Date: Mon, 17 Feb 1997 11:27:36 -0800
From: djones-AT-uclink.berkeley.edu (rakesh bhandari)
Subject: M-I: [Mark, Hugh, Karl] Overdue replies 


I have had a few minor problems logging on, and apologize for the delay in
replies.

1. Mark Jones asked me to elaborate about new or emerging divisions within
the working class. For example, Paul Krugman has written  that in the US
skilled workers have gained at the expense of unskilled workers and capital
in the last two decades. The economists basically take this as their
starting point and then argue about whether skill-intensive technical
change (Robert Lawrence & Paul Krugman) or comparative advantage in
skill-intensive tradeables (Adrian Wood) is responsible for the putative
gains of the skilled at the expense of everyone else.

Perhaps at the root of this conceptualization is the neoclassical idea that
labor gets paid its marginal product and that as skilled labor has become
more productive due to its ability to use computers (though economists also
are confused about the productivity paradox--the one trillion dollar
investment in information technology without a productivity revolution),
its share of income has risen accordingly.  At any rate, it's quite clear
that the economists don't know what they are talking about, and it is also
clear that Krugman feels that he is correct to attack the idea that trade
is primarily responsible for the declining fortunes of unskilled labor. But
it is not trade in itself, rendered more economical by advances in
transportation and telecommunication, which is the real root of the
problem. The real problem is discoverable only  through value analysis,
specifically that capital is forced to increase the rate of exploitation
and this is forcing capital to relocate or outsource jobs abroad (as long
as productivity levels can be approximated)--to the detriment of workers in
the North as dislocated manufacturing workers begin to compete for the few
limited so called service jobs and wages fall preciptiously.

2. Hugh offered some valuable comments on Bourdieu. As for why I have found
Bourdieu's analysis in his *Distinctions* of the style of the middle class
especially appealing, again I shall beg out of a reply. Hugh's comments on
the possible limits of concept formation in Bourdieu's work are quite
helpful. I think it may be true that Bourdieu has not been able to discern
what for Marx were the thinnest abstractions of the capitalist mode of
production. How these "thinnest" concepts are both abstract and
historically specific is explored well by Patrick Murray.

3. I am not sure whether I agree with Karl C that the conflict in Central
Africa is primarily an inter-imperialist one. It is possible that the US is
there to sell intelligence and stability to the French. That is, the US may
actually use its military and financial influence over rebel forces to keep
them within parameters acceptable to the French and thus manage the
inevitable transition to a post Mobutu era. As a declining power, the US
should perhaps be understood as a mercernary force in the world today,
without any clear vision of a truly imperialist design--Shane Mage
suggested so much many months ago.

 But to the extent that the US declines as a industrial power (despite
continued domination in a few highly profitable industrial sectors), the
more it will resort to cheap mercernary tactics to maintain influence,
though such a resort will only have the effect of hastening industrial
decline through continued military expenditures. So it is not surprising
that Samuel Huntington is actually encouraging US extrication from Africa
and most of the world, while other great bourgeois thinkers will encourage
deeper involvement. There is deep confusion within the US ruling class
about its position in the world, though its newly won ability to penetrate
the world's telecommunications markets is surely no small victory.

Rakesh




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