-----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of Miles Jackson Sent: Thursday, December 30, 2010 8:21 PM To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Agency and Capitalism
On 12/30/2010 03:34 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:
> Angelus Novus
>
>
> This reminds me of a brilliant sticker by the group Gender Killer I once
saw
> on a lamppost: "Capitalism is Not a Conspiracy of the Few. It Works
Because
> You Work."
>
> =====
>
> That comes close to being a pretty good encapsulation of Postne's central
> argument -- though as Angelus mentioned some time ago, Postone can't draw
> very good politics from his own theory! (And of course, neither can any of
> his grad students apparently.)
>
> I would add that capitalists themselves can't stop being capitalists (even
> if as individuals they wanted to) as long as workers continue to be
workers.
>
> Carrol
...as long as workers continue to be wage workers, yes? --I suspect this is Carrol's point, but it's good to be explicit!
Yes. Especially since the sentence is about capitalists ceasing to be capitalists.
A british historian (whose name I forget just now) in aseries of CDs on history of human thought notes that in the Paleolithic period labor or work did not really exist because "productive" activities were so intermingled with other activities that no real separation existed.
Carrol