Carrol wrote:
"But only Marx latches on to the horror of a system that operates wholly independently of human will."
To which SA added:
> It's worth acknowledging that there is a counterview - that capitalism
> operates independently of human will (to the extent that it does) not
> because it's capitalism but because there's a large-scale division of
labor.
> So that any society with a large-scale division of labor will find
itself
> vulnerable to processes independent of human will.
To which combined views Lakshmi responded:
"No the system operates the way it does as a result of people reacting to the conditions and social relations that they created and recreate. That we are not always free to act otherwise does not mean that the system operates "wholly independently of human will". A lot of silly things are being said." LR
This seems as good an entry as any to the first of three of the broader issues around which this thread seems to revolve: (1) The value of social-theoretical or social-scientific analysis, as opposed to (in Lakshmi's words) "institutional description, history and journalism" plus "social justice"; (2) What a "social justice perspective" might be, in contrast to "leftist economics" or Marxism; and (3) The relation of the labor theory of value to (1) and (2).
I'd like to simply assert the following, leaving their further development to future posts if there is interest: (1) Marx’s analytics of the structure and dynamics of capitalism – most succinctly summarized in the phrase “capital is a social relation,” and conveyed by explicating the analysis packed into that phrase – is an indispensable contribution to understanding the modern social world, one that many leftists and even Marxists ignore at their peril, typically because of an undue obsession with simple-minded analytic and normative ideas associated with theft, force, etc.; (2) there is nothing necessarily vague, silly, ineffectual or obscure about the language of “social justice” or “fairness” and in fact the normative analysis of social institutions and practices in terms of “justice” and the like – or, if one wishes to move beyond “the horizon of bourgeois right” (Marx, Gotha Programme), in terms of the values of freedom and fraternity – can be a useful contribution to socialist thought and practice and to dismiss all such normative analysis as simply “liberal” typically evinces a lack of self-understanding on the part of a leftist; (3) one need not take a stand either way on the “labor theory of value” to engage in (1) (a critical appropriation of Marx’s analytics of capitalism) or (2) (normative analysis of social institutions and practices under capitalism or any other arrangement) and, in fact, it is likely best to do so without (if for no other reason than ltv tends to reinforce the tendency to think only in overly simplistic terms of “theft,” etc.)
Here I just wanna say a few words on the first issue, the idea that Marx provides an analysis of capitalism that is (a) social-theoretical or social-scientific rather than merely descriptive/journalistic; and (b) that in that analysis capitalism operates as a system with an internal logic/dynamic that is not reducible to the will of individuals. But as backdrop, let me first say that I think that the debate here between what Lakshmi’s “facts plus values” leftist approach and the approach of others (maybe summarizable as “Marxism plus ‘what is justice?’”) is a recurring debate between non-Marxists and Marxists leftists of some significance.
Lakshmi, whether or not it is best captured by Carrol’s phrase of “operating wholly independently of human will,” the idea that capitalism is a “system” – i.e., an institutional structure with a set of associated dynamics or logics that cannot be reduced to the will of individual persons, is, I think, an indispensable idea. At the most abstract level, the basic notion as I see it is as follows: the institutional structure of capitalism – namely, private ownership of productive assets + commodity production (or production for exchange value) + wage labor – forces all individuals within that institutional structure to act in ways that they might not otherwise wish to and, further, results in a series of typical dynamics that stem from the properties of the system rather than the pre-systemic traits, desires, etc. of individuals. While none of the dynamics can occur without decisions and actions taken by the individuals who comprise the system (and to that extent it the system is not “independent” of individuals), all that is needed in terms of individual choice is that people wish to avoid some combination of destitution and indignity, with all further variations between individuals being secondary factors (and thus the system’s operation is to that extent not “reducible” to individuals).
So, what is the system and Marx’s analysis of it? In a nutshell, let me initially propose the following thumbnail summary: It is a socioeconomic system where (1) most people cannot reproduce their conditions of existence through direct access to the means of subsistence and production, but rather must hire themselves out to others who have control over productive assets, (2) which others are constrained by competition with other owners, all of whom produce for sale on a market, (3) which competition need not be fueled by greed but rather simply by some combination of (a) the desire not to become a wage worker; (b) fear that other owners will be greedy; (c) or simply projection onto other owners of fear (b), so that they will act aggressively out of a defensive motivation. Further, although motives (a) through (c) may well be enough, if even one out of ten owners is in fact greedy/rapacious, all the others will be force to follow suit on pain of losing market share and, ultimately, their business and having to join the work force. This “grow or die”/“innovate or die” compulsion leads to the “logic of accumulation” whereby the entire system is oriented toward expanding the amount of surplus produced in Time 1 so as to reinvest it for expanded production in Time 2. With this logic comes a series of attendant dynamics, including booms and busts, greater capitalization of industry, ceaseless technological dynamism, etc. Perhaps most significantly, the gains from increased productive capacity are systematically biased in their deployment, favor of increased output of exchange value/commodities, at the expense of less easily commodifiable goods such as leisure, meaningful activity, friendship, green spaces, etc. Thus, the system operates as an “alien force,” systematically seeking to increase “exchange-value” irrespective of “concrete-sensuous” human goods, desires, etc. (or, more precisely, only registering those that can be expressed as “effective demand” – i.e., commodifiable preferences backed by willingness and ability to pay that can be profitably satisfied through market competition).
Now, there is a lot more to say and refine (including how all this is usefully explicated by unpacking the multisided meaning of “capital”), but I think there are two key points to underline: (1) the institutional analysis of “capital as a social relation” resulting in “alienation of social powers,” “alienation of person from person,” “alienation of activity from human need” is precisely what Marx’s analysis offers as a crucial addition to other socialist and leftist thought, which tends to be preoccupied with, say, “exploitation,” “theft,” “injustice,” “authority,” “coercion,” not to mention liberalism’s “unequal opportunity,” “leveling the playing field,” etc.; (2) none of this requires any position on the labor theory of value.
I'll end somewhat polemically and say that although the non-Marxist left’s skepticism toward “theory” is somewhat warranted to the extent that it is rooted in “theory”’s tendency to lead to unsupple thinking, that skepticism is also rooted in a host of other not so good reasons and, in any case, operates as a serious barrier to satisfactory understanding of the social world, as evinced by the litany of unilluminating and boring journalistic “analyses” coming from sources like ZNet.
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