robbo203
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When we discuss the enclosures just how much of the Commons was privatised by the nascent capitalists?
The earliest enclosures in England go back as far as the 13th century and were related to such developments as the establishment of deerparks . The pace of enclosures sharply increased during the Tudor period an in this instance the reason was more directly economic,. As has been pointed out the growth of the wool trade required the conversion of arable land into pasture. Not only did this require less labour but the still numerous class of independent peasants – the yeomanry – faced with rising rents and denied access to land, found themselves increasingly unable to support their way of life.
This development was aided and abetted by another – the Reformation. As Marx noted in <u>Capital</u>: The process of forcible expropriation of the people received in the 16th century a new and frightful impulse from the Reformation, and from the consequent colossal spoliation of the church property. The Catholic Church was, at the time of the Reformation, feudal proprietor of a great part of the English land. The suppression of the monasteries hurled their inmates into the proletariat. The estates of the church were to a large extent given away to rapacious royal favourites, or sold at a nominal price to speculating farmers and citizens, who drove out, en masse, the hereditary sub-tenants and threw their holdings into one (Karl Marx. <u>Capital</u>, Vol 1, Ch27).
However, the enclosure movement really reached its peak in the period from 1750 to 1860, which roughly coincides with the first great Industrial Revolution when literally thousands of Parliamentary Bills were passed giving effect to these enclosures. As Irfan Habib notes:
The drive for rent led to the eighteenth century enclosures, since large landowners found that capitalist farmers, using the methods of new husbandry, could pay them higher rents. The result was that by the early years of the nineteenth century, the bulk of the English peasants had been evicted through private enclosures (where the estates of the large landowners were fairly well consolidated) as well as through parliamentary enclosures (where in areas of mixed properties, the landowners needed acts of parliament to consolidate estates and terminate existing tenancies). (Irfan Habib, “Capitalism in History”, <u>Social Scientist</u>, Vol. 23, No. 7/9, Jul. – Sep., 1995, pp. 15-31)
According to J. M. Neeson, enclosures occurring between 1750 and 1820 dispossessed former occupiers of some 30 percent of the total agricultural land of England – a significant figure given the already concentrated pattern of landownership (J. M. Neeson, 1996, <u>Commoners: Common Right, Enclosure and Social Change in England, 1700-1820</u>, York University, Toronto). This drastic incursion on the traditional way of life of rural folk was reinforced by a battery of other pieces of legislation such as the Game Laws which prohibited unauthorised hunting, making a rural way of life even less sustainable for many.
Yes thanks Robbo, I know that – but how much on/in UK media. Binoy Kampmark and Craig Murray are publishing each day.
True. So much for the concern of press for press freedom
Lockdowners versus Libertarians
One only has to check out the coverage, or almost no coverage of the current Julian Assange case on MSM which is surely one of the most important cases ever for press freedom – and so little of it is being covered.
There is daily coverage of the trial here
Thomas
Just a quickie – there are economic historians like Ellen Meiksins Wood who would argue that “mercantile capitalism” is not really capitalism as such – see her book The Origin of Capitalism: A Longer View (2002). There was capital in the form of merchant capital of course in periods you mention but is the mere existence of capital sufficient to allow us to talk about the existence of capitalism? Similarly wage labour. In Ancient Roman there was wage labour but the dominant form of coerced labour was of course slave labour
We can define capitalism as a constellation of interlocking features but it is a tricky business to pin down when exactly capitalism was supposed to have kicked off . To use the language of dialectics it may be a case of quantitative changes transmuting into qualitative changes – for instance a growth in the extent of wage labour
Though I am no expert in this field, I do find Thomas’ account of things quite plausible. History does not come neatly packaged in stages. If a shorthand way of describing capitalism is the “wages system” (and Marx himself described capitalism in this way) then clearly labour service in the feudal sense of compulsory work on the manorial lord’s demesne was giving way to wage labour long before the 17th century – most particularly after the Black Death in the mid 14th century when wage rates increased sharply along with an increase in tenant farmers as the lords scrambled to secure a reliable income in the face of significant labour shortages (see for example M M Postan’s book “The Medieval Economy and Society”)
I am quite sympathetic to the “agrarian-origins-of-capitalism” school of thought, associated with individuals such as Ellen Meiksins Wood and Robert Brenner who emphasise the historical specificity of capitalism and locate its origins narrowly in a qualitative break in the structure of rural property relationship in England. It has often been contrasted with the trade-based or “commercialisation” school represented by the likes of Paul Sweezy, James Blaut and others who take a much less Eurocentric view of this whole subject and focuses on such things as the revenue derived from the slave trade. In fact, though these two different models may be, not so much opposed, as complementary.
In many ways one could say that science as we understand the term today grew out of “natural theology” or the religious study of nature which sought to identify divine purpose in the particular forms of nature. This is what the “argument from design” was about. If a watch implied the existence of a watchmaker then how could something much more complex like the human eye not presuppose God?
The argument from design was effectively demolished by Darwin but we should not overlook that much of the original impetus behind scientific discoveries on the part of generations of so called “gentleman scientists” exemplified by the likes of Derham, Paley and Gilbert White – before the era of institutionalised R & D – was driven by religious motives
So I dont think the argument is so cut and dried as is made out. Living in Andalucía, I am reminded of the role of the Muslim Moors in the historical region of Al Andalus in promoting science. Cordoba in the 10th century was the second largest city in Europe and comparatively speaking, a model of enlightenment, civic tolerance (Jews and Christians peacefully worked and lived alongside Muslims until the barbaric Christian Reconquista commenced) AND scientific progress . I read somewhere that there is a theory that the origins of the Renaissance can be traced back to Cordoba rather than the Italian city states
Religion reflects society rather than the other way round. And so does science! The notion that the practice of science is value free, objective, rational and impartial is pure nonsense. Scientists are as much prone to irrational tendencies such as confirmation biases as the rest of us and under capitalism are subject to enormous pressures to deliver results that serve the interests of the profit system, Though I wouldn’t go so far as individuals like Feyerabend in saying science is just another religion with its own high priests and holy dogmas but who can deny there is a smidgeon of truth in it? Look at the controversies surrounding COVID 19.
A healthy scepticism as far as science is concerned is definitely called for. I strongly recommend Carolyn Merchant’s wonderful book The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution, published in 1980 which touches on the relationship between science and society.
Is it this one Robin?
Yes that’s one Matt. I wonder what LBird has to say about that one. He might well become and Engels fan
And for us, who aspire to build towards socialism, surely we’re better adopting a scientific ideology that stresses ‘society and nature’ as an intertwined couplet, as did Marx
As did Engels, LBird, though I note you omitted to comment on the quote I provided which sort of dents you anti-Engels bias in quite a big way, dont you think?
LBird you say:
“The bourgeoisie’s separation of ‘society and ‘nature’ was an entirely ideological step. It’s purpose was to keep ‘science’ and ‘nature’ out of the hands of democratic forces, as displayed during the English Revolution of the 1640s.Only the ruling class benefitted from this separation. To maintain it, is to support the ruling class, and separate society into two: those who know and do ‘science’, an elite minority, and those who can’t know and can’t do ‘science’, the vast majority. The role of socialists is to challenge the power of the elite, wherever it is manifested – as it is in their current version of ‘science’. “
With that in mind I wonder what you would make of Engels’ remarkable piece of environmental prose given your hostility to all things Engels:
“Thus at every step we are reminded that we by no means rule over nature like a conqueror over a foreign people, like someone standing outside nature — but that we, with flesh, blood, and brain, belong to nature, and exist in its midst, and that all our mastery of it consists in the fact that we have the advantage over all other beings of being able to know and correctly apply its laws.….in fact, with every day that passes we are learning to understand these laws more correctly and getting to know both the more immediate and the more remote consequences of our interference with the traditional course of nature. … But the more this happens, the more will men not only feel, but also know, their unity with nature, and thus the more impossible will become the senseless and antinatural idea of a contradiction between mind and matter, man and nature, soul and body. “
(The Dialectics of Nature)
Incidentally , I thought we had come to an agreement many months ago that there is bound be a degree of scientific specialisation even in a socialist society. We can’t all become nuclear physicists or brain surgeons – occupations that require many years of training to become competent in. Moreover it is not advisable that we should all even attempt this for obvious reasons – its would represent a massive waste of society’s resources
Your reference to those who know and do ‘science’, an elite minority, and those who can’t know and can’t do ‘science’, the vast majority seems to imply that we should all strive to become nuclear physicists and brain surgeons in order to avoid an elitist state of affairs where some (the elite) know more than others (the majority) in their particular fields of endeavour.
But that’s not practical is it? I dont see any problem with the idea that some individuals are bound to know much more than others in certain branches of scientific knowledge. You can call these individuals an “elite” if you like but the real issue is whether their superior knowledge will translate into power of others. I would say not at all because the fundamental characterises of a socialist society – free access to goods and services produced by the voluntary efforts of people – is what completely removes the possibility of any one group or individual exerting any leverage over another.
Also, the thing about specialists is that whilst they might be specialists in their own particular field of endeavour they are in the same position as the lay majority with respect to other fields of endeavour which have their own “specialists”. So it is a bit misleading and simplistic to talk of a scientific elite vis a vis a non scientific majority. That apart, I think a socialist society will be much more conducive to people in general taking an interest in science but there will still nevertheless be “specialists”, relatively speaking, in the various branches of scientific knowledge. That’s inevitable and frankly it doesn’t pose any problem that I can see
As an aside, I have always taken the view that an applicant to the party must agree with the Party’s case on religion, not that they must not be religious. There is a subtle difference.
I dont quite get that, Bijou – what is the subtle difference?
The Party’s case on religion amongst other things holds that anyone joining the Party must not be religious. Or I have missed something?
We will end up with this kind of nonsense being advocated. It is bad enough with closet Leninists.
I dont agree that the comparison holds at all. We have more than enough built-in safeguards in the guise of our comprehensive membership test to ensure that even individuals who held personal religious beliefs were genuine socialists. If they held closet views that were in contradiction to our basic principles that were subsequently revelated after they joined then there is a simple remedy to hand – you invite them to leave the Party or expel them
I suspect such a situation is very unlikely to arise and if it does arise we have the means to deal with it. In the meanwhile at least we might start growing again as an organisation that is quite possibly facing extinction in a few years time.
Of course people can and do change after they join the Party. Normally they resign if they do Holding atheist views is no guarantee whatsoever that they will not gravitate towards a non socialist point of view whilst in the Party. I know of at least two ex members, both devout atheists, who left the Party to become anarcho-capitalists.
Does that mean on the basis of this evidence that we should require that anyone joining should not hold atheist views? Of course not. So why do we automatically assume that people holding personal religious will not make good socialists?
Incidentally, Robbo, if your proposal is to have any chance of success I wouldn’t tie it to a head-on attack on “science” and “philosophical materialism”. That will get people’s backs up and is a separate issue
I am emphatically not attacking science or the scientific method. What I am attacking is the ridiculous nonsense that scientists – the same goes for socialists – are 100% rational and that people who believe in some deity or whatever must therefore be 100% irrational.
We are, all of us, without exception – you, me, the Pope, and Mr and Mrs Smith next door – a mix of rational and irrational. Anyone who thinks otherwise is deluding themselves
If Lucretius and those Deist bourgeois philosophers you refer to accepted our goal and our democratic method of achieving it along with our opposition to nationalism , sexism, and racism then why the hell should we not admit them? What is more important – achieving socialism and growing the movement to achieve socialism or engaging in some arcane pointless philosophical debate about the meaning of life and whether some entity called god exists?
If we were serious about wanting to achieve socialism, we would want to remove any and all obstacles in the way of growing the movement to help achieve socialism. As it is , we are turning away people who could join this movement and make good socialists and who pose no threat whatsoever to the socialist integrity of this movement. More to the point by our intransigence we are driving them into the welcoming arms of other organisations that dont share our socialist objective
So who exactly is being rational – or irrational?
“Our species cannot hope to extricate itself from its current perilous condition without engaging in rational thinking on the widest possible scale. Religion is one of the main barriers to such an expansion of rational thinking.”
The pragmatic case for amending and softening our approach to religious applicants for membership is persuasive. A sizeable chunk of applicants are rejected because they hold religious beliefs in one form or another. Typically the response on being rejected is one of dismay, particularly in the case of individuals who are very enthusiastic about what we have to say and agree with us on more or less everything else, barring the question of religion. So they drift away , never to be heard of again. By our actions, we have probably driven them into the arms of some reformist political organisation and caused them to become completely disenchanted with socialism as an objective. We have thus strengthened our political opponents.
For a tiny organisation whose numbers are shrinking this is not a rational approach to take – ironically! The above statement is based on a caricature in equating religion with irrationality and science with rationality. But every single human being on this planet, socialists included, is a mixture of rational and irrational thinking. We wouldn’t be humans if we were not. Ever since the publication of Thomas Kuhn’s work <i><b>The Structure of Scientific Revolutions</b></i> (1962), it has become impossible to seriously maintain that the practice of science is not also profoundly influenced by irrational motives
The only form of materialism that should be of any practical interest to socialists -since we are, supposedly, a practical movement, not a philosophical debating club – is historical materialism. Philosophical materialism is just academic navel-gazing. It is perfectly possible to be a historical materialist and hold religious beliefs
It is quite true though that many religions can have pernicious social effects. It is this that should be our sole concern as socialists , not the metaphysics of religion as such which is more or less irrelevant
We can address this question effectively by excluding from membership
- individuals who belong to organised religions
- individuals who subscribe to theistic notions of divine intervention in human affairs
One beneficial consequence of this is that this will encourage individuals to abandon their membership of an organised religion and so we will be able to contribute in a much more effective manner to the decline of organised religion by adopting this stipulation. As things stand, we reinforce the power of organised religion by denying religious applicants the choice of having to abandon their particular church or whatever in order to become a member of our organisation
Finally, it should be remembered that applicants have to meet multiple requirements in order to become a member of this organisation. For example , they cannot support nationalism or the principle of leadership/vanguardism. If some metaphysical belief in spiritual energy or an afterlife or whatever, seriously impacted on these core socialist principles, this would “come out in the wash”.
It all likelihood such beliefs would have zero impact on those principles of ours that really matter. So to that extent our current blanket an all religious applicants is completely superfluous and redundant
We need to focus only on what is obnoxious about religion – that is its social consequences. Arguing that it is irrational or “encourages irrationality” is completely irrelevant and springs from a bourgeois Enlightenment belief that reifies rationality and depicts human beings as fundamentally rational entities whereas the older Medieval view saw rationality as something embedded in the universe itself- the Great Chain of Being. The bourgeois Enlightenment philosophers , as it were, simply relocated or transferred this rationality into the human mind itself, thereby despiritualising Nature and reducing it to dead inert matter available for capitalist exploitation.
How ironic that a revolutionary socialist organisation should follow in the steps of the bourgeois Enlightenment philosophers in reifying “rationality”!
We can also support Richard Wolff. It is also dogmatic to accept everything that Marx and Engels wrote because on their time communes were very popular and many were created by the what Engels called the utopian socialists.
I don’t dogmatically accept everything Marx and Engels wrote -far from it – and nor do I support Richard Wolff and his views on worker coops . All I am saying is that it come across as very dogmatic to assert without even bothering to qualify your statement that coops and communes have been a “complete failure” which is factually incorrect anyway.
If they are a complete failure where does that leave us in the WSM who – if we are to be honest with ourselves – have completely failed to make significant progress in over a century of being politically active. I can’t help noticing that you conspicuously declined to answer this question
I think it would be wise to be a little less smug about ridiculing others for being a complete failure when we are not exactly a shining example of success ourselves
