Date: Wed, 14 Feb 1996 14:23:33 +0100
From: fiastr-AT-village.ios.com (Alessandro Coricelli)
Subject: Re: Negri's Marxism


>On Wed, 14 Feb 1996, David McInerney wrote:
>
>> that is obviously silly.  The best source of Negri's views on class is
>> obviously reading Negri's writings on class, not the simple fact that he
>> was friends with Guattari or anyone else.  I am friends with postmodernists
>> too.  Does that make me a class traitor?
>>
>
>Louis:
>
>"Since the 1960's, new collective subjectivities have been affirmed in
>the dramas of social transformation. We have noted what they owe to
>modifications in the organization of work and to developments in
>socialization; we have tried to establish that the antagonisms which
>they contain are no longer recuperable within the traditional horizon
>of the political. But it remains to be demonstrated that the innovations
>of the '60s should above all be understood within the universe of
>consciousnesses, of desires, and of modes of behaviour."
>
>This is from Guattari and Negri's "Communists Like Us" written in 1985. I
>hesitate to read any more of Negri if this the type of thinking and
>writing he is capable of. "Communists Like Us" is simply a rotten piece
>of thinking and writing from beginning to end.
>

I've been a "reader" of the list for quite a while(approximately six
months).I find it very interesting but it is difficult to partecipate in it
actively for two reasons : mainly because there is the language barrier
(I'm italian),another problem I'm having is that when,five years ago,I
moved to the U.S. I thought I
would have been back in two years.So I didn't bring whith me my books.

I can't help  but say something about Toni Negri and his contribution to
marxism and the italian revolutionary movement.Infact I had been a militant
of "Potere
Operaio" between 1971 and 1973(til its end).

1) I find reasonable that someone (Louis) reading a couple of lines of Negri's
defines them "a rotten piece of thinking and writing from beginning to
end".Negri wouldn't mind himself.On the other hand if I were in Louis's
shoes I would admit that I don't really know much about it (nothing
personal).

2)I also desagree with David when he says that,"the best source of Negri's
views on class is obviously reading Negri's writings on
class....".Fortunately there are other sources.Negri has been primarely
somebody who felt comfortable within the movement.Is this unorthodox ? You
decide.In early september of 1971 in the Organization Conference of Potere
Operaio in Roma a huge sign remembered us all that "communism is the real
movement which abolish the present state of things".
This still is Negri's interpretation of Marx.
In the late 60's  "operaism" (the thinkers whom founded the magazine
"Quaderni Rossi") divided itself in two(or three).Tronti (the author of
"Operai e Capitale"),Asor Rosa (a literature scholar)and Cacciari(the
"young" philosofer,now mayor of Venice) were convinced that mainstream
politics,the art of compromise(often quoting Machiavelli),was the right
place to be.
The core of Negri's thinking was that the working class changed from a
class of skilled workers to a one of "workers of thousands  jobs"(the
"operaio massa").
Therefore the "behaviour" of the "class" changed accordingly.Forms of
struggle like sabotage or armed pickets showed up.The movement he helped
(later) to create ,Potere Operaio,was built to ask "income".A guaranteed
salary for the workers,besides what they do.The end of work was the
issue.Is that unorthodox ?
You decide.
What we saw later was that another change was taking place.The
"factory",the place where surplus is produced,wasn't anymore the actual
"factory".The factory was all over the places.Restricting itself in size
was actually expanding its range of action.The working class was therefore
everywhere as the "factory"was.
This change meant the necessity of a passage to a class war extended in the
"territory"(no more confined inside the place of work but extended to the
schools,the offices,the streets).Obviously this was a pretty "subjective"
push.
So what?Is that unorthodox?You decide.
What I mean is that the "forms" of struggle are "always" related to the
changes in the way goods are produced.And Negri was "always" comfortable
with this.Up til 1977 (when Guattari showed up,so what?).

3)Now I would like to introduce a topic which is really "blasfeme".I mean
that all the "bordighisti"(where were they,anyway,when a "real movement was
abolishing the state of things"?) would be very upset,along with the
orthodoxs.
Something Toni Negri taught an entire generation of revolutionary is that
revolution "can be fun".
What we witness is that periodically somebody realizes that(lately
France,BTW isn't ironic that Negri lives there?).But,what we should hope
for if nobody  could not experience a nice revolution during his/her
lifetime?
I mean that many orthodoxes haven't expierenced it.

4) it is ironic that most of Negri's thoughts about "work"(which I find
very "marxist") are present in a book by Jeremy Rifkin,"The End of
Work,subtitle "The decline of Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the
Post-Market Era"(Tarcher-Putnam).

I apologize for my "semplicity"(naivete?).

Ciao,
Alessandro

Alessandro Coricelli
tel(212)593-2529




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