<HTML> James Devine wrote: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE>(I'm not sure what this is a response to or why I received two copies. Can I forward an edited version of my reply to lbo-talk?)</BLOCKQUOTE> I liked your reply too.   Please do post it. <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE> <PRE>I don't know about this. First, it's possible, from a capitalist point of  view of course, for the labor movement to be _too strong_, pushing up  wages, etc. and encouraging capital flight</PRE> </BLOCKQUOTE> This is one possibility.  However, it hasn't happened in Countries like Sweden where Labor was strong..  Capital isn't always like the American variety totally willing to wander the globe to the place of maximal return.  The current panic also shows the timidity of Capital.  Rather than take risks there is massive flight to 5% treasuries which is a low rate of real return in this time and place.   <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE> <PRE> The English bourgeoisie didn't face a labor movement at all during the period 1770 to 1830, but somehow they wangled an Industrial Revolution and created the "workshop of the world" or whatever English hegemony  in manufacturing was called.</PRE> </BLOCKQUOTE>   I think I need to look a little at English social history, in particular when the first crash in England occured due to oversupply and what was done about it. As you have said, and Marx originally I think,  (I haven't looked at Marx in a long time) unless mass i.e. labor wages keep up with underlying productivity one has a declining rate of profit and crisis of oversupply or of misallocation of  supply i.e. like Asia too. At this stage, it seems to me critical to have a strong labor movement.  Whats perfectly obvious to "Enlightened Capitalists" say of the Roosevelt variety, a species that seemed to have disappeared at the moment that social democracy is to their benefit.  If a living wage is not paid then there is nobody to buy the goods and services.  While a reserve army of cheap labor is good to a point too much of a good thing means collapse even for the Capitalist ruling class. It seems you only get enlightened Capitalists of the Roosevelt or Authoritarian Bismark variety only when their is a credible threat from labor.  Political democracy may have nothing to do with this threat from labor.   Labor and functioning Capitalism are symbiotic at least in the current world.   I really believe a moderately strong Labor movement saves Capitalism from itself, unfortuangely. It would be nice to see labor have a lot more strength, maybe I'll see it in my lifetime.   <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE> <PRE>One thing that keeps the bourgeoisie from being thieves is that thieves tend to steal from each other. Part of the Lockean "social contract" is that such intramural crime is verboten. That is, the capitalists unite to prevent such class-destructive behavior.  Another thing is that there are limits on how far wages can be pushed down via theft. The big thieves like Mobutu or Marcos were totally oppressive toward the working class, but gained their lucre from raw-material mining, ripping off their imperial sponsors (who were willing to be ripped off in order to get support in the Cold War), etc.</PRE> </BLOCKQUOTE> In order for the Lockean Social Contract to make sense you already need a fairly wide distribution of wealth. This is not what happened in Russia or the places you cited.  In addition to Rich Industrialists you need a prosperous community of Petty Bourgeosie with some political power.  Otherwise you will see looting as in the Soviet Union.  In this regard it was interesting to listen to Greenspan who actually was complaining about the distribribution of wealth today being antithetical to democracy.  This was a very useful moment at the Senatorial Hearings which was unfortunately lost. Another example the state managers of Russian Enterprise.  The Russians former managers I understood pushed wages down to zero.    Right: the old USSR is one force that made the US and its allies make concessions to labor even if it's in a weak state (as in the US). I don't get what you're saying about the destruction fo labor under Stalin. It's true that independent labor unions were totally destroyed (even before Stalin) but workers had some influence on the government-controlled unions, partly because it was impossible for the government to have true control over _everything_. BTW, as I understand it, the KGB was primarily oriented toward the international arena (like the CIA). It was more the domestic secret police's job to keep labor down (like the FBI).   I had it right about Russia but I was using the wrong names.  Organized Labor was destroyed certainly under Stalin but Also under Lenin.  The equivalent of a national bourgeoisie was the state managers of industrial firms.  Presumably, fear of the state police kept the looting of the industrial managers within reach.  Afterwards they were under no such constraints and effectively controlled what was left of the state apparatus.   I was talking about the reason the Soviet Economic system functioned and during Wartime probably better than any of the "Democratic ones"  but at terrible human cost.     -- Michael Cohen mike@cns.bu.edu Work: 677 Beacon, Street, Rm313 Boston, Mass 02115 Home: 25 Stearns Rd, #3 Brookline, Mass 02146 Tel-Work: 617-353-9484 Tel-Home:617-734-8828 Tel-FAX:617-353-7755  </HTML>