From: Travas Gunnell (travasg@yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Apr 17 2001 - 15:48:38 MDT
On this list I'm sure I'm in for a volley of assaults,
but here goes... ;-)
Regarding the various posts that are essentially
arguing for (or at least not arguing against)
sweatshops and the like:
[put on kevlar vest]
The REAL problem here is capitalism and private
property.
[duck behind blast sheild]
Now before anyone launches into their pat anti-commie
diatribes; save them, I'm not a communist, or a
"socialist" (at least not in the sense of the word
that you're most likely familliar with), I'm an
anarchist. Or, to differentiate myself from the
supposed "anarcho-capitalists", one could say I'm a
"libertarian socialist". Which is NOT a contradiction
in terms. For more on this, go here:
http://infoshop.org/faq/secA1.html#seca13
Many people on this list seem to already be aquainted
with such ideas, but I think that they, for the most
part, don't understand them fully.
Rather than re-state what's already been said, what
follows are a few select quotes from the massive
Anarchist FAQ that some of you are likely familiar
with, but in all probability haven't read more than a
minor tidbit here and there. The quotes below should
not be construed as all there is to be said or as the
entirety of such arguments, but rather as a small
taste of what the links below point to. There are
several megabytes of text in the FAQ.
From: http://infoshop.org/faq/secB4.html
Private property is in many ways like a private form
of state. The owner determines what goes on within the
area he or she "owns," and therefore exercises a
monopoly of power over it. When
power is exercised over one's self, it is a source of
freedom, but under capitalism it is a source of
coercive authority. As Bob Black points out in The
Abolition of Work:
"The liberals and conservatives and
Libertarians who lament totalitarianism are phoneys
and hypocrites. . . You find the same sort of
hierarchy and discipline in an office or factory
as you do in a prison or a monastery. . . A
worker is a part-time slave. The boss says when to
show up, when to leave, and what to do in the
meantime. He tells you how much work
to do and how fast. He is free to carry his
control to humiliating extremes, regulating, if he
feels like it, the clothes you wear or how often you
go to the bathroom. With a few
exceptions he can fire you for any reason, or
no reason. He has you spied on by snitches and
supervisors, he amasses a dossier on every employee.
Talking back is called
'insubordination,' just as if a worker is a
naughty child, and it not only gets you fired, it
disqualifies you for unemployment compensation. . .The
demeaning system of domination
I've described rules over half the waking hours
of a majority of women and the vast majority of men
for decades, for most of their lifespans. For certain
purposes it's not too
misleading to call our system democracy or
capitalism or -- better still -- industrialism, but
its real names are factory fascism and office
oligarchy. Anybody who says these people
are 'free' is lying or stupid."
Unlike a company, the democratic state can be
influenced by its citizens, who are able to act in
ways that limit (to some extent) the power of the
ruling elite to be "left alone" to enjoy their power.
As a result, the wealthy hate the democratic aspects
of the state, and its ordinary citizens, as potential
threats to their power. This "problem" was noted by
Alexis de Tocqueville in early
19th-century America:
"It is easy to perceive that the wealthy
members of the community entertain a hearty distaste
to the democratic institutions of their country. The
populace is at once the object of
their scorn and their fears."
----
Capitalist apologists are able to convince some people
that capitalism is "based on freedom" only because the
system has certain superficial appearances of freedom.
On closer analysis these appearances turn out to be
deceptions. For example, it is claimed that the
employees of capitalist firms have freedom because
they can always quit. But, as noted earlier,
"Some people giving orders and others obeying them:
this is the essence of servitude. Of course, as
[right-Libertarians] smugly [observe], 'one can at
least change jobs,' but you can't avoid having
a job -- just as under statism one can at least change
nationalities but you can't avoid subjection to one
nation-state or another. But freedom means more than
the right to change masters" [Bob
Black, The Libertarian as Conservative]. Under
capitalism, workers have only the Hobson's choice of
being governed/exploited or living on the street.
Anarchists point out that for choice to be real, free
agreements and associations must be based on the
social equality of those who enter into them, and both
sides must receive roughly equivalent
benefit. But social relations between capitalists and
employees can never be equal, because private
ownership of the means of production gives rise to
social hierarchy and relations of coercive
authority and subordination, as was recognised even by
Adam Smith.
----
The statist nature of private property can be seen in
"Libertarian" (i.e. minarchist, or "classical"
liberal) works representing the extremes of
laissez-faire capitalism:
"[I]f one starts a private town, on land whose
acquisition did not and does not violate the Lockean
proviso [of non-aggression], persons who chose to move
there or later remain
there would have no right to a say in how the
town was run, unless it was granted to them by the
decision procedures for the town which the owner had
established" [Robert Nozick,
Anarchy, State and Utopia, p. 270]
This is voluntary feudalism, nothing more. Of course,
it can be claimed that "market forces" will result in
the most liberal owners being the most successful, but
a nice master is still a master. To
paraphrase Tolstoy, "the liberal capitalist is like a
kind donkey owner. He will do everything for the
donkey -- care for it, feed it, wash it. Everything
except get off its back!" And as Bob Black
notes, "Some people giving orders and others obeying
them: this is the essence of servitude. . . .
[F]reedom means more than the right to change
masters." [The Libertarian as Conservative].
That supporters of capitalism often claim that this
"right" to change masters is the essence of "freedom"
is a telling indictment of the capitalist notion of
"liberty."
---
For anarchists, freedom means both "freedom from" and
"freedom to." "Freedom from" signifies not being
subject to domination, exploitation, coercive
authority, repression, or other forms of
degradation and humiliation. "Freedom to" means being
able to develop and express one's abilities, talents,
and potentials to the fullest possible extent
compatible with the maximum freedom of
others. Both kinds of freedom imply the need for
self-management, responsibility, and independence,
which basically means that people have a say in the
decisions that affect their lives. And
since individuals do not exist in a social vacuum, it
also means that freedom must take on a collective
aspect, with the associations that individuals form
with each other (e.g. communities, work
groups, social groups) being run in a manner which
allows the individual to participate in the decisions
that the group makes. Thus freedom for anarchists
requires participatory democracy, which
means face-to-face discussion and voting on issues by
the people affected by them. ...
---
Far from being "based on freedom," then, capitalism
actually destroys freedom. In this regard, Robert E.
Wood, the chief executive officer of Sears, spoke
plainly when he said "[w]e stress the
advantages of the free enterprise system, we complain
about the totalitarian state, but... we have created
more or less of a totalitarian system in industry,
particularly in large industry." [quoted by
Allan Engler, Apostles of Greed, p. 68]
----
Many capitalist apologists have attempted to show that
capitalist authority structures are "voluntary" and
are, therefore, somehow not a denial of individual and
social freedom. Milton Friedman
(a leading free market capitalist economist) has
attempted to do just this. Like most apologists for
capitalism he ignores the authoritarian relations
explicit within wage labour (within the
workplace, "co-ordination" is based upon top-down
command, not horizontal co-operation). Instead he
concentrates on the decision of a worker to sell their
labour to a specific boss and so
ignores the lack of freedom within such contracts. He
argues that "individuals are effectively free to enter
or not enter into any particular exchange, so every
transaction is strictly voluntary. . .
The employee is protected from coercion by the
employer because of other employers for whom he can
work." [Capitalism and Freedom, pp. 14-15]
Friedman, to prove the free nature of capitalism,
compares capitalism with a simple exchange economy
based upon independent producers. He states that in
such a simple economy each
household "has the alternative of producing directly
for itself, [and so] it need not enter into any
exchange unless it benefits from it. Hence no exchange
will take place unless both parties do
benefit from it. Co-operation is thereby achieved
without coercion." [Op. Cit., p. 13] Under capitalism
(or the "complex" economy) Friedman states that
"individuals are effectively free to enter
or not to enter into any particular exchange, so that
every transaction is strictly voluntary." [Op. Cit.,
p. 14]
A moments thought, however, shows that capitalism is
not based on "strictly voluntary" transactions as
Friedman claims. This is because the proviso that is
required to make every transaction
"strictly voluntary" is not freedom not to enter any
particular exchange, but freedom not to enter into any
exchange at all.
This, and only this, was the proviso that proved the
simple model Friedman presents (the one based upon
artisan production) to be voluntary and non-coercive;
and nothing less than this would
prove the complex model (i.e. capitalism) is voluntary
and non-coercive. But Friedman is clearly claiming
above that freedom not to enter into any particular
exchange is enough and so, only by
changing his own requirements, can he claim that
capitalism is based upon freedom.
---
From: http://infoshop.org/faq/secB3.html#secb33
In other words, private property is the state writ
small, with the property owner acting as the
"sovereign lord" over their property, and so the
absolute king of those who use it. As in any monarchy,
the worker is the subject of the capitalist, having to
follow their orders, laws and decisions while on their
property. This, obviously, is the total denial of
liberty (and dignity, we may note, as it is
degrading to have to follow orders). Little wonder,
then, that anarchists oppose private property as
Anarchy is "the absence of a master, of a sovereign"
[Op. Cit., p. 264] and call capitalism for
what it is, namely wage slavery!
---
What is the difference between private property and
possession?
Anarchists define "private property" (or just
"property," for short) as state-protected monopolies
of certain objects or privileges which are used to
exploit others. "Possession," on the other
hand, is ownership of things that are not used to
exploit others (e.g. a car, a refrigerator, a
toothbrush, etc.). Thus many things can be considered
as either property or possessions depending on
how they are used. For example, a house that one lives
in is a possession, whereas if one rents it to someone
else at a profit it becomes property. Similarly, if
one uses a saw to make a living as a
self-employed carpenter, the saw is a possession;
whereas if one employs others at wages to use the saw
for one's own profit, it is property.
While it may initially be confusing to make this
distinction, it is very useful to understand the
nature of capitalist society. Capitalists tend to use
the word "property" to mean anything from a
toothbrush to a transnational corporation -- two very
different things, with very different impacts upon
society.
---
The difference between property and possession can be
seen from the types of authority relations each
generates. Taking the example of a capitalist
workplace, its clear that those who own the
workplace determine how it is used, not those who do
the actual work. This leads to an almost totalitarian
system. As Noam Chomsky points out, "the term
'totalitarian' is quite accurate. There is
no human institution that approaches totalitarianism
as closely as a business corporation. I mean, power is
completely top-down. You can be inside it somewhere
and you take orders from above
and hand 'em down. Ultimately, it's in the hands of
owners and investors."
In an anarchist society, as noted, actual use is
considered the only title. This means that a workplace
is organised and run by those who work within it, thus
reducing hierarchy and increasing
freedom and equality within society. Hence anarchist
opposition to private property and capitalism flows
naturally from its basic principles and ideas.
----------
Well, I better stop there or I'll end up quoting the
whole damn thing. The main page can be found here
(among other places): http://infoshop.org/faq
Sections B and C are probably the most relevant here.
Also there is an appendix that deals with the
errors and distortions in Bryan Caplan's "Anarchist
Theory FAQ." It is located here:
http://infoshop.org/faq/append1.html
Happy reading! (Or flaming, as the case may be.) :-)
-Travas
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