>What Gar and others have been typing about is the *division of labor* about which Marx and Engels wrote: "the division of labor implies the possibility, nay the fact that intellectua l and material activity--enjoyment and labor, prodution and consumption--devolve on different individuals..." The paradigmatic d.o.l is in the family "where wife and children are the slaves of the husband...Division of labor and private property are, moreover, identitical expressions" They go on to describe how the division of labor and the ideologies associated w/ it obfuscates the social, cooperative, communal characteristic of productive
labor in which the products of one's labor appear as alien to us:
"For as soon as the division of labor in society comes into being,
each man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is
forced upon him and from which he cannot escape. He is a hunter, a
fisherman, a shepherd, or a critical critic, and must remain so if he
does not want to lose his means of livelihood"
>The point here is that the division of labor--between mental and material production-- was already advanced by M&E. There was the general d.o.l. manifesting itself as workers v. owners, production v consumption. There was another level of a d.o.l that existed within the bourgeoisie, that between the intellectuals (ideologists, the capitalists who invested capital, and the rentiers who owned the land and/or machinery (see the 18th Brumaire)
Whereas I'm quite sure that M&E saw capitalists, and workers as separate classes, I'm not so sure that they saw workers in the intellectual and control fields as such. To the extent they considered a *class* between labor and capital they seemed to have thought of the small capitalists, those people who lived both from their own labor and some ownership of the means of production. The other examples you have given they seemed to regard as just what you said -- a division of labor which comes with the invention of property and not a separate class.
I like the way you explicate your thesis below, and I'd like to see you continue to develop it in future posts. However I hope you don't mind if I tie it back to my more simple minded point; if those in "control" functions do indeed constitute a separate class with a separate class interest from workers then anyone interested in movement building has to avoid a class bias in favor of the coordinator classe interest. I'm not saying there is conflict on every issue; but on those issues on which conflict does exist (and they seem to me quite substantial) we have to support the 80% or so in the working class, as opposed to the around 20% between capital and labor.
Thanks
Gar
>But this d.o.l. has become increasingly complex, particularly with
revolutions in the means of production and I would include one of
those
advances to be rationalization. Now, here's where Weber comes in
handy.
Weber argued that capitalism as a form of market exchange has existed
for
quite some time. What Marx was looking at, and what made it unique
and
different from earlier forms of capitalism was it's character as a
form of
*rationalized* capitalism: the focus on efficiency (optimum means for
getting from one point to another), calculability (precise
measurements of
time, size, cost--this becomes extremely important as capitalism
advances
and explains why time calculations, cost-benefit calculation, rational
accounting procedures are crucial to success), predictability
(uniformity,
sameness, methodical preciciseness about the future--what one can
expect
from a supplier for example), and control (the rise of technologies
which
control people: assembly lines control people; people control
hammers).
>Those control functions Gar and Curtiss were describing I think fall into
two different aspects of rationalization, societal-level and
organizational-level. We separate them out for analytical reasons,
but
there are intertwined in complex ways. On the one hand, control
through
computer software which determines how we do our work (say the way a
spell
check program tells the typist what word to substitute for a
misspelled
word). The people who develop this software exercise control over the
labor process at the organizational level in this way. Reminds me of
a
time years ago when computers were just being developed for use in
restaurants. The salesman was talking to my boss, who was a notorious
sucker for anything salesmen were selling, but NOT with this one
because
the guy said to him: "Look the advantage is that you can control your
waitresses and make sure they don't rip up the guest check and pocket
the
cash. Everything is documented and if a guest check and the money is
missing you'll know who stole it." My boss at the time replied, to
paraphrase: "Look my employees are honest and they don't steal from
me.
This computer you have here is just going to turn this into a
suspicious
place and my waitresses don't need to be treated as if they're
theaves.
What good is that going to do me?"
>Control also happens to customers for, in addition to services, customers
are produced in service-based organizations. When you go to a chain
restaurant w/ waitress service you will *know* that you shouldn't
loiter
for a leisurely meal. The chairs and tables have been designed to
make you
uncomfortable after a certain amount of time. The din has been
scientifically tested to produce the right mix to annoy you right
about the
time you're done w/ desert.
>I think that we can see that societal rationalization is really about an
increasingly advanced division of labor. Physicians now define what
consitutes illness (health) and have a monopoly over the production of
knowledge about what constitutes illness, who is ill and who isn't,
etc.
This was work once performed in the home, by community healers, etc.
Educators now define what is to be learned, who is learned and who is
not,
whereas that was one work done by the family, community, church. I
could
go on. As these things become subsumed by the cash nexus of
capitalism
part of what happens is that they become 'rationalized' for good or
ill.
>anyway, enough for now.
-- Gar W. Lipow 815 Dundee RD NW Olympia, WA 98502 http://www.freetrain.org/