There has been so much written on environmentalism vs 'Brown Marxism' that I would like to stick to just one issue, for clarity's sake, and that is Marx's view of the development of the productive forces. I don't say that this ought in any way be decisive for our attitude today, but it does seem to me undeniable that Marx favoured the extension of the productive forces, and that his critique of Capital is precisely that it fails to develop them beyond a certain point.
This is of course a theme in Marx's writing since he wrote the Communist Manifesto at age 28. There he argues that, like feudalism before it, capitalism has become a fetter on the further development of the productive forces: 'The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to the further development of the conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions, by which they are fettered' (p40, Peking ed). 'And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? ... by the enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces' (ibid).
It has often been argued that this early counterposition of forces and relations of production is naive on Marx's part, that he recognised and dispensed with it. But in fact this theme is consistent throughout Marx' work.
The development of the productive forces is the means by which the realm of human freedom is enlarged, as the realm of necessity, of human labour is reduced to a minimum. In the rough draft for Capital, the Gurndrisse, Marx wrote:
'Real economy - saving - consists of the saving of labour time (minimum (and minimisation) of production costs; but this saving identical with development of productive force. Hence in no way _abstinence from consumption_, but rather the development of the power, of capabilities of production, and hence of the capabilities as well as the means of consumption.' 711
In Capital Volume one, Marx is scathing about the barriers to mechanisation that arise from Capital's undervaluation of labour power. He points out that as long as labour is paid less than the value it creates that will make the introduction of technology less attractive than the use of cheap labour. 'Hence nowhere do we find a more shameful squandering of human labour-power for the most despicable purposes that in England, the land of machinery' (p372)
And in the penultimate chapter Marx reprises the 'naive' formulations of the Manifesto: 'The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with and under it. Centralisation of the means of production and socialisation of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. Thus integument is burst asunder' (p715)
(I think it must have been written as the final chapter, it being clearly the climax of the work, and the bit on Wakefield added as an afterthought)
Marx continues in this vein in volume three, published by Engels after Marx' death. In a discussion of Ricardo and the tendency of the rate of profit to fall, he makes this telling point:
'Development of the productive forces of social labour is the historic task and justification of capital. This is just the way that it unconsciously creates the material requirements of a higher mode of production.'
Marx continues that the falling rate of profit is only an indicator that capitalist social relations are historically redundant because they have become a barrier to the further development of social productivity.
'It comes to the surface here in a purely economic way - ie from the bourgeois point of view ... - that it has its barrier, that it [Capital] is relative, that it is not an absolute, but only a historical mode of production corresponding to a definite limited epoch in the development of the material requirements of production.' P259
Now, I must admit that I had thought that this was all ABC to socialists, but I guess that the disorienting effect of the current period are profound.
So when
In message <355890A3.53ABEC91 at netcomuk.co.uk>, Mark Jones
<Jones_M at netcomuk.co.uk> writes
>More growth can ONLY result in WORSE living conditions
and
>Yes, I mean increased output by the techniques of modern capitalist agriculture
>are UNQUESTIONABLY A BAD THING.
I am taken aback. Is it acceptable that 381 million industrial workers
must continue to exhaust their lives in unremitting toil? Or do we
anticipate that a socialist society could, by developing productivity,
release them from the greater part of their burden. Is it acceptable
that sub-Saharan Africa should persist in a state of food scarcity. Or
should we apply the grains and fertilisers that have made the US the
world's largest agricultural producer to Africa? Do we leave the third
world in conditions of chronic pollution, or do we apply the new
technologies that have been improving air conditions in the first world
for the last forty years?
In message <355896DA.D7635589 at netcomuk.co.uk>, Mark Jones
<Jones_M at netcomuk.co.uk> writes
>James, you constantly talk about capitalism as creating limits to growth. This
>was
>not what Marx talked of.
But that was exactly what Marx talked of, teh way that capitalist
relations of production were a fetter on the furhter development of the
productive forces.
> What kind of growth do you hope for if capitalism were
>to
>be abolished? More factories, highways, cars, consumer goods, and more people --
>that seems to be your notion, and it is simply an insane one.
Here I think Mark should try to listen to himself, as others might hear
him. More people is a bad thing? People are what makes life worth
living. People are the creative force in the world, they are not the
problem.
More factories is a bad thing? Yes, if working in factories necessarily entailed exploitative and oppressive working conditions. But an increased productive capacity that was not undertaken for profit would release people from the burden of endless toil.
More consumer goods is a bad thing? That is easy to say when you have enough, but for many people in the more impoverished parts of the world, things like soap, blankets, salt, razor blades are consumer goods that they long for, not to mention cars, radios, fridges and all the other things that one takes for granted.
More cars and motorways are a bad thing? Well, if you take it for granted that you can travel freely around your country then perhaps you can be blase about roads and cars. But to travel to Brasilia from the coast is a six-day round trip. That's a lot of time out of your life. Not all cars are dirven by bored teenages. Some are ambulances, or fire engines, or trucks carrying the food that people need to live, or taking people to earn their livelihoods. -- Jim heartfield