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subrosa wrote

We may be good enough for communism, but communism isn't good enough for me >:)

I desire intensification, complexity and variety in our games of giving and taking, of contributing, appropriating and distributing. Let's not throw it all on the commons pile, where's the love in that?

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Esperaux wrote (edited )

There's still a degree of variety and complexity in moving from the capitalist mode of production to the communist mode of production. Communism is merely production being done to each according to their ability and to each according to their need. It is not just simply tossing everything into a common share pile. Moving away from a system of overproduction and emphasis on constant work for the sake of production means moving away from the capitalist mode of production. Proposed alternatives to capitalism such as market socialism only collectivizes the workplace but doesn't address the issue of the workplace itself.

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subrosa wrote

You seem a bit too Marxist, I'm a bit too Fourierist, to have a fruitful conversation about this. But maybe we can have a go at it when I'm sober, some other time. Not exactly lookin forward to it though, the last time didn't get us anywhere.

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Esperaux wrote

I'm not a Marxist just because I use similar language. Marx used the language of David Ricardo and Adam Smith but that didn't make him a capitalist. If I could find different terms to articulate this better I would. Closest I can think is the concept of antiwork which effectively attacks capitalism at these same points of constant production and labor.

The point being however is that you simply claim communism to be when we just throw things in the commons pile. Which is true in certain aspects but communism is more defined by its productive relationship.

What do you mean by a complexity and variety in giving, taking, and distributing in this context? The other noncommunist anticapitalist groups always tend to be market proponents who effectively just want the capitalist workplace preserved but collectivized.

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subrosa wrote

Is it a market when you downvote my offering?

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Esperaux wrote

I'm asking you to be specific in what you see as involving more complexity and variety as an alternative to capitalism. You claimed communism is just when we share everything in the commons. Yet what actually defines communism is the change of productive relationship from what we currently have under capitalism.

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subrosa wrote

So any "productive relationship" that isn't capitalistic is communistic?

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Esperaux wrote

There are other forms of hierarchical productive relationships that weren't capitalist such as with feudalism. Though in terms of moving past the capitalist logic of constant production, accumulation, and work it can be said that a wide variety of post capitalist relations would fall under communistic productive relationships such as with gift economies or certain types of decentralized planning.

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subrosa wrote

So communist really just means post-capitalist?

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Esperaux wrote

That depends. Do you consider market socialism as a means to move us past capitalist relationships of production?

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subrosa wrote (edited )

Ugh, let's not start with wikipedia constructions of socialist genres. At least with communism I can assume you're talking about an anarchist tendency around Kropotkin, Reclus, and the like.

About markets, I'm no abolitionist. The "communism or markets" talking point is reductive nonsense.

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Esperaux wrote

How is it reductive nonsense?

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subrosa wrote

It reduces all anti-capitalist alternatives to communism to market economy proposals.

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Esperaux wrote

What would you specifically consider to be these alternatives then?

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subrosa wrote

I have no idea what you're asking.

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Esperaux wrote

You're claiming it's reducing all anti capitalist alternatives. So what would these specific alternatives be?

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subrosa wrote

What, do you want me to list a bunch of anarchisms?

What I'm saying is, communism opposing markets relies on an idea of markets that primarily serves the communist opposition to markets. I have no use for any of that.

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Esperaux wrote

Communism is pretty broad and envelopes a variety of lifestyles already. I guess I'm confused what you mainly mean by wanting more variety in this sense. What alternative form of market would you propose that would meaningfully change the relationship workers have with their workplace?

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subrosa wrote

About markets, it's not a question I spend much time bothering with. I've read a bit about mutual banking, about "cost the limit of price", and other proposals that point to exchange customs that seem pretty consistent with anarchist commitments and yet deserve the name of "market".

What I'm interested in is apolitical organization, abandoning the workplace as a political entity, and worker as a political subject. The relation between worker and the workplace would shift, on both sides, to a point where we wouldn't be workers, wouldn't have workplaces.

What I'm opposed to is communism in the exclusive sense. Any communism that hopes for post-scarcity levels of overproduction with the help of technology and further industrialization.

What bothers me about communism is that it seems to soften and simplify all the other anarchisms, in unhelpful ways. E.g. the question of appropriation is answered with "abolish property" or collective property. The question of equity/balance in economy is answered with "from each, to each", reciprocity denied with something like a gift-economy. The critique of civilization is either ignored or transformed into yet another anti-capitalism. At this point I'm not sure communism is anything other than a crude and empty anti-capitalism. Which it doesn't have to be.

If we wanna keep going with this, maybe you can tell me how communism distinguishes itself, in positive terms.

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Esperaux wrote

How would mutual banking help us abandon the workplace or move away from constant production for the sake of production?

Also communism being defined here as a mode of production of each according to their ability and each according to their need if anything is a necessity in moving away from overproduction and overindustrialization. The motivation for industry comes from the production of commodities for exchange on a market system. Markets by their nature necessitate constant growth and expansion. What can be commodified will be commodified.

I think we can both agree it's not enough to simply collectivize the workplace. The same economic forces would be in place that demand we engage in constant production, competitive self exploitation, and commodification. In the most practical sense this would involve forms of decommodification. For example when housing is squatted or a restaurant transformed into a place for people to eat freely.

On the critique of civilization it's really up to you personally. Feminism isn't necessarily just another anti-capitalism either although has its relations. Civilization itself is also a pretty broad term though tends to involve social stratification which at that point anarchism could be said to just be anticiv by default since the whole point is moving away from forms of social stratification anyways. Though that leads me to further be confused as to how mutual banking would challenge civilization. It's less that the anticiv position has to call itself communist and more that it seems that even the most primitivist variation of this position would effectively take on communistic lifestyles operating according to mutual aid.

I think part of "The Self-Abolition of the Proletariat As the End of the Capitalist World" can better address your question on how communism really distinguishes itself.

"A current and concrete example of an immediate communist measure; the looting of supermarkets in the south of Italy, one of the countries most afflicted by the “coronavirus crisis,” which was done by proletarians who are already in precarious situations and now desperate, given that, as they themselves say, “the problem is immediate, the children have to eat.” Why is it an immediate communist measure? Because, despite it not directly affecting the sphere of production (as on the other hand the recent wildcat strikes in the same country have indeed done), it eliminates by the deed the sacrosanct private property, the commodity, wage labor and money, and satisfies the common and basic needs of the proletarians and their families. The spontaneous, autonomous and anonymous networks of solidarity and mutual aid among proletarians, which have been created in these precise moments everywhere, are also a concrete communist practice. How can these kinds of measures be sustained over time an space? That’s another subject. On the other hand, it’s also possible to consider as an immediate communist measure the call for a “universal rent strike” (to not pay rent and to occupy empty homes for people that are homeless) from many countries of the world (Spain, France, Sweden, United Kingdom, USA, Canada, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, etc.)."

to essentially summarize, communism in the sense of "to each according to their ability, to each according to their own" or paraphrasing Kropotkin here in terms of "all is for all" distinguishes itself by actions such as these. A capitalist owned grocery store being turned into a worker owned grocery store for example doesn't change the fact it's still a grocery store. Communism would involve doing away with the grocery store.

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subrosa wrote

Fair. Sounds like we have enough 'common ground' in our rejection of grocery stores and workplaces. I'll respond to this tomorrow, sketch something out about mutual banking as an exercise to see where I would run into fresh questions of currency and whatnot. Probably worth a longer post. For now I'll just say that the looting example can just as easily be an illegalism, without any communism in mind. And similarly, that communists aren't alone in attacking and disregarding private property, nor in advocating for autonomy and networks of mutual aid and solidarity.

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subrosa wrote

Also, this thread is getting real narrow on mobile. Let's move.

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lettuceLeafer wrote (edited )

The other noncommunist anticapitalist groups always tend to be market proponents who effectively just want the capitalist workplace preserved but collectivized.

I disagree capitalized distributes the profits from the means of production too much. I want no workers so I can hoard 100 percent of the money rather than 80% of money. No workers, more profit is what I say. I am incredibly insulted that anyone would ever make the assumption that I would want to funnel my profits to others rather than myself. Collective workplaces r sometimes fine tho mostly bad imo.

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Esperaux wrote

What do you mean by 100 percent of your money? What metric are you even going by to calculate what would be considered 100 percent profits? Why even bother preserving money at all?

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lettuceLeafer wrote

I want money so I can hoard massive amounts of resources to not share. Maybe increase my pile of precious metals so I can be like sauron.

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