From: Russell Pearson <R.Pearson-AT-art.derby.ac.uk>
Date: Thu, 5 Mar 1998 10:42:37 +0000
Subject: M-TH: Re: Who is Working-Class?


>In message <l0302090ab1233e3a9dc8-AT-[130.244.201.179]>, Hugh Rodwell <m-
>14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se> writes
>>So that definition of proletariat includes everyone without means of
>>production or land of their own to make a living off. This is good because
>>it definitely includes those unable to support themselves by their labour
>>in the general class definition.
>
>To my mind, this leans to heavily on the objective side of class. The
>working class is not just an objective economic category, but a subject
>that creates itself. The difference, as someone once pointed out is that
>between a mass in itself and a class for itself.
>--
>James Heartfield

Some excellent posts generated in this debate (and some amusing antics from
Tom and Jerry). I agree with both James _and_ Hugh. There's a dialectic
between the objectivity of the working class as producers of surplus value,
who, in the classic definition have nothing to sell but their labour power,
and the purely relational aspect of class as an abstraction.  As Hugh
srtongly alludes to and Chris points out more directly, none of us could
survive for very long without either a wage coming in or some sort of state
benefits. This picture becomes somewhat muddied however, if we put it into
the global perspective of imperialism: eg. the increasing numbers of people
retiring at an earlier age, living longer, and enjoying an income generated
by their pension funds. These funds extract surplus value from both their
fellow workers within the imperialist powers, but more particularly, from
investments exploiting the cheap labour elsewhere in the world. Are not
these former workers now living off the fat of the land, so to speak?
To pursue some of the points opened up by James, if capital is the
relationship between people as mediated by the relationship between things,
class only exists within this schemata in terms of the relationship between
those who own of the means to produce commodities and the tendency of those
who produce commodities to become commodities themselves. A 'thingyness'
thus pervades the relationship in all its forms, turning people into things
whose raison d'etre is to produce things for exchange and whose social
relations are thus mediated by things. The working class can in one sense
be seen as a thing in itself as a reified sociality, although we should
never forget the historically contingent nature of this reification. This
is to suggest that the working class is created as an objectification of
capitalist relations, whereas James suggests that the working class is
_also_ a subject that creates itself. Thus a shift arises between the class
in itself and for itself- as fully conscious of its own historic mission as
the subject and object of history etc.
Now given the mischief that pomo theorists have made with the individual
subject, how can a mass of people become a subject?
Or put another way, can we still uphold this Lukacsian ideal?
(And can you back up your claim that he was a Stalinist Butcher, Hugh? From
what I know of his actions, he ordered the shooting of 4 deserters during
the aborted Hungarian revolution and was one hell of a sexist, but
Stalinist Butcher- surely this is the claim of an anarchist booby?)

Russ






     --- from list marxism-thaxis-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---