I agree of course that "economics" (including "Marxist" economics, is not a science in the positivist sense that term currently carries. But there is a history (the present as history) which, also not a "science" _is_ a crucial domain of systematic study. And from that study we learn, do we not, if it is not self-evident, that production (of plenty or otherwise) simply does not exist as an independent activity. Production occurs as an inseparable element of a massive complex of social relations, and it is in terms of hat complex that we must determine existence or non-existence of "Plenty." Moreover, " value systems and morality" _also_ have no existence in abstraction from that complex of social relations (specifically, in this case, _capitalism_). Moral outrage at the results of that system is, as I noted a couple of days ago, is why we become socialists in the first place; but we have to abstracvt from that moral outrage if we are to gain an understanding that can guide our political opposition to capitalism. CAPITALISM IS NOT EVIL, NOR ARE CAPITALISTS IMMORAL. It is history. A politics that does not go beyond oral outrage is a toothless politics. Or worse: it is moral outrage at capitalism understood as a system of values that drives Pound's Cantos and the politics of that poem. That is not the _only_ possible politics derivable from Proudhonism (which is the theory implicit in Wojtekk's post) but it is a common one.
Carrol
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[WS:] Nice piece indeed. What I particularly like about it is the argument that it is not about economics (which is pseudo-science anyway) but about value systems and morality. We collectively produce enough to provide decent standards of living to practically everyone on the planet - but that runs against the elite value system, which is built on inequality and autocratic control. It is one thing to engage in a cut-throat competition when there is not enough for everybody - it may be brutal and inhumane but it is about survival after all. But engaging in a cut-throat competition amidst of plenty is simply criminal - it is a crime against humanity just like sending people off to death camps to achieve a mad vision of racial superiority. These two may differ in methods they employ but not in the underlying value systems.
Wojtek
On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 5:54 PM, <123hop at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> Nice article on Nake Capitalism....
>
>
>
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/02/matt-stoller-the-liquidation-of-socie
ty-versus-the-global-labor-revival.html
>
> Joanna
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>
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