ZJW
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What I found alarming in the article was this:
‘What can be said with near certainty is that a revolution that does not have substantial participation from engineers is doomed to fail at implementing communism.’ […] ‘t is indeed mass manufacturing and global distributive capacity that makes a planned social system, controllable by the collective human desire for wellbeing, possible.’
and
‘The past two decades have seen a rebirth of mass politics brought on by decreasing proletarian access to the means of subsistence. These struggles signal the start of a new phase in proletarian activity qualitatively different from the mass worker mobilizations of the 19th and 20h centuries. Unlike many of these older struggles, the mass mobilizations of today tend to take place outside of the workplace and, insofar as they have demands or specific complaints, are focused largely on a lack of the means of subsistence rather than on workplace issues or other matters relating directly to capitalist productive activity. The reasons for this lie outside the scope of this essay; however, a significant causal factor is the simple fact that a far smaller proportion of the global proletarian population is today employed directly in the commodity production process. This is why much contemporary communist theory [[whose? one of the ‘communiser’ factions?]] focuses on the role of surplus population (the growing number of people superfluous to commodity production) in today’s struggles and uprisings; this is now the defining dynamic of proletarian self-activity. **The problematic aspect of this dynamic is that these movements cannot build towards communism without the involvement of workers with the technical know-how of commodity production and the willingness to deploy that know-how towards communist ends.**’ [my emphasis]
Well, regardless of the truth or non-truth of his ‘ [now] defining dynamic of proletarian self-activity’ (as ‘the growing number of people superfluous to commodity production in today’s struggles and uprisings’), the longer that the tendency described earlier by him continues (that is, (a) knowledge increasingly concentrated in the engineer; (b) concomitant deskilling of others involved in direct production) — all the more will the role of the engineer in socialist revolution become all the more critical/pivotal. Because: if only the engineers really knows how to ‘do anything’, then without them, the forces of production can hardly be freed in the direction of providing abundance.
Regarding the ‘Why England?’ question —
1) Aside from Meiksins Wood’s book ‘The Origin of Capitalism: A Longer View’ (easily downloadable free from libgen) also see George Comninel’s 2000 ‘English Feudalism and the Origins of Capitalism’ which can be read at http://www.yorku.ca/comninel/courses/ComninelPDF/English_feudalism(JPS).pdf . An earlier version of it was favorably referred to in a footnote in an previous book by Meiksins Wood.
The abstract of the Comninel is the following:
‘The specific historical basis for the development of capitalism in England — and not in France — is traced to the unique structure of English manorial lordship. It is the absence from English lordship of seigneurie banale – the specific political form of parcellised sovereignty that figured centrally in the development of Continental feudalism – that accounts for the peculiarly ‘economic’ turn taken in the development of English class relations of surplus extraction. In France, by contrast, the distinctly ‘political’ tenor of subsequent social development can equally specifically be traced to the central role of seigneurie banale in the fundamental class relations of feudalism.’
(By the way, based on both political and economic criteria, he draws a distinction between ‘manorialism’, ‘feudalism’ , and ‘absolutism’:
‘All three of these systems of class relations of exploitation were based upon the ‘extra-economic’ appropriation of surplus from peasants, and the differences among them are far less than the qualitative difference between capitalism and them all. Yet distinctions may be drawn between manorialism, feudalism, and absolutism in precisely the same way that Marx distinguished the extraction of labour-rent in Asia from European feudalism – specifically in relation to differing structures of extra-economic coercion of the peasants.’)
Regarding the Bird-recommended book by Spencer Dimmock from 2014, ‘The Origin of Capitalism in England, 1400–1600’, its detailed table of contents, on Google Books, can be seen here: shorturl.at/gqvCZ . This book (likewise downloadable from libgen) ought to be reviewed in the SS.
(Dimmock might be surprised at Bird’s characterisation of the Political Marxism current in Bird-comment #208026. Near the beginning of the chapter ‘Orthodox Marxism versus Political Marxism’, Dimmock writes:
‘As we shall see, the accusation of voluntarism – among other things – against Robert Brenner and Ellen Meiksins Wood (the Wood referred to in the above quote) stems from a total misreading of Brenner’s thesis and its application by Wood and other political Marxists such as George Comninel, Benno Teschke and Charles Post. Far from abandoning historical materialism, Brenner’s social-property
relations perspective has sought to bring it to life by rejecting the tendency to teleology and techno-determinism in earlier orthodox accounts.’Re my #215880, relatedly see this by Chomsky in 1989: https://chomsky.info/1989____/ .
(edit: I suppose this would probably have been better posted on the Anti-zionism is not anti-semitism thread.)
A left-communist friend remarks on it:
‘Not a bad critique, right about the basics. However, their understanding of both science and Marxism seems a bit crude – you would think they’ve never read Pannekoek’s critique of Lenin’s “Materialism and Empiriocriticism”!’
In the June 2021 Brooklyn Rail / Field notes:
Chris Knight: ‘Did communism make us human? — On the anthropology of David Graeber’:
https://brooklynrail.org/2021/06/field-notes/Did-communism-make-us-human
He opposes Graeber’s insistence on the non-existence of primitive communism and demonstrates the opposite.
Some keywords: ‘immediate return’, ‘delayed return’ …. ‘selfish gene’.
Young Master:
Bauerism (as well as a voting system that might overcome the danger of ethno-majority tyranny) both came up in this thread: https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/topic/against-lesser-of-the-two-evils-ism-on-the-article-was-the-jewish-bund-anti-semitic/#post-132981
Glenn Greenwald: ‘AOC’s Attack on Yang’s Meaningless Israel Statement Shows Her Role: Protect Dem Leaders — Real power over U.S. policy toward Israel and Gaza rests with Biden, Harris, Pelosi, Schumer, Blinken — not Yang. But AOC’s function is to shield them from leftist anger.’:
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/aocs-attack-on-yangs-meaningless
A new article from the autonomist-colored left-communist group Mouvement Communiste/Kolektivně proti Kapitălu:
“RACES” AND THE WORKING CLASS IN THE USA
https://mouvement-communiste.com/documents/MC/Letters/LTMC2148 ENvH.pdf ENvH.pdfIt includes these sections:
An antiracist movement against the police but in defence of the state
BLM, a stack of anti-worker ideas
The present situation of Blacks in the USA (with 11 subsections)
Capital and imaginary communities
Intersectionality, a counter-revolutionary instrument for dividing the proletariat
An ideology soaked in philosophical indifferentism
Intersectionality and the politics of identity
Intersectionality and antiracism: a pillar of racialisation
A counter-revolutionary impasse
ALB:
‘Anarchists (and “Utopian Socialists”) argued that it could have been and could be established anywhere and at any time in history. Marx argued that *one of its conditions was productive forces capable of providing plenty for all*.’
Can you supply some Marx-text for that? Thanks.
(I don’t know if he exactly rates as a utopian socialist or anarchist, but if I am not too mistaken, what you characterise as the anarchist view is also that of, say, Jean Barrot/Gille Dauvé — as well as some of the other ‘communisers’.
‘New antisemitism definition excludes BDS, but Palestine activists say it’s still flawed’:
New antisemitism definition excludes BDS, but Palestine activists say it’s still flawed
‘The Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism: a critical view’:
Norman Finkelstein: ‘WHY WE SHOULD REJOICE AT HOLOCAUST DENIERS, NOT SUPPRESS THEM – A Reply to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’: http://normanfinkelstein.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Finkelstein-HDeny.pdf
WSWS: ‘Anti-Semitism” accusations used in attempt to prevent Ken Loach speaking at Oxford University’: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/02/17/loac-f17.html
Norman Finkelstein’s comment on the B’Tselem report:
The Jewish supremacist state (A comment on B’Tselem’s ‘apartheid regime’ designation for Israel)
Jonathan Cook: ‘Antisemitism claims mask a reign of political and cultural terror across Europe’:And here is the article mentioned in his first sentence:Haaretz: ‘In Germany, a witch hunt is raging against critics of Israel. Cultural leaders have had enough’: https://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/1.9362662(This link gets around the subscription firewall)
