>In that model however the rate of exploitation is assumed to
>be uniform; and that assumption simplifies the analysis, i.e., the
>demonstration that the law of value can only govern bourgeois society in
>the form of an average rate of profit, not directly by way of relative
>prices.
you'll have to expand on this for me. I think I grasp the point, but am unsure. what is the relation between price and profit at the level of the imposition of the law of value?
> But by what right do we have to assume that in the real world the rate of
>exploitation is 1. uniform (Mark Blaug raises this criticism) or 2. simply
>sufficiently high enough in these high labor low tech third world
>industries to pump sufficient new masses of surplus value into the system
>as a whole to exert upward pressure on the global average profit rate?
my take would be a little different from George's, inasmuch as I don't think the _immediate_ result would be a rise in the rate of profit, but rather would be important to the character of exploitation globally. I find George's argument compelling in that it seems to take account of the expansion of relative surplus value parallel to the expansion of absolute sv, and in that sense is an important critique of Negri's fascination with 'intellectual labour' as the cutting edge of late capitalism. now, I would begin from a different point than George, from the co-existence of the two rather than a reversal of Negri's position. and, here, I grasp the question as a political one, which is not to say this is exhaustive, but only that this is how I think about it -- I would appreciate elaborations or criticisms.
but, there is no reason to assume that simply because a strategy is being pursued, that of low-tech, intensive labour for instance, that it is at all an effective one, or that it is one conceived with a global profit rate in mind. the attempts by individual employers to extend the working day is not necessarily in line with the preferences of social capital (credit) to intensify productivity through other means, such as technology.
then again, the question that preoccupies me is that of why very different strategies are concurrent. why, for instance, are there zones which over the last decade have, in developmental terms, gone backwards? (if we're to use that schema at all...)
so, how would these processes be accounted for within a consideration of average rates of profit? so, in another sense, in the real world, need they be, as in do capitalists act as capital should on paper, especially in those places where the cheapening of labour allows for strategies that in other places would require, say, technology? or, to put it another way, how do export processing zones fit in the equations? (these are serious questions...)
Angela --- rcollins at netlink.com.au