[Young Master Smeet]

Well, he's clearly saying animal being preceded conscious being.  And clearly stating that social applies only to multiple humans working together, so a being on their own can produce, is that not so?  Or do none of Marx' words mean what they say?

[Young Master Smeet]

See, thing is, Marx could define social:

Quote:

By social we understand the co-operation of several individuals, no matter under what conditions, in what manner and to what end.

So a woman alone on an island picking fruit is not social, she is merely satisfying her own needs.Oh, and just for old times sake, here's what Marx eally said about social production:

Quote:

Consciousness is, therefore, from the very beginning a social product, and remains so as long as men exist at all. Consciousness is at first, of course, merely consciousness concerning the immediate sensuous environment and consciousness of the limited connection with other persons and things outside the individual who is growing self-conscious. At the same time it is consciousness of nature, which first appears to men as a completely alien, all-powerful and unassailable force, with which men’s relations are purely animal and by which they are overawed like beasts; it is thus a purely animal consciousness of nature (natural religion) just because nature is as yet hardly modified historically. (We see here immediately: this natural religion or this particular relation of men to nature is determined by the form of society and vice versa. Here, as everywhere, the identity of nature and man appears in such a way that the restricted relation of men to nature determines their restricted relation to one another, and their restricted relation to one another determines men’s restricted relation to nature.) On the other hand, man’s consciousness of the necessity of associating with the individuals around him is the beginning of the consciousness that he is living in society at all. This beginning is as animal as social life itself at this stage. It is mere herd-consciousness, and at this point man is only distinguished from sheep by the fact that with him consciousness takes the place of instinct or that his instinct is a conscious one. This sheep-like or tribal consciousness receives its further development and extension through increased productivity, the increase of needs, and, what is fundamental to both of these, the increase of population. With these there develops the division of labour, which was originally nothing but the division of labour in the sexual act, then that division of labour which develops spontaneously or “naturally” by virtue of natural predisposition (e.g. physical strength), needs, accidents, etc. etc. Division of labour only becomes truly such from the moment when a division of material and mental labour appears. (The first form of ideologists, priests, is concurrent.) From this moment onwards consciousness can really flatter itself that it is something other than consciousness of existing practice, that it really represents something without representing something real; from now on consciousness is in a position to emancipate itself from the world and to proceed to the formation of “pure” theory, theology, philosophy, ethics, etc.

[Young Master Smeet]

Quote:

A fine conclusion! If useful labor is possible only in society and through society, the proceeds of labor belong to society — and only so much therefrom accrues to the individual worker as is not required to maintain the "condition" of labor, society.In fact, this proposition has at all times been made use of by the champions of the state of society prevailing at any given time. First comes the claims of the government and everything that sticks to it, since it is the social organ for the maintenance of the social order; then comes the claims of the various kinds of private property, for the various kinds of private property are the foundations of society, etc. One sees that such hollow phrases are the foundations of society, etc. One sees that such hollow phrases can be twisted and turned as desired.

I think it was Engels who said that, or was it Kautsky?  So, to be clear, you think that only through society, as expressed throuh it's organs of violence, can production occur?

[Young Master Smeet]

Lbird, can non-social producers create a product?

[Young Master Smeet]

Vin wrote:

I have asked a simple question 'Will the proletariat exist in democratic communism'. It is easily answered. 'yes'  or 'no' without reference to

A slightly better question is: if the revolutionary proletariat exrcise democratic decision making, what otehr classes are there in society?Further, to return to the question of violence, not all human beings are capable of violence (or effective violence) so, if the democratyic majority is to have its way, it rests on the fraction of society that can be violent, not on the whole community.  Is this, then, not dividing society into two parts, the violent and the violented?

[Young Master Smeet]

The default is a single authority at any given time for any given topic, the membership of which might overlap, just as say, under the old English council system it was one council but with many sub-committees having the real say, or like the Paris Commune which worked in much the same way.

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

I've recently said that I find the SPGB's attitude to 'power' to be strange for a political party – but perhaps the reason is emerging more clearly, now.

We're just slavishly following Marx:

Quote:

 The character of the election does not depend on this name, but on the economic foundation, the economic situation of the voters, and as soon as the functions have ceased to be political ones, there exists 1) no government function, 2) the distribution of the general functions has become a business matter, that gives no one domination, 3) election has nothing of its present political character.

Electing the milkboard would be non-political, since there would be no class contest, and the question of 'who rules?' would be settled.

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

This is your 'substantive point', YMS. It's a political argument for the liberal theory of the diffusion of 'powers', similar to legislature, executive, judiciary, etc.

Nothing of the sort, it is based on freedom of association, not separation of power  The model is more cybernetic, thn liberal, with autonomous associations for specific functions forming vertical and horizontal connections, in particular circumstances.

LBird wrote:

On the contrary, my 'substantive point' is that there will be a single world authority, which will have any necessary final say regarding any 'many, varied and overlapping [lower level] authorities'.

I agree, there would have to be a single world authority, but the idea that it would have a direct line of command/control to Droitwich Rugby Club is absurd.Moreover, there is no necessary reason why that singular entity should always have the final say, it would be rational to have a world emergencies committee which might temporarilly supercede teh wrold authority, or there might be competing world authorities working in parrallel, for example a forld forestry commission, and a world agriculture administration, and no regular way to impose on either of them (except maybe through some sort of general, and rare, global plebiscite).Many authorities would have a competence competence, and many wouldn't, and would be subject to the competence of a higher body, the main point would be information and discussion first.

[Young Master Smeet]

The substantive point is, there won't be one way of making decisions, but thousands, where useful, algorithmic decision making can be applied, sometimes, raw voting, sometimes weighted scoring by technical experts, each organisation, community and region will be different: single non-transferable voting, single transferable voting, condorcet pairwise voting, condorcet pairwise voting with AV track back, block vote, limited vote, d'Hondt, droop.  I won't be voting on the colour of the bus stops in Dorset, nor about the street names in Aberdeen.  I might have a vote for the world forestry commission, etc.In Socialist as a Practical Alternative, we cite the Food and Agriculture Organisation as a potential precursor to a world agricultural plan, but I doubt the decision of what to do with that field just off Thames Road should be used for would be taken at their head office, though their advisors might visit the local authority, and advise them in the light of expertise and co-ordinating with the world food plan…. etc.  There would be many, varied and overlapping authorities involved in many decisions, not a single vote, and some decisions even might be made by consensus.

[Young Master Smeet]

gnome wrote:

Lawrie's case was different insofar as he threatened violence against fellow-members and when he refused to resign was expelled by Central London branch.

That isn't what the charge was, though, was it, the threat of violence came after you charged moved the charge against him.

gnome wrote:

But the crucial distinction is in the 'bigness' and the nature of the audience. Party members (and there's now been two) announcing to the whole world on the SPGB's Facebook group page their intention to vote for the Labour party cannot be anything but immensely damaging to the Party and, IMO, constitutes 'action detrimental'.

Nope, not actin detrimental, breech of rule 6, yes, but not action detrimental.

[Young Master Smeet]

Vin wrote:

This situation has nothing to do with the past conflicts. Comrade Colborn's contribution of many years will not be wiped off the slate by petty mindedness and knee jerk reactions and dragging other members into the conflict. 

But those long years are irrelevent to the question at hand, and provide no mitigation.

[Young Master Smeet]

gnome wrote:

Of course, neither you nor I yet know that he won't be putting the party case at every opportunity.

If he were to put the party case, he'd have to resign and stand on the party platform first. And I don't recall you taking this position over Jim Laurie.

Gnome wrote:

There's literally a world of difference between a member expressing an opinion down the pub to a handful of other members and broadcasting it to thousands on Facebook.  The latter couldn't be further from a "lesser matter".

No, there's not.  Social media is just a big pub.

[Young Master Smeet]

gnome wrote:

The position of Steve Colborn is not quite as clear cut as some members would have us believe.  OK, he joined and was elected as a member of another organisation, but is the Seaham Community Party "political" in the sense we in the Socialist Party understand that description?  More to the point; have his actions been "detrimental" to the interests of the Party?  At this stage I'm much more concerned about those members, and there have been a few, particularly on Facebook, who have openly expressed their preference, even support in one or two cases, for one of the main, and avowedly, capitalist parties.

It is pretty clear cut, even if a member even stood as an independent without joining a technical group, it would be an expulsion offence.  Standing for public office without putting the party case is a misuse of the opportuniy the ballot box presents to us, and harms the party.  Peddling the myth of apolitical councillors (usually independents groups are Tories in disguise) is also harmful.  All public office is political in a class divided society.A member expressing an opinon down the pub, or on Facebook is a much lesser matter. 

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

Yeah, 'no-one' will have domination – the collective, democratic, social producers will 'dominate', through their own authority. That's what democracy is, YMS.

That's right, in democracy, people will voluntarily submit to the decision because it is in their long term interest (sometimes they will win the votes).  In democracy among friends, the majority does not dominate, and sometimes a substantial and determined minority might prevail (usually where they feel very strongly and the majority only feel weakly).

[Young Master Smeet]

LBird wrote:

Except in the minds of 'individualists', for whom the pre-property world was a condition of hippyish love and peace, man.

There is a big difference between violence and organised violence (which is why the question of how to efine war is  so tricky the further we go back into the past).  At its most basic, pre-tribal society with loose kinship groups cannot sustain organised violence, there may well be individual violence, or personal violence, but the whole point of the development of culture has been mitigate and prevent such within-group violence.Attaining a society based on the free association of producers means we cannot institute within-group violence as an organising principle.Let's look at who Engels thought socialist society should be run:

The Devil Himself wrote:

In a trade union, for example, does the whole union form its executive committee? Will all division of labour in the factory, and the various functions that correspond to this, cease? And in Bakunin's constitution, will all 'from bottom to top' be 'at the top'? Then there will certainly be no one 'at the bottom'. Will all members of the commune simultaneously manage the interests of its territory? Then there will be no distinction between commune and territory.The Germans number around forty million. Will for example all forty million be member of the government? Certainly! Since the whole thing begins with the self-government of the commune.The whole people will govern, and there will be no governed.If a man rules himself, he does not do so on this principle, for he is after all himself and no other.[…]With collective ownership the so-called people's will vanishes, to make way for the real will of the cooperative.

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