[p2p-research] Fwd: Launch of Abundance: The Journal of Post-Scarcity Studies, preliminary plans

[Kevin Carson]

On 2/23/09, Christian Siefkes <christian at siefkes.net> wrote:

> The power of Marx argument is that he demonstrates that all the detrimental
>  effects of capitalism actually do occur regardless of unequal exchanges,
>  i.e. _even if all exchanges are equal and "fair"_. Hence, you can demand as
>  much as you like that all exchanges should be equal, you might even
>  completely realize that goal -- it won't make a difference. All the
>  detrimental results of capitalism (social inequality continually rising;
>  most people either having to work very much or live in poverty; competition
>  preventing interoperability and the free sharing of innovation; the need for
>  endless growth destroying Earth and people; etc.) will remain in place.

Marx makes an argument as to why he believes these detrimental effects
occur regardless of unequal exchange, but as to whether he actually
demonstrates it (i.e., whether the argument holds up), I disagree.

>  As for exploitation (Marx uses that word in a purely *technical* sense, not
>  in the *moral* sense as it is commonly understood), that's a different
>  matter. Exploitation results from the simple fact that capitalists can hire
>  people's labor power, and that the value produced by a worker is usually
>  higher than the value of her labor power.
>
>  Exploitation will usually only be possible if some people are *forced* to
>  sell their labor power because they have nothing only to sell. If they had
>  some means of production, it would usually make more sense for them to
>  employ these means and sell the *results of their labor*, rather than
>  selling their *labor power*, since in that way they can realize the full
>  value produced by their labor, not just the value of their labor power.

I think you're ignoring the dialectical relationship between the
conditions of wage labor, and the availability of means of subsistence
or self-employment outside the wage system.  Even when a worker
chooses wage labor, the practical terms of the exchange (i.e., how
much of his labor product he receives as a  wage) will be determined
by the effects of competition from the possibility of self-employment.
 The widespread availability of independent access to means of
subsistence and production may make the wage relationship itself less
numerically prevalent; but just as importantly, it will make it less
exploitative where it does exist.

But
>  the fact that there are people who have nothing except their labor power to
>  sell ("workers"), is an the inevitable outcome of any system based on trade
>  (exchange).
>
>  Hence you can't, as Marx shows, have it both ways: you can have trade (e.g.
>  "free trade") _and_ exploitation, or you can stop trading and end
>  exploitation. (The latter option requires that we regard the means of
>  production as commons and that we jointly, more or less loosely coordinated,
>  produce what we need and distribute it among ourselves--as is already the
>  case in commons-based peer production.) The choice is yours (ours), but it's
>  a choice you (we) have to make.

Perhaps I should clarify that by "market" I do not simply mean "cash
nexus," but rather the sum total of all voluntary exchanges and
relationships.  I do not regard either common property or networked
organization as inconsistent with the market.

> The historical analysis you mention (I agree that it is brilliant) is
>  actually quite short, is comprises only chap. 24 (on the "so-called
>  primitive accumulation") of vol. 1. Marx always separates logical analysis
>  and historical developments--the rest of vol. 1, and most chapters of vol.
>  2+3, are dedicated to the logical analysis of the operations of capitalism,
>  where he shows that the division of most of humanity into two classes
>  ("capitalists" who jointly control the means of production, and "workers"
>  who don't) is the inevitable outcome of market exchange (trade). So Engels
>  only confirms what Marx already demonstrates, with powerful arguments, in
>  his analysis of Capital.

But I don't think Marx demonstrates this.  He asserts it, and puts
forth some of the same arguments you do in defense of the assertion.
But I don't think he succeeds in proving it.

> > As a wide range of thinkers have pointed out, it is only possible to
>  > get labor to work for less than its full product only when it is
>  > deprived of independent access to the means of subsistence and
>  > production.

> True--but how exactly can you avoid the possibility of bankruptcies and
>  other personal failures that would leave a person with nothing except her
>  labor power to sell, if, on the other hand, you want "free trade"?

See my response to your later comments, below:

On 2/25/09, Christian Siefkes <christian at siefkes.net> wrote:

> Yes, they would trade, and initially their trading wouldn't be capitalistic,
>  since labor is not available for hire. But assuming that trade/exchange is
>  their primary way of organizing production, capitalism would ultimately
>  result, since some of the producers would go bankrupt, they would lose their
>  direct access to the means of production and be forced to sell their labor
>  power.

I'm not sure what you mean by exchange being the "primary way of
organizing production."  For one thing, my idea of trade is perfectly
compatible with widespread production in the household and informal
economy, with exchange taking the primary form of exchange of
surpluses with neighbors through a neighborhood/community barter
system (using LETS or local currencies).

If none of the other producers is rich enough to hire them, they
>  would be unlucky and starve (or be forced to turn to other ways of survival
>  such as robbery/thievery, prostitution, or begging--which is what we also
>  saw as a large-scale phenomenon with the emergence of capitalism, and which
>  we still see in so-called developing countries where there is not enough
>  capital to hire all or most of the available labor power). But if there are
>  other producers/people would *can* hire them, the seed of capitalism with
>  it's capitalist/worker divide is laid.
>
>  Of course, the emerging class of capitalists won't be just passive
>  bystanders watching this process happen. Since they need a sufficiently
>  large labor force, and since independent producers are unwanted competition
>  for them, they'll actively try to turn the latter into the former. Means for
>  doing so are enclosure/privatization laws that deprive the independent
>  producers of their means of productions, technical progress that makes it
>  harder for them to compete (esp. if expensive machines are required which
>  they simple lack the money to buy), other laws that increase the overhead
>  for independent producers (e.g. high bookkeeping requirements), creation of
>  big sales points that non-capitalist producers don't have access to
>  (department stores etc.), simple overproduction that drives small-scale
>  producers (who can't stand huge losses) out of the market, etc. But even if
>  they were passive bystanders (which is an unrealistic assumption), the
>  conversion of independent producers into workers forced to sell their labor
>  power would still take place through the simple laws of the market, which
>  cause some producers to fail and go bankrupt.
>
>  So whenever you start with trade as the primary way of production, you'll
>  sooner or later end up with capitalism. It's not a contradiction, it's a
>  process.

I think you're assuming (as did Marx) certain conditions of production
as "natural" in a non-capitalist market economy, and hence leading to
capitalism.  And I don't think these assumptions are valid.  For one
thing, the assumption that there would be a high rate of failure and
bankruptcy implicitly assumes high initial capital outlays for market
entry and attendant high overhead expenses.  But one of the central
functions of the state from at least the beginning of paleotechnic
industry in the Industrial Revolution, and intensified with the rise
of mass-production industry as an alternative to the kind of
small-scale craft production with power machinery that Kropotkin
envisioned, has been to impose minimum mandatory overhead costs and
criminalize a great deal of low-overhead production.

In a market economy without such mandated minimum overhead, a great
deal of production would take place in the household for direct
consumption or trade through small barter networks, and it would rely
primarily on spare capacity of household capital goods most people own
anyway.  So there would be little or no risk of failure, and no real
cost to riding out periods of slow business.

So the very idea that "failure" of a business would mean the lack of
any alternative means of support, and hence desperate acceptance of
wage labor on any terms available, is an unjustified assumption.
First of all, absent enclosure of vacant land, falling back on
subsistence production would be a safety net for those whose
commercial production ventures failed.  And the sizable fraction of
subsistence needs that could be met by small-scale production in the
household or for immediate exchange with one's neighbors, would
provide a great deal of cushion against unemployment, so that those
taking wage labor could take their time holding out for an offer to
their liking.

In addition, both you and Marx seem to overestimate the importance of
the firm as primary economic unit, in considering the consequences of
"failure."  In a networked economy, like that of Emilia-Romagna today,
firm boundaries are quite porous, and the model of employment tends
toward de facto self-employment, with employment organized around the
project rather than the firm.  The line between "employer" and
"employed" is also fluid, changing from one project to the next.  And
in many cases (as in the American garment industry) the cheapness of
minimum required capital equipment means that projects can be
organized around individually owned capital equipment that is carried
with the individual from one project to the next.  And given a
bargaining power of labor determined by the ongoing availability of
capital and land, such networking would take much more of a pattern of
relations between equals than it does even presently in
Emilia-Romagna.

In short, the boundaries between self-employment, household
subsistence production, and commercial production in the worker-owned
enterprise, would be much less distinct than at present.  And the cost
of "failure," slipping from one to the other, would be much less
significant than at present.

At the same time, the benefits to the "winners" would be limited by
the unavailable of state-enforced scarcity rents on capital and land,
so a little "win" couldn't continue to build on itself through the
power of compound interest, or through barriers like IP prohibitiing
market entry.  There would surely be some inequality resulting from
differences in effort and pure luck, but it's a level of inequality
that would reach a saturation point fairly quickly and then be
restricted by built-in systemic safeguards.

It's interesting that you list enclosures, state impositions of
minimum overheads, etc., as active measures the capitalists might
take.  But it's impossible to consider the rate of failure that took
place historically, outside the context of these forms of intervention
that did in fact take place.  With the free availability of
low-overhead production in the household economy, the free
availability of squatting on vacant land, etc., "failure" would not be
nearly as big a stick to hit people with.  In such circumtances,
"failure" would just be the resting period between amassing a minor
sum of capital to reenter the market--if amassing such a sum was
necessary at all, as opposed to simply ramping up a bit of surplus
production for exchange using the capital you owned all the time.

> Yes, and he also says that trade (as the primary way of production) would
>  necessarily cause this expropriation (see above). That's why he could knew,
>  with absolute certainty, that a post-capitalist way of production (which he
>  denoted as "communism") would *not* be based on trade (or at least not
>  primarly). If it *was* based on trade, it would inevitable revert to
>  capitalism, and so it wouldn't be "post-capitalist" after all.

I think it's pretty clear that, while Marx may have thought he knew
this with absolute certainty, his certainty was unfounded.

> Yes, but these markets were never the primary way of organizing production.
>  Markets played only a minor rule for the exchange of surplus produce and
>  some specialized items (e.g. luxury goods), people didn't depend on them for
>  their survival.

But it's only because of the state's arificial limitation of
alternatives that people depend so heavily on the cash nexus for their
survival.  IMO the very sharpness of the distinction between the cash
nexus, and the informal subsistence and barter economy, is an
artificial state of affairs.  My view of a market society is simply
one based on individual self-ownership and whatever mix of individual
and common ownership results from social consensus, in which people
can freely choose to deal with each other through whatever combination
of exchange, gift or network that suits the individuals involved.


-- 
Kevin Carson
Mutualist Blog:  Free Market Anti-Capitalism
http://mutualist.blogspot.com
Studies in Mutualist Political Economy
http://www.mutualist.org/id47.html
Anarchist Organization Theory Project
http://mutualist.blogspot.com/2005/12/studies-in-anarchist-theory-of.html