robbo203
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He favours some form of labour-time accounting, though in terms of actual labour rather than in terms of an attempt to mirror the “socially necessary labour” brought about by the market under capitalism. At least this is what he replied when I asked him “was I right in concluding that, when it comes to measuring labour in a socialist/communist society, it would have to be in terms of actual labour rather than in terms of some estimated ‘socially necessary’ labour?”:
You are right. The actual labour of the individual in a system of collective production is social labour from the start, it does not need any mediation to prove its socially necessary character. The social necessity of the actual labour is pre-determined due to the collective character of production.
I wonder how Paresh deals with the problem of the “heterogeneity of labour” which is commonly invoked in critiques of labour time accounting. Saying that complex labour can be treated as multiples of simple labour is no answer because we cant really know by how much one can be reduced to the other. This is a quantitative matter. For labour time accounting to work on its own terms, accuracy is essential otherwise this would result in a gross misallocation of resources.
As for “socially necessary labour time”, Marx’s view was that this could only be (indirectly) revealed through the market process itself which is obviously precluded in socialism so yes, there is only “actual” or past labour (the kind that you can measure with a stopwatch) that the proponents of labour time accounting are let to play with, with all the attendant problems this entails including the enormous bureaucratic costs that Stephen referred to.
I dont see any problem with treating labour power as an input, just like any other input, within the framework of a decentralised or polycentric self regulating system of stock control and based on the assessment of the (ever changing) labour requirements of particular production units. (It is quite easy to imagine something equivalent to todays’ job centres, or an online version of them, operating in a socialist society).
To me this is the only viable form of “labour time accounting” on offer. What is usually meant by this term is both impractical as a procedure (particularly when it comes to guesstimating the labour content of intermediate goods such as machinery) and quite unnecessary anyway. What purpose does it serve that cannot be served by the much more straightforward procedure involved in a self regulating system of stock control which no large scale, technologically advanced society – including capitalism – could do without?
Hi ZJW
Just to correct something you wrote – no, I haven’t been in touch with Chattopadhyay about the nature and workings of a post capitalist society but I have widely recommended his book – “The Marxian Concept of Capital and the Soviet Experience” – in my various interventions on internet forums. But yes, perhaps he ought to be contacted on the subject you refer to (I am writing something about that at the moment as it happens which makes a reference to him)
Is he not based in Canada?
“The solution is simple. Join the socialist party of Great Britain and transfer all the archives and websites to the SPGB. It should have been done 12 years ago”
No thanks.Rather than just write off the WSPUS as “dead”, why not first of all establish who and where the members are? I would have thought that was the obvious first step that the SPGB could do and this matter should really be on the agenda of the next EC meeting. Someone should be tasked to comprehensively report on the status of the Party. The objective should be to resuscitate the victim not administer a lethal injection.
It is quite possible that the problem is more to do with the collapse of the administrative structure and internal communication than the decline of membership (small though it is) – though the former could very well accelerate the latter. It has already been pointed out on this thread that individuals contacting the WSPUS have been turned away for the reason that the organisation lacks the capacity to support the membership. Perhaps what is needed to transfer responsibility for administration to those members who are more motivated and able to take on the task and to restructure the Party.
The Canadian Party should be called in to assist as well.
I just find it incredible that in a country where there is so much potential for socialist growth that we are talking about winding up WSPUS without even investigating the situation on the ground. This is totally sending out the wrong message.
I agree, Alan. A pamphlet on nationalism is urgently needed, taking into account recent developments. I’m not averse to the idea of a pamphlet on Leninism and its offshoots, however – though I dont think this is a priority and to some extent the subject has been covered in other pamphlets. But the subject of nationalism has not really been adequately covered and in particular the question of why it continues to be so resilient. I think it was Thomas Nairn who said nationalism represents Marxism’s biggest theoretical failure or words to that effect. We need to better understand the menace of nationalism and where it come from in order to more effectively counter it…
Alan, talking of Leninist Vanguardists, I see those folk at “Anti-Capital” (really pro state capital) have had a snidey dig at your recent post on Libcom about the Soviets. Do you think it is worth making a response? I cant having been kicked off the site by their Fuhrer, Mr Artesian, for responding in kind to his insults
I notice some new features are gradually being introduced to improve the forum like the “Additional Forum Statistics” at the bottom of the page. (This, incidentally, reveals that there are now 893 members on this forum; is there a way of contacting each of these members periodically such as other forums like RedMarx do, to encourage more active participation?)
Just to clarify what I mean by the above here is an example of a recent email I received from RedMarx, In the case of the SPGB forum the Admin could select a few examples of popular threads like the one on Climate Change and send a syndicated email to all forum users every few months or so to encourage participation
Top Discussions from RedMarx
Find our publication at the following web address
RedMarx – Broletariat As of February 7, AC has moved: Anti-Capital has moved: New URL: We now have an iTunes hosted podcast which you can find at: or more generally our RSS feed can be found here: Read MoreEarly Marxist groups and individuals
RedMarx – August It’s long seemed to me that there would be a full-length book dedicated to the single topic of the early rise and spread of Marxist (or “proto-Marxist”, if you will, for some examples) intellectuals and agitators across continents in the 19th century to the turn of the 20th century. Sort of surprisi Read MoreChronicle of first months of White Terror (beginining in October 1917)
RedMarx – Noa Read MoreMe getting banned from libcom
RedMarx – Noa Read MoreThe so-called international Marxist tendency
RedMarx – joewillie17 We need to have a discussion about unsavoury this little cult is. I’ll get the ball rolling by posting a couple of links that serve to illustrate just how sinister the aforementioned group are: https://medium.com/@armanleftarm/imt-opposing-imperialism-by-endorsing-imperialism-2806c2a98cf6 https://im Read MoreAs can be seen from the content of my posts, I might be full of doom, but I have not given up hope and have made what I consider to be a strategy to stem the decline and hopefully reverse it.
Good to hear that Alan though, as I say, even without such a strategy there is still reason to hope (though this is not a reason for not developing such a strategy)
And just for the record I stick with the same set of lottery numbers every week not because I’m insane but because I’m too bloody lazy to think up an alternative set of numbers. But dont worry – Ill let you all know when Ive acquired the windfall that will enable to retire in luxury to Clacton-on-sea
Another bunch of time-wasting Leninist Vanguardists – “We must earn a place in the vanguard, not through our ideological pedigree or our superior command of theory, but through our strategy, dedication, and practice” – who have nothing to say about genuine socialism let alone wanting to pursue as an objective
I’m getting quite sick and tired of these posturing poseurs who seem to popping up with increasing frequency of late particularly in the US it would seem – with their constant talk of ‘socialist programs’ ( meaning capitalist reform). The much reported growth of interest in “socialism” in the US is very much a double edged sword
There is truth in the aphorism that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is insanity
Alan, just to clarify – I am not at all suggesting we should continue doing things in the same old way as we have always done. Far from it, and I have already suggested a few changes that could be implemented.
However, what I was questioning was the assumption which seems to be implicit in the very aphorism you cite that our fate is entirely in our own hands and that since we continue to do what we have always done and have got nowhere this borders on insanity. But this is not entirely true, is it?
If Joe Bloggs continues to use the same set of numbers for his lottery ticket week after week , year after year you wouldn’t call his actions insane would you? Why? Because there is also a chance that the lottery will generate the numbers that correspond to what he has on his ticket with the outcome that Joe will hit the jackpot and will finally be able to retire to the Bahamas or Clacton-on-sea, perhaps. It would of course be insane for Joe to use the same numbers week after week if it were the case that the lottery generated the same numbers week after week which bore no relation to Joe’s numbers but that’s not the case in reality
It might be stretching matters a little but the same kind of argument could apply to what we are doing. In one sense capitalism generates a predictable outcome. Things haven’t changed much in this deep structural sense. The same old problems seem to re-occur over and over again. But, in another sense, capitalism is the throes of constant change . “All that is solid melts in the air” as the Communist Manifesto said. New technological advances – from machine learning to gene editing; new forms of social interaction and ‘pop culture’; new challenges like climate change and plastic pollution are constantly throwing up new possibilities and pointing to the need for new ways of thinking
We cannot know or predict how all this secular trends might interact in the future. It is at least conceivable that this shifting constellation of factors might re-align themselves and come together in quite novel ways that begin to suddenly make what we are saying appear a lot more relevant and interesting. I dont know if I am deluding myself but I have already noticed a few straws in the wind in the many Facebook forums I frequent. Its a glass ceiling we are running into at the moment but with a few heftier pushes we could break through.
The point that I am making , Alan, is that there is always grounds for hope and that this does not depend entirely on what we do ourselves. There is simply no point in pessimism. It is self defeating and demoralising. That way lies only doom as Private Frazer was wont to point out
We need somehow to combine a belief that things can change with a belief in ourselves to make the changes that will help bring about that change
Robbo, political parties do not emerge from nowhere. They arise when they meet certain conditions and when the ground has been prepared in advance. They reflect the ideas people already hold in their heads, and rarely introduce new ones to them.
Yes I go along with that Alan but the point I am trying to make is that you cannot predict the particular constellation of conditions that might come together to permit a breakthrough as far as the socialist movement is concerned. Negatively harping on the fact that after 105 years the SPGB has made no progress – as if we didn’t all know! – not only demoralises and serves no useful purpose but seems to imply that the future is something predictable or preordained when what I am trying to say is that it is not and that our fate is not entirely all in our hands. We just dont know what the future will being and that, if anything, is reason for hope, not despair.
Baby-steps are not going to get us anywhere, Robbo. A look back at conference and ADM agendas and you’ll find an obsession with fine details but no Big Ideas.
But you cannot separate these things, ‘Baby Steps’ and the ‘Big Picture’ go together. One without the other makes no sense
What is lacking is the fact that members of the companion parties are missing from this cooperation. We have no coordination.
Yes I entirely agree, There should be MUCH more in the way of practical coordination. At the very least there should also be a world socialist journal for all the companion parties alongside journals such as the SS and Imagine. What I am implacably against, though, is dissolving all the companion parties and merging them into one single global entity. I think this will be a retrograde step which will actually matters much worse. It will reduce the sense of involvement by individual members on the ground
Relax our strict admittance. I think you refer to prospective members holding religious beliefs. I doubt there would be any marked difference in membership. But our attitude changing and relaxing to those active participants in the huge number of reform movement…then perhaps we might see a rise in members who would have an audience for the socialist message. This means explaining how we can individually work towards various reforms as we do within our trade unions but how our political organization must stand apart but act as an umbrella to muster under
Yes, softening our approach to applicants with religious beliefs is certainly one of the things I had in mind – for instance, by simply requiring applicants not to belong to any organised religion and not to propagate religious ideas in the context of promoting socialism. As you know this has long been, and continues to be, my position, It may not make a “marked “difference but it will certainly make some difference and ANY difference in membership uptake is something to be welcomed. Anyway, I dont see how holding religious beliefs per se prevents one from endorsing a materialist conception of history, In practice, many religious historians do precisely that and that’s all that matters
On reforms I probably take a more hard-line than you Alan, but again I think a persistent problem with the Party (as is perhaps illustrated by your comments above) is the lack of a clear definition of reformism, How many times does it need to be explained that trade union activism is NOT reformism and that the latter is essentially a form of political activity requiring implementation of policies by the state to address those problems that arise from the workings of capitalism itself. So for instance challenging racist or sexist ideas is not reformist in itself Nor is expressing concern about climate change. Rather reformism has to do with way in which you propose to deal with climate change
I do agree, though, that a blanket application of the hostility clause to all-comers is problematic and that a more subtle and nuanced approach that differentiates between political organisations is needed. It would be preposterous to bracket together, say, a libertarian communist and a conservative group. In practice I think the SPGB is moving in the direction of a more nuanced approach even if it has not yet reached a formalised position on the matter. I would not agree with Vin though that the hostility clause is the main reason why the SPGB remains small, In fact, in some ways, had there not been a hostility clause it is questionable whether the SPGB would have even remained in existence at all. Quite likely we would have disappeared into the bowels of the Labour Party or some other such capitalist outfit,
I think by far the most important reason why the SPGB remains small is precisely the “small party syndrome” explained above which keeps us small, That is why we urgently think about what is required to bring us to that critical threshold where we have achieved a critical mass to fuel a momentum of growth. We shouldn’t allow ourselves to be overawed and depressed about the all too dauting prospect of building a movement of millions. Even just an organisaton of one or two thousand would do wonders at this point, And to get there, to realise the bigger picture, Alan, we seriously do need those “baby steps” that you seem to have all too readily dismissed
Nobody possesses a crystal ball but we cannot simply extrapolate from current trends to arrive at the depressing conclusion that we are never likely to see socialism even in our children’s children’s lifetime. It is not usually in the nature of political growth to take an arithmetic form. More often than not it takes an exponential form. There is no reason to expect the growth trajectory that a socialist movement might take would be any different.
We cannot predict the constellation of factors that might finally push us through the glass ceiling and bring us to the point of critical mass when a sustainable growth momentum will hopefully kick in. I have always felt that our small size is by far the most important reason why we continue to remain small – because it denies us the credibility we deserve. When we are a Party of several thousand members people’s perception of us will be quite different. That is when people will sit up and take notice – and join. The hardest part of the struggle to gain influence is now when we are still relatively tiny
Here in Spain the right wing Vox Party came from nowhere to capture 12 of the 109 seats in the recent Andalusian elections. Before that it was considered a joke. But to everyone’s surprise they proved everyone wrong. We could do the same. Our efforts should be focussed on reaching that critical point rather than allowing ourselves to feel depressed or overwhelmed by the apparent impossibility of morphing into a movement of millions any time soon. It is the micro picture we should be looking at, the nitty gritty detail of how to turn our fortunes around. All journeys begin with a few tiny steps. We should do more to encourage people not only to join (which might involve softening one or two of our quite strict admissions criteria) but also to be more active. What has happened about the ongoing project of party reorganisation?
Yes, the WSM as a whole needs to act in a more coordinated manner but I am wary of abandoning the idea of nationally-based political parties. That might alienate members even more and discourage activity because of the perceived remoteness of a (relatively small) global organisation in relation to a few scattered socialist on the ground. Why cannot those two approaches – national and global – be applied concurrently? Its not an either/or thing.
In relation to the US, what I believe has happened is that those who have been involved in the central administration of the Party in the past are no longer active or have been reduced in numbers. Yet there are individuals in America who are active, and have even joined the SPGB recently, who are disconnected or isolated from the former for whatever reason. There needs to be a transfer of responsibility for running the WSPUS as a political party to this ‘new blood’ so to speak and the SPGB should take initiative in assisting this development in my opinion. As a first step it needs to compile a complete list of all contacts, including members, in America to assess what can be done to improve the situation
I’m all for this Neil. I think it is an excellent idea. There is also Quora in which several members are already active participants. I’m more familiar with Quora than Reddit but will certainly look into the latter myself, The idea of setting up a subreddit looks attractive
I see from the EC minutes that another individual based in the US has just joined the SPGB. Has the administration of the WSPUS become so moribund that it cannot process new applicants? Its seems a bit ridiculous that there are active members in the US and individuals wanting to join but no means to enable them to join the local Party. This all the more bizarre given the upsurge in interest in ‘socialism’ in the US. Ok its not real socialism but you would expect the WSPUS to reap some benefits from this trend
What can be done to promote a more coordinated approach? Are there members in the US who might want to take on the vital task of administration?
“Mainstream and large businesses are an important part of today’s economy. They need to be part of the transformation to foster true systemic change,”
Sounds like pacifists trying to stop war by joining the army
An afterthought – perhaps Artesian can be taken to task for some of the claims made in his latest outburst which is full of non sequiturs:
You come here blowing smoke about the “capitalist revolution” the “red capitalists” the self-centered working class without any interest in socialism– and when challenged, you try to hide your contempt for that actual material basis for the events of 1917 with statements about what’s “appropriate” for here and now.
If the outcome of the ‘revolution’ was state capitalism , how could the ‘revolution’ not have been capitalist? As for the ‘red capitalists’, nobody said Lenin and his associates were themselves capitalists. Artesian has such a simplistic and crude view of what his opponents are actually saying. The state capitalist class was an emergent outcome following the Bolshevik takeover and was not defined by legal de jure rights to capital but by de facto ultimate control over the means of production as a collective class, not as private capitalists (with or without top hats and fat cigars).
And finally, as for the self-centered working class without any interest in socialism, well, even Lenin stated that the Russian workers were overwhelmingly non-socialist at the time – what drew them to the Bolsheviks was the latter’s slogan of peace, land and bread. The charge that that they are being portrayed as ‘self centred’ for concerning themselves with such things as job security in a condition of financial breakdown and widespread factory closures is curious, Does Artesian believe that a socialist revolution can only be effected on the basis of altruistic self sacrifice? Is altruism necessarily socialist anyway? The worker who willingly dies for her country is acting out of altruism but no socialist would endorse her actions. Socialism involves both altruism and self interest anyway.
I would have loved to have put these points to Mr Artesian who claims we have not been answering the questions he posed but I have been banned from the site. If someone else wants to post these points on that site be my guest…
