Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 00:31:41 -0800
From: djones-AT-uclink.berkeley.edu (rakesh bhandari)
Subject: Re: Western factory workers...faceless and docile?


Louis G writes:

>My own feeling is that,  when the physical limits of exploitation of the
>consumer market are reached,  and when the opportunities for the
>reinforcement of capitalism from without are exhausted in any given country,
>the clash between the interests of employer and worker may once more become
>predominant,  and that the way will be clear for the long delayed
>proletarian revolution on the Marxist model.

This seems little different than Rosa's accumulation theory:  The limits to
accumulation are external and as they are finally approached, the system
will then only require that the proletariat simply push the old system
aside.

Though such limits will doubtless be reached before the sun burns out, we
would have to wait a long time indeed before we finally exhaust all the raw
materials needed to supply  an ever-increasing circle of consumers with a
Western middle class lifestyle  and before the third world becomes too
overcapitalized to absorb additional surplus capital and thus cease to
reinforce capitalism from without.  In short, Louis G's is a deferred
'breakdown theory'.

The conservative political implications of this deferral of course do not
invalidate the idea that such may be the preconditions for the constitution
and intensification of the class struggle. However, I think it is possible
to give a value theoretic analysis of why the administered society,
technocratic capitalism, the mixed economy, etc. will give way and are
giving way to internal social contradictions long before the said external
constraints become operative.

Rakesh

PS A new work reviewing different Marxist theories about class conflict is
John F. Sitton, 1996. Recent Marxian Theory: Class Formation and Social
Conflict in Contemporary Capitalism. Albany: State Univ of New York Press.
Another important recent work is Cyrus Bina, Laurie Clements and Chuck
Davis, 1996. Beyond Survival: Wage Labor in the Late 20th Century. Armonk,
NY: ME Sharpe Publishers.

PPS Could Louis G please provide the full citation for this Rand
Corporation study undertaken by Lucas?  Thanks.