Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2001 11:56:17 -0600 From: Mary Murphy&Salstrand <ericandmary-AT-earthlink.net> Subject: Re: [Fwd: [CSL]: Will high-tech chaos finally give birth to a dan cing Donald Smith: Thanks for your helpful comments. Maybe it is just the way the corporate media has been fawning over our newly selected president as he rolls back the clock on rights that others once worked hard to achieve and now promises us instead the spectacle of America as a Xristian nation. What will be next...reviving the inquisition? I watched "Office Space" by Mike Judge on cable last night and although this wasm't a great movie, I could certainly relate to the feeling of apathy in the workplace it presented. Anyway, all this is making me think harder about creating alternatives, even though I agree with you that workers today definitely have "less power now than they did many years ago." Despite this, I don't think the situation is hopeless and I don't want to engage in some fashionable cult of despair concerning the hopeless of everything is the face of a Capitalism Triumphant. On your point about the political class serving the interest of the ruling class; yes, I am sure Cleaver would agree with you. I simply wasn't being clear. I would be interested in hearing more from you about your feet (the one in pomo - the other in Crit Theory) as I feel I am also standing with both feet firmly planted in similar quicksand. I am also very interested in renewing the study of Marx along these very same non-Euclidean lines. What interests me about Marx right now is two fold: 1. The social legitimation of the various spheres of society - media, politics, business, education, religion are clearly controlled by the ruling dominant elite interests. We continue to live in a class society where differends proliferate because the scope of possibilities has increasingly become more narrow. 2. Paradoxically, the developments in technology and science point, if not necessarily towards a coming singularity, at least in the direction of other alternatives, once they are freed from the current social controls. The challenge remains that of creating a global baseline sustainable culture capable of providing everyone on the planet with the necessities of life - food, clothing, shelter, heath - and from this developing a more nurturing, equalitarian society which allows for greater individual autonomy and less alienation. Wasn't it Marx who said: "The free development of each shall become the basis for the free development of all." I have to admit I haven't read anything Marxian in a long time and appreciate the mention of Braverman and Ollman. They sound like they would be worth checking out. I also want to return to Lyotard as extension of Marx, rather than a denial of Marx. A more svelte Marx, perhaps, but a stronger, revitalized, pagan Marx with fewer illusions. Smith, Donald S wrote: > > Eric, Reading Capital Politically sounds interesting. I will try to read it. > > You said: > > >The current lack of reception of Marx stems primarily from two sources. One > of > >these comes from reading Marx as a political economist; the other from > >reading him as the philosopher of dialectical materialism. > > Don't you also think that part of the reason Marx was supressed even in some > "progressive" universities was the threat of Communism? I am hoping now that > Communism is no longer seen as a threat, Marx will begin to get more > recognition for his analysis of capitalism. > > >Cleaver points out; "we can define labor as a social system based on the > >imposition of work through the commodity form." > > >What this means is that the mode of work, the job economy, tends to > >organize everything under capitalism, precluding other possibilities of > >life. It leads to a very regulated and dominated form of existence which > >is strongly authoritarian in nature. > > More than a social system it is a system that appropriates the surplus labor > of individuals in the interest of those who hold the means of production. > This fact in itself, even independent of the authoritarianism that > accompanies it, if you believe Marx, creates alienation in workers that they > can't even understand; psychological effects beyond repressive working > conditions. Bertell Ollman did a nice interpretation of alienation, as Marx > understood it, in his book "Alienation". > > Also, Harry Braverman in , "Labor and Monopoly Capital" detailed the > historical process in which management divided the components of the labor > process, not so much in the interest of efficiency, but rather in the > interest of controlling workers. This practice continues. > > >It is in the interests of the contemporary power structure to maintain it > only because it >ultimately is a form of domination which serves the > interests of a political class. > > Don't you mean that it serves the interest of the ruling class which is also > served by the political class, or does Cleaver propose a different relation? > > >Marcuse with his theories of co-option "cannot > >see either the extent and difficulties of current capitalist attempts at > >restructuring or how the continuing struggles of workers are thwarting > >those efforts. > > Are the capitalists really having difficulty restructuring or is their plan > for global corporatism going along nicely? And what continuing struggles of > workers? Workers have less power now than they had years ago? > > You can probably sense that while I have one foot in the postmodern camp, I > still have the other in Critical theory which I think is still relevant. > > Don Smith
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