[lbo-talk] Why Capitalism Cannot be Tamed

[Alan Rudy]

He's repeatedly claimed that real substantive differences between the
cultures of different organizations are more robust than what they have in
common.  I disagree.  It doesn't mean I have a determinist, ahistorical view
of the overweening power of Utilitarianism.  It just means that I see more
sameness than difference and see that sameness coming from the cultural
hegemony of capitalist social relations writ large - capitalist social
relations Wojtek says can't be writ large.  I'm not even saying its not a
different experience to work for GM than it is to work for GE, or Ratheon,
or Boeing, or Seagate, or Disney, or the University of Notre Dame or the TVA
(which I know is not private)... it is.  What I'm saying is that - perhaps
most importantly since the end of the Cold War - these institutions are
being run in ever more common ways... hell, even Pacifica's having to fight
the neoliberal cost-cutting-your-way-to-efficiency-and-sustainability world.

I wrote the "picture in the head thing" because I didn't want to write
socialism without a modifier 'cuz you get slammed by some people for
implying that you have an idea of what it'll look like in the future... and
knowing the risk that, in doing so, I'd get slammed for denying that
actually existing socialisms were real or actual or existing or not
socialism... but, then again, I couldn't leave it out, either.  So you've
simply confirmed that putting the word in a post leads to unavoidably
predictable criticism one way or another.

On Mon, Nov 1, 2010 at 2:01 PM, Somebody Somebody <philos_case at yahoo.com>wrote:


> Alan: You're claiming that variants of capitalist competitive individualism
> are qualitatively different and have more differences than their collective
> distance from anarchocommunalism, agrarian populism, feudalism or (whatever
> picture we each have in our head of) a liveable socialism.
>
> Somebody: When did Wojtek say this exactly? He simply argued you're unable
> to explain the differences generated by the same general ideals and economic
> order.
>
> It's interesting to me that you'd even raise the issue of the collective
> distance between capitalism and a "picture we each have in our head" of
> socialism. Unfortunately, despite vast amounts of empirical data on the
> actually existing socialisms  of the 20th century, we still get abstract
> discussions like this.
>
>