>
> > >>Capital is not theft in marxist terms.
> >
> >Joanna wrote: >But, doesn't it start out with "primitive capitalist
> >accumulation" -- that is, theft? And, when we look at more recent
> >capitalist
> >formations: eastern europe, FSU, as well as the global privatization of
> >social "capital"., does it not also look like theft?<
> >
> >Justin writes: >In a sense, but it's not useful to look it it that way.
>
> >With
> >ordinary theft, you restore the property to its owner. With primitive
> >accumulation, that means what? Going back to precapitalist production
> >relations? What's wrong with capitalism is not that it is based on
>theft
> >but
> >that it is based on exploitation, which involves unnecessary unfreedom
> >(coercion and domination and alienation at work), injustice
>(unnecessary
> >inequality), and general bad effects in terms of unnecessary suffering
>due
> >to unemployment and poverty. <
> >
> >In volume I of CAPITAL, Marx seems to have followed the moral strategy
>that
> >Cornel West ascribes to him (in his dissertation, published by Monthly
> >Review press): instead of trying to develop a moral philosophy of his
>own,
> >he assumes a bourgeois system of ethics applies, i.e., that every
>commodity
> >sells at value.
>
>This is not an ethical assumption. "Value" is a theoretical quantity. No
>one
>has an ownership claim to any quantity of value.
>
>Given that assumption, he is able to show that capitalism
> >_in practice_ violates its own moral theory, exploiting labor despite
> >exchange at value.
>
>AS you know,. Jim, I disgree with this account. I think Marx's critique
>of
>capitalism is not that it involves theft of value, but unnecessary
>unfreedom, that's what's wrong with exploitation.
>
>We can go further, acknowledging the
> >generalized immorality of capitalism -- fraud as normal, business as
>usual
> >-- while agreeing with Marx that even when capitalism does involve
>living
> >up
> >to its own moral standards, it is a fundamentally immoral system
> >(exploitative, dictatorial, and alienating).
> >
> >In other words, capitalism is based on both systemic exploitation _and_
> >individual theft.
>
>Fraud may be a normal part of capitalism, but as we see right now, it's
>not
>what makes capitalism go. It threatens capitalism, on the contrary.
>Rermarkable story in the NYT today on whether capitalism can survive
>capitalists--they're worried! Theft and fraud is a consequence of
>capitalism, but unlike exploittaion it is not part of the system.
>
>jks
>
>
>
>_________________________________________________________________
>Join the world's largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail.
>http://www.hotmail.com
_________________________________________________________________ Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: http://messenger.msn.com