robert brenner, property and progress
(58): nice definition of s-p relations: "relations among direct producers, relations among exploiters, and relations between exploiters and direct producers that, taken together, make possible/specify the regular access of individuals and families to the means of production and/or the social product"
(59): evolution of a society of a given type versus transition from a society of one type to another are qualitatively different phenomenon. this is the 'closed rules of reproduction' point.
(61): the key condition is that people be subject to the competitive constraint. this is only the case if people are dependent upon the market. being involved in the market is insufficient.
(62): pre-capitalist MoP as a 'single broad type' of social-property relations
(65): ruling classes needed to organize to extract surplus (organized force). this typically required endowing subordinates with politically constituted private property, or 'rights to an income' derived from peasant wealth
(67): Smith's fatal flaw is to fail to think about the potential 'losses' incurred by new participants on a market. he sees only gains.
(70): the key pt re: Lordly rules of reproduction is not that they don't have the incentive to increase their product, but that they don't have the capacity to innovate/specialize in pursuit of that goal (there's no workforce compelled to work for them, the costs of constructing one/supervising it are prohibitive) . they can pursue extensive growth.
(76): towns, for Brenner, weren't external to feudalism -- but politically constituted communities that also shielded producers from the market [this is the source of their political conservatism, in the revolutions. cue the revisionist challenge to the Marxist orthodoxy].
(85): re: the transition, Brenner's argument doesn't allow for the accretion of micro-level intiativies/action. Smith, he's saying, doesn't understand the constraints imposed by feudal s-p relations
(86): market can consolidate a feudal mode of production (as it did E. of the Elbe)
(92-93): absolutist State as a result of the seigneurial reveneue crisis of the late 1200s (in Fr. and W. Germany, at least), because lords were to weak to stand up to monarchs. absolutist State didn't mind free peasantry (sometimes), as long as it could guarantee centralized taxes [hmm]
(96-98): in aftermath of Black Death in England English lords didn't construct a tax office State, in response, but to use their political organization (and the monarchical State) to seize ownership [here the story could be clearer; in particular the contrast with France and W. Germany]
Showing posts with label capitalism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label capitalism. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Thursday, July 15, 2010
alex calinicos, the modern state (1987)
15th to 18th C – centralized and bureaucratic states emerge in the form of Absolutism
prior two this, there are two main forms
(1) World Empires—monarchies that rule through military power, and have little or no relation to States of a comparable level of advancement (this is very different from the modern state, which is part of a state-system, the members of which are at a more-or-less shared level of development)
(2) City-States—a number of States co-existing, but small in size. Rely often on popular armies, and can develop 'democratic' political forms (the modern state, though, rules a much larger territory—reflecting development of political forces—rules that territory through a bureaucratic apparatus, and a standing army)
so the modern state is distinctive.
modern states form a system—they co-exist with each other, and they interact with each other.
these interactions take various forms.
one such form is trade. rise of the modern state is coincidental with the formation of the world market [hobson/blaut would have their grievances with this]
the most important form of their interaction as States, of course, is war/military competition. the European state-system was characterized by the most ruthless military competition. what this leads to is a kind of Darwinian process of natural selection—in 1500, there were 500; in 1900, there were 25.
the emergence and development of this system is often seen—especially by bourgeois sociologists—as a refutation of Marxism. why? because it emerged in a context that wasn't capitalist—in a context where the prevailing form of exploitation was feudal ('analytically autonomous' from world capitalism). the notion is that the competitive interaction of nation-states represents a logic of military competition that is autonomous from capitalist social relations—both historically and in the present (Skocpol, Mann)
the point of disagreement with this position is not over the emergence of absolutism prior to the emergence of the bourgeoisie. Marx was well aware that many of the institutions of the modern state precede the 'bourgeois revolutions.'
the argument is not an argument over the facts. it's over the explanation.
can the emergence of the modern state be explained in terms of historical materialism? the answer is yes (Brenner)
the two key elements to Brenner's argument
(1) the crisis of the late-middle ages—the 14th and 15th centuries (plagues, famines that hid Europe in the middle of the 1300s, and then in the early of the 1400s). symptoms of a deep-seated economic crisis. you have another crisis in the 1600s—the whole of Europe is swept by wars (Thirty Years' War) and famine, which climaxes in the English Revolution in the late 1600s.
this arises in the context of the feudal mode of production.
characteristic form of exploitation is lord over peasant—extraction of surplus labor on the basis of legal rights over the peasant, reinforced by his political power. unlike in capitalism, both lord and peasant have direct access to their means of subsistence—none of this is mediated by the market. the peasants have direct access to their means of subsistence, they typically have their own plots. the Lord uses his military powers, his armed retainers to get resources from the direct producers.
in this situation, in which both exploiters and exploited have direct access, neither have incentive to increase the productive forces. no one has an incentive to develop the level of the productive forces. the main developments in the level of productive forces that do occur, under feudalism, occur in the early middle ages, when feudalism first appears. after that, the main form of growth is extensive (not intensive), and runs into limits by the 1300s.
(2) the crucial point—the second aspect—is that these dynamics give rise to 'political accumulation'. the lord, to maintain and increase his consumption, must (a) squeeze his peasants harder; (b) pinch other lord's peasants. what that means is that a fierce competitive dynamic is unleashed (e.g., the Hundred Years' War). this process of military competition then gives rise to State-building. more pressure to build up professional armies, etc.
this, the argument is, will culminate in the absolutist state (Perry Anderson—the only way feudalism could persist, in the face of its economic stagnation)
far from it being the case, then, that you don't need Marxism—Marxism is central.
and the one major exception to the 'absolutist' trend, England, demonstrates the superiority of the Marxist method.
out of the crisis of feudalism, the feudal lords were able--'unintended consequences' of the class struggle in the later middle ages—to separate peasants from the land, and to transform them into wage-laborers. in the 1400-1700s, these new wage laborers didn't go to work in industry (the industrial revolution takes place in the late 1700s); rather, they become involved in capitalist agriculture. you see the emergence of the capitalist 'trinity'--the landowner, the capitalist (who rents the land), and the worker. this permits a dynamic development of the productive forces—there is a sharp increase in agricultural productivity, which in turn enables the development of industrial capitalism (without it, of course, you couldn't support an industrial workforce).
also, you have 1640-1660 and 1688-1689—the English revolution—the outcome of that process was to establish as politically dominant a capitalist landed class. in the 18th century, the dominant class were capitalist landowners. the State that they create is an odd one—the bulk of political control is still in the hand of local landowners (in the nobility and landowners—no centralized standing army or bureaucracy). the country is run through a parliament of landowners. BUT, externally, a strong state—based, above all, on the Royal Navy, created with the support of the land-owning parliament as a means of expanding Britain's influence in the world.
and so we see a period—during the 18th century—which is sometimes described as the First World War. England vs. France (which is the greatest of the absolutist monarchies). this culminates in the Napoleonic Wars.
to understand why Britain came out on top in this war is to appreciate the economic dynamism of capitalism. rapid economic development gave the British ruling-class the naval and military power to defeat the French (English also helped build up Prussia, remember, as a rival to France). internally, this involved an absolutely massive increase in military spending—between 1700 and 1815, public spending rose fifteen-fold (civilian aspects never amounted to more than 23% of total spending—the rest was military!). the centralized monarchies put the burden of taxation on their peasantries—in England, however, because of relative economic dynamism, lords were prepared to tax themselves, relatively heavily (the land tax amounted to something like 20% of the nominal gross income of landowners). they were prepared to take from their own pockets.
in the 1800s, the English pattern is generalized throughout Europe. this becomes especially true as, more and more, military power comes to depend on having a considerable industrial base.
and so you see, in Germany, the junkers encouraging development in industry, in order to win wars, etc. in other words, 'political accumulation' becomes subordinated to economic accumulation. the outcome, of course, is imperialism.
this process continues today.
this historical argument thus has an important political point—the horrific bloodshed of the contemporary interstate system can only be ended by a socialist revolution that destroys world capitalism!
15th to 18th C – centralized and bureaucratic states emerge in the form of Absolutism
prior two this, there are two main forms
(1) World Empires—monarchies that rule through military power, and have little or no relation to States of a comparable level of advancement (this is very different from the modern state, which is part of a state-system, the members of which are at a more-or-less shared level of development)
(2) City-States—a number of States co-existing, but small in size. Rely often on popular armies, and can develop 'democratic' political forms (the modern state, though, rules a much larger territory—reflecting development of political forces—rules that territory through a bureaucratic apparatus, and a standing army)
so the modern state is distinctive.
modern states form a system—they co-exist with each other, and they interact with each other.
these interactions take various forms.
one such form is trade. rise of the modern state is coincidental with the formation of the world market [hobson/blaut would have their grievances with this]
the most important form of their interaction as States, of course, is war/military competition. the European state-system was characterized by the most ruthless military competition. what this leads to is a kind of Darwinian process of natural selection—in 1500, there were 500; in 1900, there were 25.
the emergence and development of this system is often seen—especially by bourgeois sociologists—as a refutation of Marxism. why? because it emerged in a context that wasn't capitalist—in a context where the prevailing form of exploitation was feudal ('analytically autonomous' from world capitalism). the notion is that the competitive interaction of nation-states represents a logic of military competition that is autonomous from capitalist social relations—both historically and in the present (Skocpol, Mann)
the point of disagreement with this position is not over the emergence of absolutism prior to the emergence of the bourgeoisie. Marx was well aware that many of the institutions of the modern state precede the 'bourgeois revolutions.'
the argument is not an argument over the facts. it's over the explanation.
can the emergence of the modern state be explained in terms of historical materialism? the answer is yes (Brenner)
the two key elements to Brenner's argument
(1) the crisis of the late-middle ages—the 14th and 15th centuries (plagues, famines that hid Europe in the middle of the 1300s, and then in the early of the 1400s). symptoms of a deep-seated economic crisis. you have another crisis in the 1600s—the whole of Europe is swept by wars (Thirty Years' War) and famine, which climaxes in the English Revolution in the late 1600s.
this arises in the context of the feudal mode of production.
characteristic form of exploitation is lord over peasant—extraction of surplus labor on the basis of legal rights over the peasant, reinforced by his political power. unlike in capitalism, both lord and peasant have direct access to their means of subsistence—none of this is mediated by the market. the peasants have direct access to their means of subsistence, they typically have their own plots. the Lord uses his military powers, his armed retainers to get resources from the direct producers.
in this situation, in which both exploiters and exploited have direct access, neither have incentive to increase the productive forces. no one has an incentive to develop the level of the productive forces. the main developments in the level of productive forces that do occur, under feudalism, occur in the early middle ages, when feudalism first appears. after that, the main form of growth is extensive (not intensive), and runs into limits by the 1300s.
(2) the crucial point—the second aspect—is that these dynamics give rise to 'political accumulation'. the lord, to maintain and increase his consumption, must (a) squeeze his peasants harder; (b) pinch other lord's peasants. what that means is that a fierce competitive dynamic is unleashed (e.g., the Hundred Years' War). this process of military competition then gives rise to State-building. more pressure to build up professional armies, etc.
this, the argument is, will culminate in the absolutist state (Perry Anderson—the only way feudalism could persist, in the face of its economic stagnation)
far from it being the case, then, that you don't need Marxism—Marxism is central.
and the one major exception to the 'absolutist' trend, England, demonstrates the superiority of the Marxist method.
out of the crisis of feudalism, the feudal lords were able--'unintended consequences' of the class struggle in the later middle ages—to separate peasants from the land, and to transform them into wage-laborers. in the 1400-1700s, these new wage laborers didn't go to work in industry (the industrial revolution takes place in the late 1700s); rather, they become involved in capitalist agriculture. you see the emergence of the capitalist 'trinity'--the landowner, the capitalist (who rents the land), and the worker. this permits a dynamic development of the productive forces—there is a sharp increase in agricultural productivity, which in turn enables the development of industrial capitalism (without it, of course, you couldn't support an industrial workforce).
also, you have 1640-1660 and 1688-1689—the English revolution—the outcome of that process was to establish as politically dominant a capitalist landed class. in the 18th century, the dominant class were capitalist landowners. the State that they create is an odd one—the bulk of political control is still in the hand of local landowners (in the nobility and landowners—no centralized standing army or bureaucracy). the country is run through a parliament of landowners. BUT, externally, a strong state—based, above all, on the Royal Navy, created with the support of the land-owning parliament as a means of expanding Britain's influence in the world.
and so we see a period—during the 18th century—which is sometimes described as the First World War. England vs. France (which is the greatest of the absolutist monarchies). this culminates in the Napoleonic Wars.
to understand why Britain came out on top in this war is to appreciate the economic dynamism of capitalism. rapid economic development gave the British ruling-class the naval and military power to defeat the French (English also helped build up Prussia, remember, as a rival to France). internally, this involved an absolutely massive increase in military spending—between 1700 and 1815, public spending rose fifteen-fold (civilian aspects never amounted to more than 23% of total spending—the rest was military!). the centralized monarchies put the burden of taxation on their peasantries—in England, however, because of relative economic dynamism, lords were prepared to tax themselves, relatively heavily (the land tax amounted to something like 20% of the nominal gross income of landowners). they were prepared to take from their own pockets.
in the 1800s, the English pattern is generalized throughout Europe. this becomes especially true as, more and more, military power comes to depend on having a considerable industrial base.
and so you see, in Germany, the junkers encouraging development in industry, in order to win wars, etc. in other words, 'political accumulation' becomes subordinated to economic accumulation. the outcome, of course, is imperialism.
this process continues today.
this historical argument thus has an important political point—the horrific bloodshed of the contemporary interstate system can only be ended by a socialist revolution that destroys world capitalism!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
larry bartels, unequal democracy (2008)
chapter 1
(2): economic inequality shapes politics is half of this book. other half is that politics profoundly shapes economics.
(3, 30, 60): claim #1--partisan politics have had a substantial impact on the economic fortunes of the middle class and the poor. real incomes of working poor families have grown six times as fast under democrats, real incomes of the middle class have grown twice as fast. a great deal of economic inequality is attributable to republican policies and priorities. (chapter 2) [there is an acknolwedgement on pg. 30 that some of these differences have been 'muted'--this begs explanation]
(3-4): claim #2--party image of white conservative working-class is largely mythical. this group has become more democratic. (chapter 3)
(4): claim #3--there are three reasons that republicans have fared so well over the past half-century, despite this (chapter 4)
(5): claim #6--puzzle of the federal estate tax--which would have been repealed much earlier, had the political system been responsive to peoples' preferences. (chapter 7)
(5): claim #7--a 40% decline in the real value of the minimum wage since the late 1960s, despite consistent and strong public support for it. (chapter 8)
(5): claim #8--US Senators views are explained much better by their own partisan preferences than by the preferences of their constituents. where their constituents do matter, it is their affluent and middle-class constituents (the views of ordinary citizens have no discernible impact) (chapter 9).
(6): this book provides strong evidence that economic inequality has a profound impact on the political process.
(7): massive cumulative influence in divergent real income growth over the past half-century (real incomes of 20th percentile increased by less than 15,000 dollars; at the 9th percentile, 130,000 dollars) [see the charts on pages 8 and 9]
(9): much of the income growth that did appear was attributable to increases in working hours.
(13): the dramatic economic gains of the past 30 years have, in fact, been concentrated among the extremely rich
(14): [very deceptive use of polling data here -- 'many americans', when really the figure is quite low, and less than those who disagree that income differentials are necessary]
(15): 255 of the 400 richest people were 'self-made' -- interesting...
(17): citing Krugman to make clear that income stagnation is not explained by technological/sectoral change (how do you explain stagnation of mathemeticians and computer scientists; while CEO salaries jump by 100%?)
(19-20): tendency to totally ignore the 'political dimension' [again, this is important -- but it needs to be tempered. welfare cuts? glass-steagall?]
(22-23): interesting bit about media and inequality (how can you have ads for vacations to the caymans interspersed with analyses of inequality?)
(24-25): importance of government fiscal policy, taxation, central bank operations, debt management, banking, trade and tariffs, bailouts -- all this is agreed, no doubt. but needs, again, tempering [can we think about the 'autonomy' of the State, as it relates to this discussion? in other words, we might have a proxy for partisan effects in strength of labor movement, or even something else?]
chapter 2
(29): key--you need a response to this book's emphasis on political facts that can accomodate both
(35): and a nice chart, also, to problematize the question of Democrats in the neoliberal age [under carter inequality jumps (volcker shock, anyone?); under clinton it's steady, though if there hadn't been a decline in the first year there would have been an increase (what explains this blip?). this is quite strong evidence for point 2, above. part of the problem is the 'blackboxing' of social and technological trends, which allows him to talk about the long-term trends without any notion of partisan complicity. we need to respond to this point, as well]
(41): income growth for the 95th percentile has been remarkably stable, across regimes and across time.
(44): example of richard nixon, certainly, is illustrative--he pursues a contractionary policy before pursuing an inflationary policy confronted with the election campaign. here, certainly, we can agree that partisan effects mattered.
(45): same with gerald ford -- launches the whip inflation now policy, before calling for a one-year tax rebate in 1976
(46): the portrayal of Carter is deceptive -- where is the Volcker shock? the shock to the economy is presented as exogenous.
(50): unemployment and GNP growth preferable under democrats; inflation roughly equal.
(53): the 'honeymoon' effect -- first-year of their terms is when presidents have their most significant effects
(58): important--noting that it has become more difficult for presidents to influence pre-tax income. this is an important point about the neoliberal age, which is left implicit in the rest of the argument, i think. but obviously the other point, about taxes and the partisan policies, is important and shouldn't be neglected.
chapter 3
(66): argument--three questions, answer to all is no.
(72-74): to the first question, no--it has not, the opposite trend is observed when you split the data up the way Bartels has. Republicans, in fact, win by 18 percentage points amongst high-income whites.
(77-78): what we have seen has everything to do with an erosion of Democratic support in the South, where the party's stance on civil rights and Jim Crow cost it the white vote. this is quite stark, actually.
(78-83): to the second question, no--hese are his attempt to assess views on gov't spending, etc., and he sees little evidence on the core issues [would have been preferable to use a cumulative measure, here]
(84, 86, 89): to the third question, no--combined weight attached to the economic issues exceeds the importance given to cultural issues by voters. he does find that american politics is increasingly about cultural issues, but still primarily about economic issues. evidence that higher-income voters attach more importance to cultural issues, than lower-income voters.
(90): to a fourth question, also more-or-less no--churchgoers might attach more importance to cultural issues, but this obscures differences amongst churchgoers.
(95): class politics are alive and well in the US--in fact, citing a huber and stanig study that shows that the gap in right-wing electoral suport is larger in the US, than Europe.
chapter 4
(98-99): argument--the puzzle of republican success despite their terrible performance is explained by three forms of myopia that characterizes voters:
(107): in a FN he says that Nixon presided over a booming economy--really?
(111, 125): a special kind of false-consciousness--american voters most sensitive to the fortunes of high-income voters
chapter 5
(129): argument-- two important conclusions from this chapter
(164): argument--example of the Bush tax cuts is an excellent example of disconnect between egalitarian sentiments and policy preferences (most people, in fact, hadn't thought about the cuts--page 188). there is considerable latitude given to the political system, he's arguing [this is the wrong way of interpreting this, i would argue]
chapter 7
(198): argument--perplexing story of the estate tax repeal. most people in favor of repeal, though it would benefit only the super-rich. in fact it proves the stubbornness of the political system.
chapter 8
(226-227): argument--paradox of why minimum wage hasn't been raised. explanations include:
(248): he notes the critical importance of lobbying and corporate interests [strange that this doesn't figure in the explanation, directly.]
(251): demonstrates the unresponsiveness of political institutions in the US
chapter 9
(253): the premise of this presentation is emphatically pluralist--it is the miliband-style critique, of the sort that poulantzas scorned.
(253-254): argument--senators in this period (late 80's, early 90's) were vastly more responsive to the their affluent constituents, than to their constituents of modest means. (see the stark graphs on pg. 261 and pg. 270)
(262): "equal representation of incomes" not "equal representation of citizens"
(277): divergent knowledge levels is not an explanation
(280): important--if senators responded only to campaign contributions, they would respond in a way that accords with the data seen in this chapter.
chapter 10
(285): preferences of low-income people have no discernible impact on the political process.
(287): schumpeter quote
(288-289): bright spots--there are many affluent people with egalitarian views
(290): speaking of 'ideological polarization' -- but this is fundamentally not helpful. all he is saying is that party unity has hardened. push back here.
(292): push back here, too--Democrats have pursued policies for the have-nots(!), Republicans for the haves -- again, this is a clear case where he is not being nuanced in the conclusions drawn from his data.
chapter 1
(2): economic inequality shapes politics is half of this book. other half is that politics profoundly shapes economics.
(3, 30, 60): claim #1--partisan politics have had a substantial impact on the economic fortunes of the middle class and the poor. real incomes of working poor families have grown six times as fast under democrats, real incomes of the middle class have grown twice as fast. a great deal of economic inequality is attributable to republican policies and priorities. (chapter 2) [there is an acknolwedgement on pg. 30 that some of these differences have been 'muted'--this begs explanation]
(3-4): claim #2--party image of white conservative working-class is largely mythical. this group has become more democratic. (chapter 3)
(4): claim #3--there are three reasons that republicans have fared so well over the past half-century, despite this (chapter 4)
- myopic focus of voters on recent economic performance
- high sensitivity to income-growth, which means that Republican's success in generating election-year income growth helps them
- responsiveness of voters to campaign spending rewards Republicans' advantage in campaign fund-raising
(5): claim #6--puzzle of the federal estate tax--which would have been repealed much earlier, had the political system been responsive to peoples' preferences. (chapter 7)
(5): claim #7--a 40% decline in the real value of the minimum wage since the late 1960s, despite consistent and strong public support for it. (chapter 8)
(5): claim #8--US Senators views are explained much better by their own partisan preferences than by the preferences of their constituents. where their constituents do matter, it is their affluent and middle-class constituents (the views of ordinary citizens have no discernible impact) (chapter 9).
(6): this book provides strong evidence that economic inequality has a profound impact on the political process.
(7): massive cumulative influence in divergent real income growth over the past half-century (real incomes of 20th percentile increased by less than 15,000 dollars; at the 9th percentile, 130,000 dollars) [see the charts on pages 8 and 9]
(9): much of the income growth that did appear was attributable to increases in working hours.
(13): the dramatic economic gains of the past 30 years have, in fact, been concentrated among the extremely rich
(14): [very deceptive use of polling data here -- 'many americans', when really the figure is quite low, and less than those who disagree that income differentials are necessary]
(15): 255 of the 400 richest people were 'self-made' -- interesting...
(17): citing Krugman to make clear that income stagnation is not explained by technological/sectoral change (how do you explain stagnation of mathemeticians and computer scientists; while CEO salaries jump by 100%?)
(19-20): tendency to totally ignore the 'political dimension' [again, this is important -- but it needs to be tempered. welfare cuts? glass-steagall?]
(22-23): interesting bit about media and inequality (how can you have ads for vacations to the caymans interspersed with analyses of inequality?)
(24-25): importance of government fiscal policy, taxation, central bank operations, debt management, banking, trade and tariffs, bailouts -- all this is agreed, no doubt. but needs, again, tempering [can we think about the 'autonomy' of the State, as it relates to this discussion? in other words, we might have a proxy for partisan effects in strength of labor movement, or even something else?]
chapter 2
(29): key--you need a response to this book's emphasis on political facts that can accomodate both
- the limits of those partisan effects (and here can enter talk of state 'autonomy')
- the underlying structural 'facts' (and here can enter some assessment of the narrowness of the regimes he's talking about -- really, the only Democrat that enters this analysis is Clinton. differences may be important (the EITC, for example), but the similarities are critical too (failed health reform, welfare reform, etc.)
(35): and a nice chart, also, to problematize the question of Democrats in the neoliberal age [under carter inequality jumps (volcker shock, anyone?); under clinton it's steady, though if there hadn't been a decline in the first year there would have been an increase (what explains this blip?). this is quite strong evidence for point 2, above. part of the problem is the 'blackboxing' of social and technological trends, which allows him to talk about the long-term trends without any notion of partisan complicity. we need to respond to this point, as well]
(41): income growth for the 95th percentile has been remarkably stable, across regimes and across time.
(44): example of richard nixon, certainly, is illustrative--he pursues a contractionary policy before pursuing an inflationary policy confronted with the election campaign. here, certainly, we can agree that partisan effects mattered.
(45): same with gerald ford -- launches the whip inflation now policy, before calling for a one-year tax rebate in 1976
(46): the portrayal of Carter is deceptive -- where is the Volcker shock? the shock to the economy is presented as exogenous.
(50): unemployment and GNP growth preferable under democrats; inflation roughly equal.
(53): the 'honeymoon' effect -- first-year of their terms is when presidents have their most significant effects
(58): important--noting that it has become more difficult for presidents to influence pre-tax income. this is an important point about the neoliberal age, which is left implicit in the rest of the argument, i think. but obviously the other point, about taxes and the partisan policies, is important and shouldn't be neglected.
chapter 3
(66): argument--three questions, answer to all is no.
- has the white working-class abandoned the democratic party?
- has the white working class become more conservative?
- do moral values trump economics as a basis of working-class?
(72-74): to the first question, no--it has not, the opposite trend is observed when you split the data up the way Bartels has. Republicans, in fact, win by 18 percentage points amongst high-income whites.
(77-78): what we have seen has everything to do with an erosion of Democratic support in the South, where the party's stance on civil rights and Jim Crow cost it the white vote. this is quite stark, actually.
(78-83): to the second question, no--hese are his attempt to assess views on gov't spending, etc., and he sees little evidence on the core issues [would have been preferable to use a cumulative measure, here]
(84, 86, 89): to the third question, no--combined weight attached to the economic issues exceeds the importance given to cultural issues by voters. he does find that american politics is increasingly about cultural issues, but still primarily about economic issues. evidence that higher-income voters attach more importance to cultural issues, than lower-income voters.
(90): to a fourth question, also more-or-less no--churchgoers might attach more importance to cultural issues, but this obscures differences amongst churchgoers.
(95): class politics are alive and well in the US--in fact, citing a huber and stanig study that shows that the gap in right-wing electoral suport is larger in the US, than Europe.
chapter 4
(98-99): argument--the puzzle of republican success despite their terrible performance is explained by three forms of myopia that characterizes voters:
- voters responds most to income growth in election years
- election-year income growth is more consequential for affluent families--much more so than for middle-class and poor families. part of this is the special kind of false-consciousness he adduces, it would seem (see graph on 105)
- voters are swayed by campaign-spending (pg. 120)
(107): in a FN he says that Nixon presided over a booming economy--really?
(111, 125): a special kind of false-consciousness--american voters most sensitive to the fortunes of high-income voters
chapter 5
(129): argument-- two important conclusions from this chapter
- strong evidence of the importance of egalitarian values in American political culture
- at the same time, the increasing inequality of the last three decades hasn't had a marked effect on public perceptions (this is a place to talk more about false-consciousness, ideology, etc.)
(164): argument--example of the Bush tax cuts is an excellent example of disconnect between egalitarian sentiments and policy preferences (most people, in fact, hadn't thought about the cuts--page 188). there is considerable latitude given to the political system, he's arguing [this is the wrong way of interpreting this, i would argue]
chapter 7
(198): argument--perplexing story of the estate tax repeal. most people in favor of repeal, though it would benefit only the super-rich. in fact it proves the stubbornness of the political system.
chapter 8
(226-227): argument--paradox of why minimum wage hasn't been raised. explanations include:
- declining stregnth of labor unions (pg. 240)
- partisan politics--republican presidents and republican congresses (pg. 243)
- alternative policy, like the earned income tax credit (pg. 246)
(248): he notes the critical importance of lobbying and corporate interests [strange that this doesn't figure in the explanation, directly.]
(251): demonstrates the unresponsiveness of political institutions in the US
chapter 9
(253): the premise of this presentation is emphatically pluralist--it is the miliband-style critique, of the sort that poulantzas scorned.
(253-254): argument--senators in this period (late 80's, early 90's) were vastly more responsive to the their affluent constituents, than to their constituents of modest means. (see the stark graphs on pg. 261 and pg. 270)
(262): "equal representation of incomes" not "equal representation of citizens"
(277): divergent knowledge levels is not an explanation
(280): important--if senators responded only to campaign contributions, they would respond in a way that accords with the data seen in this chapter.
chapter 10
(285): preferences of low-income people have no discernible impact on the political process.
(287): schumpeter quote
(288-289): bright spots--there are many affluent people with egalitarian views
(290): speaking of 'ideological polarization' -- but this is fundamentally not helpful. all he is saying is that party unity has hardened. push back here.
(292): push back here, too--Democrats have pursued policies for the have-nots(!), Republicans for the haves -- again, this is a clear case where he is not being nuanced in the conclusions drawn from his data.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
ralph miliband, "state power and class interests" (1983)
(57): guiding question--"how great a degree of autonomy does the state have in capitalist society?"
(58): two views in Marx
(60): Theda Skocpol's view of the State, two readings (first favorable, second excessive)
(62): key--this does not satisfy him--yes, the foregoing bit about sources of autonomy is important, and yes, the dynamic of State action is explained by the imperative requirements of capitalism and the pressure of captialists--but this is not the whole story. there are to main impulses that give the State an 'autonomous' kind of interest [whereas the previous autonomy had everything to do with capitalism, in a sense, this is more about the State, it seems]
(65): and thus, key: he is going to argue we must think of this as a "partnership between two different, separate forces, linked to each other by many threads, yet each having its own separate sphere of concerns" [this loses so much of the force, really--no conception of the inequality and the deep differences between the two institutions. the State is much more dependent on the capitalist class, than the other way around, surely? unless we are thinking of a State which owns sources of surplus? and is even that sufficient? quite confusing formulation, i think]
(65): we have to find space between, in short, a 'class-reductionist' position and a 'state-reductionist' one. "I seek to avoid both forms...", in speaking of a partnership.
(66): Skocpol, and the State living 'for itself'
(67): mistakes of Statecraft are not evidence of 'fundamental disagreements' between the ruling class and the capitalist class [two examples: war in Vietnam, and Hitler's expansion]
(57): guiding question--"how great a degree of autonomy does the state have in capitalist society?"
(58): two views in Marx
- State as instrument of a ruling class
- State as 'independent from and superior to all social classes' (Bonapartism as extreme example)
- the State acting on behalf of the ruling class (defensible)
- the State acting on behest of the ruling class (vulgar deformation)
(60): Theda Skocpol's view of the State, two readings (first favorable, second excessive)
- the interests that the State may have, on its own, and the question of how that intersects with the interests of the ruling class (important amendment, miliband is saying)
- the possibility that the State possesses interests that are fundamentally opposed to the interests of all forces in society (excessive conception of autonomy)
- class struggle--the extent to which struggle challenges the hegemony of the ruling classes
- also, functional--to better serve the existing order and the dominant class
(62): key--this does not satisfy him--yes, the foregoing bit about sources of autonomy is important, and yes, the dynamic of State action is explained by the imperative requirements of capitalism and the pressure of captialists--but this is not the whole story. there are to main impulses that give the State an 'autonomous' kind of interest [whereas the previous autonomy had everything to do with capitalism, in a sense, this is more about the State, it seems]
- self-interest--people in power wish to retain it.
- the 'national interest', as a motivation for those in power [this is much weaker than the first, I think--can be thought of as a 'legitimation', in fact. for the 'national interest' is naught but ideology, surely]
(65): and thus, key: he is going to argue we must think of this as a "partnership between two different, separate forces, linked to each other by many threads, yet each having its own separate sphere of concerns" [this loses so much of the force, really--no conception of the inequality and the deep differences between the two institutions. the State is much more dependent on the capitalist class, than the other way around, surely? unless we are thinking of a State which owns sources of surplus? and is even that sufficient? quite confusing formulation, i think]
(65): we have to find space between, in short, a 'class-reductionist' position and a 'state-reductionist' one. "I seek to avoid both forms...", in speaking of a partnership.
(66): Skocpol, and the State living 'for itself'
(67): mistakes of Statecraft are not evidence of 'fundamental disagreements' between the ruling class and the capitalist class [two examples: war in Vietnam, and Hitler's expansion]
claus offe, "structural problems of the capitalist state"
(106): principal take-home point. individual capitalist are limited in three dimensions (vis-a-vis larger capitalist rationality)
(106): principal take-home point. individual capitalist are limited in three dimensions (vis-a-vis larger capitalist rationality)
- competition amongst each other
- time-wise -- they are predisposed to think in the short-term
- politically, there may be interests of which they're unaware that are in the interests of the class, at-large
Thursday, March 11, 2010
nicos poulantzas, political power and social classes (1973)
part 1, section 1
(37): classes as the 'effect' of certain levels of structures
(37): 'political' vs. 'politics' -- distinction between 'juridico-political superstructure of the state" (which is the political), and 'political class practices' (political class struggle, or 'politics)
(38): historicism--which "makes superfluous the theoretical study of the structures of the political and of political practice" (Lukacs, Korsch--an 'over-politicization')
(40): towards anti-historicism--the political as that "crucial level in which the contradictions of a formation are condensed" (only this, he's arguing, allows you to appreciate the anti-historicist character of the argument that the political class struggle is the motive force of history)
(41): a la Lenin, the 'political class struggle' (or political practice) as the nodal point where contradictions are condensed
(42): political structures are the 'institutionalized power of the state' [as distinct from political practice, no?]
(44-45): state's specific function is to constitute 'the factor of cohesion' in a social formation (a 'complex unity'), with two implications:
(47): the problem of the overlapping of several modes of production in any concrete instance
(48): relating the state to the political class struggle demands relating the state to the 'ensemble of the levels of structures--to the articulation of instances that characterize a formation'
(49): the State as the official resume of society--the condensation or fusion of contradictions
(50): following Bukharin, State as 'regulator' -- maintaining conditions of production and conditions for the existence of the unity of a mode of production/formation
(53): the State and a 'twin role--corresponding to 'exploitation' and 'organization-cum-supervision'
(53): economic function, ideological function, political function
(53-54): in sum, two results
part 1, section 3
(99): power is 'constituted' in the field of class practices (i.e., not at the level of structures, but is an effect of the ensemble of these levels')
(102): 'power' cannot be enumerated at the level of structure (relations of production), but only at level of political class struggle
(104): rejecting class-for-itself/class-in-itself [why? interrogate]
(104): definition--power as capacity of a class to realize its specific objective interests
(107): important--a class can exist at the level of the class structure, without making itself felt in the political arena [it seems like in this case we will want to say they exist as a 'social force' but not politically -- though this is inconsistently the case in his argument, if it is the argument. the idea is fairly clear, though]
(108): ok--"power reveals relations not directly determined by the structure"
(111): important, needs interrogation--similarly, interests can only be related to the field of practices (not at the level of structures) [but in what sense can you have objective interests; this is where he introduces the 'near-side'/'far-side' stuff]
(112): class interests always relational
(112): 'objective', then, seems to refer to 'interests' once have abstracted away from 'ideology' and the way in which their represented by agents. it doesn't, though, mean that we understand them at the level of 'structure'--there can be no interests at this level, remember
(113): ok--'power relations' are determined 'in the last instance' by 'economic power'
(115): the 'relative autonomy' of the state is not due to the fact that the Stae has its own power, but because it constitutes 'power centers' (again, this function of unity/cohesion')
(116) state apparatus (personnel of the state) vs. state power (the social class or fraction of a class which holds power)
(117): not an 'instrumentalist' conception
(118): not zero-sum power--i.e., loss of power by the bourgeoisie does not mean gaining of power by the working-class
part 2, section 1
(124-125): we are not proceeding on the state/civil society schema, precisely because it abstracts from the 'class struggle' and hides real problems in the concept of separation
(128): important--the constituting of individuals as juridical-political individual citizens (which has 'real' and 'ideological' components)
(129): it is the separation of the direct producer from the means of production that produces the 'specific autonomy'
(130-131): at the level of the economic class struggle, the State has the effect of concealing the fact of classes from individuals (it imposes isolation, individualization). this is what makes it possible for the State to be implicated in the constitution of classes, at the level of the political class struggle.
(133): the capitalist State relates to the socio-economic relations in the form in which they appear in their isolation, insofar as socio-economic relations are already class practices [but consider our objection, here]
(133-134): in sum, two functions
(137): again, in sum [rich passage, needs some unpacking]--in constituting class unity out of the isolation of the economic class struggle, the State serves the interests of the dominatn classes. it has to constitute their unity, first of all. but it also, ideologically, constitutes their particular interests as the interests of the whole--this is made necessary by the autonomy of the political class struggle, and made possible by the isolation of the dominant classes.
(137): hegemony as based in political practices, not structures
(138): we are not going to use 'hegemony' in the sense of 'legitimacy' in the eyes of the dominated classes
(140-141): rather, hegemony will have a two-fold meaning applied to the political practices of the dominant classes
(187-190): useful summary of the claims thus far
part 3, section 1
(190): capitalist state represents the political interests of the dominant classes, not their economic interests--it is the 'organizing agent'
(190-191): it can move against their immediate interests in the favor of the dominated classes, but only to secure the hegemony of the dominant
(191-192): crucial--the fact that the dominated classes can impose themselves, within limits, on the State, shows imply that the State presides over a society divided into classes (and functions not, then, as the simple tool of the dominant classes). it respects, though, these interests only to the extent that it can accommodate them into prolonged domination [there is an important question, then, about the institutionalization of these gains]
(193): explicit mention of the Welfare state, in this regard--making economic sacrifices in order to safeguard political power
part 3, section 4
(229): against a 'dualist' conception of the struggle between dominated and dominant
(230): point 1--the rule of a 'power bloc' is made possible/necessary by the nature of the capitalist state [unpack this--it doesn't seem terribly important to the larger argument, but worth understanding all the same]
(231): point 2--insofar as CMP is characterized by a plurality of dominant classes (citing landlords)
(232-233) point 3--the bourgeoisie appears as divided into fractions [the question, here, is along what lines it splits--due to competition (and thus as individuals), or due to circuits, etc.--he seems to imply the latter, but is this convincing?]
(234): definition of power bloc--contradictory unity of the politically dominant classes as related to the capitalist state
(237): hegemonic leadership within the power bloc
(239): summary of claims here--contradictory unity, and class struggle within power bloc
(243): the question of the 'supporting classes', who don't demand any real political sacrifices from the power bloc but offer their support primarily on the basis of 'ideological illusions' and also due to the fear of the power of the working class (specially the petty bourgeoisie). all this depends, he reminds us, on the state of political disorganization prevailing amongst these classes.
(247): political practice vs. political scene (parties, etc.) [which corresponds to form of state vs. form of regime, see 252--this is not a chronological distinction, though]
(250): discussing question of 'staffing' of the State, dealing with England through concept of hegemonic leadership and power bloc
(251): we need to be able to distinguish between 'party relations' and 'class relations', which is something that political science is not good at doing
part 4, section 1
(255): enumeration of the concept of 'unity', as it is peculiar to the capitalist state (due to the 'autonomized juridico-political superstructure')
(256): important--again, against the notion of the State as instrument--instead, a 'relative autonomy' viz-a-viz the power bloc and viz-a-viz allies/supports, which is unique to the Capitalist state.
(257): important, on two species of relative autonomy--to try and make all this explicit: the political class struggle has a 'relative autonomy' viz-a-viz the other instances; and the State, has relative autonomy viz-a-viz the dominant classes in this political class struggle (and, importantly, the latter fact 'reflects' the former) [unpack this, a bit]
(258): Bonapartism as a theoretical model of the capitalists state, when we abstract away from the historical story, there
(260): relative autonomy is not, at all, premised on some notion of equilibrium between the forces in the class struggle
part 4, section 2
(266): the 'ne0-liberal' theory of the State
(267-268): the institutionalist ('institutionalization of the class struggle')
(272): state socialist and Bismarckian illusions, premised on a notion that social forces are in equilibrium (and that the State form is foreshadowing the future--'planning', etc.) [return to text, if interested in his rebuttal]
(273): again, against instrumental theory of State monopoly capitalism
(274): again, the unique relation between the economic and political undergirds this theorization ('a new articulation of the economic and the political')
part 4, section 3
(275-277): again, useful summary section
(279): all this allows the State to function as the 'unambiguous' power of the dominant classes (how? follow the argument, now--this is where he begins to justify this claim, he's saying)
(282): key--it is precisely through the relative autonomy of the State that the State upholds the political interests of the politically dominant classes (he is noting some confusion about multiple uses of the term autonomy--both autonomy of political from economic, and of the State from the political). he is saying that unity is a condition of possibility for this autonomy--but isn't what he's actually arguing the other way around? that political unity is only possible if the State has relative autonomy.
(284): key--and this is the answer to why that's the case, again, which is specific to CMP
(287): again, we are not talking about those instances of relative autonomy that arise from 'equilibrium' in the class struggle' (this is something much more regular) [this does elide the question of what happens at those moments to the State--but one would think he would turn to Lenin and the constitution of a 'dual State', for answers]
(287-288): more summary--how does relative autonomy follow?
(289): the question of equilibrium resulting from social forces--not much said, but just distinguishing it from the stable formulation of the concept of autonomy
(291): aspiration to legitimacy in the State's presentation of itself as representative of people-nation
(294): 'totalitarianism' is not actually that distinct from 'unambiguous class power in the capitalist state'
part 4, section 4
(298): again, bourgeoisie as a 'uniquely fractured class', which has its origins at the level of the actual relations of production [here we have a quote that suggests a competition-centered interpretation of this fact]
(299): State as 'political organizer' of the power bloc, precisely because individual parties and its fractions are unable to do so ['only because', he is saying--worth interrogation, because of its 'functionalist' implications]
(300): the State, remember, doesn't confront a politically unified dominant class--it is the agent of this unification
(303): question of separation of powers
part 1, section 1
(37): classes as the 'effect' of certain levels of structures
(37): 'political' vs. 'politics' -- distinction between 'juridico-political superstructure of the state" (which is the political), and 'political class practices' (political class struggle, or 'politics)
(38): historicism--which "makes superfluous the theoretical study of the structures of the political and of political practice" (Lukacs, Korsch--an 'over-politicization')
(40): towards anti-historicism--the political as that "crucial level in which the contradictions of a formation are condensed" (only this, he's arguing, allows you to appreciate the anti-historicist character of the argument that the political class struggle is the motive force of history)
(41): a la Lenin, the 'political class struggle' (or political practice) as the nodal point where contradictions are condensed
(42): political structures are the 'institutionalized power of the state' [as distinct from political practice, no?]
(44-45): state's specific function is to constitute 'the factor of cohesion' in a social formation (a 'complex unity'), with two implications:
- equilibrium is not given by the economic, but has to be maintained at the level of the political
- transformation can only unfold at the level of 'political practice'
(47): the problem of the overlapping of several modes of production in any concrete instance
(48): relating the state to the political class struggle demands relating the state to the 'ensemble of the levels of structures--to the articulation of instances that characterize a formation'
(49): the State as the official resume of society--the condensation or fusion of contradictions
(50): following Bukharin, State as 'regulator' -- maintaining conditions of production and conditions for the existence of the unity of a mode of production/formation
(53): the State and a 'twin role--corresponding to 'exploitation' and 'organization-cum-supervision'
(53): economic function, ideological function, political function
(53-54): in sum, two results
- State's 'global role' as cohesive factor unfolds in particular modalities (economic, ideological, and political'
- State's functions can be grapsed only their interrelation (and their role in 'political class conflict') [i.e., not just directly political, but also generally political]
part 1, section 3
(99): power is 'constituted' in the field of class practices (i.e., not at the level of structures, but is an effect of the ensemble of these levels')
(102): 'power' cannot be enumerated at the level of structure (relations of production), but only at level of political class struggle
(104): rejecting class-for-itself/class-in-itself [why? interrogate]
(104): definition--power as capacity of a class to realize its specific objective interests
(107): important--a class can exist at the level of the class structure, without making itself felt in the political arena [it seems like in this case we will want to say they exist as a 'social force' but not politically -- though this is inconsistently the case in his argument, if it is the argument. the idea is fairly clear, though]
(108): ok--"power reveals relations not directly determined by the structure"
(111): important, needs interrogation--similarly, interests can only be related to the field of practices (not at the level of structures) [but in what sense can you have objective interests; this is where he introduces the 'near-side'/'far-side' stuff]
(112): class interests always relational
(112): 'objective', then, seems to refer to 'interests' once have abstracted away from 'ideology' and the way in which their represented by agents. it doesn't, though, mean that we understand them at the level of 'structure'--there can be no interests at this level, remember
(113): ok--'power relations' are determined 'in the last instance' by 'economic power'
(115): the 'relative autonomy' of the state is not due to the fact that the Stae has its own power, but because it constitutes 'power centers' (again, this function of unity/cohesion')
(116) state apparatus (personnel of the state) vs. state power (the social class or fraction of a class which holds power)
(117): not an 'instrumentalist' conception
(118): not zero-sum power--i.e., loss of power by the bourgeoisie does not mean gaining of power by the working-class
part 2, section 1
(124-125): we are not proceeding on the state/civil society schema, precisely because it abstracts from the 'class struggle' and hides real problems in the concept of separation
(128): important--the constituting of individuals as juridical-political individual citizens (which has 'real' and 'ideological' components)
(129): it is the separation of the direct producer from the means of production that produces the 'specific autonomy'
(130-131): at the level of the economic class struggle, the State has the effect of concealing the fact of classes from individuals (it imposes isolation, individualization). this is what makes it possible for the State to be implicated in the constitution of classes, at the level of the political class struggle.
(133): the capitalist State relates to the socio-economic relations in the form in which they appear in their isolation, insofar as socio-economic relations are already class practices [but consider our objection, here]
(133-134): in sum, two functions
- sets up agents of production so as to produce the effect of isolation
- represent the unity of the isolated relations (the "unity of an isolation" which is "largely its own effect")
(137): again, in sum [rich passage, needs some unpacking]--in constituting class unity out of the isolation of the economic class struggle, the State serves the interests of the dominatn classes. it has to constitute their unity, first of all. but it also, ideologically, constitutes their particular interests as the interests of the whole--this is made necessary by the autonomy of the political class struggle, and made possible by the isolation of the dominant classes.
(137): hegemony as based in political practices, not structures
(138): we are not going to use 'hegemony' in the sense of 'legitimacy' in the eyes of the dominated classes
(140-141): rather, hegemony will have a two-fold meaning applied to the political practices of the dominant classes
- so, as they constitute themselves as the 'general interest'
- also, though, to talk about the dominant role within the dominant classes (the leadership of the power bloc'
(187-190): useful summary of the claims thus far
- CMP has specific autonomy of instances
- state is the cohesive factor in the unity of a formation, which has several functions (economic, ideological, political) which are condensed in its strictly political function--"its function in relation to the field of the political class struggle"
- the State 'determines' the class struggle, but only in the sense that it unfolds within limits set by it--additionally, the political class struggle redounds on the State, too [sense that he is trying to make sense of the Welfare State, social democracy, etc.]
- for the dominated classes, the function of the capitalist state is to prevent their political organization which would overcome their economic isolation (an isolation which is partly produced by the state). for this the ideological role is critical, but obviously other functions have their place, too [the political-repressive, presumably].
- for the dominant classes, the capitalist state is "permanently working otheir organization" by cancelling out their economic isolation (which is also the effect of the State and the 'ideological'--how so? this needs unpacking)
part 3, section 1
(190): capitalist state represents the political interests of the dominant classes, not their economic interests--it is the 'organizing agent'
(190-191): it can move against their immediate interests in the favor of the dominated classes, but only to secure the hegemony of the dominant
(191-192): crucial--the fact that the dominated classes can impose themselves, within limits, on the State, shows imply that the State presides over a society divided into classes (and functions not, then, as the simple tool of the dominant classes). it respects, though, these interests only to the extent that it can accommodate them into prolonged domination [there is an important question, then, about the institutionalization of these gains]
(193): explicit mention of the Welfare state, in this regard--making economic sacrifices in order to safeguard political power
part 3, section 4
(229): against a 'dualist' conception of the struggle between dominated and dominant
(230): point 1--the rule of a 'power bloc' is made possible/necessary by the nature of the capitalist state [unpack this--it doesn't seem terribly important to the larger argument, but worth understanding all the same]
(231): point 2--insofar as CMP is characterized by a plurality of dominant classes (citing landlords)
(232-233) point 3--the bourgeoisie appears as divided into fractions [the question, here, is along what lines it splits--due to competition (and thus as individuals), or due to circuits, etc.--he seems to imply the latter, but is this convincing?]
(234): definition of power bloc--contradictory unity of the politically dominant classes as related to the capitalist state
(237): hegemonic leadership within the power bloc
(239): summary of claims here--contradictory unity, and class struggle within power bloc
(243): the question of the 'supporting classes', who don't demand any real political sacrifices from the power bloc but offer their support primarily on the basis of 'ideological illusions' and also due to the fear of the power of the working class (specially the petty bourgeoisie). all this depends, he reminds us, on the state of political disorganization prevailing amongst these classes.
(247): political practice vs. political scene (parties, etc.) [which corresponds to form of state vs. form of regime, see 252--this is not a chronological distinction, though]
(250): discussing question of 'staffing' of the State, dealing with England through concept of hegemonic leadership and power bloc
(251): we need to be able to distinguish between 'party relations' and 'class relations', which is something that political science is not good at doing
part 4, section 1
(255): enumeration of the concept of 'unity', as it is peculiar to the capitalist state (due to the 'autonomized juridico-political superstructure')
(256): important--again, against the notion of the State as instrument--instead, a 'relative autonomy' viz-a-viz the power bloc and viz-a-viz allies/supports, which is unique to the Capitalist state.
(257): important, on two species of relative autonomy--to try and make all this explicit: the political class struggle has a 'relative autonomy' viz-a-viz the other instances; and the State, has relative autonomy viz-a-viz the dominant classes in this political class struggle (and, importantly, the latter fact 'reflects' the former) [unpack this, a bit]
(258): Bonapartism as a theoretical model of the capitalists state, when we abstract away from the historical story, there
(260): relative autonomy is not, at all, premised on some notion of equilibrium between the forces in the class struggle
part 4, section 2
(266): the 'ne0-liberal' theory of the State
(267-268): the institutionalist ('institutionalization of the class struggle')
(272): state socialist and Bismarckian illusions, premised on a notion that social forces are in equilibrium (and that the State form is foreshadowing the future--'planning', etc.) [return to text, if interested in his rebuttal]
(273): again, against instrumental theory of State monopoly capitalism
(274): again, the unique relation between the economic and political undergirds this theorization ('a new articulation of the economic and the political')
part 4, section 3
(275-277): again, useful summary section
- the autonomization of the political class struggle viz-a-viz the relations of production, owing to the unique nature of capitalism. this induces isolation in the agents of production, despite a socialization of the labor-process. the effect of this is to conceal class rleations from the agents, for all classes. this fact of the 'isolated' economic class struggle is precisely why the political class struggle is of such importance.
- as well we have to consider other isolated classes in the social formation (they are overdetermined in their isolation by the state effects, in addition to what it already means to be a peasant or petty-bourgeois in the CMP)
- state presents itself as the public unity of society--it represents the 'people nation', the 'poltical unity' of an 'economic isolation' which is its own effect'.
- this is an ideological function, which is to occlude the class structure. (of course, this isn't the only function of the State's juridico-political superstitious--it also has 'real' effects)
(279): all this allows the State to function as the 'unambiguous' power of the dominant classes (how? follow the argument, now--this is where he begins to justify this claim, he's saying)
(282): key--it is precisely through the relative autonomy of the State that the State upholds the political interests of the politically dominant classes (he is noting some confusion about multiple uses of the term autonomy--both autonomy of political from economic, and of the State from the political). he is saying that unity is a condition of possibility for this autonomy--but isn't what he's actually arguing the other way around? that political unity is only possible if the State has relative autonomy.
(284): key--and this is the answer to why that's the case, again, which is specific to CMP
- because the bourgeoisie is incapable of raising itself to the level of internal unity
- because of the bourgeoisie's struggle with the dominanted classes, against whom it finds it difficult to realize political hegemony
(287): again, we are not talking about those instances of relative autonomy that arise from 'equilibrium' in the class struggle' (this is something much more regular) [this does elide the question of what happens at those moments to the State--but one would think he would turn to Lenin and the constitution of a 'dual State', for answers]
(287-288): more summary--how does relative autonomy follow?
- because of the isolation of the bourgeois calss, who can't raise themselves to the level of unity. the State must organize class domination
- it must function to politically disorganize the working class, by presenting itself as the representative of the 'people-nation'
- its important role viz-a-viz supporting classes.
(289): the question of equilibrium resulting from social forces--not much said, but just distinguishing it from the stable formulation of the concept of autonomy
(291): aspiration to legitimacy in the State's presentation of itself as representative of people-nation
(294): 'totalitarianism' is not actually that distinct from 'unambiguous class power in the capitalist state'
part 4, section 4
(298): again, bourgeoisie as a 'uniquely fractured class', which has its origins at the level of the actual relations of production [here we have a quote that suggests a competition-centered interpretation of this fact]
(299): State as 'political organizer' of the power bloc, precisely because individual parties and its fractions are unable to do so ['only because', he is saying--worth interrogation, because of its 'functionalist' implications]
(300): the State, remember, doesn't confront a politically unified dominant class--it is the agent of this unification
(303): question of separation of powers
Monday, February 22, 2010
ching kwan lee, 'chambishi rising'
chinese as 'new imperialists' -- only rhetorical impotance, analytically thin
'chambishi is of strategic importance for the Chinese
---
the reason colonialism is not the most productive way to look at China-Africa, she's arguing, has to do with where it focuses our attention (trade statistics, investment, etc.)
these statistics are true--they are true, but they don't suggest a real question
capital is not investment/trade numbers. it is a 'social relation', a process (not 'figures'). so to understand this we need to ask what kind of capitalism are the chinese implementing (both at home and abroad). it is the peculiarity of chinese capitalism that is interesting.
---
we want to think in terms of mechanisms and limits of domination. (the question is not 'capitalism'/socialism; but how we embed the market in social relations-hmph).
we need to understand what the limits are to the kind of capitalism the chinese are pursuing.
---
if you want to make profit, then, the first question is how you control/manage labor? but the chinese encounter distinct additional questions, in this attempt--they cannot simply repeat what the brits were doing, we live in a postcolonial age. but we also live in a post-fordist era, meaning they can't 'buy off' their working class [but what are the parameters of this position?]. they can also not lay claim to hegemony on the basis of universal values, due to the insistence on chinese uniqueness.
the question, in sum, is what is distinctly chinese about this investment?
---
in fieldwork: the number one problem for chinese investors self-reported as labor.
---
why zambia? not because it represents africa; but because, for two reasons, it's a critical case: (1) one of china's closest allies in the continent (independence in '63; '68 -'72, china built railroad that helped it escape white dependence for export of copper). if china has problems here, then, they'll have more problems everywhere else. (2) chambishi is supposed to be the heart of a cross-africa railroad; and, more generally, very central strategically (first of five chinese-owned special economic zone, on a 99-year lease with the promise to bring manufacture--including the value-added part of the copper process)
---
burawoy--writing about the problem of 'zambianization', which was the question of replacing white managers with zambians (british multinationals).
(1) today, however, the problem is not the question of who owns the mine (as perceived by whom? by miners)--zambians have gone through failed nationalization, without improvement of life. followed by IMF-led privatization.
today you have 7 major companies -- the nationality of capital doesn't really matter. what we want is decent pay and decent welfare. they are very aware of class question; national question is no longer the issue. [how strong is the old claim, though?]
less, here, a race to the bottom. competition amongst the seven firms have forced the chinese to lift up the wage levels and welfare benefits. internationalization has produced its own effect.
---
(2) another thing that separates this from Burawoy's work from 40 yrs ago is 'casualization' --liberalization of labor law, no mandate on welfare provision. this has a very profound influence on labor politics; you have to go outside the domain of production to understand labor politics (chinese are not afraid of labor unions; but, rather, wildcat strikes and protests by those who are unemployed/casualized/informal). de-institutionalization of labor politics.
---
against current media presentation, chinese interest in Africa has a lot to do with what is going on inside China. first, the danger of enormous reserves and overcapacity; hyperinflation is looming, real estate prices have gone through the roof. an intense need to find new outlets for chinese capital. Africa allows a release of surplus; 'export of capital'. secondly, of course, there is a real need to guarantee the source of raw materials, particularly in a place where the West has not been as dominant. (and let's not forget, Chinese presence in Africa is not new; an anticolonial bond; China and the Bandung Conference. China is looked at as an alternative; this is particularly how china pitches itself, as a 'model'. this is part, she's arguing, of the hegemonic influence on workers, as well).
---
chinese regime of production
1. creating a chinese-owned economic space: aiming at 60 firms; 6,000 zambian workers, 1,000 chinese. chinese have a 25-year tax holiday, from when they first declare profit. the zambian government is concentrating on this as a source of employment for their voters. they care more about votes, than taxation. also, residential segregation--the 'china houses' are highly regimented/regulated; they have very long work schedules, are controlled as if they were workers. the local Zambian bourgeoisie also like having chinese there--attendant benefits. (crux of her argument is that this is not just a 'space of domination'.
2. zambian time, chinese time: q. of working hard like the chinese.
3. race and 'multi-national capital': after the failure of 'zambianization', race understood differently.
4. collective bargaining and wildcat strikes: 'casualization' is on the table--over the past ten years, the chinese have tremendously improved the conditions of service (in the beginning, they had the largest number of casualized workers; now they have been compelled to change this. conceded on company medical insurance, too). the union's strategy is to encourage wildcat strikes, which are joined by the wives of miners. a very important strategy.
5. managers of state capitalism: most resistant to fieldwork; who are they? many of these have gone through the reform period at home; having rejected state-owned enterprise of the maoist sort, they are totally committed to the mission of capitalism. these managers are effective conduits of chinese capitalism. one vulnerability, though, is that they are responsible for the image of the Chinese gov't. not just tasked with making profit. there is a logic, perhaps, beyond profit-making.
---
chambishi story, in sum
(1) diachronic--chinese concession and expansion
(2) synchronic--elements of a chinese regime fo production
(3) inadequacy of Marxian theory of production (?) -- polanyi's counter-movement; perhaps Bourdieu and notion of 'symbolic capital', perhaps post-colonial notion of difference?
chinese as 'new imperialists' -- only rhetorical impotance, analytically thin
'chambishi is of strategic importance for the Chinese
---
the reason colonialism is not the most productive way to look at China-Africa, she's arguing, has to do with where it focuses our attention (trade statistics, investment, etc.)
these statistics are true--they are true, but they don't suggest a real question
capital is not investment/trade numbers. it is a 'social relation', a process (not 'figures'). so to understand this we need to ask what kind of capitalism are the chinese implementing (both at home and abroad). it is the peculiarity of chinese capitalism that is interesting.
---
we want to think in terms of mechanisms and limits of domination. (the question is not 'capitalism'/socialism; but how we embed the market in social relations-hmph).
we need to understand what the limits are to the kind of capitalism the chinese are pursuing.
---
if you want to make profit, then, the first question is how you control/manage labor? but the chinese encounter distinct additional questions, in this attempt--they cannot simply repeat what the brits were doing, we live in a postcolonial age. but we also live in a post-fordist era, meaning they can't 'buy off' their working class [but what are the parameters of this position?]. they can also not lay claim to hegemony on the basis of universal values, due to the insistence on chinese uniqueness.
the question, in sum, is what is distinctly chinese about this investment?
---
in fieldwork: the number one problem for chinese investors self-reported as labor.
---
why zambia? not because it represents africa; but because, for two reasons, it's a critical case: (1) one of china's closest allies in the continent (independence in '63; '68 -'72, china built railroad that helped it escape white dependence for export of copper). if china has problems here, then, they'll have more problems everywhere else. (2) chambishi is supposed to be the heart of a cross-africa railroad; and, more generally, very central strategically (first of five chinese-owned special economic zone, on a 99-year lease with the promise to bring manufacture--including the value-added part of the copper process)
---
burawoy--writing about the problem of 'zambianization', which was the question of replacing white managers with zambians (british multinationals).
(1) today, however, the problem is not the question of who owns the mine (as perceived by whom? by miners)--zambians have gone through failed nationalization, without improvement of life. followed by IMF-led privatization.
today you have 7 major companies -- the nationality of capital doesn't really matter. what we want is decent pay and decent welfare. they are very aware of class question; national question is no longer the issue. [how strong is the old claim, though?]
less, here, a race to the bottom. competition amongst the seven firms have forced the chinese to lift up the wage levels and welfare benefits. internationalization has produced its own effect.
---
(2) another thing that separates this from Burawoy's work from 40 yrs ago is 'casualization' --liberalization of labor law, no mandate on welfare provision. this has a very profound influence on labor politics; you have to go outside the domain of production to understand labor politics (chinese are not afraid of labor unions; but, rather, wildcat strikes and protests by those who are unemployed/casualized/informal). de-institutionalization of labor politics.
---
against current media presentation, chinese interest in Africa has a lot to do with what is going on inside China. first, the danger of enormous reserves and overcapacity; hyperinflation is looming, real estate prices have gone through the roof. an intense need to find new outlets for chinese capital. Africa allows a release of surplus; 'export of capital'. secondly, of course, there is a real need to guarantee the source of raw materials, particularly in a place where the West has not been as dominant. (and let's not forget, Chinese presence in Africa is not new; an anticolonial bond; China and the Bandung Conference. China is looked at as an alternative; this is particularly how china pitches itself, as a 'model'. this is part, she's arguing, of the hegemonic influence on workers, as well).
---
chinese regime of production
1. creating a chinese-owned economic space: aiming at 60 firms; 6,000 zambian workers, 1,000 chinese. chinese have a 25-year tax holiday, from when they first declare profit. the zambian government is concentrating on this as a source of employment for their voters. they care more about votes, than taxation. also, residential segregation--the 'china houses' are highly regimented/regulated; they have very long work schedules, are controlled as if they were workers. the local Zambian bourgeoisie also like having chinese there--attendant benefits. (crux of her argument is that this is not just a 'space of domination'.
2. zambian time, chinese time: q. of working hard like the chinese.
3. race and 'multi-national capital': after the failure of 'zambianization', race understood differently.
4. collective bargaining and wildcat strikes: 'casualization' is on the table--over the past ten years, the chinese have tremendously improved the conditions of service (in the beginning, they had the largest number of casualized workers; now they have been compelled to change this. conceded on company medical insurance, too). the union's strategy is to encourage wildcat strikes, which are joined by the wives of miners. a very important strategy.
5. managers of state capitalism: most resistant to fieldwork; who are they? many of these have gone through the reform period at home; having rejected state-owned enterprise of the maoist sort, they are totally committed to the mission of capitalism. these managers are effective conduits of chinese capitalism. one vulnerability, though, is that they are responsible for the image of the Chinese gov't. not just tasked with making profit. there is a logic, perhaps, beyond profit-making.
---
chambishi story, in sum
(1) diachronic--chinese concession and expansion
(2) synchronic--elements of a chinese regime fo production
(3) inadequacy of Marxian theory of production (?) -- polanyi's counter-movement; perhaps Bourdieu and notion of 'symbolic capital', perhaps post-colonial notion of difference?
Thursday, February 18, 2010
harry braverman, labor and monopoly capital
Introduction
(10): intermediate classes discussed in the Second International--but abortive
(11): labor movement's critique of capitalism as a mode of production became a critique of capitalism as a mode of distribution
(16): insistence that machine/technology is embedded in social relations
(19): the growth of the forces of production within a mode of production (i.e., the growth of potential forces of production--for the next mode of production, within antiquated forms--industrial capitalism "gives us" electric power, internal combustion engine, atomic power)
(20): technology does not produce social relations, but is produced by social relations represented by capitalism.
(23): Khruschev ridiculing Chinese industrialization as 'eating soup with an awl'
(26): new/old working class confusion -- everything, in some sense, is 'new' as an occupation, in other words, because the labor process has--always--been in flux
(27): this book is about the working class as a class in itself, not a class for itself
(29-30): three expressions of class consciousness
Chapter 2
(51): labor-power critically important--won't necessarily look like this to the master of laborers. but for the individuals who allocate their own labor, this is of critical importance (and this is where, he's suggesting, the labor theory of value begins)
(52): emphatically not Smithian--three conditions of capitalist production
(55-56): the essential distinction between human and animal labor is the infinite malleability of the former; example of the ox (who lacks the many-sided potentiality of the human)
(57): labor process has become the responsibility of the capitalist
(58): capitalist, thus, strives to take control--this presents itself, to us, as the problem of management.
(60-63): from "timid" to "avid" capitalists--they avoid taking control, at first. but eventually, the potential benefits are simply too great (controlling/moulding the labor process--this is, also, a precondition for rapid technological change)
(66): absolute surplus value, and habituation (association of early industry with prisons, workhouses, and orphanages)
Chapter 3
(72): distinction between the social division of labor and the division of labor in detail
(74): the stupidity of Durkheim (thank you!)
(80): Babbage's innovation--dividing the craft cheapens the laborers you are hiring; decreases the value of labor-power
(82): the capitalist mode of production systematically destroys skills where they exist--bringing into existence skills that correspond to its needs. the end of the generalized distribution of knowledge about the production process.
Chapter 4
(90): Taylor is not someone who was seeking the best way to do work in general, but the best way to manage alienated labor (labor power that is bought and sold).
(98): natural soldiering (laziness) and systematic soldiering. Taylor saw himself as up against the latter.
(100): the conclusion Taylor drew was simple--so long as workers control the labor proceess, capital cannot realize the full potential inherent in their labor power.
(107): and this is the pivot on which management turns--the control over the decisions that are made in the course of work no longer belong to the worker.
(113, 119): three principles of scientific management:
Chapter 5
(126): separation of hand and brain is the most decisive step, again (socially, of course, their unity still exists; but not individually, in the labor process as experienced by the worker)
(129-130): the influx of laborers from ruined agriculture, the advent of new industries which require some skill training -- all this can obscure a long-term, secular trend toward the incessant lowering of working-class skills.
(132): craftsman traditional repository of technical knowledge of the production process
Chapter 6
(146-149): the way in which the worker is habituated to the capitalist mode of production is not through manipulation or cajolery, but through socioeconomic forces--the capitalist mode of production destroys all other forms of organization of labor, and thus eliminates all alternatives for the working population.
PART TWO
Chapter 7
(156): science, like labor, has been turned into capitalist property [question, here, of the role of the State?]
(166): the distinctiveness of the scientific-technical revolution, the systematic application of science to the labor process (which really takes off in the last quarter of the nineteenth century)
(169): initially, it is the organization of labor that changes. next, it is the instruments of labor that are revolutionized. to the question of how this happens, though, there is no unitary answer (it is open to history, we might say)
(171): and this, then, coincides with a systematic attack on the unity of thought and action in the labor process. this signals its total destruction, in a sense. [there is an important point about technology being both an effect and a cause of the separation of planning and execution, here]
(172): he is arguing, though, that this is an ideal that is only realized within definite limits [the question is what are these limits, and how can they be established]
(179-180): worker is seen as a machine from the perspective of capital, which is the animating principle of this method of labor organization (of this mode of production)
(182): moving, in a sense, towards abstract labor stripped of all its concreteness
(184): two approaches--the engineering approach, which abstracts from social relations, and the social approach, which views technology as situated in social relations.
(185): we must look at technology as it affects the labor process.
(188): the key element in the development of machinery is not size, speed, etc., but the manner in which its operations are controlled (and thus, of course, what this spells for workers and the labor process)
(190-191): trends in machine development -- from universal to specific to universal functions again?
(193): excellently put--machinery presents us with the possibility of human control over the labor process. but this is nothing but an abstraction, as humans is not explicated in the concrete social setting in which we find ourselves. what it really means is that the mass of humanity is subjected to the labor process, rather than it being set to serve the interests of humanity in general [well expressed, here]
(195): machinery offers management a mechanical means of doing what it might be unable to do through organization or discipline -- take effective control of the labor process.
(199): revolutionary effects of 'numerical control'
(203): price ratio is 12 (old) to 1 (new)
(206): the pursuit of the increased productivity of labor, under capitalism, becomes "generalized social insanity"
(208): in this relentless pursuit of productivity without reference to human need, we have the reductio ad absurdum of capitalist inneficiency.
(212): the crux, again -- machinery enabling control of the labor process, from outside.
(216, 218-219): very interesting tables about levels of control (17!)
(227): dead labor and living labor
(229): it has become fashionable to attribute powers to machine, where we ought to be speaking of social relations
(230): in reality, machines also present us the possibility of eliminating drudgery for all (and a commensurate sharing of the remaining boring tasks) -- this is a classic presentation of forces/social relations contradicton
(237): value of labor power/machine implementation discussion --some interrogation needed, here, of his earlier argument and the preconditions for it.
Introduction
(10): intermediate classes discussed in the Second International--but abortive
(11): labor movement's critique of capitalism as a mode of production became a critique of capitalism as a mode of distribution
(16): insistence that machine/technology is embedded in social relations
(19): the growth of the forces of production within a mode of production (i.e., the growth of potential forces of production--for the next mode of production, within antiquated forms--industrial capitalism "gives us" electric power, internal combustion engine, atomic power)
(20): technology does not produce social relations, but is produced by social relations represented by capitalism.
(23): Khruschev ridiculing Chinese industrialization as 'eating soup with an awl'
(26): new/old working class confusion -- everything, in some sense, is 'new' as an occupation, in other words, because the labor process has--always--been in flux
(27): this book is about the working class as a class in itself, not a class for itself
(29-30): three expressions of class consciousness
- absolute expression -- pervasive durable attitude
- long-term relative expression -- slowly changing traditions, organization
- short-term relative expression -- dynamic complex of moods and sentiments
Chapter 2
(51): labor-power critically important--won't necessarily look like this to the master of laborers. but for the individuals who allocate their own labor, this is of critical importance (and this is where, he's suggesting, the labor theory of value begins)
(52): emphatically not Smithian--three conditions of capitalist production
- workers separated from the means of production, can only gain access to them by selling labor-power
- workers freed of legal constraints that prevent them from disposing of their labor power
- purpose of employment is the expansion of capital
(55-56): the essential distinction between human and animal labor is the infinite malleability of the former; example of the ox (who lacks the many-sided potentiality of the human)
(57): labor process has become the responsibility of the capitalist
(58): capitalist, thus, strives to take control--this presents itself, to us, as the problem of management.
(60-63): from "timid" to "avid" capitalists--they avoid taking control, at first. but eventually, the potential benefits are simply too great (controlling/moulding the labor process--this is, also, a precondition for rapid technological change)
(66): absolute surplus value, and habituation (association of early industry with prisons, workhouses, and orphanages)
Chapter 3
(72): distinction between the social division of labor and the division of labor in detail
(74): the stupidity of Durkheim (thank you!)
(80): Babbage's innovation--dividing the craft cheapens the laborers you are hiring; decreases the value of labor-power
(82): the capitalist mode of production systematically destroys skills where they exist--bringing into existence skills that correspond to its needs. the end of the generalized distribution of knowledge about the production process.
Chapter 4
(90): Taylor is not someone who was seeking the best way to do work in general, but the best way to manage alienated labor (labor power that is bought and sold).
(98): natural soldiering (laziness) and systematic soldiering. Taylor saw himself as up against the latter.
(100): the conclusion Taylor drew was simple--so long as workers control the labor proceess, capital cannot realize the full potential inherent in their labor power.
(107): and this is the pivot on which management turns--the control over the decisions that are made in the course of work no longer belong to the worker.
(113, 119): three principles of scientific management:
- dissociation of the labor process from the skills of workers--it should be planned not according to craft or other principles
- separation of conception from execution
- use of the monopoly over knowledge of the labor process to control each step
Chapter 5
(126): separation of hand and brain is the most decisive step, again (socially, of course, their unity still exists; but not individually, in the labor process as experienced by the worker)
(129-130): the influx of laborers from ruined agriculture, the advent of new industries which require some skill training -- all this can obscure a long-term, secular trend toward the incessant lowering of working-class skills.
(132): craftsman traditional repository of technical knowledge of the production process
Chapter 6
(146-149): the way in which the worker is habituated to the capitalist mode of production is not through manipulation or cajolery, but through socioeconomic forces--the capitalist mode of production destroys all other forms of organization of labor, and thus eliminates all alternatives for the working population.
PART TWO
Chapter 7
(156): science, like labor, has been turned into capitalist property [question, here, of the role of the State?]
(166): the distinctiveness of the scientific-technical revolution, the systematic application of science to the labor process (which really takes off in the last quarter of the nineteenth century)
(169): initially, it is the organization of labor that changes. next, it is the instruments of labor that are revolutionized. to the question of how this happens, though, there is no unitary answer (it is open to history, we might say)
(171): and this, then, coincides with a systematic attack on the unity of thought and action in the labor process. this signals its total destruction, in a sense. [there is an important point about technology being both an effect and a cause of the separation of planning and execution, here]
(172): he is arguing, though, that this is an ideal that is only realized within definite limits [the question is what are these limits, and how can they be established]
(179-180): worker is seen as a machine from the perspective of capital, which is the animating principle of this method of labor organization (of this mode of production)
(182): moving, in a sense, towards abstract labor stripped of all its concreteness
(184): two approaches--the engineering approach, which abstracts from social relations, and the social approach, which views technology as situated in social relations.
(185): we must look at technology as it affects the labor process.
(188): the key element in the development of machinery is not size, speed, etc., but the manner in which its operations are controlled (and thus, of course, what this spells for workers and the labor process)
(190-191): trends in machine development -- from universal to specific to universal functions again?
(193): excellently put--machinery presents us with the possibility of human control over the labor process. but this is nothing but an abstraction, as humans is not explicated in the concrete social setting in which we find ourselves. what it really means is that the mass of humanity is subjected to the labor process, rather than it being set to serve the interests of humanity in general [well expressed, here]
(195): machinery offers management a mechanical means of doing what it might be unable to do through organization or discipline -- take effective control of the labor process.
(199): revolutionary effects of 'numerical control'
(203): price ratio is 12 (old) to 1 (new)
(206): the pursuit of the increased productivity of labor, under capitalism, becomes "generalized social insanity"
(208): in this relentless pursuit of productivity without reference to human need, we have the reductio ad absurdum of capitalist inneficiency.
(212): the crux, again -- machinery enabling control of the labor process, from outside.
(216, 218-219): very interesting tables about levels of control (17!)
(227): dead labor and living labor
(229): it has become fashionable to attribute powers to machine, where we ought to be speaking of social relations
(230): in reality, machines also present us the possibility of eliminating drudgery for all (and a commensurate sharing of the remaining boring tasks) -- this is a classic presentation of forces/social relations contradicton
(237): value of labor power/machine implementation discussion --some interrogation needed, here, of his earlier argument and the preconditions for it.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
robert brenner, "from theory to history..." [critique of mann]
(189): ok, important but not really powerful--mann's account of the rise of europe is internally contradictory, because it violates his theoretical commitments [since it requires him to presuppose the socio-geographical unity of Europe, even as he's argued for anti-holism in his four forms of 'social power' model'--see 190, 200-201, 205]
(193): why do people sit at the bottom of these hierarchies, for Mann? because they are out-organized. this will come again, and is quite critical to understanding the faults in what he's peddling.
(194): summarizing Mann's argument, which appears here as hogwash, confused/overdetermined/disorganized (formally complex--actually meaningless)
(203): key--there's no account of the economic reproduction of the agents that operate the organizations he's outlining (which, means, then, that there is no account of how they're able to hold sway)
(205): here this point emerges, again, in Mann's treatment of diffused power vs. authoritative power (but this is confused, obviously) -- he retreats to simple 'out-organization'
(207): key--why do those at the top carry any bite--why are those at the top able to carry out their will, at all? [and Brenner has more than hinted at the resolution--these instruments of domination will have to be intimately related to the economic distribution of resources, which these four networks cannot explain, but must presuppose]
(210): "capitalist is a captain of industry because he is a capitalist, not vice versa..."
(211): Brenner's account of why the economic and the political were merged, in feudalism--which has to do with the predominance of 'political accumulation', of course. it could also be come at, from the opposite direction--any class with the means of domination, in hand, would obviosuly use that authority to pursue the conditions for materially reproducing itself.
(217): rules of reproduction--no incentive to innovate, due to immense costs of specialization (safety first)
(220-222): key point--unlike Mann's account and others', Brenner is asserting that the centralized state, in feudalism, does not emerge because of capitalist dynamics. it is emphatically feudal--it emerges due to the material requirements of lords, pursuing its construction. they were obliged to rely on extensive growth, which pit them against rival lords.
(222): neither was this led by a monarch, who proceeded without a political community. he needed lordly followers, since he depended on them for "counsel, administration, finance and military backing. "
(222): thus, feudalism exhibits both a Malthusian dynamic--and a unilineal dynamic to ever larger, more centralized states.
(226): again, it cannot be the simple pursuit of a social need that determines whether you will be successful in establishing a social network with you at its head--this is voluntarist hogwash, and confronts countless counterfactuals which it cannot explain away. you need some account of why certain people triumph over others.
(226-227): similarly, political power is not set up to fulfill political functions, "per se for themselves." one rather can only conceive of states being set up to fulfill the political needs of some already-existing group. [Mann himself recognizes this!
(227): the separation of the economic and the political, under capitalism, becomes possible when economic surplus extraction no longer depends on extra-economic coercion, but on the dull compulsion of the economic structure.
(228-229): key, why does the State not move against the capitalists?
(189): ok, important but not really powerful--mann's account of the rise of europe is internally contradictory, because it violates his theoretical commitments [since it requires him to presuppose the socio-geographical unity of Europe, even as he's argued for anti-holism in his four forms of 'social power' model'--see 190, 200-201, 205]
(193): why do people sit at the bottom of these hierarchies, for Mann? because they are out-organized. this will come again, and is quite critical to understanding the faults in what he's peddling.
(194): summarizing Mann's argument, which appears here as hogwash, confused/overdetermined/disorganized (formally complex--actually meaningless)
(203): key--there's no account of the economic reproduction of the agents that operate the organizations he's outlining (which, means, then, that there is no account of how they're able to hold sway)
(205): here this point emerges, again, in Mann's treatment of diffused power vs. authoritative power (but this is confused, obviously) -- he retreats to simple 'out-organization'
(207): key--why do those at the top carry any bite--why are those at the top able to carry out their will, at all? [and Brenner has more than hinted at the resolution--these instruments of domination will have to be intimately related to the economic distribution of resources, which these four networks cannot explain, but must presuppose]
(210): "capitalist is a captain of industry because he is a capitalist, not vice versa..."
(211): Brenner's account of why the economic and the political were merged, in feudalism--which has to do with the predominance of 'political accumulation', of course. it could also be come at, from the opposite direction--any class with the means of domination, in hand, would obviosuly use that authority to pursue the conditions for materially reproducing itself.
(217): rules of reproduction--no incentive to innovate, due to immense costs of specialization (safety first)
(220-222): key point--unlike Mann's account and others', Brenner is asserting that the centralized state, in feudalism, does not emerge because of capitalist dynamics. it is emphatically feudal--it emerges due to the material requirements of lords, pursuing its construction. they were obliged to rely on extensive growth, which pit them against rival lords.
(222): neither was this led by a monarch, who proceeded without a political community. he needed lordly followers, since he depended on them for "counsel, administration, finance and military backing. "
(222): thus, feudalism exhibits both a Malthusian dynamic--and a unilineal dynamic to ever larger, more centralized states.
(226): again, it cannot be the simple pursuit of a social need that determines whether you will be successful in establishing a social network with you at its head--this is voluntarist hogwash, and confronts countless counterfactuals which it cannot explain away. you need some account of why certain people triumph over others.
(226-227): similarly, political power is not set up to fulfill political functions, "per se for themselves." one rather can only conceive of states being set up to fulfill the political needs of some already-existing group. [Mann himself recognizes this!
(227): the separation of the economic and the political, under capitalism, becomes possible when economic surplus extraction no longer depends on extra-economic coercion, but on the dull compulsion of the economic structure.
(228-229): key, why does the State not move against the capitalists?
- historically, it only emerged with the rise of the capitalist class--they pursued a state which could defend their property rights without plundering them (winning of Parliament in 1688-1689)
- logically, the state--to pursue its own goals--needs dynamic economic growth, which means it needs vigorous capitalist accumulation. "only apparently autonomous, the state is dependent upon capital."
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
persistent inequalities, howard botwinick (1993)
chapter one
(7-8): positioning himself against neoclassicals, but also against radicals who see differential wages as produced by 'monopoly' or 'dual markets' [because, as he says, they accept the traditional theory of 'competitive wage determination'--"that wage differentials persist only when competition is restricted"]
(9): concerned with three dynamics that explain wage differentials [:
(11): wage differentials perfectly consistent with capitalist competition
(13): and certainly, wage differentials are not the result of individual differences in skill/quality (he is not saying this is unimportant--but these are decisively secondary, and do not explain what we are interested in)
(15): importance of 'class struggle'--both negative and positive, of course, depending on how it's waged
(16): arguing that class struggle, though, cannot lead to capitalist crisis (there are in-built mechanisms that 'check' this)
(17-18): two anomalies that radicals have been unable to solve, that we will now
(63): neoclassical assumptions, nature of their static abstraction
(69-70): 'historical' and 'moral' element to wages in Marx's theory; not an 'iron law of wages'
(73): excellent explosion of neoclassical position on labor supply -- because of uniqueness of labor power as a commodity, even when wages drop, laborers cannot exit the market.
(74): three dynamics go into law of accumulation:
(84): critique of Keynesian position on chronic unemployment [a functionalist retort?]
(89): again, iron law of wages in Marx? No, says Botwinick.
(92): post-crisis, an anticapitalist consciousness?
(93): Shaikh on crisis and rising organic composition of capital, post-WWII
chapter four--wage differentials
(94): again, wrt to wage differentials, we're looking to explain "systematic variation within limits."
(96-97): four basic forms of the reserve army
(100-101): important--a discussion of de-skilling does not obviate the continuous redifferentiation of workers, even if between increasingly narrow limits.
(102): craft unions, and industrial unions
(106-107): important discussion, citing Moody and Davis, of labor's co-option in the late 40s, early 50s (prohibition of solidarity strikes, etc., with taft-hartley)
(110): summary of observations on the 'wage level' -- that it cannot outstrip productivity growth, because of the effect that has on the rate of profit.
(111): labor mobility is not any longer an assumption, of course, because we have a reserve army. so there is no automatic 'upward pressure' on wage rates at the low end. there is, of course, downward pressure--the way in which this is effected will depend on three things:
(116): in sum--he is stating his argument, briefly and without complications:
chapter one
(7-8): positioning himself against neoclassicals, but also against radicals who see differential wages as produced by 'monopoly' or 'dual markets' [because, as he says, they accept the traditional theory of 'competitive wage determination'--"that wage differentials persist only when competition is restricted"]
(9): concerned with three dynamics that explain wage differentials [:
- capitalist competition and technical change;
- regeneration of a reserve army
- uneven efforts of organized workers to raise their wage rates within lmits
(11): wage differentials perfectly consistent with capitalist competition
(13): and certainly, wage differentials are not the result of individual differences in skill/quality (he is not saying this is unimportant--but these are decisively secondary, and do not explain what we are interested in)
(15): importance of 'class struggle'--both negative and positive, of course, depending on how it's waged
(16): arguing that class struggle, though, cannot lead to capitalist crisis (there are in-built mechanisms that 'check' this)
(17-18): two anomalies that radicals have been unable to solve, that we will now
- successful unionization and wage increases in the 'periphery'
- absence of segmentation in Europe
(63): neoclassical assumptions, nature of their static abstraction
- give endowment of capital and labor
- technology exogenously determined
- supply and demand of labor are autonomous and stationary entities
- perfect competition
- profit-maximizing behavior based on dininishing returns
(69-70): 'historical' and 'moral' element to wages in Marx's theory; not an 'iron law of wages'
(73): excellent explosion of neoclassical position on labor supply -- because of uniqueness of labor power as a commodity, even when wages drop, laborers cannot exit the market.
(74): three dynamics go into law of accumulation:
- changes in rate of accumulation--this is the critical, 'independent' variable, setting the limits
- changes in organic composition
- changes in labor force participation
- accumulation accelerates increased organic comp
- original capital also changes when additional capital changes, meaning extra workers are thrown out
- lowering rate of profit, dampening accumulation
(84): critique of Keynesian position on chronic unemployment [a functionalist retort?]
- reserve army provides capital with a critical mechanism
- provides capital with necessary flexibility
(89): again, iron law of wages in Marx? No, says Botwinick.
(92): post-crisis, an anticapitalist consciousness?
(93): Shaikh on crisis and rising organic composition of capital, post-WWII
chapter four--wage differentials
(94): again, wrt to wage differentials, we're looking to explain "systematic variation within limits."
(96-97): four basic forms of the reserve army
- floating--attached to centers of modern industry
- latent--on the verge of becoming proletariat
- stagnant--decaying branches of industry, etc.
- pauperism
(100-101): important--a discussion of de-skilling does not obviate the continuous redifferentiation of workers, even if between increasingly narrow limits.
(102): craft unions, and industrial unions
(106-107): important discussion, citing Moody and Davis, of labor's co-option in the late 40s, early 50s (prohibition of solidarity strikes, etc., with taft-hartley)
(110): summary of observations on the 'wage level' -- that it cannot outstrip productivity growth, because of the effect that has on the rate of profit.
(111): labor mobility is not any longer an assumption, of course, because we have a reserve army. so there is no automatic 'upward pressure' on wage rates at the low end. there is, of course, downward pressure--the way in which this is effected will depend on three things:
- level of militancy
- differential costs of training a new work force
- differential technical conditions of production
(116): in sum--he is stating his argument, briefly and without complications:
- between industry wage differentials--stagnant industries will be flooded with those that are adopting more capital-intensive techniques; in low-wage sectors, you see a race ot the bottom; the uneven development of technical change is exacerbated even further, because low-wage sectors have little incentive to pursue technical improvements
- within industry wage differentials--workers in more backward firms will find that they are being super-exploited to compete with more advanced firms. this is not just a featyure of the transition to handicraft/manufacture-industry.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
What’s wrong with this scheme? Several things. First, many small banks have more money than they can profitably invest locally. As Barbara Garson shows in her wonderful book, Money Makes the World Go Around, the portion of her book advance she deposited in tiny upstate New York bank was probably lent via the fed funds market to Chase, where it entered the global circuit of capital. This is not at all uncommon. Money is fungible, protean, and highly mobile even when it looks locally rooted. That very mutability is part of what makes money so valuable: it’s the ideal form of general wealth that can instantly be turned into caviar, lodging, Swedish massage, or shares of Google.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
claudio katz, from feudalism to capitalism
(85-86): distinction between early and late Marx on questions of merchants and transition to capitalism.
(88): here begins his reconstruction of the classic account. worthwhile.
(90-91, and 103): question--"artillery, ocean navigation and printing" were all innovations of the late medieval epoch. how do you fit this sort of dynamism into Brenner's "rules of reproduction"? presumably you can have technological innovation that doesn't imply a move toward capitalism--but the question is still what, exactly, is the incentive structure driving this. the crux of the Brennerian response, I think, would consist in arguing that there's no competition; but what if the feudal lords are unhappy with the goods being produced? if they're ineffective?
(96): in sum
(97-98): merchant incentive structure, laws of motion that impel them
(100 and 104): question, related to putting-out system--didn't this represent an advance, in terms of a classical definition of capitalism, over previous methods of production? or is this not germane?
(100): key point--merchant 'capitalism' flourishes outside prevailing mode of production--doesn't have any relationship to the method of production, only worries about circulation. capitalism must unite production and circulation. therefore it flourishes in precapitalism.
(101): question, how do you make sense of the acknowledged development of productive forces to which merchants contributed?
(102): feudal lords pitted against merchants as an intraclass rivalry over the surplus claimed from basic producers? but isn't there something else going on here? the question of the political revolution, for example?
(103, and 114, and 116): a parallel between merchants and capitalists, and lords and serfs--well, clear question is how we relate this class struggle to the rural class struggle. because, as explicated by Katz, the urban one seems more or less autonomous (until he concludes the opposite, without evidence, in the conclusion)
(104): merchants not interested in productive investments
(107): there is a question, here, regarding crises in general--in feudalism represent a 'contraction', rather than a breakthrough of the productive forces
(107): status of absolutism -- how do we think of this, if not like Anderson did? what is the place of the absolutist state in the larger narrative? if not as a transitional form, then what? another precapitalist form?
(108): distinction between 1300s and 1600s
(110): merchants make a feudal response to the crisis of the 1600s
(85-86): distinction between early and late Marx on questions of merchants and transition to capitalism.
(88): here begins his reconstruction of the classic account. worthwhile.
(90-91, and 103): question--"artillery, ocean navigation and printing" were all innovations of the late medieval epoch. how do you fit this sort of dynamism into Brenner's "rules of reproduction"? presumably you can have technological innovation that doesn't imply a move toward capitalism--but the question is still what, exactly, is the incentive structure driving this. the crux of the Brennerian response, I think, would consist in arguing that there's no competition; but what if the feudal lords are unhappy with the goods being produced? if they're ineffective?
(96): in sum
(97-98): merchant incentive structure, laws of motion that impel them
(100 and 104): question, related to putting-out system--didn't this represent an advance, in terms of a classical definition of capitalism, over previous methods of production? or is this not germane?
(100): key point--merchant 'capitalism' flourishes outside prevailing mode of production--doesn't have any relationship to the method of production, only worries about circulation. capitalism must unite production and circulation. therefore it flourishes in precapitalism.
(101): question, how do you make sense of the acknowledged development of productive forces to which merchants contributed?
(102): feudal lords pitted against merchants as an intraclass rivalry over the surplus claimed from basic producers? but isn't there something else going on here? the question of the political revolution, for example?
(103, and 114, and 116): a parallel between merchants and capitalists, and lords and serfs--well, clear question is how we relate this class struggle to the rural class struggle. because, as explicated by Katz, the urban one seems more or less autonomous (until he concludes the opposite, without evidence, in the conclusion)
(104): merchants not interested in productive investments
(107): there is a question, here, regarding crises in general--in feudalism represent a 'contraction', rather than a breakthrough of the productive forces
(107): status of absolutism -- how do we think of this, if not like Anderson did? what is the place of the absolutist state in the larger narrative? if not as a transitional form, then what? another precapitalist form?
(108): distinction between 1300s and 1600s
(110): merchants make a feudal response to the crisis of the 1600s
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
erik olin wright, classes (1985)
Chapter One, Posing the Problem: The Agenda of Class Analysis 1. The Legacy of Marx (6-7)
(6): two problems
2. The Agenda of Contemporary Marxist Class Analysis (8-16)
(9): we can sidestep the issue, then, no longer
(10): important-- "class structure exists independently of the specific people who occupy specific positions... class formation, on the other hand, refers to the formation of organized collectivities within that class structure on the basis of the interests shaped by the class structure... A given type of class structure may be characterized by a range of possible types of class formation..."
(10-11): three levels of abstraction
(13): embarassment of the 'middle-class'
(13): embarassment of the peasantry
(14): other work suggesting that class formation cannot be deduced from class structure, but is conditioned by the presence or absence of autonomous, institutional factors
(14-15): a new marxist class analysis--(1) self-consciously precise; (2) committed to working at the middle-level of abstraction.
(15-16): outline
PART ONE: CONCEPTUAL ISSUES Chapter Two, The Biography of a Concept: Contradictory Class Locations
(19): not a commentary on epistemology or philosophical principles, but it is, it seems, in a sly way..
1. The Logic of Concept Formation (20-24)
(20): constraints on concept building
(23): "conceptual adjudication" as a "double-process"--in terms of abstract conceptual requirements and empirical observations
(23): 'dogmatism' -- refusing to call theory into question; and 'eclecticism' -- refusing to worry about theoretical coherence
2. Steps in the Analysis of the Formation of the Concept of Contradictory Locations (24-25)
(24-25): five steps (see section headings, below)
3.The Empriical Setting (25-26)
(26): how to categorize people, according to class? "How should we deal with the numerou cases of people who did not seem to be either bourgeois or proletarian?"
4. Theoretical Constraints (26-37)
(27): of two sorts
(30): transformation/limitation/selection diagram, quite useful
(32): map of history as class structures, motor of history as class struggle.
(32-33): class struggle definition has been three-fold:
(34): four basic structural properties of the concept of class, which are also constraints 3-6
5. Alternative Solutions (37-42)
(37): alternative solutions to the problem of the middle-class:
(43): key move--dropping assumption that have to be in only one class; possibility of being in "more than one class simultaneously." so you have contradictory positioning, which is generative of contradictory interests.
(45): key--Balibar's distinction between 'ownership' and 'possession'--used by Wright (former means 'real control', whereas latter means 'control over actual operation'). and this can be further divided--control over physical means of production, and control over labor. but this does not go far enough--later discussing control over money capital, physical capital, labor. and four degrees of control.
(47): question of how this ought to be specified, further
(48): class map, figure 2.2 (this is 1979, he's saying)
(51): shift to appropriation and domination relations--so semi-autonomous becomes appropriation of labour process, but not appropriation of product
7. Problems with Conceptualization (51-64)
1. Roemer's Account of Class and Exploitation (64-73)
(65): concept of explotiation as a particular way of understanding inequalities, which makes a claim about a causal relationship between rich and poor.
(65) "in Roemer's analysis the rich are said to exploit the poor when it can be established that the welfare of the rich causally depends upon the deprivations of the poor--the rich are rich because the poor are poor, they are rich at the expense of others." The Traditional Marxian concept is a subset of this larger, general concept.
(65): two approaches
2. Towards a General Framework of Class Analysis (73-92)
(73): three modifications, on Roemer
(83): useful Table 3.2
(85): important--skill assets don't really open up to relational hierarchies, which is what is demanded by the concept of class. in this sense socialism can be seen as a society with exploitation, but without fully coherent classes.
(86): communism as the withering away of of skill-based exploitation (i.e., situation in which control over skills gives you preferential access to the social surplus)
(87): a 'heterogenous' exploitation definition of the middle class, now.
(88): KEY table that follows from the previous reflections.
(89): "one of the consequences... is that it is no longer axiomatic that the proletariat is the unique... rival to the capitalist class..." [hmm, this strikes me as a serious stretch--you need to speak about numbers, organization, etc.] The spectre of the 'third class' benefiting from revolutions--unapologetically ahistorical.
(90-91): the possibility of bureaucratic/mangerial alternatives, when capitalism is meeting with difficulty? ok, but again, not very useful...
(91): "...it does suggest that the process of class formation and class struggle is considerably more complex and indeterminate than the traditional Marxist story has allowed..." [ok, this is fair enough, and as far as it goes...]
(91-92): four benefits of these amendments
3. Once Again, Unresolved Problems (92-110)
Chapter One, Posing the Problem: The Agenda of Class Analysis 1. The Legacy of Marx (6-7)
(6): two problems
- abstract structural maps (class relations
- concrete conjunctural maps (concrete classes-as-actors, political alliances, etc.)
2. The Agenda of Contemporary Marxist Class Analysis (8-16)
(9): we can sidestep the issue, then, no longer
(10): important-- "class structure exists independently of the specific people who occupy specific positions... class formation, on the other hand, refers to the formation of organized collectivities within that class structure on the basis of the interests shaped by the class structure... A given type of class structure may be characterized by a range of possible types of class formation..."
(10-11): three levels of abstraction
- mode of production (can have different forms, certainly)
- social formation (specific combinations of distinct modes of production--e.g., pre-capitalist classes within capitalism)
- conjuncture (analysis in terms of concrete historical detail, contingent historical factors--this is also where non-class factors are likely to be explored)
(13): embarassment of the 'middle-class'
(13): embarassment of the peasantry
(14): other work suggesting that class formation cannot be deduced from class structure, but is conditioned by the presence or absence of autonomous, institutional factors
(14-15): a new marxist class analysis--(1) self-consciously precise; (2) committed to working at the middle-level of abstraction.
(15-16): outline
PART ONE: CONCEPTUAL ISSUES Chapter Two, The Biography of a Concept: Contradictory Class Locations
(19): not a commentary on epistemology or philosophical principles, but it is, it seems, in a sly way..
1. The Logic of Concept Formation (20-24)
(20): constraints on concept building
- theoretical presuppositions
- empirical constraints
(23): "conceptual adjudication" as a "double-process"--in terms of abstract conceptual requirements and empirical observations
(23): 'dogmatism' -- refusing to call theory into question; and 'eclecticism' -- refusing to worry about theoretical coherence
2. Steps in the Analysis of the Formation of the Concept of Contradictory Locations (24-25)
(24-25): five steps (see section headings, below)
3.The Empriical Setting (25-26)
(26): how to categorize people, according to class? "How should we deal with the numerou cases of people who did not seem to be either bourgeois or proletarian?"
4. Theoretical Constraints (26-37)
(27): of two sorts
- imposed by the explanatory role of class, around issues (1) class formation, structure and consciousness (28-31)--primarily the notion that 'class' has to be intelligible outside these three processes, against EP Thompson; and (2) around class and revolution
- "not only should class structures be viewed as setting the basic limits of possibility..., but they also constitute the most fundamental social determinant... and thus historical epochs can best be identified by their predominant class structures." [this, he's noting, doesn't require technological determinism (since we are agnostic on what produces class) or class functionalism (since we are not concerned with superstructure in its specificity, just primacy of 'class'). moreover, you can have a struggle on non-class basis, but within the limits set by class (maybe you can eliminate patriarchy, for example, he's saying)]
(30): transformation/limitation/selection diagram, quite useful
(32): map of history as class structures, motor of history as class struggle.
(32-33): class struggle definition has been three-fold:
- agents--must be class actors
- objectives--must target distribution of resources
- effects--anything with an effect on class relationships, counts
(34): four basic structural properties of the concept of class, which are also constraints 3-6
- classes are relational--"classes are always defined" in relation to other classes; not gradationally. (for three reasons, detailed on pg. 35--struggle/conflict, typologies in theory of history, explains essential features of gradiational-based distributions)
- relations are antagonistic--opposing interests
- antagonisms rooted in exploitation--not just simple inequality, causal relationship between affluence of one and poverty of the other
- exploitation based on social relations of production--production-centered concept, even if there are distinctions between three positions: Poulantzas, Roemer, Wright
5. Alternative Solutions (37-42)
(37): alternative solutions to the problem of the middle-class:
- actually, society is simply polarized--that this is apperaence, not essence, based on fact that managers don't own means of production. BUT this fails constraint one--doesn't satisfactorily explain class struggle, etc.
- 'the new petty bourgeoisie', as owners of skill or human capital (in ideological predispositions, and in intermediate position in class conflict). BUT same problem--too much diversity to be subsumed, here (in sum, first and sixth constraints)
- "the new class," in relationship to reproduction (or cultural production) of capitalism [BUT again, too amorphous--fifth and sixth constraints]
- "middle strata"--outside of basic class relation
(43): key move--dropping assumption that have to be in only one class; possibility of being in "more than one class simultaneously." so you have contradictory positioning, which is generative of contradictory interests.
(45): key--Balibar's distinction between 'ownership' and 'possession'--used by Wright (former means 'real control', whereas latter means 'control over actual operation'). and this can be further divided--control over physical means of production, and control over labor. but this does not go far enough--later discussing control over money capital, physical capital, labor. and four degrees of control.
(47): question of how this ought to be specified, further
(48): class map, figure 2.2 (this is 1979, he's saying)
(51): shift to appropriation and domination relations--so semi-autonomous becomes appropriation of labour process, but not appropriation of product
7. Problems with Conceptualization (51-64)
- contradiction? how are objective interests of petit bourgeois pole contradictory to objective interests of proletarian role? heterogenous, dual, instead.
- overstating the autonomy of this class; structural underdetermination; empirical anomalies
- classes in post-capitalism?
- shift from exploitation to domination (most fundamental), which is what the concept really rested on (and not exploitation). this is troubling, because domination, unlike exploitation, doesn't necessarily generate opposed objective interests.
1. Roemer's Account of Class and Exploitation (64-73)
(65): concept of explotiation as a particular way of understanding inequalities, which makes a claim about a causal relationship between rich and poor.
(65) "in Roemer's analysis the rich are said to exploit the poor when it can be established that the welfare of the rich causally depends upon the deprivations of the poor--the rich are rich because the poor are poor, they are rich at the expense of others." The Traditional Marxian concept is a subset of this larger, general concept.
(65): two approaches
- Labour Transfer--without LTV, "market-based exploitation can be formally derived simply from inequalities in the distribution of property rights in the means of production."
- Game-Theory--(1) would S be better off upon withdrawal? (2) its complement, S', would be worse off. and (3) the background condition is that S' dominates S. this helps Roemer identify four kinds of exploitation: capitalist (with per-capita share of assets), feudal (leave with personal assets--in fact, neoclassical economists only see feudal exploitation, and therefore can't see exploitation in capitalism), socialist (per capita share of inalienable assets), status .
2. Towards a General Framework of Class Analysis (73-92)
(73): three modifications, on Roemer
- economic exploitation and economic oppression--appropriation of 'fruits of labour', such that wealth of exploiting class depends on work of exploited class
- recasting concept of feudal exploitation, by definition of labor power as an asset (thus our definitions are now symmetrical)
- organization asset exploitation--control over division of labor
(83): useful Table 3.2
(85): important--skill assets don't really open up to relational hierarchies, which is what is demanded by the concept of class. in this sense socialism can be seen as a society with exploitation, but without fully coherent classes.
(86): communism as the withering away of of skill-based exploitation (i.e., situation in which control over skills gives you preferential access to the social surplus)
(87): a 'heterogenous' exploitation definition of the middle class, now.
(88): KEY table that follows from the previous reflections.
(89): "one of the consequences... is that it is no longer axiomatic that the proletariat is the unique... rival to the capitalist class..." [hmm, this strikes me as a serious stretch--you need to speak about numbers, organization, etc.] The spectre of the 'third class' benefiting from revolutions--unapologetically ahistorical.
(90-91): the possibility of bureaucratic/mangerial alternatives, when capitalism is meeting with difficulty? ok, but again, not very useful...
(91): "...it does suggest that the process of class formation and class struggle is considerably more complex and indeterminate than the traditional Marxist story has allowed..." [ok, this is fair enough, and as far as it goes...]
(91-92): four benefits of these amendments
3. Once Again, Unresolved Problems (92-110)
- status of organization, in organization assets--is it not just another skill? are these not just strategic jobs, that require loyalty payoffs? BUT we need a concept that maps onto our class structure question.
- relationship between skill and class--can skill-based differences really ground a class relation? are we not just speaking about fractions, within a class?
- interaction among forms of exploitation--managers partaking, indirectly, in capitalist exploitation? we are going to assume this away.
- non-asset bases of exploitation--why not religious classes, military classes, sex classes, etc.? well, unique role of productive forces; or, at least, a 'distinct logic' that systematically implicates 'subsistence'
- Alternative Class Theories (106)-- Weberian (via Parkin, Giddens), rooted in "social closure" due to unequal ownership of resources (but, again, the key difference is that the Weberian theory doesn't have an account of exploitation, just a notion of inequalities generated though market exchange with this ownership as background. In other words, it becomes a problem of level of abstraction--for Marx, at the level of mode of production, skill-based exploitation doesn't feature; only at the level of the social formation; for Weber, only one level of abstraction exists, and 'class' exists specific to it as well as to the social formation (so feudalism wouldn't have 'class', in this sense). "At the heart of the distinction... is the contrast between an essentially culturalist theory of society and history and a materialist theory," since it enlists meaning-based definitions)
- Mode of Production and Social Formation (109) -- question of the relative weight of different exploitations, at various levels of abstraction; concept of "dynamic primacy"; question of 'internal-external' relations; the question of 'overlapping exploitations', which ties into the expectations re: class formation.
- The Theory of History (114): development of forces of production conditions probability of achieving more progressive social formations (not, of course, 'necessity'). Revision of three theses: capitalism can lead to statism, as well as socialism (organization exploitation might not be eliminated); proletariat is no longer only bearer of revolutionary mission; socialism has a distinctive kind of exploitation, not simply transitional.
- Legitimation and Motivation (118): ideologies of two types--(1) rights to defend privilege; (2) welfare to defend privilege [here Wright's point about the 'costs of revolution' comes in; as Vivek says, what about the 'costs of counter-revolution'?]
- Class Structure and Form of the State (122)
- Class Structure and Class Formation (123): from class-in-itself, to class for-itself, how? "relative indeterminacy"--the structure, Wright's arguing, constitutes "the material basis for a variety of potential class formations."
- Class Alliances (124): alliances between 'classes, segments of classes, and between contradictory class locations' are plausible, depending on what strategies actors choose to pursue; concept of 'net exploiters'
- Women in the Class Structure (126): gender as conditioning skill, as credential itself, or as a form of feudal exploitation; but are they a distinct class? depends, says, Wright, on the complex particular to a given household.
- more coherent way of describing different types of class structures
- more coherent way of understanding "contradictory nature of contradictory locations."
- much better link to 'interests,' than domination-based concept
- more systematically materialist
- more historically coherent
- critical character, opening up to emancipation
Monday, December 14, 2009
herbert marcuse, one-dimensional man (1964)
(390): speaking of freedom of speech, etc. -- "the achievement cancels the premises"
(390): "new modes of realization are needed... such new modes can be indicated only in negative terms because they would amount to the negation of the prevailing modes. thus economic freedom would mean freedom from the economy... political freedom would mean liberation of the individuals from politics over which they have no effective control..."
(391): yes -- "the unrealistic sound of these propositions is indicative, not of their utopian character, but of the strength of the forces which prevent their realization."
(391): true vs. false needs
(391): "the distinguishing feature of advanced industrial society is its effective suffocation of those needs which demand liberation--liberation also from that which is tolerable and rewarding and comfortable--while it sustains and absolves the destructive power and repressive function of the affluent society."
(392): "the spontaneous reproduction of superimposed needs by the individual does not establish autonomy, it only testifies to the efficacy of the controls..."
(392): "it is desublimation practiced from a 'position of strength' on the part of society, which can afford to grant more than before because its interest have become the innermost drives of its citizens..."
(394): this is more-or-less the main point, the integration of desire into reproduction--"technical progress and more comfortable living permit the systematic inclusion of libidinal components into the realm of commodity production and exchange. but no matter how controlled the mobilization of instinctual energy may be... no matter how much it may serve as a prop for the status quo -- it is also gratifying to the managed individuals, jsut as racing the outboard motor..."
(394): speaking of the "mobilization and administration of libido [which] may account for much of the voluntary compliance, the absence of terror, the pre-established harmony between individual needs and socially-required desires, goals, and aspirations.'
(395): "to be sure, there is pervasive unhappiness... this unhappiness lends itself easily to political mobilization; without room for conscious development, it may become the instinctual reservoir for a new fascist way of life and death..."
(396): possibility of total, controlled desublimation: "it seems that society's growing capacity to manipulate technical progress also increases its capacity to manipulate and control this instinct... then social cohesion would be strengthened at the deepes instinctual roots. the supreme reisk, and even the fact of war would meet... with instinctual approval on the part of the victims. here too, we would have controlled desublimation."
(396): the ascent of the happy consciousness--"the belief that the real is rational, and that the established system... delivers the goods... the people are led to find in the productive apparatus the effective agent of thought and action to which their personal thought and action can and must be surrendered..."
(396): "one man can give the signal that liquidates hundreds and thousands of people, then declare himself free from all pangs of conscience, and live happily ever after..."
(397): "those who identify themselves with the whole, who are installed as the leaders and defenders of the whole can make mistakes, but they cannot do wrong--they are not guilty..."
(390): speaking of freedom of speech, etc. -- "the achievement cancels the premises"
(390): "new modes of realization are needed... such new modes can be indicated only in negative terms because they would amount to the negation of the prevailing modes. thus economic freedom would mean freedom from the economy... political freedom would mean liberation of the individuals from politics over which they have no effective control..."
(391): yes -- "the unrealistic sound of these propositions is indicative, not of their utopian character, but of the strength of the forces which prevent their realization."
(391): true vs. false needs
(391): "the distinguishing feature of advanced industrial society is its effective suffocation of those needs which demand liberation--liberation also from that which is tolerable and rewarding and comfortable--while it sustains and absolves the destructive power and repressive function of the affluent society."
(392): "the spontaneous reproduction of superimposed needs by the individual does not establish autonomy, it only testifies to the efficacy of the controls..."
(392): "it is desublimation practiced from a 'position of strength' on the part of society, which can afford to grant more than before because its interest have become the innermost drives of its citizens..."
(394): this is more-or-less the main point, the integration of desire into reproduction--"technical progress and more comfortable living permit the systematic inclusion of libidinal components into the realm of commodity production and exchange. but no matter how controlled the mobilization of instinctual energy may be... no matter how much it may serve as a prop for the status quo -- it is also gratifying to the managed individuals, jsut as racing the outboard motor..."
(394): speaking of the "mobilization and administration of libido [which] may account for much of the voluntary compliance, the absence of terror, the pre-established harmony between individual needs and socially-required desires, goals, and aspirations.'
(395): "to be sure, there is pervasive unhappiness... this unhappiness lends itself easily to political mobilization; without room for conscious development, it may become the instinctual reservoir for a new fascist way of life and death..."
(396): possibility of total, controlled desublimation: "it seems that society's growing capacity to manipulate technical progress also increases its capacity to manipulate and control this instinct... then social cohesion would be strengthened at the deepes instinctual roots. the supreme reisk, and even the fact of war would meet... with instinctual approval on the part of the victims. here too, we would have controlled desublimation."
(396): the ascent of the happy consciousness--"the belief that the real is rational, and that the established system... delivers the goods... the people are led to find in the productive apparatus the effective agent of thought and action to which their personal thought and action can and must be surrendered..."
(396): "one man can give the signal that liquidates hundreds and thousands of people, then declare himself free from all pangs of conscience, and live happily ever after..."
(397): "those who identify themselves with the whole, who are installed as the leaders and defenders of the whole can make mistakes, but they cannot do wrong--they are not guilty..."
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