----- Original Message ----- From: "Shane Mage" <shmage at pipeline.com> To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Monday, September 28, 2009 12:32 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] The State (Was: Ralph loves the nice plutocrats)
>
> On Sep 28, 2009, at 11:34 AM, Chris Doss wrote:
>> I think the point was to address the question, "do states in
>> capitalist societies sometimes act consciously against the interests
>> of both domestic and foreign capitalists?" The answer appears to be
>> "yes," with the conclusion to be drawn that the Marxist notion that
>> the state in a capitalist society is merely the tool of the
>> capitalist class is false.
>
> No ruling class is homogeneous, so any state's action is quite
> likely to be against the interests of *some* members of the ruling
> class. In that case its class character is unaffected. In the
> opposite case, where the state action is against the interests of the
> whole "ruling class," the state has clearly ceased to be an agent of
> what was the ruling class and has now become the agent of a different
> class: in other words it has been overthrown and no longer is the same
> state, no longer has the same social nature. But when the state
> "nationalizes" property in a capitalist society it merely substitutes
> state for private capital. One set of capitalists (state capitalists)
> has substituted itself for a different set--or, to put it more
> bluntly, as in the case of Libya et. al., a gang of military thugs has
> stolen from a gang of capitalist swindlers and thereby become
> capitalists themselves.
>
> There is of course nothing remotely resembling what Chris imagines to
> be "the Marxist notion that the state in a capitalist society is
> merely the tool of the capitalist class." The slave is not "merely"
> the tool of the owner, nor is the employee "merely" the tool of the
> employer. But their *social function* is that of tool. He who pays
> the piper calls the tune.
>
> Shane Mage
>
>> This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it
>> always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,
>> kindling in measures and going out in measures."
>>
>> Herakleitos of Ephesos
>
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