Date: Wed, 2 Jul 1997 03:09:30 -0400 (EDT) From: Andrew Wayne Austin <aaustin-AT-utkux.utcc.utk.edu> Subject: Re: M-I: state capitalism Comrades, If somebody would like to tell me how bourgeois social relations continue after the bourgeoisie has been appropriated I would appreciate this clarification. But more is needed than just this. One needs to show me how residual relations from a previous social formation can fully characterize the social formation which replaces it. Feudal relations, for instance, continued well into capitalist society, but this does not make capitalism feudalism. Neil keeps repeating the state capitalist slogan but his posts don't explain what it is. And when he tries his hand at political economy the results leave a lot to be desired. For example, his analysis of the genesis and emergence of capitalism in Japan is confused. Indeed, he misses the significance of his own point concerning the Meiji government taking a leading role in promoting capitalist development in Japan--the point being that it refutes his thesis. Ironically, what happened in Japan at this time is a great example of state capitalism. One form of state capitalism is where the state plays an activist role, enabling the bourgeoisie to rise to a dominant economic, and in actuality political, position against other social classes (or, if you subscribe to modernist teleology, the state accelerates the rate of economic development--a course advocated by Huntington, against Rostow, in the late 1960s and taken up by many Asian countries), in this instance to rise to a position capable of competing with the international bourgeoisie. The Japanese during this period were aggressively imperialist. By the turn of the century capitalist relations where highly developed; Japan was on a rapid path to state monopoly capitalism. One might say that Neil has confused form with essence. He has looked at structures of state bureaucracy and rational planning, the existence of a ruling stratum, the existence of social class, and residual characteristics from past developmental paths, seen some similarities, and supposed from this that social formations as distinct as Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union hold the same empirical content. But it would wrong to say that Neil even understands form in this matter, since the Soviet Union was state capitalist neither in form nor in content, for all the reasons I have specified, reasons which have never been addressed either by Neil or by Lew. (Note how they attack little side posts and parentheticals--part of their endless quest for red herrings.) Neil can't even get what I write correct (neither can Lew). For example, I wrote that massive state organization in the US New Deal and German Nazi period did not make these societies socialist. Somehow, Neil got from this unambiguous point to an understanding that I said state organization of the economy means socialism. It is hard enough trying to carry on a conversation with Neil without him mangling what I write. Anthrax has this blistering thrash number called "Caught in a Mosh." The main hook says: Which one of the words don't you understand? Talking to you is like clapping with one hand. Sometimes I feel like this is what's going on when I talk to Neil. Andrew Austin --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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