andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>
> Unfortunately, Charles, this leaves the situation
> symmetrical with the ruling class that can repress the
> revolution in its self-intereest, and the workers can
> have nothing to say about that except, it opposes our
> interest.
I don't think revolution (or evolution) is going to be brought about by sweeping moral or pragmatic condemnations of capitalism, or by explanations of it which reduce it to a few formulas like "theft." We can prove over and over again that it is exploitative or that it is against workers' interests or X or Y and it won't have moved us one step forward. We are not in a high-school debate tournament where there is a judge outside history (King Morality or Jehovah or whatever) who will proclaim the victory of one side or another.
The current issue (12-3) of _Historical Materialism_ is rather interesting and at least tangential to these topics, though it's making my head spin a bit. Nearly half of it is taken up with commentary on Postone. Considering that I'm half a year away from completting 3/4 of a century, the articles haven't convinced me that Postone should be one of the limited number of books I have time remaining to read, but the responses to him are interesting enough to make me glad he did write the book.
Also a long and interesting article on the scope and limits (my top-of-the-head terminology) Commodity Fetishism in Marx's thought.
Gotta run.
Carrol