Socialism means a moneyless, wageless, stateless
commonwealth. This was the general understanding of what socialism meant. Marx
didn't talk about a "transitional society". He talked about the lower
phase of communism. It was still communism...that is, a classless society.
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his need”
Who decides what your ability or need is? It would take some
sort of position of power to determine who is in need and who has ability.
Power naturally corrupts and tends to find ways to increase and consolidate
power. After time, you are left with those who have consolidated power to
abuse, and those who don't. Therefore who decides? The answer, you do! This is
the whole point of the communist slogan "from each according to ability to
each according to need". The autonomy of the individual is maximised and
as a result, we all benefit. As the Communist Manifesto put it:
"In place of the old bourgeois society, with its
classes and class antagonisms, we shall have an association in which the free
development of each is the condition for the free development of all"
Specifically a communist (aka socialist) society - or at
least what Marx called the "higher stage" of communism - exhibits two
key features:
1) Free access to
goods and services - no buying and selling. No barter. You simply go to the
distribution point and take what you require according to your self determined
needs. This depends on there being a relatively advanced technological
infrastructure to produce enough to satisfy our basic needs. Such a possibility
already exists. Capitalism, however, increasingly thwarts this potential. In
fact, most of the work we do today in the formal sector will be completely
unnecessary in a communist society - it serves only to prop up capitalism. What
possible use would there be for a banking system under communism, for example?
We could effectively more than double the quantities of resources and human
labour power available for socially useful production by scrapping capitalism.
Communism will destroy the need for greed and conspicuous consumption
2) Voluntary
labour. Your contribution to society is completely voluntary. There is no wage
labour or other forms of co-erced labour. You can do as little or as much work
as you choose. And you can do as many different kinds of jobs as you want, too.
The presumption is that people would freely choose to work under communism for
all sorts of reasons:
- the conditions under which we work will be radically
different, without an employing class dictating terms work will become
fulfilling and pleasant
- we need to work, to express ourselves creatively
- with free access to goods, conspicuous consumption will be
rendered meaningless as a way of gaining respect and social esteem. Which
leaves only what we give to society as a way of gaining the respect of our
peers. This should not be underestimated; it is one of the most important
motivational drives in human beings as numerous studies in industrial psychology
have confimed
- Socialism depends on people recognising our mutual
interdependence. There is, in other words, a sense of moral obligation that
goes with the territory
- Socialism will permit a far greater degree of
technological adaptation without the constraints of the profit system.
Intrinsically backbreaking or unpleasannt work can be automated. Conversely
some work may be deliberately made more labour intensive and craft based.
- Even under capitalism today most work is unpaid or
unremunerated - the household economy, the volunteer sector and so on. So it is
not as if this is something we are unaccustomed to. Volunteers moreover tend to
be the most highly motivated as studies have confirmed; they dont require so
called external incentives
- We will get rid of an awful lot of crappy and pointless
jobs that serve as a disincentive to work
- since we would be free to do any job we chose to what this
means in effect is that for any particular job there would be a massive back-up
supply of labour to cover it consisting of most people in society. In
capitalism this cannot happen since labour mobility is severely restricted
since if you have a job you cannot just choose to abandon it for the sake of
another more urgent job from the standpoint of society
With these two core characteristics of a socialist society -
free access to goods and services plus volunteer labour - there can be no
political leverage that anyone or any group could exercise over anyone else.
The material basis of class power would have completely dissolved. What we
would be left with is simply human beings being free to express their
fundamentally social and cooperative nature
Free access communism is not going to be brought to the
point of collapse by the fact that we cannot all have a Porshe or Ferrari
parked outside our front door. Imagine what it could be like without a boss
class on our backs? Imagine what our workplaces could become without the cost
cutting constraints of capitalism and having the freedom to decide on these
matters ourselves. Imagine not being tied tdown to one single kind of job all
the time but being given the opportunity to experiment with different jobs, to
travel abroad to work in new places, to taste new experiences. Imagine a
moneyeless, wageless communist world in which most of the occupations that we
do today - from bankers to pay departments to arms producers to sales-people -
will simply disappear at a stroke releasing vast amounts of resources and, yes,
human labour power as well for socially useful production. Kropotkin was quite
right. We dont need the whiplash of the wages system to compel us to work. The
mere fact that we recognise our mutual interdependence in a society in which we
will fully realise our social nature will suffice to impose upon us a sense of
moral obligation to contribute to the common good of our own free will. Indeed
we already, to some extent, do this today even under capitalism, given that
fully half of all the work that we do today is completely unremunerated. How
much more conducive will a communist moral economy be to the performance of
unremunerated work is not hard to see.
The Left-wing tend to be nothing more than the reformist
advocates of some kind of state-administered capitalism, paying lip service to
authentic socialism but in practice obstructing any real movement towards
socialism. The Left-wing, by and large, does not stand for socialism and
persistently misrepresents what socialism is all about by identifying it with
some kind of state involvement in the economy. To suggest that free access
communism would be less efficient than capitalism ignores among other things
that at least half the work done under capitalism serves no socially useful
purpose whatsoever and contributes nothing to human wellbeing in any meaningful
way - it is merely done to keep the capitalist monetary system ticking over.
For instance, most of the work carried out today in the formal sector of the
capitalist economy will no longer be needed in communism. What useful work does
a banker or pay-roll official do today, for instance? Absolutely nothing. When
production for sale on market ceases to exist and we produce simply and solely
for need, a huge and growing chunk of the work we do today will no longer be
required. Conservatively speaking, we can at least double the available
manpower and material resources for socially useful production. If that is not
a huge advance in efficiency then what is? In free access communism we will be
able to do more with far less because we will producing directly for use and
not for sale. The capitalist monetary system is the most extraordinary wasteful
form of economic organisation but we are sure the capitalists will be gratified
to learn that someon the left should spring to the defence of their system
against the communist alternative.
The notion that capitalism can only be defined as a system
where capital is owned privately for a profit is absurd. Doesn't capital owned
by the state for example count as capitalism? Doesn't the very fact that means
of production take the form of capital, irrespective of who owns it, make the
system capitalist? The theory of state capitalism does not require there to be
a class of private owners of capital, for there to be capitalism. This is a
legalistic de jure approach to capitalism whereas a historical materialist
approach looks instead at the de facto relations of production. It argues that
there was a capitalist class in the Soviet Union that collectively owned the
means of production as a class by virtue of their complete control of the state
- the nomenklatura. Ownership and control are in fact inseparable. Ultimate
control IS ownership. We are not saying there were no differences
between the state capitalism and the private or mixed-economy capitalism but in
their essentials they were the same. In Socialism Utopian and Scientific Engels
noted how capitalism was rapidly evolving away from private ownership of
capital for profit by individual capitalist to joint stock companies and on to
ownership by the state. Here is what he said concerning the latter
"The modern state, no matter what its form, is
essentially a capitalist machine, the state of the capitalists, the ideal
personification of the total national capital. The more it proceeds to the
taking over of the productive forces, the more does it actually become the
national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit. The workers remain wage
workers - proletarians. The capitalist relationship is not done away with. It
is rather brought to a head." Socialism Utopian and Scientific"
This does not seem to be compatible with the notion of
"private profit" or ownership by private individuals but, clearly,
what Engels is saying here is that state ownership is still very much
capitalism. Of course you can chose to define it in whatever way you want but
in the Marxian tradition the relation between "capital" and
"wage labour" is absolutely pivotal to any real understanding
capitalism. Hence statements like these.
“Capital therefore presupposes wage-labour; wage-labour
presupposes capital. They condition each other; each brings the other into
existence.” (Wage Labour and Capital)
and
“To say that the interests of capital and the interests of
the workers are identical, signifies only this: that capital and wage-labour
are two sides of one and the same relation. The one conditions the other in the
same way that the usurer and the borrower condition each other."
So, no, it is not essentially to do with "private"
ownership and profit. This is misleading. This idea that capitalism rests on de
jure legal ownership of capital by private individuals is essentially an
idealist notion which defines a mode of production in terms of its legal
superstructure. With state ownership your have in effect collective ownership
by the capitalist class via their control of the state apparatus itself. From
the point of the view of the worker it makes absolutely no difference whether
their employers is the state or a "private" business. From the point
of view of the consumer too state property is private property and for which
reason a payment is required.
"The capitalist relation is not done away with. It is,
rather, brought to a head. But, brought to a head, it topples over.
State-ownership of the productive forces is not the solution of the conflict,
but concealed within it are the technical conditions that form the elements of
that solution."
Engels is saying is that by bringing the scattered means of
production under state ownership this will facilitate the transformation of
these means into common property. So instead of having to deal with many
separate individual capitalists we would have only to deal with the
"national capitalist" as it were. This is what is meant by the
"technical conditions" Engels speaks of - the centralised structure of
decision making that socialism would inherit from (state) capitalism
As opponents of central planning we would disagree strongly
with Engels on this particular point. Neverthless, Engels is clearly NOT
suggesting that state ownership of the means of production, even though it
faciilitates centralised decisionmaking (which he seems to have thought would
be important and useful for a socialist society) is anything other than a form
of capitalist ownership.
It was Kropotkin who said:
"No hard and fast line can be drawn between the work of
one and the work of another. To measure them by results leads to absurdity. To
divide them into fractions and measured them by hours of labour leads to
absurdity also. One course remains: not to measure them at all, but to
recognise the right of all who take part in productive labour first of all to
live – and then to enjoy the comforts of life" (The Wage System)
Communism is not about "setting prices at zero" as
some like Paul Mason has been inferring. It is about doing away with the whole
notion of price and exchange value so that the very concept of "setting
prices at zero" is a meaningless one as far as communism is concerned. To
talk of setting prices at any level presupposes still a capitalist framework.
If the supermarkets tomorrow said 'All cans of beans are free' the shelves
would be cleared in hours. But if they said the same the next day, and the
next, it would become pointless to go and fill your arms with cans of beans,
and easier to just go and take a reasonable stock to keep close to hand. That
is, money (likewise price) is not abolished, but the need for money is rendered
redundant. Just because individuals in a free access economy are not restricted
by money or labour vouchers from taking what they want does not mean they will want
to take everything they can possibly lay their hands on. As for labour
vouchers. Similarly just because these same individuals will not be externally
compelled to work by the fact that their consumption is explicitly linked to
their work contribution does not mean they will not contribute to the work. The
point about a communist society proper - or higher communism - is that there is
no objective or external econonomic mechanism - like money or labour vouchers -
mediating beween the individual and his or her needs or wants. This includes
the desire to work which would become as Marx put it in the Critique of the
Gotha Programme, "life´s prime want". A means by which we express
ourselves, our individuality. Kautsky has the right take on that, why bother mimicking
the pricing mechanism when there is already a perfectly good way of doing that?
Money is a social relationship. It links buyers and sellers
in a market and therefore presupposes these things. But communism implies
common ownership of the means of production. Where everybody owns the means of
production it is not logically possible to have economic exchange. Exchange
implies owners and non-owners. When I exchange something with you I am
exchanging property title to this thing for some other thing. If you own a
factory producing widgets you can sell these widgets on because you own them by
virtue of owning the factory that produced them. It follows that if everyone in
society owned the factory there would be no one to whom these widgets could be
sold or exchanged. If there is no economic exchange then there is no reason to
have a means of exchange - money. Money is a mean of exchange amongst other
things and what it implies is the existence of an exchange economy which is
completely incompatible with the idea of your "public" owning the
means of production. Exchange denotes a transfer of ownership rights of the
things being exchanged. This cannot happen where everyone owns the means of
production, common ownership rules out the exchange of products and hence
money. Logically then if you advocate the use of money and hence exchange, this
means you advocate a system based on sectional or private ownership of the
means of production - not common ownership. Money is not some kind of neutral
tool of administration; it is fundamentally a social relationship between
people. Of course, money existed before capitalism but, in its generalised
usage, it corresponds to, and demonstrates, the existence of capitalist
relations of production as a monetised economy par excellance. Since there will
be no economic exchange transactions in socialism - socialism being based on
common ownership of the means of production - this reason falls away along with
the need for money.
This is why socialists totally reject the idea of using
money not only - obviously - in a communist society but in any supposed
transition to such a society. A transitional stage that continiued to use money
would not be a transition at all. It would still be a capitalist society based
on generalised commodity production. That is why Marx advocated labour vouchers
- which we reject as too as both unnecessary and far too cumbersome - precisely
because it was not money.
Many leftists have aligned themselves with the argument of
the arch pro-capitalist Ludwig von Mises in asserting the need for a common
universal unit of accounting. According to this argument, only by means of such
a unit can we directly compare different bundles of inputs and thus supposedly
select the "least cost "combination. For Mises this unit is money;
for some so-called leftists labour values. The purpose of a common unit of
account is to expedite economic exchange - what communism will lack - rather
than the actual efficient deployment of resources as such. Having a common unit
of account has nothing to do with the technical organisation of production
itself and everything to do with capitalism's own priorities such as the need
to determine profitability and the rate of exploitation.
Free access communism is a form of "generalised reciprocity"
par excellance, a “gift economy”, which as the term itself suggests denotes the
absence of any kind of quid pro quo set up.
1) The amount of
work that needs to be done by comparison with today will be much less because
of the elimination of all that socially uselsss labour that only serves to prop
up the capitalist money economy - from bankers , pay to tax collectors and a
thousand and one other occupations. Less work means a much reduced per capita
workload on average which, in turn, means less resistance to working since our
attitutde to work is partly conditioned by how much time we are required to do
it. If you only have to do 2 hours per week on a boring job you are going to
regard it differently than if you have to do it for 20 hours
2) A volunteer
economy means that we are not stuck with just one job but can try a variety so
there is a labour reservoir in depth for any particular job - even the most
onerous or boring - and to an extent that is simply not possible under
capitalist employment.
3) With free
access to goods and services there is only one way in which you can acquire
status and the respect and esteem of your fellows - through your contribution
to society. Conspicuous consumption and the accumulation of private wealth
would be rendered meaningless by the simple fact that all wealth is freely
available for direct appropriation
4) The terms and
conditions of work will be radically different without the institution of
capitalist employment. It is often these terms and conditions - in particular
the authoritarian structure of the capitalist workplace - that are the real
problem rather than the work itself
5) Without the
profit motive there will be far greater scope to adapt technology to suit our
inclinations. Some work might be subject to greater automation; other work
might be made more artisan or skilled-based
6) In a communist
society our mutual interdependence will be much more transparent and the sense
of moral obligation to give according to one's ability in return for taking
according to one's need will correspondingly be much more sharply defined and
enhanced as a motivating factor
7) A communist
society cannot be introduced except when the great majority understand and want
it. Having struggled to achieve it can it seriously be maintained that they
would willingly allow it to be jeopardised? The reductio as absurdum argument
8) Work, loosely
defined as meaningful productive activity is actually a fundamental human need,
not simply an economic requirement. Try sitting around on your ass for week
doing nothing and you will soon find yourself climbing up the wall out of sheer
boredom. Prison riots have been known to break out on occasions when frustrated
prisoners are denied work opportunities and even under the severe conditions
they have to contend with.
9) Even under
capitalism just over half of the work that we do is completely unpaid and
outside of the money economy. This is by no means just confined to the
household sector - think for example of international volunteers such as the
VSO - and it gives the lie to the capitalist argument that the only way you can
induce people to work is paying them to do it
Since you don’t have a quid pro quo set up with free access
communism, individuals are free to do whatever work they chose. What work needs
to be done as explained can be readily communicated through the appropriate
channels such as job centres, online facilities and so on. You don’t have the
same kind of dichotomous view induced by a quid pro quo set up which pits your
self-interest against the interests of others. So social opinion become becomes
a much more powerful force in society. Work that needs to be done most urgently
and is not perhaps being done to the extent required - e.g. garbage collection
- gains in status to the extent that it remains undone. People work for all
sorts of reasons not just because they "like it". This is why we find
the usual objections to free access communism being trotted out to be
simplistic and reductionist. Labour at this higher stage is no longer coerced
labour in the sense that an individual's access to goods (via their
"income") is made dependent upon his or her contribution. On the
contrary, the labour of freely associated individuals becomes life's
"prime want". It becomes entirely voluntary labour, freely offered.
The compulsion to produce without which human life could not continue will then
operate exclusively on the social plane and not directly upon individuals who,
neverthless, will have realised their fully social nature in a communist
society and respond accordingly to the requirements of society to produce and
reproduce its own means of existence. This is what constitutes the essence of
communism - the realisation of our true social nature and of the need to
contribute to society's maintenance and wellbeing - and it is why I have long
argued that communism needs to be conceived as what is technically called a
"moral economy"
The problem for the notion of apportioning labour time
according some single vast society wide plan. Because production is a
socialised process, because everything is interconnected - you need to ensure a
certain amount of input X is produced in order to ensure that a certain amount
of consumer good Y is produced - the ratios of millions upon millions of inputs
and outputs have to be worked out in advance and the relative proportions or
amounts have to be produced precisely in accordance with the Plan because the
knock on consequences of any shortfall, say, will ramify through the whole
economy and upset the carefully worked out calculations of the central
planners. So finally on to the question of labour time allocation within the
context of a definite social plan. It seems to me that if you are going to
allocate labour in this predetermined a priori fashion then, in order for the
definite social plan to be effectively implemented to the letter, you would
need some way of ensuring that labour in its multiple forms is supplied in
precisely the quantities needed in order to ensure that the technical ratios of
inputs and outputs embodied in the plan are complied with. How can this can
this be done without the most resolute and coerceive central direction of
labour and the conception cannot possibly accommodated to the principle
"from each according to ability to each according to need". It cannot
be done and the fact that it cannot be done points to the need for a radically
different perspective on the nature of a communist society to the one he is
proposing. Actually even Marx's speculations on the nature of work and the
abolition of the division of labour in communism directly contradict this
notion in the famous quote from the German Ideology:
“For as soon as the distribution of labour comes into being,
each man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is forced upon
him and from which he cannot escape. He is a hunter, a fisherman, a herdsman,
or a critical critic, and must remain so if he does not want to lose his means
of livelihood; while in communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere
of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society
regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one
thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the
afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a
mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic. This
fixation of social activity, this consolidation of what we ourselves produce
into an objective power above us, growing out of our control, thwarting our
expectations, bringing to naught our calculations, is one of the chief factors
in historical development up till now.”
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