm.gmu.edu/rhr/rhr.htm+An dy+Daitsman+hl=en http://www.google.com/search?q=Andy+Daitsman+hl=enlr=safe=offstart=10sa =N Jeesh... Michael Pugliese - Original Message - From: Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, May 29, 2001 6:07 AM Subject: [PEN-L:12323] Re: Re: the mita Steve wrote: I'm afraid I never made the connection between Brenner and Warren. Must be something like the connection between Zeitlin and Pinochet. There is no connection between Zeitlin and Pinochet. I have no idea how you interpret things this way. All I said is that a professor in Chile named Andy Daitsman defended Pinochet's revolution using healthy swags of Zeitlin. Whatever Zeitlin thinks about Pinochet is an entirely different matter. My concern is how certain kinds of orthodox Marxism represented by Brenner, Laclau et al feed conservative trends in the academy. As Jaime Torras argues in the Fall 1980 Review of the Braudel Center, the Spanish academy utilized the Brenner thesis to institute a kind of neo-Kautskyism as official dogma. The reaction against the MR school was part of a conservatizing trend in academic Marxism. It was a way for academics to distance themselves from third world revolutions while clutching a cleaned up version of V. 1 of Capital to their breast. When you want to crawl your way to the top of the academy, there is a distinct disadvantage in identifying with third world revolutions. People will not only laugh at you, they might not give you tenure. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Jim Devine: I'm not the one who invented the term [semi-proletarian]. So you'll have to explain why it makes no sense. To me, it expresses the fact that the pure cases of theory (proletarian, non-proletarian) often don't exist in pure form in empirical and historical reality. We often see mixed forms, as when Trotsky, in his HISTORY OF THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION, argues that Russia had an unevenly developing combination of capitalism and pre-capitalist social relations. Louis Proyect: Russia and colonial Peru had nothing in common. If an army had invaded Russia in the 15th century, destroyed the Czardom and pressed the lower ranks of society into gang labor working 14 hours a day to produce commodities for the world market, then we might be in the same ballpark. _nothing in common_? so we didn't have homo sapiens dwelling in both of those places? one of them didn't involve class oppression? one of them didn't involve capitalism in any way, shape, or form? I see nothing wrong with making analogies in order to understand what's going on (Peru was like Russia in some ways) as long as the analogy isn't taken too far (Peru was exactly like Russia). I would _never_ argue the latter. Nor did I. Saying that mixed forms rather than pure cases existed in both places is hardly taking an analogy too far. Rather, it's a simple methodological point, made by Paul Sweezy in the first chapter of THE THEORY OF CAPITALIST DEVELOPMENT for example: it's a serious mistake to jump directly from an abstract theory to an understanding of concrete, empirical, reality. Are you saying that an army had invaded [Peru] in the 15th century, destroyed the [Inca Empire] and pressed the lower ranks of society into gang labor working 14 hours a day to produce commodities for the world market? I'll assume you are. Though clearly we agree that merchant capital -- the world market -- played a role, gang labor working 14 hours a day is much more similar to slave labor than to capitalist proletarian labor. But in your previous message, you said that the latter prevailed in Peru. What took place in Latin America has to be examined on its own terms, not invoking Marx on mercantilism or Trotsky on combined and uneven development. I'm not an empiricist, so I don't think this (examining each case on its own terms) is a valid way to understand anything. It's perfectly possible to study individual, specific, cases (e.g., Latin America) while relating them to other cases (e.g., Russia) without losing track of the specificities of the case being studied. That is, one can say Louis is a man which says that he is like other men, without washing out all of his endearing individual characteristics. To say that each case must be examined only in its own terms (is this what you're really saying?) is totally anti-theoretic, leaning heavily toward stereotypes of post-modernism, full of sound and rhetorical fury but signifying nothing. When I file my final post on Brenner/Wood at the end of the week, it should be obvious that there was no parallel for what took place in Latin America during the 17th to 19th centuries. It has to be examined on its own terms. Brenner and Wood never spend one word describing the reality of this world. It is not feudalism, nor is it mercantile capitalism. But you said in the previous message it was capitalism (since work was done by PROLETARIANS)? that means that it was _like Russia_ in many ways! Thus, Latin America wasn't a unique case that should be analyzed solely in its own terms. Or did the oobleck mode of production prevail, one that was completely different from those of other countries, times, and places? summary of the issues: (1) the oppression of Peru involved markets and merchant capital, within the context of the Spanish Empire. -- Both Blaut Brenner would agree. (2) the oppression of Peru involved proletarianized labor (Louis' previous message) or it involved forced gang labor (Louis' current message). or maybe a combination of both (semi-proletarization)? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~JDevine
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marxism Chronological -- Find -- Thread -- Re: Musings of a Brennerite From: Louis Proyect Subject: Re: Musings of a Brennerite Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2000 12:04:49 -0800 In what sense is Andy Daitsman a Brennerite given the above very un-Brenner-like remark on the other capitalisms? Does he cite Brenner to support his musings? Yoshie In the same sense that Genovese is a Dobbsian. When I cited Genovese to that effect, you merely replied that no-no, Genovese doesn't understand Dobbs and has him all wrong. It is a waste of time to try to connect the dotted lines between Dobbs and Genovese or Daitsman and Brenner, because you are uncomfortable with the reactionary logic. Sorry, I can't help you with that. As you know, Yoshie, when there was a debate on Blaut-Brenner on PEN-L, it unleashed a tidal wave of reactionary beliefs from Wojtek Sokolowski's oddball marriage of Barrington Moore and hatred for the black liberation movement to Ricardo Duchesne's outspoken belief that capitalism has a progressive role to play in places like Puerto Rico or India. If you put Daitsman's crackpot defense of Pinochet side-by-side with Ricardo's procapitalist Marxism, there's virtually nothing to distinguish them apart. Only Connect --E.M. Forster Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/ Follow-Ups: Re: Musings of a Brennerite From: snedeker Re: Musings of a Brennerite From: Yoshie Furuhashi Chronological -- -- Thread -- Reply via email to - Original Message - From: Louis Proyect [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, May 29, 2001 7:07 AM Subject: [PEN-L:12326] Re: Re: the mita What Third-World revolutions really needed from proletariat intellectuals in rich imperial nations was not so much the latter's identification with the former as socialist revolutions in the belly of the beast, which didn't happen -- hence the former's collapse or retreat. You can't eat someone's identification with you, though you may be encouraged by it at times. Yoshie Socialist revolutions in the belly of the beast? This is not really feasible at this time. What is feasible is for Marxist activists to provide solidarity to countries in struggle, whether Vietnam, Nicaragua or Cuba, etc. Brenner's diatribe against third worldism was a subtle cue that such activity had become dated. It was much more in the spirit of Marx to drive around in a jeep in places like Kenya looking for a progressive bourgeoisie to orient to, as Colin Leys did. No longer was there an interest in identifying peasant or working class insurgencies. Instead neo-Kautskyites on the payroll of a university would devote their time and intellect to promoting a third world version of the 19th century European capitalist class. While this venture might have been futile, at least it paid better and it wouldn't get you killed or tortured. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Jim Devine: To say that each case must be examined only in its own terms (is this what you're really saying?) is totally anti-theoretic, leaning heavily toward stereotypes of post-modernism, full of sound and rhetorical fury but signifying nothing. No, rather I am saying that Marxists should apply the historical materialist method to Latin America in the 16th through 18th century. Marx himself never did this. If you are serious about doing this, you have to roll up your sleeves and engage with scholarly material. Although Wood makes frequent references to the region, she never bothers with a concrete analysis of concrete class relations. For that you have to look elsewhere. At least with Brenner, you don't even get an inkling that the New World even existed. But you said in the previous message it was capitalism (since work was done by PROLETARIANS)? that means that it was _like Russia_ in many ways! Thus, Latin America wasn't a unique case that should be analyzed solely in its own terms. Or did the oobleck mode of production prevail, one that was completely different from those of other countries, times, and places? There was capitalism in Russia, capitalism in Latin America and capitalism in Western Europe. Each region has its specific class relations and dynamics. Trotsky and Lenin analyzed Russia. Marx and Engels analyzed Western Europe. People like Celso Furtado, A.G. Frank, Mariategui, and Adolfo Gilly analyzed Latin America. My analysis rests on their work, not what Marx and Engels did not write. summary of the issues: (1) the oppression of Peru involved markets and merchant capital, within the context of the Spanish Empire. -- Both Blaut Brenner would agree. I just talked to Jim's ghost who is standing above my left shoulder and he disagrees with you. (2) the oppression of Peru involved proletarianized labor (Louis' previous message) or it involved forced gang labor (Louis' current message). or maybe a combination of both (semi-proletarization)? I am not interested in identifying the forms of labor. I am interested in identifying the specific nature of the way in which capital was created. Krupp used slave labor throughout WWII. It remained capitalist. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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And such revolutions aren't likely to happen in the rich imperial nations if their left intellectuals are interested only in affairs thousands of miles from where they sit. Doug You forgot to mention that I live on the Upper East Side. Slipping in your old age? Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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What I meant was that we must understand that our understanding is imperfect and that we cannot speak as if we could command absolute truths. On Tue, May 29, 2001 at 01:17:17PM -0400, Louis Proyect wrote: Given this complexity, it is dangerous to pretend that one can command adequate information about formations that are distant and time and space. Michael Perelman So what is this? A justification for ignoring the facts about 16th to 18th century Mexico, Bolivia and Peru? If you took this kind of warning seriously, you never would have written The Invention of Capitalism which draws upon scholarly and source material written in and about England in this period. Guess what. The same kind of information exists for Mexico, Bolivia and Peru and I plan to draw on it for my final post. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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What I meant was that we must understand that our understanding is imperfect and that we cannot speak as if we could command absolute truths. Michael Perelman Who is talking about absolute truths? I am simply preparing to describe extensive capitalist growth based on free wage labor in 18th century Mexico. I will obviously draw my own conclusions about this, but allow others to supply countervailing information. Needless to say, I won't hold my breath... Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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On Tue, 29 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: Jim Devine: To say that each case must be examined only in its own terms (is this what you're really saying?) is totally anti-theoretic, leaning heavily toward stereotypes of post-modernism, full of sound and rhetorical fury but signifying nothing. Lou responded: There was capitalism in Russia, capitalism in Latin America and capitalism in Western Europe. Each region has its specific class relations and dynamics. Trotsky and Lenin analyzed Russia. Marx and Engels analyzed Western Europe. People like Celso Furtado, A.G. Frank, Mariategui, and Adolfo Gilly analyzed Latin America. My analysis rests on their work, not what Marx and Engels did not write. Why not also rely on the works of, say, Petras and Zeitlin in addition to Frank? Why would you prefer the work of Frank over these two, aside from the fact that Frank's position supports yours? When you say you have researched Latin America, that is true, but it is a very selective research. Any positions that don't support a world systems/dependency approach are out not relevant to LA for you, even though authors who challenge those very positions have done very relevant research on Lat. Am. Or at least explain to us how Frank's understanding of Lat. Am. is superior to Petras's or Zeitlin's. Steve
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Am. Or at least explain to us how Frank's understanding of Lat. Am. is superior to Petras's or Zeitlin's. Steve I have read Petras extensively. I consider him useful but ultraleft, especially on Nicaragua. However, he has not written that much about the 16th to 18th century which is of particular interest to me. As far as Zeitlin is concerned, I do plan to dismantle him at some point but for the post I am filing tomorrow my concentration will be on Colin Leys, another ortho-Marxist, neo-Kautskyite. Why don't you read and defend Zeitlin yourself? It would be of more use to PEN-L than the smirking provocations you waste our time with. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Mark Jones wrote: Are you also saying, that revolutions only happen when left intellectuals form vanguards? Nope. Doug
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On Tue, 29 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: Am. Or at least explain to us how Frank's understanding of Lat. Am. is superior to Petras's or Zeitlin's. Steve I have read Petras extensively. I consider him useful but ultraleft, especially on Nicaragua. However, he has not written that much about the 16th to 18th century which is of particular interest to me. As far as Zeitlin is concerned, I do plan to dismantle him at some point but for the post I am filing tomorrow my concentration will be on Colin Leys, another ortho-Marxist, neo-Kautskyite. That's an interesting position. You have not read Zeitlin, but before even reading him you plan to dismantle him. Why don't you read and defend Zeitlin yourself? It would be of more use to PEN-L than the smirking provocations you waste our time with. How do you know I'm smirking when I write these posts. Amazing powers you have all the way over there in the Big Apple. I have read Zeitlin, what charges do I have to defend him against? That his former student is a Pinochetist? Steve Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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How do you know I'm smirking when I write these posts. Amazing powers you have all the way over there in the Big Apple. I don't know you if you are smirking or not, but I am glad that you don't deny you are writing provocations. I have read Zeitlin, what charges do I have to defend him against? That his former student is a Pinochetist? The question is not whether there are charges against him. Rather it is whether his analysis can clarify our understanding of such phenomena as indentured servitude, etc. Basically since you have done nothing but drop his name, I don't know if he is relevant to our discussions. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
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Jim Devine: To say that each case must be examined only in its own terms (is this what you're really saying?) is totally anti-theoretic, leaning heavily toward stereotypes of post-modernism, full of sound and rhetorical fury but signifying nothing. Louis Proyect: No, rather I am saying that Marxists should apply the historical materialist method to Latin America in the 16th through 18th century. Marx himself never did this. If you are serious about doing this, you have to roll up your sleeves and engage with scholarly material. Although Wood makes frequent references to the region, she never bothers with a concrete analysis of concrete class relations. For that you have to look elsewhere. At least with Brenner, you don't even get an inkling that the New World even existed. I think that it's a mistake to assume that every author -- or every author you dislike (for whatever reason) -- _must_ write about Latin America. That kind of standard can be used to trash anyone. For example, I never see you criticizing sexism or heterosexism. I never even see you deal with those subjects. Does this imply that you're sexist and hate gays? No. It's better to try to learn what can be learned from each author rather than splitting authors into two camps, bad guys and good guys and then throwing out the former. Splitting is very academic: one of the problems with academia is that people dwell on the competing schools vision, creating seemingly endless battles of various schools, rather than trying to draw out a synthesis. (In economics, on the other hand, there's only one Truth, neoclassical economics, there's only one God, Adam Smith's Invisible Hand, but the competing schools paradigm is applied within this framework.) Since the capitalist disease -- the cancerous world-wide expansion of capitalism -- seems to have started in Western Europe, specifically in England, it seems valid for the hated Brenner to study that area of the world. It's possible that this disease started somewhere else, but I've never seen you present the case for this possibility. But you said in the previous message it was capitalism (since work was done by PROLETARIANS)? that means that it was _like Russia_ in many ways! Thus, Latin America wasn't a unique case that should be analyzed solely in its own terms. Or did the oobleck mode of production prevail, one that was completely different from those of other countries, times, and places? There was capitalism in Russia, capitalism in Latin America and capitalism in Western Europe. Each region has its specific class relations and dynamics. Trotsky and Lenin analyzed Russia. Marx and Engels analyzed Western Europe. People like Celso Furtado, A.G. Frank, Mariategui, and Adolfo Gilly analyzed Latin America. My analysis rests on their work, not what Marx and Engels did not write. But that doesn't imply that Marx's concepts -- his general theory of historical materialism political economy, not specific stuff like his early belief in the automatic stage theory of history -- are wrong. You never showed that. You seem to be arguing the empiricist, anti-theoretical theory, but you never really present an argument. Folks like Trotsky knew that Russian capitalism was different from German capitalism, but they also didn't reject all lessons learned from studying Germany in their effort to understand Russia. Trotsky never threw CAPITAL into the dust-bin of history. summary of the issues: (1) the oppression of Peru involved markets and merchant capital, within the context of the Spanish Empire. -- Both Blaut Brenner would agree. I just talked to Jim's ghost who is standing above my left shoulder and he disagrees with you. so he thinks that markets played no role in Peru? (2) the oppression of Peru involved proletarianized labor (Louis' previous message) or it involved forced gang labor (Louis' current message). or maybe a combination of both (semi-proletarization)? I am not interested in identifying the forms of labor. you changed your mind, then. I am interested in identifying the specific nature of the way in which capital was created. doesn't this involve identifying different forms of labor? Krupp used slave labor throughout WWII. It remained capitalist. that's because Nazi society _as a whole_ remained capitalist. As Baran Sweezy quote Hegel to say, the truth is the whole. At this point, I think it's worth quoting Marx (volume I, chapter 10, section 2): “Capital has not invented surplus-labor. Wherever a part of society possesses the monopoly of the means of production, the laborer, free or not free, must add to the working-time necessary for his own maintenance an extra working-time in order to produce the means of subsistence for the owners of the means of production, whether this proprietor be the Athenian [aristocrat], Etruscan theocrat, civis Romanus, Norman baron, American slave-owner, Wallachian Boyard, modern landlord or
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Doug Henwood wrote: such revolutions aren't likely to happen in the rich imperial nations if their left intellectuals are interested only in affairs thousands of miles from where they sit. Are you saying that Louis Proyect is not interested in America? Mark
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Jim Devine: Merchant capital = buying selling consumer and producer goods on the market, M-C-M. As Marx argues, it's impossible (for a system of merchant capital as a whole) to extort surplus-labor -- and produce a surplus-product -- simply through buying and selling such goods.[*] Look, Jim, Karl Marx had very little understanding of the rest of the world in terms of modes of production. He theorized something called the Asiatic Mode of Production that had no correlation with reality. He knew little about Africa or Latin America, which is understandable given the fact that solid information was not easy to come by and even it if did, there was no compelling political reason for him to examine it. Marx and Engels, when they did write about Latin America, wrote howlingly ignorant things. Marx wrote that Bolivar was a bandit. Engels supported the USA against Mexico in the war of 1847 based on a basically racist attitude toward what he regarded as unproductive (ie., lazy) Mexicans. Mercantile capitalism nowhere addresses the specific forms of value creation in places like Peru and Bolivia. It rather is concerned with how capital is exchanged by those at the top. For example, Mandel notes that piracy is a key element in the development of mercantile capital. What is missing from this picture is how silver got out of the ground originally before Francis Drake got his hands on it. It took a PROLETARIAT to get it out of the ground, didn't it? The 'mita' was an early form of capitalist exploitation of labor. I will deal with this at some length in my final post on Brenner/Wood. If you want to get up to speed on the scholarly material, I'd recommend Steve Stern's Peru's Inidan Peoples and the Challenge of Spanish Conquest: Huamanga to 1640. in fact, it's part of the same bureaucratic apparatus. Many merchandising efforts today involve more that just buying and selling and are thus kinds of industrial capital (something is actually produced, rather than titles to property being transferred). (Being in a separate bureaucracy often promotes profits, however. For example, merchant capital describes the such companies as Kelly Services, which facilitates the purchase of labor power by industrial capitalists.) Mercantile capital describes the Kelly Services? Only on PEN-L, I'm afraid. Most everybody else would call this services, or the temporary labor sector of American industry. Instead, I want to make Brenner's point -- which builds on Marx -- about the difference between the situation where workers are subject to direct coercion (by the boss, not just by the state) and true proletarianization (the double freedom). I think this is the essence of Brenner's theory, even though it's been largely ignored in recent pen-l discussions. No, I have referred to it from the beginning. In essence it defines capitalist class relations as those that prevailed in 19th century Great Britain. Thus, based on this Aristotelian formal logic approach, everything that does not fit into the category is characterized as non-capitalist or pre-capitalist. Except when Marx himself described slave plantations as CAPITALIST. In which case it is conveniently ignored by you. political fragmentation and constant wars. (Slavery also discourages technical progress, since slaves resist any but the simplest kinds of work. I know that if I were a slave, I'd act dumb and break the boss-man's equipment.) Slavery might discourage technical progress, but it facilitates capitalist progress. Without slavery and other forms of unfree labor in the New World, the free labor/rapid technological progress paradigm of 18th and 19th century would have never taken shape. The capitalist SYSTEM is like a huge factory, with smart white people running complicated machines and people of color sweeping the floor. Under full-blown or industrial capital, on the other hand, the ability to apply direct coercion is severely limited, while the production process is under tremendous amount of direct control by the capitalists' proxies. Why do you insist on repeating things that everybody understands? This debate is not about the outcome of the industrial revolution, but the much more complex and harder to define process of early capitalism in the colonies which Marx never addressed. I don't know about the Congo, but saying that mercantile capital existed in ancient Babylonia is simply saying that markets existed back then. If I remember correctly, some of Hammurabi's code referred to market transactions. If there any experts on this subject reading this, please correct me if I'm wrong. I am an expert. You are wrong. That doesn't contradict what I've read. My interpretation is that these _obrajes_ probably did not truly involve proletarian labor because the workers were peons and were competing with those under slave-like conditions. (I don't have enough information, though, to be conclusive.) Your interpretation is wrong. They did rely
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Quoth Jim: If I remember correctly, some of Hammurabi's code referred to market transactions. If there any experts on this subject reading this, please correct me if I'm wrong. Respondeth Lou: I am an expert. You are wrong. One small addition to Lou's thoughts - they're probably wrong. The stela at Susa records +/- 282 of H's legal decisions, and many of 'em are to do with rules for commerce (on price setting for services, differential tariffs and the nature of rights and obligations between landowners and the workers of the land). Rules that do the sort of thing ME write about in the Manifesto insofar as an attempt is made to supplant lots of traditional relations and their concomitant rights (although the penalty schedule does evince a traditional power differential). I'm of the impression that much of what we might call 'mercantilism' was in place - the code was meant to standardise trade practices across lines isomorphic to national boundaries, and the class of merchants was a politically powerful class, with strong linkages to a 'state' which recognised their role, privileged it, and carefully regulated it. Cheers, Rob.
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Another commercial feature reflected in Hammurapi's code was the use of silver as _both_ a means of payment _and_ a measure of value. In early cultures the two most often varied: e.g., use silver or copper for means of payment but cattle for measure of value. By Jim Blaut's criteria, capitalism is at least 4000 years old and thus useless as a historical category. Carrol Absolutely correct. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/ Alas, Louis admits that Carrol and Jim are correct. Steve
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On Mon, 28 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: Mercantilism = Code of Hammurabi = Kelly Girls? Why not? For you Brenner=Kautsky Graduate students of Ellen Wood=Fool Raymond Lau=Trotskyist Sect leafleter Zeitlin=Pinochet Steve
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Alas, Louis admits that Carrol and Jim are correct. Steve Of course they are correct. How can anybody deny that ancient Babylonian society and day labor, the fastest growing job category in the USA by some accounts, both fall under the rubric of mercantile capitalism. In fact the first job I ever had before I became a computer programmer was with Office Temp. They sent me out to steal gold bullion from a Brinks truck in order to pay for Chinese Ming vases. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
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On Mon, 28 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: Alas, Louis admits that Carrol and Jim are correct. Steve Of course they are correct. How can anybody deny that ancient Babylonian society and day labor, the fastest growing job category in the USA by some accounts, both fall under the rubric of mercantile capitalism. In fact the it seemed to me that what your saying is consistent with the arguments Wood makes about Ancient Greek slavery in Peasant Citizen and Slave...or for that matter in her book Origins of Capitalism...
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Lou, why not give us the whole text instead of the parts that are ironical. You know this section hardly does justice to the argument Linebaugh is making in support of Marx and Engels... And ain't it funny, when pomo's make the same exact kind of argument about Marx and Engels you have a Dick Cheney, but when the post-colonialists' 'world systems' folks make the argument that Marx was 'eurocentric, teleological', etc. hey you just grab it and run with it. Ahmad's section on Marx on India I think does more than a fair job of refuting simplistic accounts of Marx's views on colonialism, teloeology, etc. Steve On Mon, 28 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: Michael Perelman wrote: Let's keep this under control. Jim gave a very nice description of Marx's analysis of the mode of production. Lou asked him to relate those abstract topics to Latin America, which Marx and most of us do not know all that well. Marx was not familiar with the internet either. Michael, the Internet was an invention of the late 20th century. It had not been invented when Marx was writing. However, colonial society had existed for more than 300 years when Marx was writing. He reflected his milieu by neglecting this social reality. Peter Linebaugh honed in on the problem with this May Day article: May 1, 2001 A May Day Meditation by Peter Linebaugh Comrades and Friends, May Day Greetings! Here is 'the day.' The day we long to become a journee', those days of the French Revolution when a throne would topple, the powerful would tumble, slavery be abolished, or the commons restored. Meanwhile, we search for a demo for the day, or we gather daffodils and some may for our loved ones and the kitchen table. We greet strangers with a smile and Happy May Day! We think of comrades around the world, in Africa, India, Russia, Indonesia, Mexico, Hong Kong. With our comrades we remember recent victories, and we mutter against, and curse our rulers. We take a few minutes to freshen up our knowledge of what happened there in Chicago in 1886 and 1887 before striding out into the fight of the day. So during this moment of studying the day, I'm going to take a text from Frederick Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, and I'll ask you to take it down from the top shelf of the spare room where you stuck it when Reagan came to power, or to go down into the basement and dig it out of a mildewed carton whence you might have disdainfully put it during the Clinton years. No where does Engels mention the slave trade. No where does Engels mention the witch burnings. No where does Engels mention the genocide of the indigenous peoples. He writes, A durable reign of the bourgeoisie has been possible only in countries like America, where feudalism was unknown, and society at the very beginning started from a bourgeois basis. Dearie me. Dear, dear, dear! He has forgotten everything, it seems. He has swallowed hook, line, and sinker the whole schemata of: Savagery leads to Barbarism leads to Feudalism leads to Capitalism which, in turn, with a bit of luck, c., c., will be transformed, down the line, in the future, when the times are ripe, c. c. into socialism and communism. He has overlooked the struggle of the Indians, or the indigenous people, of the red, white, and black Indians. The fact is that commonism preceded capitalism on the north American continent, not feudalism. The genocide was so complete, the racism so effective, that there is not even a trace or relic of memory of the prior societies. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
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And ain't it funny, when pomo's make the same exact kind of argument about Marx and Engels you have a Dick Cheney, but when the post-colonialists' 'world systems' folks make the argument that Marx was 'eurocentric, teleological', etc. hey you just grab it and run with it. Ahmad's section on Marx on India I think does more than a fair job of refuting simplistic accounts of Marx's views on colonialism, teloeology, etc. Steve Ahmad shows that Marx's Herald Tribune articles were based on ignorance. What excuse do people like Bill Warren, Colin Leys, Robert Brenner and Ernesto Laclau have? Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
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I'm afraid I never made the connection between Brenner and Warren. Must be something like the connection between Zeitlin and Pinochet...or Raymond Lau and some dogmatic trotskyist sloganeer... The arguments that Ahmad makes about the need to take seriously the study of specific class relations in 'post-colonial' countries that give rise to the nature of dependent relations between rich and poor countries are entirely consistent with Brenner's arguments to the same effect found in his 1979 argument against Dependency Theory. Again, if the pomos claim that Marxism is all about teleology, economic determinism etc., you can't accept that argument. Let a 'post-colonialist' or 'world-system' theorist make the same argument and it's A-Ok in your book...At least Ahmad is consistent, he doesn't accept that sloppy argument from pomos or your world system theory heroes... Steve On Mon, 28 May 2001, Louis Proyect wrote: And ain't it funny, when pomo's make the same exact kind of argument about Marx and Engels you have a Dick Cheney, but when the post-colonialists' 'world systems' folks make the argument that Marx was 'eurocentric, teleological', etc. hey you just grab it and run with it. Ahmad's section on Marx on India I think does more than a fair job of refuting simplistic accounts of Marx's views on colonialism, teloeology, etc. Steve Ahmad shows that Marx's Herald Tribune articles were based on ignorance. What excuse do people like Bill Warren, Colin Leys, Robert Brenner and Ernesto Laclau have? Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
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At 04:29 PM 05/25/2001 -0400, you wrote: Jim Devine: with regard to the case of contemporary Africa: in the world system, merchant capital has become subordinated to industrial capital (part of a unified system), so one might say that Africa is dominated by industrial capital even if it isn't part of it. This makes absolutely no sense to me. Merchant capital = buying selling consumer and producer goods on the market, M-C-M. As Marx argues, it's impossible (for a system of merchant capital as a whole) to extort surplus-labor -- and produce a surplus-product -- simply through buying and selling such goods.[*] Nonetheless, it's possible for an individual merchant to make a profit if there are differences in prices (that aren't swamped by transportation costs, etc.) More likely, M-C-M makes a profit by taking a piece of the action, a fraction of the surplus-product resulting from some labor process, in return for facilitating the marketing, etc., for the direct exploiter (the slave-owner, feudal lord, the industrial capitalist, etc.) Thus merchant capital lives off of various modes of exploitation. Industrial capital = buying labor-power and other inputs to use in production to produce consumer producer goods which are sold on the market for a profit (M - C - M'). Unlike for pure merchant capital, the M' M arises from the production process itself, because the labor done produces more than enough to cover the cost of the labor-power hired. This occurs because of proletarianization, the separation of the direct producers from both direct coercion in production and from direct access to the means of production and subsistence. (This is Marx's double freedom.) Whereas merchant capital can exist in the interstices of non-capitalist societies, industrial capitalism incorporates an entire society (and is continuing to swallow more and more of the world each year, creating a world society). In last 200 years or so, most non-capitalist modes of exploitation have been swept aside (often after a preliminary phase where they were subordinated to merchant or industrial capital), so that merchant capital has gone from mediating between industrial capital and other modes of exploitation to simply being a phase in the circulation of industrial capital, either in the buying of inputs or the selling of outputs. Often, in fact, it's part of the same bureaucratic apparatus. Many merchandising efforts today involve more that just buying and selling and are thus kinds of industrial capital (something is actually produced, rather than titles to property being transferred). (Being in a separate bureaucracy often promotes profits, however. For example, merchant capital describes the such companies as Kelly Services, which facilitates the purchase of labor power by industrial capitalists.) Africa has been almost totally subordinated to the world market, which itself is dominated by industrial capital. This is especially true in raw-material extraction, traditional tropical crops, and the new commercial agriculture. There's not much in the way of industrial capital itself, except in advanced areas like the Republic of South Africa and Egypt, though the low-wage/pliable workers/high pollution path to capitalist development might be possible. However, as an article posted to pen-l noted awhile back, many countries are much more open to the cold wind of the world market than rich countries are. Nonetheless, there are areas which have been shoved aside by the capitalist juggernaut. In this case, Joan Robinson's quip applies: there's one thing worse than being exploited by capitalism, i.e., not being exploited. Once capitalism is established, it's better to work for capital than to be unemployed. (Once the world capitalist system is established, this is akin to the rational core of Brad's recent comment that it's better to get a loan from the IMF than to not do so. If you're poor and the banks refuse to lend to you, Lenny the Loan-Shark's services seem like a good thing.) The stoop labor ... under conditions of widespread coercion is exactly the kind of forced-labor mode of exploitation that isn't true proletarianization, isn't part of full-blown industrial capitalism in Marx's terms. My statement started with if merchant capitalism ... were the same as industrial capitalism because I _reject_ that premise. Neither does this [make sense]. I don't want to repeat myself (since I think the explanation can be found above). Instead, I want to make Brenner's point -- which builds on Marx -- about the difference between the situation where workers are subject to direct coercion (by the boss, not just by the state) and true proletarianization (the double freedom). I think this is the essence of Brenner's theory, even though it's been largely ignored in recent pen-l discussions. Under situations where labor is subject to direct coercion, such events as increasing
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Grundrisse, p. 513. Louis Proyect wrote: Karl Marx, Theories of Surplus Value, part 2: The fact that we now not only call the plantation owners in America capitalists, but that they *are* capitalists, is based on their existence as anomalies within a world market based on free labor. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
