______________________________________________________________________ Issue Number 8 March 20, 1994 // /// // //// // /// /// // //// ////// /// ////// //// // // // /// // // // // // // // / // // // ///// // // // // // ///// // // // // ////// // // // //\\ // \\\ ///// // // // // // \\\// / \\ // // //// \\//// \\ // /// // // // //// \\///// \\/// /// // \\\\\\ \\ ////\\\\ \\ \\ \\\ \\ \\ \\\\\\ \\\\\ \\ \\\\\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\\\\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\\\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\\\\ \\ \\ \\ \\ \\\ \\\ \\ \\\\ \\\ \\ \\ \\\ \\ \\\ \\\\\ \\\\ CONTENTS ________ #8.01 S. Coleman, "Market Socialism - Don't Buy It" #8.02 A. Petersen, statement on workers' "agreement" with the terms of employment, 1938 Marx's observations about trade unions -- #8.03 From _Value, Price and Profit_, 1865 #8.04 Statement to the Geneva Congress, 1866 #8.05 Remark in _The Volksstaat_ 1869 #8.06 Marx, from _Critique of the Gotha Program_, 1875 #8.07 De Leon, from _Socialist Reconstruction of Society_, 1905 #8.08 L. Otter, correspondence #8.09 M. Lepore, reply to L. Otter, and - #8.10 opinion on the necessity of political organization #8.11 H. Morrison, correspondence #8.12 M. Lepore, reply to H. Morrison ______________________________________________________________________ The back issues of this publication are archived at FTP site etext.archive.umich.edu in /pub/Politics/Organized.Thoughts. These documents may be freely distributed in electronic or printed form, and the reader is encouraged to upload them to local bulletin boards. For an e-mail subscription write to 5559653@mcimail.com ______________________________________________________________________ "We have heard enough nonsense about the Pyramids. If Congress should vote to rear such structures on the prairies today, I should not think it worth the while, nor be interested in the enterprise. It was the foolish undertaking of some tyrant." * * * -- Henry David Thoreau, Journal, April 21, 1852 -- ______________________________________________________________________ 8.00 Mike Lepore ----- longwinded introductory verbiage ______________________________________________________________________ The leaflet "MARKET SOCIALISM - DON'T a BUY IT" came out of the 1993 session of the annual Midwest Radical Scholars j o u r n a l and Activists Conference. Steve Coleman, member of the Socialist Party o f of Great Britain (SPGB), is the author. In my view, what makes this l i b e r t a r i a n paper a masterpiece is the fact that the five signatories represent s o c i a l i s m different working class organizations, with somewhat different views about the meaning of socialism and the correct road to reach it. They were able to identify something that they did agree on, and to cooperate to the extent of signing a common statement. That's a very good omen. The most insidious claim of the reactionary right is that workers "voluntarily consent" to the terms of employment. Pseudo-libertarians invoke this trick to justify everything from regimented work environments to poverty wages. I am including an eloquent statement disposing of this myth, written in 1938 by Arnold Petersen, former National Secretary of the Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP). De Leon once said, "The Marxian motto, 'only the union can give birth to the true party of labor', became the guiding light of the SLP. The party lay main stress upon the organization of the working class into revolutionary unions, and considered the ballot, however important, useful and necessary, a secondary consideration." (Quoted by Arnold Petersen, _Proletarian Democracy versus Dictatorships and Despotism_; New York Labor News, 1932) But what exactly did Marx say about the role of unions? To cast some light here, I am reprinting three brief statements made by Marx. You will observe that the sentence in the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) preamble, regarding "the revolutionary watchword, 'Abolition of the wage system'" (reprinted in O.T. #1), was taken almost word for word from Marx's address, _Value, Price and Profit_. The letter from Laurens Otter readdresses the subjects taken up in issue #7. I have been arguing that capitalism cannot be ended by historical developments alone, such as the system's long foretold "collapse." I also argue that the use of the political process will be necessary to transfer the industrial management role from the present owners to the workers' workplace-based associations. Laurens corrects me on some of these matters. I have included a passage from De Leon's 1905 address, _Socialist Reconstruction of Society_, because it was referenced in Laurens Otter's letter and in my response to it. Harry Morrison and I continue the discussion which we began in issues #6 and #7. At stake are several aspects of the new society that is to be built, as well as the (in)adequacy of syndicalist unionism as the lever for social change. One of the issues Harry and I clash over is whether a classless society should feature personal incomes determined by work hours, or whether the system should feature free access to all goods and services. In his _Critique of the Gotha Program_, Marx projected that, in "a communist society ... just as it emerges from capitalist society", [the individual worker] "receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor ... and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption...." I have reprinted that portion for the reader's reference. Was Marx right? Or was he right for the last century, and yet wrong for our modern age of automation? I think it's an important question, because it's related to the matter of whether each definition of socialism would ultimately be workable. SAM BRANDON DEAD AT 90 I'm deeply sorry to note that Sam Brandon, the General Secretary of the Industrial Union Party, died this past October. He had been active in De Leonist organizations since the age of 17. Sam was most enthusiastic about O.T., and he wrote hundreds of letters to gather e-mail users and point them in my direction. The IUP was formed in 1980 by a merger of several small De Leonist groups. The party publishes the newsletter 'People for a NEW SYSTEM' (NS). Subscriptions are 4 quarterly issues for $4. The address is: IUP, P.O. Box 711, Red Bank, NJ 07701 USA. The following paragraph appears on the NS masthead: "Democracy will never be practiced until we have decision-making power in the workplace. The present system allows no such freedom. The NEW SYSTEM empowers us to use the democratic workplace assembly to set basic policies to govern ourselves in every aspect of our work lives: the offices, labs, schools, medical centers, mines, and everywhere industrial activity is needed." Here's another good quotation. It was the page 1 headline in the Fall 1993 NS: "It's not the deficit - It's the system, Stupid!" A large internet site for classic Marxian literature has been established at csf.colorado.edu (FTP, Gopher). Look in the /psn/Marx subdirectories to find extensive writing by various authors, such as Marx, Engels, De Leon, Lenin and Trotsky. Beg pardon - The first release of O.T. #7 contained a typo which said Lenin died in 1929, whereas 1924 would have been more accurate. ______________________________________________________________________ "He mocks the people who proposes that the government shall protect the rich, and they in turn will care for the laboring poor." * * * Grover Cleveland (1837-1908) 22nd and 24th President of the United States Message to Congress, March 1, 1886 ______________________________________________________________________ #8.01 Steve Coleman, "Market Socialism -- Don't Buy It" reprinted from the DISCUSSION BULLETIN, Jan.-Feb. 1994 ______________________________________________________________________ MARKET SOCIALISM -- DON'T BUY IT The attempt to give intellectual credibility to an essentially meaningless term, 'Market Socialism', is about as useful as a project to promote meat-eating vegetarianism. As a political objective, 'Market Socialism' is both foolish and dangerous. We urge you to reject it for the following reasons: COMMODITY PRODUCTION IS CAPITALISM It is precisely the buying and selling of commodities - everything from the food we eat to the prostituted lives of wage and salary workers - which defines the world capitalist system. The purpose of socialism is to replace commodity production with production solely for use. Either we allow everything we need in life to be bought and sold, with the capital-owning minority as the sellers and the wealth-producing majority as the buyers, or we rid ourselves of this wasteful, wretched market system. But to endorse the continuation of commodity production (the market) in the name of socialism is to hijack a social alternative in order to support the status quo. Let those who want to maintain commodity production cease to call themselves socialists - if words are to have any meaning. 'SOCIALIST' MARKETS HAVE BEEN TRIED - AND FAILED There is nothing new about aiming to run the market and call it socialism. From Lenin's New Economic Policy to modern China, where 'socialist banks' are just as capitalist as any other ones, and 'socialist prisons' incarcerate those who dare to interfere with the making of 'socialist profits', there has been a pretense that governments are somehow controlling the markets. In reality the opposite is manifestly the case: THESE STATES ARE GOVERNED BY THE LAWS OF THE MARKET. Every so-called socialist government, from British Labour governments which have committed no end of crimes against workers (from the introduction of the British atomic bomb to the 1960s' statutory incomes policy which made it for the first time ever illegal for bosses to give pay increases), to the recent miserable experiences in New Zealand, Australia, Spain and Greece, there has never been a government of the market which has not been forced to bow to the tyranny of the market. Are we really being told that a U.S. 'market socialist government' would succeed where every other one has totally failed? IF YOU WANT CAKE, WHY GO FOR CRUMBS? Our main objection to this academic wordplaying is that it strips socialism of its really radical content. We are not socialists because we want a 'new deal' for workers to be exploited as commodities in the market, but because we stand for a society where all resources belong to all of us - and what we all own in common we don't need to buy back from ourselves. Under no circumstances should the exciting and revolutionary case for production for use be debased by those who think that markets and socialism could ever be made compatable beyond the unreal world of academia. Steve Coleman - London, England Jeff Miller - Minneapolis, MN Frank Girard - Grand Rapids, MI Perry Sanders - Chicago, IL. Rado Mijanovich, Chicago, IL For further information, contact Rado Mijanovich, 4800 Chicago Beach Dr. #705S, Chicago, IL 60615. Phone (312) 373-4719 ______________________________________________________________________ #8.02 Arnold Petersen, excerpt from "Labor Power and the Power of Labor", editorial in the _Weekly People_, Oct. 29, 1938 ______________________________________________________________________ The vast majority are people who work for a wage - if and when they find work. Having no possessions, the means of production being held in private and exclusive ownership by the few (the capitalists), these millions of propertiless persons (the wage workers) must go to the owners and beg them for permission to use the machines and plants of production in general. The capitalist will, in effect, say to these workers, "We own this land, these mines, these oil wells, this machinery, etc., etc., but they are useless to us without labor, or labor power. On the other hand, you have labor power, or ability to work at some job or other, but that labor power is no use to you unless you have access to the land and machines, etc., which we own, but can't operate ourselves. Very well, we will make a deal with you. If you will agree to work for us, and let us keep all you produce, we will pay you back just enough to enable you to live and raise a family. Experience demonstrates, and our experts estimate, that in two hours you can produce what you need to live and raise a family. We will allow you to keep for yourself what you produce in those two hours of labor, provided you will continue for six more hours, we to keep for ourselves everything you produce in these additional six hours. We own, and do no work, but we keep the bulk of what you produce. You work, but own nothing; you produce all, but you keep just a small fraction of the things you produce. Fair enough?" Well, the toolless worker, himself and family starving, is not likely to be much concerned about fairness at this juncture, and so he is likely to say, in effect, "Very well, you own me and my life, because you own that whereon my life, and the lives of my dear ones, depend. I have no choice but to accept your terms, even if they do seem like the terms of highway robbers." ______________________________________________________________________ #8.03 excerpt from Karl Marx, _Value, Price and Profit_ (1865) ______________________________________________________________________ I think I have shown that their struggles for the standard of wages are incidents inseparable from the whole wages system, that, in 99 cases out of 100, their efforts at raising wages are only efforts at maintaining the given value of labor, and that the necessity of debating their price with the capitalist is inherent to their condition of having to sell themselves as commodities. By cowardly giving way in their every-day conflict with capital, they would certainly disqualify themselves for the initiating of any larger movement. At the same time, and quite apart from the general servitude involved in the wages system, the working class ought not to exaggerate to themselves the ultimate working of these everyday struggles. They ought not to forget that they are fighting with effects, but not with the causes of those effects; that they are retarding the downward movement, but not changing its direction; that they are applying palliatives, not curing the malady. They ought, therefore, not to be exclusively absorbed in these unavoidable guerrilla fights incessantly springing up from the never-ceasing encroachments of capital or changes in the market. They ought to understand that, with all the miseries it imposes on them, the present system simultaneously engenders the material conditions and the social forms necessary for an economic reconstruction of society. Instead of the conservative motto, "A fair day's wage for a fair day's work!", they ought to inscribe on their banner the revolutionary watchword, "Abolition of the wage system!" After this very long and, I fear, tedious exposition, which I was obliged to enter into, to do some justice to the subject matter, I shall conclude by proposing the following resolutions: Firstly. A general rise in the rate of wages would result in a fall of the general rate of profit, but, broadly speaking, not affect the prices of commodities. Secondly. The general tendency of capitalist production is not to raise, but to sink, the average standard of wages. Thirdly. Trade unions work well as centers of resistance against the encroachments of capital. They fail partially from an injudicious use of their power. They fail generally from limiting themselves to a guerrilla war against the effects of the existing system, instead of simultaneously trying to change it, instead of using their organized forces as a lever for the final emancipation of the working class, that is to say, the ultimate abolition of the wage system. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.04 Marx, excerpt from the resolution drafted for the 1866 Geneva Congress of the International ______________________________________________________________________ By constantly opposing the incessant encroachments of capitalism, the economic organisation becomes, quite consciously, the center of gravity for organising the working class, even as the medieval communes served as centers of gravity for the rising bourgeoisie. Through the daily guerilla fights between labor and capital, the economic organisations of labor became still more important as levers for the abolition of the wage system. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.05 Karl Marx, remark on trade unions reported in _The Volksstaat_, November 17, 1869 ______________________________________________________________________ The trade unions should never be connected with nor made dependent upon a political party, if the former is to fulfill its task. The moment that is done, the death-blow is done to it. The trade union is the school for socialism. In the trade union the workingmen are trained into socialists, because there the struggle with capital is daily carried on before their very eyes. All political parties, whatever their complexion may be, and without exception, warm up the working class only for a season, transitorily. The trade union, on the contrary, captures the mass of the workingmen permanently. Only the trade union is capable of setting on foot a true political party of labor, and thus raise a bulwark against the power of capital. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.06 Excerpt from Karl Marx, _Critique of the Gotha Program_, 1875 ______________________________________________________________________ ||||||| NOTE: In this section, Marx is discussing how a ||||||| classless society should distribute its products, after ||||||| is has already made the necessary deductions for ||||||| "replacement [and] expansion of the means of production", ||||||| a "reserve and insurance fund", "schools, provisions for ||||||| the protection of public health, etc." What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges. Accordingly, the individual producer receives back from society - after the deductions have been made - exactly what he gives to it. What he has given to it is his individual quantum of labor. For example, the social working day consists of the sum of the individual hours of work; the individual labor time of the individual producer is the part of the social working day contributed by him, his share in it. He receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost. The same amount of labor which he has given to society in one form, he receives back in another. Here, obviously, the same principle prevails as that which regulates the exchange of commodities, as far as this is exchange of equal values. Content and form are changed, because under the altered circumstances no one can give anything except his labor, and because, on the other hand, nothing can pass to the ownership of individuals, except individual means of consumption. But as far as the distribution of the latter among the individual producers is concerned, the same principle prevails as in the exchange of commodity equivalents: a given amount of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor in another form. Hence, equal right here is still in principle - bourgeois right, although principle and practice are no longer at loggerheads, while the exchange of equivalents in commodity exchange exists only on the average and not in the individual case. In spite of this advance, this equal right is still constantly stigmatized by a bourgeois limitation. The right of the producers is proportional to the labor they supply; the equality consists in the fact that measurement is made with an equal standard, labor. But one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement. This equal right is an unequal right for unequal labor. It recognizes no class differences, because everyone is only a worker like everyone else; but it tacitly recognizes unequal individual endowment, and thus productive capacity, as a natural privilege. It is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right. Right, by its very nature, can consist only in the application of an equal standard; but unequal individuals (and they would not be different individuals if they were not unequal) are measurable only by an equal standard insofar as they are brought under an equal point of view, are taken from one definite side only - for instance, in the present case, are regarded only as workers and nothing more is seen in them, everything else being ignored. Further, one worker is married, another is not; one has more children than another, and so on. Thus, with an equal performance of labor, and hence an equal in the social consumption fund, one will, in fact, receive more than another, one will be richer than another, and so on. To avoid all these defects, right, instead of being equal, would have to be unequal. But these defects are inevitable in the first phase of communist society as it is when it has just emerged after prolonged birth pangs from capitalist society. Right can never be higher than the economic structure of society and its cultural development conditioned thereby. In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly - only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety, and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs! ______________________________________________________________________ #8.07 excerpt from Daniel De Leon, _Socialist Reconstruction of Society_, address delivered in Minneapolis, MN on July 10, 1905 ______________________________________________________________________ The "reason" for a political party unfits it to "take and hold" the machinery of production. The "reason" for a political movement is the exigencies of the bourgeois shell in which the social revolution must partly shape its course. The governmental administration of capitalism is the State, the government proper (that institution is purely political). Political power, in the language of Marx, is merely the organized power of the capitalist class to oppress, to curb, to keep the working class in subjection. The bourgeois shell in which the social revolution must partly shape its course dictates the setting up of a body that shall contest the possession of the political robber burg by the capitalist class. The reason for such initial tactics also dictates their ultimate goal - the razing to the ground of the robber burg of capitalist tyranny. The shops, the yards, the mills, in short, the mechanical establishments of production, now in the hands of the capitalist class - they are all to be "taken," not for the purpose of being destroyed, but for the purpose of being "held"; for the purpose of improving and enlarging all the good that is latent in them, and that capitalism dwarfs; in short, they are to be "taken and held" in order to save them for civilization. It is exactly the reverse with the "political power." That is to be taken for the purpose of abolishing it. It follows herefrom that the goal of the political movement of labor is purely destructive. Suppose that, at some election, the classconscious political arm of labor were to sweep the field; suppose the sweeping were done in such a landslide fashion that the capitalist election officials are themselves so completely swept off their base that they wouldn't, if they could, and that they couldn't, if they would, count us out; suppose that, from President down to Congress and the rest of the political redoubts of the capitalist political robber burg, our candidates were installed - suppose that, what would there be for them to do? What should there be for them to do? Simply to adjourn themselves, on the spot, sine die. Their work would be done by disbanding. The political movement of labor that, in the event of triumph, would prolong its existence a second after triumph, would be a usurpation. It would be either a usurpation or the signal for a social catastrophe. It would be the signal for a social catastrophe if the political triumph did not find the working class of the land industrially organized, that is, in full possession of the plants of production and distribution, capable, accordingly, to assume the integral conduct of the productive powers of the land. The catastrophe would be instantaneous. The plants of production and distribution having remained in capitalist hands, production would be instantly blocked. On the other hand, if the political triumph does find the working class industrially organized, then for the political movement to prolong its existence would be to attempt to usurp the powers which its very triumph announces have devolved upon the central administration of the industrial organization. The "reason" for a political movement obviously unfits it to "take and hold" the machinery of production. What the political movement "moves into" is, not the shops, but the robber burg of capitalism - for the purpose of dismantling it. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.08 Correspondence from L. Otter, continuation of the debate from issue #7 ______________________________________________________________________ 1. No one asserted that growth of socialist consciousness would be unilinear, but all the arguments, as written, [& indeed your latest reply,] would have been [be] meaningless unless the assertion was [is] made, that there would never be two consecutive elections of which say 50% voted socialist & in the second only somewhere around 40%. 2. You appear willing to discount those who do not register to vote; but the many De Leonists & most Spugubs who talk of needing an 80% (or somesuch) mandate mean 80 % of the electorate; so though you may not think my point matters, to their argument it does. 3. You assume that the world will survive, with capitalism, into the 23rd century. I think you have failed to take on board the ecological case. No doubt, as the SLP & SPGB traditionally do, you pooh-pooh the possibility of the world's leaders embarking on a world-destroying war. The fact that you can quote Marx to the effect that there is a rational _cause_ of war, does not mean that there may not be a chance and irrational _occasion_. The economic causes of W.W. I had been around a long time before Sarajevo; it took a chance happening to make what was caused actually occur. Actually I think your whole argument here is wrong; it makes the most unmarxist (& even more un-De Leonist) assumption that capitalism exists now in exactly the same sense that it existed in the time of Marx, & can go on doing so; whereas the whole of Marxist theory depends on the thesis that, as technology develops, economic & social relations change, and the legal, constitutional & political framework change in order to embody those new relationships. Marx was at great pains, from the Economic and Humanist essays, through the Communist Manifesto & onwards to Capital, to distinguish socialism, & the economic analysis that underpinned it, from the Republicanism that had been manifest in the American & French Revolutions. That Republicanism was a sufficient antithesis to combat the system of Mercantilism. But the Napoleonic Wars had seen an exponential rise in the development of new economic technology. [paradoxically less fast in revolutionary France than in reactionary Britain,] (the industrial revolution had no doubt begun - as seed sewn within the Mercantilist system - nearly 100 years before.) Marx insisted that a new class system had arisen as a result of the changes in the world that came about as a result of the French Revolution, & that a new radical contradiction was needed. The French Revolution had not abolished class privilege; it had merely replaced an old form with a new, [& not just in France.] Can you doubt that since Marx's day technology has developed as fast as it did between 1789 & 1848? Do you think there will be no further development? Are you so unmarxist as to doubt that the technological transformation would be reflected in the social & economic sphere? Even the SLP got round, just before the collapse of stalinism, to seeing that what existed in the Soviet Union was a new bureaucratic collectivist form of capitalism. There's plenty of evidence that the trend within Western Monopoly Capitalism has equally been to bureaucratic collectivism. Marx, all those years ago, said the world would go, soon, to either socialism or barbarism. It went to the latter. 4. Marx stressed that the state exists as the executive committee of the ruling class, also that states exist to reflect the social divisions within societies; so when you say "there is only one way to get rid of the state ... & that is to win control of the state & then from that position of control, dissolve it;" what you are in fact saying is that you wish to take control of a class divided society, to act as the executive committee of a ruling class. No doubt you will cite Marx's approval of Lassalle's "Qu'est-ce que c'est qu'une Constitution" as evidence that, if the working class is fully mobilized, it can for a short time over-ride the natural political power of the ruling class; & that therefore controlling the state does not automatically mean running capitalism. (Though I think that it is clear that De Leon in his later years rejected this belief, renounced the aim of capturing the state, & insisted on the abolition of the state ab initio.) If however you are laying your trust in Lassalle's arguments; then you are in duty bound to show where in this you differ from Lenin, whose concept of a "workers" dominated [through the soviets] state capitalist society in transition to socialism, albeit with profound bureaucratic deformations," depended upon precisely this argument of Lassalle's. Moreover if you bother to think about what you said, you will see it is self-evidently nonsense. We both agree that workers have to form organizations of direct workers' control, that we have to replace the capitalist state by these organs of direct workers' power. Well, if these organizations achieve such power that they are in a position to displace the state organization of capitalism, why would they instead take over control of that state? If they do, - which by definition means that they put a minority of their number into power within the state organization, - how will you guarantee that the rank & file workers' organizations will be able to control these controllers of the state? It is the most elementary marxism to say that the controllers of the state, since they are now running capitalism [in whatever form it has by then reached,] will inevitably develop an interest in the 'efficient' running of that class society. The most elementary psychology, to know that they will have come to believe that what is in their best interests, as the controllers of capitalism, represents the true interests of those they rule & to decide that any opposition by workers is due to reactionary prejudices amongst those workers who cannot understand their own best interests. De Leon, despite his frequently absurd prejudices against anarchist thinkers, nevertheless reached parallel conclusions; and in his later years insisted that, immediately the SLP had a majority, government would be adjourned sine die, & the previously organized industrial union movement would launch a general stay-in strike to "take and hold" property, & transform society. Obviously since Petersen abolished the WIIU no subsequent De Leonist has been able to keep literally to De Leon's perspective of revolution; but that doesn't excuse your position [as exemplified by your insistence that workers' delegates would not abstain,] which is a mere rerun of social democracy. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.09 M. Lepore, reply to L. Otter ______________________________________________________________________ > that there would never be two consecutive elections of which > say 50 % voted socialist & in the second only somewhere > around 40 % We already know that the magnitude of revolutionary aspirations does reverse itself - it oscillates - so there's no need to speculate about it. Looking at everything from socialist votes to enthusiasm for union organizing, it seems to me that the peak in working class consciousness to date occurred around the year 1910, and it is now near an all-time minimum. > the most unmarxist (& even more un-De Leonist) assumption I don't know the usefulness in indicating that some of my opinions are un-Marxist or un-De Leonist. Argument by authority is invalid. The scientific method recognizes no articles of faith. We could say that Einstein was un-Newtonian, and Newton was un-Aristotelian, but these facts alone would tells us nothing about which propositions are true or false. All hypotheses must be evaluated individually. > you have failed to take on board the ecological case ... > you pooh-pooh the possibility of the world's leaders > embarking on a world-destroying war Our species may go out of existence due to poisoning of the habitat, a great war, an ice age, or a flare-up of the corona of the sun. However, assuming that we survive, society will remain under the control of some sort of ruling class minority until the day that the people become educated and organized in a way that we have only begun to show the slightest signs of. Besides, it's not clear that a global catastrophe would terminate capitalism. Some radiation-poisoned survivors would probably crawl out of the rubble. Among them, there would be someone who would proceed to coin a currency and start a bank; voila - capitalism. > assumption that capitalism exists now in exactly the same > sense that it existed in the time of Marx I make, not this, but the opposite assumption. Of course, the economic and political forms of capitalism are frequently revised. Moreover, there is no known limit to such revisions. Structural malleability is the reason why class rule cannot "collapse", despite its many internal contradictions. A tripod can collapse, but a blob of clay cannot. > Can you doubt that since Marx's day technology has developed > as fast as it did between 1789 & 1848? Do you think there > will be no further development? On the contrary, technological knowledge is exponential. Its rate of increase is itself increasing. > Marxist theory depends on the thesis that, as technology > develops, economic & social relations change, and the legal, > constitutional & political framework change No one can place a time limit on how long it takes for a lagging superstructure to catch up with the material base. As Engels, rejecting mechanical determinism, reminded others: "According to the materialist conception of history, the _ultimately_ determining element in history is the production and reproduction of real life. More than this neither Marx nor I have ever asserted. Hence, if somebody twists this into saying that the economic element is the _only_ determining one, he transforms that proposition into a meaningless, abstract, senseless phrase." [1] If capitalism can become socially obsolete, and then prop itself up for another hundred years, as we have seen it do, how could we know that it cannot prop itself up for another three hundred years? This cannot be resolved by saying that the system "contains the seeds of its own destruction", or similar truisms which came to Marxism mainly through Hegelian influence. It is only the development of awareness, reflected in action, and not some inexorable laws of history, that can inaugurate a classless society. The cooperative society can be attained only by the enormous project of changing the consciousness of our class, until the majority will have reversed their present opinions, no matter how long this shall take to accomplish. Then the population as a whole, acting democratically, can remake our institutions. Any other program is vanguardism; vanguardism is any other program. If my approach is wrong, please suggest an alternative. Is it supposed that something in the organism of history will eventually complete its gestation period, and we will be surprised by the new society that will be born? I would only ask Nietzsche's question -- "How could the next ten years teach what the past ten were not able to teach?" [2] It is sometimes supposed that capitalism will eventually make people so miserable that we will put it to an end. However, I agree with De Leon's reply: "If misery were sufficient to build a social revolution, surely here were misery enough. But misery lacks the necessary sufficiency by many a length. Misery is not enough: it must lead to discontent. Discontent is not enough: it must be enlightened on the causes of its misery, and the cure. Enlightenment is not enough: it must be organized, disciplined and drilled to effect the salutary revolution." [3] > if these organizations achieve such power that they are in a > position to displace the state organization of capitalism, > why would they instead take over control of that state? If a movement FOR radical change has NOT won control of the state, then this must mean that the movement AGAINST social change still has control of it. It's more difficult than I had expected it would be to convince others of the implications of this fact. In the following article, I will summarize why I insist that the political ballot will be indispensable for a successful revolution. > so when you say "there is only one way to get rid of the > state ... & that is to win control of the state & then from > that position of control, dissolve it;" what you are in fact > saying is that you wish to take control of a class divided > society, to act as the executive committee of a ruling class No one can abolish something without first controlling it. A wrecking ball is hurled toward a structure, not away from it. Water extinguishes a flame by enveloping it, not by avoiding it. A white blood cell must engulf the bacterium. To put an end to anything implies the need to get onto it, into it, around it, to hold it, or to go through it. Accordingly, it would be more logical for an anarchist to ADVOCATE use of the political process, not to REJECT it. Of course, in that period from the moment that the working class takes political control to the moment that state is disintegrated, the working class will literally be a ruling class. As Marx and Engels [4] wrote, our actions must "raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class, to win the battle of democracy." Then, within hours (if we have organized properly), all class distinctions will go out of existence. Either this will be done, or else the revolution, whatever it was, wasn't socialist. > that De Leon in his later years rejected this belief, > renounced the aim of capturing the state, & insisted on the > abolition of the state ab initio ... > in his later years insisted that, immediately the SLP had a > majority, government would be adjourned sine die It was not in his later years, but a position held from an early stage. De Leon first conceived of the Socialist Industrial Union (SIU) program in 1904. Soon afterward, in 1905, he argued that socialists who have taken control of political office should "adjourn themselves, on the spot, sine die." (We should note, for those readers who don't speak lawyers' Latin, that to end a body or a meeting "sine die" means to adjourn without making provisions ever to reconvene.) The goal of an abrupt termination to the state is also my position, although your letter implies that there is a difference between this position and my own. > then you are in duty bound to show where in this you differ > from Lenin, whose concept of a "workers" dominated [through > the soviets] state capitalist society in transition to > socialism Lenin [5] argued that the "withering" of the political state must be postponed until the "higher phase" is attained. The "higher phase" is Marx's term [6] for the ultimate future when production will be so automated that, it is speculated, everyone can have unrestricted access to all goods and services, rather than having material compensation in proportion to personal hours of work. De Leonists, however, believe that, once we have entered the age of mechanized mass production, e.g., the year 1900 would not have been too soon, then the end of the state is waiting only for the owning class to be deposed. Attainment or nonattainment of the higher phase has nothing to do with it. Marx explained that "The class domination of the workers over the resisting strata of the old world must last until the economic foundations of the existence of classes are destroyed." [7] These economic foundations are two: industrialization (which we can cross off the list at once, because it's already done) and the transfer of industrial ownership from the capitalists to the workers' association (the one extant requirement). Therefore, no "transition period" to a classless and stateless society is necessary, useful, or justifiable. As for the higher phase, i.e., the abolition of personal incomes determined by work hours, I believe that it can arrive at any later time (if it is to arrive at all, which today cannot be ascertained). Lenin modified Marx by adding the further requirement that, as long as society is not ready for the higher phase, then neither is it ready to become stateless. > how will you guarantee that the rank & file workers' > organizations will be able to control these controllers of > the state? There are no guarantees anywhere in life, particularly in the critical junctures of history. However, measures can be taken to bring politics closer to the region of workers' self-reliance and direct action. In the U.S. - I don't know about England - an organization isn't even required to have the word "Party" in its name in order to nominate political candidates. An industrial union could operate in the political field directly, as opposed to endorsing a party, a separate organization. We could elect union delegates to the legislatures, where they could mandate the transfer of management to the workers' association. If the industrial union would choose such a program, then the already-existing socialist political parties would be absorbed into it. These parties would, in De Leon's words,"'break up camp' with a shout of joy - if a body merging into its own ideal can be said to 'break up camp.'" [8] > the controllers of the state ... will inevitably develop an > interest in the 'efficient' running of that class society It's not inevitable, but occasionally some people do the opposite of what they had said they had intended to do. Just as the union must not choose a known thief to be its treasurer, a workers' political movement must not nominate anyone who has ever been heard to utter a word of compromise of principles. The unbendable axiom is that capitalism cannot be improved to any extent worth mentioning, and the first responsibility of any socialist elected to political office is to facilitate the demolition of class rule and its state. I met a person of great integrity when I met Walter Steinhilber of the SLP, which I think was in 1971. Since the party has used all sorts of political campaigns merely for the educational opportunities which those campaigns provide, Steinhilber was running for New York City Comptroller. I asked him, "What would you do if you got elected?" He replied, "Nothing. I understand that a Comptroller has something to do with money. I can't even count the change in my pocket." My second question: "What can we [high school students] do to help the movement?" His reply - "Study." References: [1] Engels, letter to Joseph Bloch, Sept. 22, 1890 [2] Nietzsche, _Thoughts out of Season_, Volume II, excerpt in Geoffrey Clive, ed., _The Philosophy of Nietzsche_, New York: New American Library, 1965, p. 223 [3] De Leon, editorial in _The Daily People_, Oct. 25, 1909 [4] Marx and Engels, _The Communist Manifesto_ [5] Lenin, _State and Revolution_, chapter 5 [6] Marx, _Critique of the Gotha Programme_ [7] Marx, _Conspectus on Bakunin_ [8] De Leon, _As To Politics_ ______________________________________________________________________ #8.10 M. Lepore, addendum to my reply to L. Otter, Opinion on the necessity of political organization ______________________________________________________________________ I begin by assuming that the adoption of socialism requires "the general lockout of the capitalist class" by the workers (De Leon's phrase, _Socialist Reconstruction of Society_, 1905). Next, I consider the probable response by the state to this lockout. The state always has, and promptly enforces, the rule that the legal owner of property, when deprived of possession or effective control of that property, can turn to the state for remedy. The process in the U.S. goes something like this: The owner goes to court with documents which prove legal ownership, and the judge issues the paperwork which dispatches the police. The next thing to recognize is that the state, when prevented from implementing legal redress, begins automatically to escalate the level of violence toward infinity. Even if a person is suspected of committing the smallest misdemeanor, the state can never give up until that individual is either placed under arrest or is dead. Law enforcers generally use weapons like rifles, truncheons, and noxious gas to return property to its legal owners. If necessary, they would have no difficulty in obtaining rocket launchers and tanks. Nor would there be hesitation to use these instruments. The capitalist class would be willing, even anxious, to damage some of its own property in an attempt to recover control of the rest of it. Damage to a part would be looked upon as a form of tax, while a successful revolution would be a total loss in the viewpoint of any ruling class facing deposition. Moreover, the use of flame throwers, tanks, etc., doesn't necessary imply significant damage to industrial property. Since the workers would have to go home sometime, the massacres could be carried out in the streets or at the workers' places of residence. If we are to have "a general lockout of the capitalist class", and yet not see million of workers killed in the process, this response by the state must be prevented. There have been at least four major proposals about how to prevent it. I will give my personal evaluation of them. PROPOSAL 1: The workers must recruit the police and soldiers into the revolutionary cause, so that they will not be willing to fire upon their fellow workers. The main problem with this suggestion is in the simple arithmetic of fractions. Even if 99 percent of the working class were ready for socialism, the state would probably have no difficulty in deputizing or conscripting a million agents willing to use violence against the workers. PROPOSAL 2: A militia of workers must defeat the police and soldiers in military combat. This suggestion is impracticable, since the state forces would be the side with the most advanced weapons and training. This suggestion is also morally reprehensible, if there exist other means to enable the transformation of society to occur in a peaceful manner. PROPOSAL 3: The workers must use economic strength to deprive the police and soldiers of material things which they require in order to operate. This is the General Strike recommendation. It relies on the assumption that the state has very little inventory of ammunition, vehicle parts, fuel, etc., and that the state's mercenaries would require a continuous flow of supplies from industry. The correctness of this assumption is seriously in doubt. It is likely that state forces have sufficient inventory so that, even in the event of a General Strike, the state could still massacre millions of workers. PROPOSAL 4: The working class must win control of the order-giving centers from which the police and soldiers receive their instructions. Not all the time, but somewhere between 99 and 100 percent of the time, the violent agencies of the state look to political offices for their daily orders. In many countries, these political offices are publicly elected. For example, typical for the U.S. would be that the local police chief is an appointee of the mayor, county sheriffs are elected directly by the county residents, and the army generals are appointees of the national president. By winning control of political office, the delegates of the working class could either send the police and soldiers home, or could reassign them to nonviolent occupations, such as medical and fire department assistance. That would be the moment for the workers' industrial union to take over the responsibility of planning the industries and services. This option has a major advantage: If it is already realized that society cannot achieve socialism until a majority of the people come to advocate it, then that new consciousness among workers would have to be correlated with a new consciousness among voters. If we select the political option, we will get it virtually for free. There is an additional benefit to the political approach. Suppose that the movement declares its intent to follow the constitutional method in abolishing capitalist ownership, similar to the way in which the 13th amendment to the U.S. Constitution cancelled the legal property rights of the slave-owners without compensation. Even if the actual amendment process is never carried out, the mere advocacy of it removes much (not all) of the state's ability to prosecute the workers while they are organizing openly for revolution. In the state's view, to call for the lockout of the present owners is to call for trespassing, grand larceny, and probably treason as well. To "incite" a crime is itself a crime. But simply propose the constitutional method, and the state is immediately deprived of much of its basis for repressive action. I conclude that the organization of the political field, while it may be encumbered by strategic problems, will nevertheless be necessary for a successful and relatively nonviolent transition to social ownership of the means of production. ______________________________________________________________________ #8.11 Correspondence from H. Morrison, continuation of the debate from issue #7 ______________________________________________________________________ After perusing O.T. #7 -- particularly the guest editorial by E. Wizek, and M. Lepore's response to my own responses, I feel the need to go all-out in an attempt to clear up certain misconceptions by De Leonists in regard to the very "guts" of the Scientific Socialist approach to the critique of capitalist production. There is a tendency on the part of "do-gooders" and "left-wing" radicals to practice what I view as a form of transubstantiation. Just as the Catholic priest swears, by all that is holy, that the wheaten wafers distributed to his faithful have been metamorphosed into the flesh of Jesus through his (supernatural) incantations, and that the wine that he himself sips is actually "God's" blood, our liberal and "left-wing" radicals transubstantiate capital and wage labor relationships into something other than what they are. Please bear with me in my analysis of the Wizek examination of the problems of capitalist employment and how to end them with an Industrial Union society. Let me begin, in reverse, with his final paragraph. I.U. society, he asserts, will provide the jobs and an abundant income for all workers! Is that not strikingly reminiscent of the campaign promises of all politicians? "Good jobs at good wages" has been the battle-cry of the Government office-seekers over the lifetimes of everyone now living and of their forebears for centuries past. What fellow worker Wizek apparently does not comprehend -- or does not agree with -- is the fact that, in a socialist society, there would be no such phenomenon as "income." Socialism would necessarily imply free right of access to all needs by all of mankind. There will be no such activity as production for markets, and that means that products will not be "exchanged." "Exchange" of the products of labor denote _value_ -- which is "socially necessary labor time" -- and such a concept can exist only when either direct barter or the need for a universal equivalent is called for. Such needs have been part of a lengthy historical process, and would not exist under a society that has abolished commodity production. In fact, socialism is incompatable with a world divided into nations. There is not a single nation -- or group of nations -- that could be self-sufficient in the minerals, etc., needed in modern production. A socialist society would necessarily be world-wide in scope -- at least encompassing all industrialized nations. Yet fellow worker Wizek exposes his sense of nationalism with a grumble -- to wit -- "They [employers] are not even necessarily American, for in this system anyone with sufficient capital, from any country, can become a member of the employer class." (!) (Comment on that would be superfluous, indeed!) In short, socialism implies a world without nations; and a world without "exchange" and "value"; -- one world with production for use, and _use value_ alone. Now, in order to clear up some mis-information on the part of friend Lepore on the S.L.P. position on Bolshevik Russia, throughout the seven-odd decades of its existence, I offer the following facts, culled from S.L.P. literature by various members/writers of the W.S.P. for its _Western Socialist_ over a number of years of its publication. In order that this writer will not be accused of tearing fact from context, let me present the case in the words of the S.L.P. writers themselves. In an article entitled "The Russian Situation", appearing in _The Weekly People_ of November 24, 1917, Mr. Arnold Petersen, National Secretary of the Party, had the following to say: Events in Russia furnish one of the most profound lessons in Socialist teachings and tactics. Up-to-date Socialism declares: (1) Socialism is not possible until: [a] Capitalism has developed to a point where all the essential forces of production have been developed, centralized and co-ordinated; [b] When the exploited proletariat has divested itself of the notion that the interests of the two main classes in society are identical, and that this system of production is God-ordained, and the only possible one. (2) Socialism is not possible, even in a highly developed capitalist country, until the working class organizes as a class into industrial unions ... supplanting the political State by the industrial representative councils of workers. Applying this text to Russia, several facts leap into prominence. In the first place, Russia as a whole is woefully behind in capitalist development. By far the majority of the population is composed of peasants, a large number of whom are illiterate and wholly ignorant as regards the object of the labor movement and the nature of the social revolution. Consequently, not only is the material groundwork for Socialism lacking, but the human element -- a class-conscious proletariat -- is largely absent. Last, but not least, the industrial proletariat is not -- so far as we are able to learn -- organized in industrial unions, the condition sine qua non of the Socialist Republic. ... So long as the Bolsheviki was in opposition it was doing excellent agitational work. Now that it is in power it faces failure. The day of its victory was the day of its defeat. Now, while the World Socialist Movement would not quarrel with much of the earlier points of that official S.L.P. assessment -- other than the need for industrial union organization in the interests of socialist revolution -- that official rejection of it as socialist (or, at least, proletarian) in nature was short lived. The reason for the about-face on the Russian question is made clear in an article in _The Weekly People_ on February 9, 1918, just a few months following that original Petersen assessment. The article dealt with a report by Arno Dosch-Fleuroi, a correspondent of the _New York World_, who claimed that Lenin was influenced by the ideas of Daniel De Leon. And that bit of news, strengthened by an address by John Reed (of _Ten Days That Shook the World_ fame) before the National Executive Committee of the S.L.P., in which he stated that Lenin foresaw the Industrial Union form of Government as Russia's future. This adulation for their leader/hero was too much for the functionary chiefdom of the S.L.P. Lenin himself a great admirer of De Leon, according to Dosch-Fleuroi and John Reed! The party went over, bag and baggage, for some time to come, to hopeful support. Now, admittedly, there were periods of back-sliding on that issue in S.L.P. literature, but never in their refusal to label that economy as State Capitalism. The denunciations were always levelled at the tyranny of the Dictatorship. Before the working class can be ready for socialism, a significant majority must approve of the need to end class society -- and be eager to effectuate it without delay. In other words, the working _class_ must become history, and that would necessarily mean the end of the need for labor unions of any sort or description. The interests of those who perform the work would be societal interests -- not sectional. And no longer would those who carry on production be compelled to spend their entire working years as "appendages of the machines" in capitalist-style Division of Labor. With the abolition of the parasitical-type industries such as advertising, banking, the military, etc., the workload needed for a decent standard of living for all mankind would become a "breeze." "Utopia"? Nonsense! The know-how and the means for immediate -- if not sooner -- attainment of such a society are at hand -- thanks to the historical development of capitalism itself! The last four centuries have been painful ones for the bulk of the industrialized world; useful, of course, in a historical sense; but it is long past time when capitalism has outgrown its usefulness. How can it be more difficult to propagandize the case for genuine socialism than "transubstantiating" capitalist relationships into something different than what they are? ______________________________________________________________________ #8.12 M. Lepore, reply to H. Morrison ______________________________________________________________________ > transubstantiate capital and wage labor relationships into > something other than what they are There's an old gimmick in trial law. Suppose I'm accused of murder. The prosecutor rises to argue that I'm the guilty party, but instead uses the opportunity to remind the jury that murder is a bad thing. Based on this emphasis that murder is a bad thing, the jury is asked to convict me. Sometimes the jury even falls for it. This fallacy is called the ignoratio elenchi, or the irrelevant conclusion. Now, in our case, Harry, you are going to illustrate to us why a syndicalist or industrial union form of workers' self-management would amount to a continuation of the capital and wage-labor relationship. But then what you do, with your transubstantiation example, is to remind us that it's a bad thing to assume that something is truly different merely because one has changed the name of it. > socialism is incompatable with a world divided into nations I believe that as well. However, national economies must first be brought under social ownership, and then these economies must be merged. Whenever any two or more national economies are merged, the borders between them must be demolished. By this means alone, all national boundaries can be made eventually to disappear. The need for global administration doesn't answer our question about whether an industrial union program is the correct program. Rather, the need for global administration is important because it shows socialism to be the means to unite the human race, eliminating such ugly effects as patriotism (which I consider the worst form of bigotry) and war. > Wizek exposes his sense of nationalism with a grumble -- to > wit -- "They [employers] are not even necessarily American I don't try to read the mind of a writer when we have the written words themselves. I see no literal difference between Ed Wizek's observation and that of Marx and Engels [1]: "The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere." You also note the De Leonists' designations for the Communist Party economic system. They have variously called it statism, bureaucratic state despotism, and so forth. You observe - > their refusal to label that economy as State Capitalism. > The denunciations were always levelled at the tyranny of the > Dictatorship All De Leonists assert that the Soviet-style regime is class-divided, and features the exploitation of the working class through a wage system which extracts surplus value. But is it most accurately called "state capitalism"? I don't know. I think there are good arguments on both sides. Most De Leonists refrain from calling that system "capitalism", for the same reason that a zoologist refrains from calling a porpoise a dolphin, or an alligator a crocodile. It assists understanding and communication for things which are empirically different to have different names. The Stalin/Mao design is noticably different from the Adam Smith design. The purely state-owned economy has no stock market to enable individuals to buy shares of ownership in the industries. Ruling class individuals attain their status, not by family inheritance and marketplace gambling, as in the U.S., but by clawing their way up the competitive ladder of a political hierarchy, and legally suppressing challenges. There are a huge number of similarities between the two modern forms of class rule, but, not being identical, they require different names. As a zoologist might phrase it, the two systems are of the same genus, but different species. However, I also see some usefulness in calling the two modern forms of class rule "private capitalism" and "state capitalism." This is because capitalism is perhaps best understood, not as a particular FORM, but as an ACTIVITY. The state-owned form, no less than the privately-owned form, "practices" capitalism. Let's try on this definition: Capitalism is the activity of operating the industries with the expectation that the total wealth consumed by the workers will be consistently less than the total product of the workers, so that a hierarchy of bosses may use the difference between the two amounts to build an empire. When this occurs, the workers, considered merely a "resource" which has been paid for, are treated as such, treated as automatons. Before we expend too much energy debating the best name for the state-monopoly form of exploitation, let's remember the warning of Bertrand Russell: "One of the most difficult matters in all controversy is to distinguish between disputes about words and disputes about facts: it ought not to be difficult, but in practice it is." [2] > in a socialist society, there would be no such phenomenon as > "income." Socialism would necessarily imply free right of > access to all needs by all of mankind. Socialism is a science only if it adheres to the scientific method. For an investigation to be a science, it is not enough that it extracts general principles from life. It is further required that a science shall not call a hypothesis a fact if it cannot be demonstrated by a combination of empiricism and logic. Since we do not yet have a neurological model of the mind, we cannot have an exact science of human behavior. We cannot be certain of the forms that human behavior will take in a future classless society. There are some things about socialism which we can demonstrate directly - I'll even say, things which we can prove. For example, the common stock form of ownership demonstrates that the capitalist investors need no technical understanding of the production process, yet the capitalists today do elect the management. This proves that it is viable for the management committees to be elected by other means, say, by the whole population, or by workers' assemblies. To give an additional example: We can demonstrate that militarism, marketing, the secrecy and duplication of effort in research, and many other present uses of labor, are purely waste. Sending dividends to a class of absentee owners, so that they can live in luxury without ever having to work, is also a form of waste. This proves that socialism would bring about a higher standard of living and a shorter workweek. These are the sorts of things that socialists can say with certainty, because the arguments need only to incorporate present-day observations, elementary logic and plain arithmetic. If someone disagrees with any of these points, I wouldn't hesitate to reply, "If you disagree with it, then you don't understand it." However, we are in danger of taking things too far. If we start to claim that we "know" very specific things about how human beings would think and act in a future classless society, then we will be engaging in wishful thinking, which is a practice abhorred by the scientific method. Regarding this question of personal income, there are at least two possibilities. One possibility is that classless society, combined with technology, will transform all work from drudgery into self-expression, so that people will work together, as frequently as necessary, without any form of compulsion, or any need for artificial incentives. In this case, there may be no need to stipulate that personal income will be determined by the work hours of the individual. The other possibility is that work and leisure will forever remain distinct: work being any activity performed as a means to a separate end, and leisure being any activity performed purely for its own sake, for the pleasure of it. In that case, we may find an inherent instability in a system which permits everyone free access to affluence, regardless of the individual's choice of total work hours. A system of free access might discover that too few people choose spontaneously to return from vacation as early as it is necessary in order for production levels to match consumption levels. After saying that we are limited in how much we can *know*, I will now state what I personally *believe*. One the most prevalent criticisms of socialism is based on the "free rider" problem. This is the principle that some people will continuously reduce their work time, or other form of social contribution, if their efforts are rewarded at a group level rather than on an individual basis. The immediate stimulus is that any slacking off in my contribution comes back directly as a payoff to myself, whereas my diligent work only increases the sum of which I receive less than a billionth part. I'll admit in my own case, I can't be certain that I'd ever perform industrial work, if my material living standard for working were virtually the same as my living standard for vacationing. However, an idea of socialism which will distribute goods according to work hours, while popularly criticized in a hundred other ways, is immune to this particular criticism. I suspect that the Free Access concept of socialism feeds the popular misconception that "socialism is against human nature." I suggest that we should not play into the hands of conservatives, by giving them additional weapons with which to attack us. References: [1] Marx and Engels, _The Communist Manifesto_ [2] Bertrand Russell, _The ABC of Relativity_, 1925; New York: The New American Library, fifth printing, 1958, p. 114 ______________________________________________________________________ "Why do you work from the IWW song For eight hours or more? "Hallelujah, Two of us could have jobs I'm a Bum." If you only worked four." ____________________________ Line 1406; end of issue number 8 ______