[lbo-talk] "Ruling Class" as Agent?????

brad babscritique at gmail.com
Sun Dec 12 06:43:59 PST 2010


CB: "The test is how much unity is there in the Chamber of Commerce on issues that are the locus of the conflict between the interests of the classes. How much disunity is there in the C of C over the Employee Free Choice Act ? Ask Josten that. Do any of his clients support the Employee Free Choice Act ? How about do any of them support repeal of Taft-Hartley ? Do any support returning to Welfare As We Knew It ? Reviving the War on Poverty ? Making Full Employment a goal of federal policy again ? Taxing capital gains more stringently ?"

No, the test is how many in the CC or the Business Round Table take the notion of capitalist social relations as a given, natural state of affairs. While any of the things above would be good, they would in no way end capitalism and I would argue really don't lead us even in that direction.

Besides the CC and BRT are on the more far end of the spectrum of 'capitalist agents' with left liberals who claim that small tweaks of the system is all that is needed acting to flank the rearguard. I am not saying abandon all those ideas or disregard those who want to fight for them, but we have to simultaneously and systematically remind them that those are the symptoms and the means not the end.

To me, at least recently, the issue of discourse and strategy is much more interesting. How does the left come at these issues and the big underlying issue in a matter that can momentarily avoid the structural politics that push it out of even the realm of the possible.

Brad



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