From: "Greg Schofield" <g_schofield-AT-dingoblue.net.au>
Subject: Re: AUT: highest form of capitalism
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 2002 06:54:31 +0800


Bravo Carrol!

How often we chase mirages. "Stage" is just a noun implying nothing more than a particular set-up, the original English reference is to plays, the stages of which were the changed scenery within a single production. It is a useful word/concept whenever anything that has distinct changes is mentioned - but "phase" would do as well.

As for the Russian word translated into "highest" that could also be translated into "latest", I didn't know this and find this simple resolution quite charming and it makes perfect sense either way (I suppose "highest" can imply "highest so far"  just as much as "highest obtainable", after all we seem to have no problem with stating some athelete has made the highest jump without implying that sometime in the future someone might exceed it - I don't believe highest implies a strong absolute).

Of course in the details of Lenin's analysis in "Imperialism, the latest phase of capitalism" he puts forward imperialism as being a product of the self-socialisation of capital and in the final chapter specifies greater socialization to follow (post-imperialism), which does not effect anything you hae said on the issue. But I would amend Lenin's title again, and re-enforce the reading which you have demolished, to "Imperialism the Final Stage of Private Capitalism" as compatable perhaps, not with reasonable translation but, to the theory being expressed within its pages (note this does not imply an end to capitalism, but to a particular form of it).


--- Message Received ---
From: Carrol Cox <cbcox-AT-ilstu.edu>
To: aut-op-sy-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Date: Fri, 08 Mar 2002 14:51:16 -0600
Subject: Re: AUT: highest form of capitalism



Nate Holdren wrote:
> 
>  What I
> don't like about the higher/lower model is I think it implies that only
> after the highest stages have been reached can revolution occur. Am I
> misunderstanding this or no?
> thanks.
> Nate


Possibly this goes back to an ambiguity in Russian, the word which has
been translated as "highest" could also have merely meant "latest." And
"stage" is a tricky word in that it _ought not_ to be a technical term
but merely a common noun to be interpreted according to context. Then in
some contexts (and I think Lenin's) it merely means "what's happening
now," and has no greater theoretical purchase. Many, both pro- and
anti-Leninists have tried to make a big deal of it.

There is far more room for contingency in historical materialism than
many will acknowledge. Actually, Stephen Gould's _Wonderful Life_ (as
well  as many of his essays) is good on the matter of contingency, and
of its _easy_ compatibility with seeing order in either history or
biology.

Carrol


Greg Schofield
Perth Australia
g_schofield-AT-dingoblue.net.au
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