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2006-07-02T14:14:00.000-07:00

The Capitalist State Revisited
Paddy Hackett

I am of the view that capital and the capitalist state essentially form a (inner) contradictory unity. Capital implies violence, organised violence, the political state. Capital, a social relation of production, contains violence within it.
It seems to me that there has been a tendency -I believe Yaffe in the seventies to be a case in point- to view capital and its laws as an independent phenomenon with the state tacked on to it --almost as an afterthought. This conception of capital tended to magnify the significance of the laws of capital and present them as a stand alone reality hardly, in a sense, in need of anything else for their operation and development. Consequently they tended to view the state as a necessary, although important, evil tacked on to capital. In this sense they constitute, perhaps, the left mirror image of neo-liberalism.
Once this perspective is adopted it becomes impossible to adequately analyse the character of contemporary capitalist society. It is this that helps explain the failure of this form of Marxism to explain the contemporary economic situation. Like the neo-liberals the logic of their position tends to suggest that the solution to capital's problems is solvable if the state is subject to an enormously strict diet involving substantial cut backs on its unproductive consumption of surplus value --only then capital can surge forward. However to advocate this course of action is evidence of a misunderstanding of the character of the relationship between capital and state in the contemporary world. Capital never has and never can operate essentially independently of the state --the two are inseparable. The character of the state as it exists today, give or take a little, is implied in the way in which capital is today. This is not to say that the state cannot be reorganised. Indeed it has been, over the recent past, reorganised. However this reflects the actual changes in the way capital itself has developed over the recent past too.
This brings me to the class struggle. The character of the class struggle is expressed through the way in which capital develops. The state as it exists today is an expression of the character of the class struggle. In a sense the specific character of the contradictory (internal) unity between capital and state is an expression of the specific character of the class struggle. Since capitalism implies violence and is grounded in violence --exists in the context of violence-- it cannot simply operate according to the law of capital in some kind of quasi-scientific objective way, that to all intents and purposes, is entirely independent of people.
For individuals, such as Yaffe, Marx's Capital is essentially merely a theory that exists to straighten out bourgeois political economy. Political economy is viewed by them as, in effect, a rather neutral category that is the site of ideological struggle over its meaning as a category. For me, on the other hand, political economy is a bourgeois category, a fetishised category if you like, in need of elimination. It is a category that implies violence, violent conflict, the class struggle and thereby the state. Marx's Capital constitutes part an ongoing critique of the category political economy. It formed part of the struggle to eliminate it and thereby establishing communism.

2006-07-02T14:00:00.000-07:00

Terrorism

It is a revelation to see how the mainstream media plays such a reactionary role. Withut exception it has been pivotal in whipping up hysteria and limiting thought to the level of bigoted jingoism. There has been hardly any dissent within the media to the mainstream view.The principal dissenting view is one which argues that we must understand the causes if we are to solve the problem of terrorism. This implies that capitalism is capable of solving such problems. Furthermore it suggests that it wants to solve the problem of terrorism. It does not seem to understand that capitalism actively creates terrorism to serve its interests. The only terrorism that capitalism does not want is terrorism that interferes with its interests. It has been relatively successful in curbing such terrorism. Indeed it comes as a surprise that there has not been more terrorism given the abject conditions under which millions of people live. This dissenting view makes little sense at any level. It represents a perspective that entirely miscontrues events. It fails to understand that direct force works. Coercion does eliminate terrorism under certain conditions. This is why imperialism maintains military resources. Because it is a necessary resource that does in fact eliminate threats to its rule. To say that the cause of terrorism must be first understood wears thin. The imperialist bourgeoisie are not unaware as to the cause of this terrorism. This is precisely why it uses force. Its understanding has led it to the view that organised violence is the way to curb and even eliminate it. Indeed imperialism can only exist by creating the very causes of terrorism. Consequently force is the only way that it can curb and even eliminate terrorism. If it were merely a matter of understanding and then applying a rational solution there would be no need for a state. If imperialism could solve the causes of terrorism without resorting to force it would have done so a long time ago. To then attribute the problem to an issue of the lack of enlightenment among the bourgeoisie is an subjective idealism that merely sustains utopian illusions in capitalism. The mass media has been exaggerating the power of islamic fundamentalism and the strenght of jihad. The Islamic world is every bit as fractured as the Christian world. This is because it economic conditions determine the character of religious ideology. Consequently there will obtain variations in the character of Islam depending on the specific objective conditions that obtain within the different regions and among the different classes and fractions of classes. Consequently the call for a holy jihad involving all Muslims is the call for a cross class alliance. It is an idealist call that fails to adequately understand the existing objective conditions. It is a call that sees religion as the primary condition that determines behaviour. This is a grossly idealist conception that fails to understand that the reverse relation is the reality.There has been a failure to understand the nature of Islamic fundamentalism from within a class context. Islamic fundamentalism is a reactionary right wing bourgeois religious ideology and politics. It is an expression of bourgeois anti-imperialism. It is the political expression of the stuggle by Islamic capitalism to achieve the conditions that facilitate the development of Islamic capitalism independent of imperialism. Imperialist capital is so powerful that is strangles any attempts by Islamic capital to establish and develop itself. Consequenlty Islamic fundamentalism is an attempt to create the regional conditions that facilitate the growth of small capital under conditions that are emancipated from imperialist capital. Of course success here would lead to the development of Islamic capitalism into a new imperialist capital. But given that the conditions for such a development dont exist and cannot exist Islamic fundamentalism is essentially a reactionary idealist bourgeois politics that is ultimately pro-imperialist. This is reflected in the contradictory relationship the Taliban and the Iranian regime have with imperialist capital. Islamic fundamentalism engages in terror because of its inherent fear of the working class. It engages in individual terror as opposed to struggling to mobilise the working class against imperialism because its class interests are antagonistic to the class interests of the working class. Any mass mobilisation of the working class can lead to the loss of control of Islamic fundamentalism over the masses. Even where mass mobilisation takes place it is organised from a religious context in order to cloud the class question and in that way prevent the experience of the mass mobilisation of the working class leading to the emergence of class consciousness. But the sacrifice of mass mobilisation to terrorism means that Islamic fundamentalism can never achieve its goal of an independent Islamic capitalism. As a class the Islamic bourgeoisie is too insipid to effectively challenge imperialist capital. Only the working class is strong enough to successfully challenge capitalism. This contradiction explains the failure of the Palestinian masses to make progress. They are led by a leadership that fears the strength of the working class. Consequently it engages in actions that maintain and promote the polarisation and the consequent continued weakness of the working class. This means that the Palestinian issue becomes a self-sustaining problem that is never solved. Islamic Jihad and Hamas undertake a suicide bombing which leads to a reaction by the forces of the Israeli state and thereby the problem continues in a tit for tat spiral. Both the Israeli state and islamic fundamentalism seek independently of the working class to gain a political advantage in such a way that they can gain a hegemony that puts them in a position whereby the problem can be solved in their respective interests in opposition to the interests of the Middle Eastern working class. Islamic fundamentalism merely exploits the plight of the Palestinian masses as means of establishing itself in power. It is not concerned with the savage oppression of the Palestinian masses. It merely views their oppression as an opportunity to advance the class interests of the Palestinian bourgeoisie. However because of the inherent weakness of the Palestinian bourgeoisie it sees the need to form an alliance with other sections of the Islamic bourgeoisie to struggle for the creation of regional conditions conditions that promotes Islamic capitalism. This is why ther is now a movement to create an Islamic world with Suadia Arabia as its centre. This is why elements within Saudia Arabia have promoted the Taleban and the Bin Laden forces. The Saudi bourgeoisie seek indepedence from imperialism as a condition for the further growth of Islamic capitalism.The few dissenting voices from the intellectual community argue that Washington is the greatest terrorist of all. They cite the well known cases that show that Washington has much more blood on their hands than the terrorists that attacked the WTC and the Pentagon. They add that its terrorism has been a primary cause of this recent atrocity on US soil. The implication here is that if you condemn the terrorists responsible for this recent atrocity then you must equally condemn the terrorism of Washington. This is a rather abstract class free approach. It entails an abstract rationalism. Instead of understanding the class context of the recent atrocity and Washington terror it presents a class free abstraction that misrepresents the specific character of these terrorisms. There are different kinds of terror. The terror of an imperialist state is a qualitatively different kind of terror to that of the terror of a group that is base in an ethnically oppressed people that is being daily oppressed in a most brutal fashion by imperialism such as the Kurds and the Palestinians. To use the argument that Washington is engages in terror too is to collapse the these opposite social categories into one. The terror conducted by an organisation based in the former social category is a qualitatively different kind of terror to the terror of a capitalist state. The latter exists to maintain and increase the oppression of the working class while the former is a reaction from that form the object of this oppression. The terror of the oppressed constitutes formally a form of resistance however ill conceived while the terror of the state is constitutes a form of attack. Consequently both forms of terror must evaluated from a class context-politically. Criticism and condemnation from a moral standpoint is mere liberal abstraction that merely obscures and thereby sustains capitalist oppression and the very terror that it is responsible for. In short state terror and the terror of resistance groups has its source in imperialism. Imperialist capital is responsible for both kinds of terror. Political criticism by communists of the terror of a resistance group cannot be mixed up with chorous of general codemnation that constitutes a virtual shibboleth. To confuse it is to be guilty of concealing communist politics while proping up bougeois ideology.The wholesale support for the response of Bush and other leaders of the ruling class by the US working class in particular and the western working class in general contains important lessons. It is indicates the extreme degree to which bourgeois ideology has the working class in its grips. When there is a critical issues of great significance it instinctively comes enthusiastically comes down on the side of the ruling class. Even though this is a product of the mass mobilisation of public opinion through the creation of pro-imperialist hysteria by the mainstream media and other bourgeois propagandists nontheless it still indicates that there obtains a deep-seated loyalty to capitalism even in more normal times. Clearly the specific character of objective conditions forms the basis for this.The response from the radical intelligentsia, with some exceptions, has been rather silent. The radical intellectuals from the universities who spun out their convoluted elaboration of this and that theoretical matter from a marxist standpoing have, on the whole, greeted the recent atrocities and their aftermath with silence. However there is nothing surprising these same figures of the radical left, these marxists etc., have never any comments on any the current significant developments. After all commitment on these matters might upset their cosy relationship with academia.It is clear that imperialism is exploiting the Manhattan/Washington terrrorist attacks as opportunity to restrict the civil liberties, to increase surveillance, to increase exploitation. Their war on terrorism has been turned into a war on the working class. The very working class that have been in the main the victims of such atrocities are the very workers that are to be the victims of the war on terrorism. They are to be punished because they have been victims of terrorist atrocity. This is the way capitalism opposes terrorism. Already its response has led to the mass dislocation of the hundreds of thousands of the Afghani masses. Again the war on terrorism is a war that inflicts great pain and suffering on the most vulnerable.If imperialism is successful in crushing Islamic fundamentalism in Asia this is going to mean the consolidation of Asian dictatorships. These are regime's that have largely existed under relatively unstable conditions that posed a substantial threat to their existence. This will mean that imperialism will find it easier to impose its settlement on the Palestinians. Under these new conditions imperialism's confidence will have increased enabling to promote its class interests in a more direct way.

The Ethics of Imperialist Foreign Policy

2006-07-02T13:47:00.000-07:00

Ethical Foreign Policy

Washington uses “ethical foreign policy” as a strategy to undermine its opponents. Using this strategy it can under the ideological cover of ethics invade other territories. It is this ethical imperialism that gives Washington the pretext for attacking, bombing and invading Serbia and thereby engaging in a modern colonialism. Washington must resort to this kind of ideological deception because it needs to conceal from the working class it real actions. In the absence of any such concealment there is always the danger of the working class both within and without the US challenging its actions. The fear of the working class underlines American imperialism’s actions. Consequently secrecy and deception is a necessity in its attempt to protect and enhance the conditions necessary for the perpetuation of the accelerated accumulation of capital.
Ethical foreign policy is the means by which Washington acts out its imperialism. Under this policy it can attack, invade and colonise other countries that it seeks to exploit or control for purposes of global strategic concerns. Today imperialist foreign policy must be hidden behind a web of deceit.
Washington and London are forever informing the public that there are “morally bad” and good countries. The bad countries are Russia, China, Serbia, North Korea, Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq etc. What is ignored is that there are other “morally wayward” countries too, However these countries are not on the black list because they serve Washington’s imperialist interests --countries such as Indonesia and Colombia. Indeed Washington actively supports these countries both strategically and militarily.
The West mobilise public opinion against a particular “bad” country through its mass media which provides the popular basis for its active intervention. Such a mobilisation may be undertaken for many months. Consequently all views that don’t fit in with the official view are marginalized and even submerged in the mass media hysteria that is generated by the bourgeoisie. This is why we only here dissenting views after the event has taken place, been completed and consolidated. Criticism post facto is not then a challenge and yet serves the ideological function of presenting the illusion that we live in a world in which freedom of expression exists. Currently it is being done in relation to Russia over Chechnya albeit in a modified form. However it is being done in a modified form because the West is not so sure how they can fully exploit this war for their own gain. However by partially whipping up antagonism they are positioning themselves while menacing Russia as a way of both asserting influence and menacing it. It is also a means of exploiting Chechnya as a means of mobilising antagonism against Russia over the long term –since it can take years to achieve this. It is also designed to obscure from the masses in the West the essence of the situation in the CIS. It is also a way of signalling to Russia what they can do if Russia goes any further in its policy of consolidating or extending the CIS.
This ethical strategy also ideologically reinforces Western capitalism by reinforcing belief in Western society as a good society despite its shortcomings. By attacking “morally depraved” societies it reinforces its own legitimacy. It also distracts the masses from the inherent limitations of Western capitalism. It gives the Western masses something to let steam off about –it becomes a substitute for authentic radicalism thereby precluding the emergence of revolutionary movements. It can also serve to maintain the working class in an inert state. It also has the added effect of presenting the imperialist bourgeoisie as being a crusading force for justice. In this way it creates a cross class alliance led by the bourgeoisie. What more could the bourgeoisie ask for.
It creates too a culture that is ideologically overwhelming. The visceral feeling is created that there is just no basis for a radically different alternative. Consequently one does not even try to present an ideological challenge. The assumptions underlying this imperialist ideology become so pervasive that they become natural givens.
The real situation becomes invisible. Delusion is substituted for reality. This has been all the more effective because old traditional bourgeois ideology have been replaced by this new one. Consciousness lags behind reality. Consequently it takes time for the character of this new ideology to be consciously recognised. Instead the Quixotic exercise of fighting the old ideological giants is engaged in –the unawareness that substance has been metamorphosed into shadow. This in itself is another bourgeois ideology that entails lefties and even radical liberals engaging in a harmless Quixotic exercise.
This ideology of the imperialist ethic spreads out in all directions while deepening its grip on the Western masses so much so that it is metamorphosed into a culture of the ethic. Consequently certain languages and conceptualisations become invisible dropping out of the frame. The culture creates the universal impression that western democracy is the ethical norm –the universal criterion as to what is just. This culture extends itself into all places. This moralistic conception of global conditions serves the ideological purpose of hiding in a web of deceit and lies the real nature of global conditions. Consequently this ideology lulls the working class into accepting and tolerating political and economic developments that it would challenge if it had a clear vision of the conditions –if it new the facts. This ideology is a screen behind which the bourgeoisie can freely advance their class interests and the continued oppression of the working class. Its oppressions assumes a hidden form. However it needs this ideological veil of secrecy if it is to effectively serve its own class interests. Without this veil of secrecy the working class would not let the capitalist class freely exploit it. It would challenge it.
As I said already to effect this uniform and universal ideology the capitalist class frequently need to modify practical and institutional conditions in order to provide a material support that can sustain this ideology. Under these conditions the device used to deceive the masses rendering them inert transcends the mere ideological level. The ideology, so to speak, is transformed into a hegemonic form. This is a form that includes both the ideological and material conditions that sustain the inability of the masses to see what is going on. Examples of such phenomenal forms are schools and universities.
The bourgeoisie to effect this universal web of deceit requires a docile mass media including the press, radio and television. These forms must be subordinated to the interests of the bourgeoisie. Consequently they must play a decisive role in deceiving the working class. Their role is pivotal in creating a web of deceit that prevent the masses from comprehending what is really going on. If the masses were to comprehend the real state of affairs they would become more awakened and thereby mobilise against capitalism. In fact a multitude of diverse institutions are employed to maintain this web of deceit: the print media, television, radio, cinema, video, universities, the state, schools, literature etc. There is in existence a massively enormous ideological apparatus that presses down on the working class to prevent it from shaking off this veil of secrecy to gain a grasp of the real fact and thereby oppose the system. Under these conditions the working class is lulled into a state of inertia whereby it is unawakened as to what is really going on. Consequently the working class lack even the critical tools whereby it can an insight as to what is really going on. The working class is thereby ideologically disarmed. This renders the working class incapable of engaging in resistance against the system. It renders the working class passive.
At the same time the material conditions prevailing at a specific point in time determine the specific character of this web of deceit. Because of the changing objective circumstances ideology does not remain static. Particular conditions require particular ideological forms. Particular conditions too can render the working class more vulnerable to ideological deception. Economic and political conditions of a specific kind can prompt the working class into action that challenges the bourgeoisie. Other conditions can render the working class less responsive to challenging or even questioning the status quo. Consequently the position is not a simple that can be reduced to the level of ideological deceit. Nonetheless the bourgeoisie need a permanent web of deceit to render the masses acquiescent. Capitalist society is inherently a deceptive society. By its very objective nature its appearance contradicts its essence. Furthermore and linked into to this it actively and systematically engages in the activity of lying. To survive it must lie. If it did not lie it would cease to exist. Consequently the lying culture created by capitalist conditions encourages lying among the working class. The working class must resist the culture of lies. Capitalism is sustained by the lie. Capitalism is anti-truth. The working class must struggle against the culture of the lie. It must fight against the lie. The more oppressed elements within the working class will tend to be more dominated by the lie. Consequently they will tend to be the less truthful layer within the working class. This being so they are the layer less responsive to the truth which makes them more difficult to argue with and win over to revolutionary communist politics.
Given that the lie rather than the truth is the norm seeking to advance the truth is a very onerous task. It is very difficult to win workers to the truth in a culture of lies from which truth is absent –especially under conditions that don’t render the need for truth all that more urgent.
Now imperialist class interests are hidden behind the screen of ethical foreign policy. Intervention in East Timor by the West in the form of Australian forces reinforces this illusion of the imperialist crusaders of natural justice. What is ignored is the interests that such intervention serve beyond the screen of a false morality.
This same type of ethical ideology is used to obstruct support for workers when they engage in direct action either in the form of strike action or political rallies. These actions are presented as morally wrong. Again action taken by the bourgeoisie against workers engaging in direct action is hidden under a web of deceit. If the workers see the real situation they may awaken and challenge the actions of the bourgeoisie.
Hostage takers such as the Burmese Army of God are presented to the public as the source of oppression and brutality against the masses. What is ignored is that this sorry organisation has its source in the Burmese oppressive state which has engaged in a much more systematic savagery against the Burmese citizenry in a way that renders the Army of God look like a lamb. Yet public opinion is mobilised against these hostage takers while the savage acts of the Burmese state are continued beyond the margins of public attention.
When it is politically opportune these guerrilla organisations can be brought in from the cold and rendered respectable. The treatment given to the Provos is such an example. The imperialist bourgeoisie can manipulate its mass media in such a way that “terrorists” are rendered respectable and its leaders presented as peaceniks when formerly their image was that of demonic figures. Imperialism manipulates and mobilises public opinion to suit its interests. The masses are viewed as a passive blob to be preserved in a state of inertia and that can be shaped this way or that by the institutions of the imperialist bourgeoisie. Again imperialism must conceal its real intentions under a web of deceit and lies.
The situation is such then that imperialism is engaged in a massive global oppression and exploitation, entailing savagery, of the world’s working class. This oppression is largely hidden from the working class in a web of deceit and lies. Imperialism must hide this global oppression from the working class as part of a strategy to prevent the working class from challenging this oppression. In a sense then the oppression is invisible and even secret. It is this secrecy that is decisive if the oppression is to be sustained.
This secrecy is conducted on a massive scale and assumes the most diverse forms –from the crude to the subtly sophisticated. It entails a manifold of institutions and resources.
It is the task of communists to struggle to penetrate this ideological and hegemonic block that prevents the working class from developing itself into a revolutionary opposition to the capitalist class. The struggle to establish the conditions necessary for the development of a revolutionary movement principally entails a theoretical battle to expose the ideological superstructure that exists. It is a struggle to expose the real facts or essence obscured by ideology. It is a battle to combat the continuous ideology that is being spewed out in a manifold of diverse ways by the bourgeoisie.
However there are limits to the extent to which ideology can be effectively combated. Ultimately the only way to conquer ideology is by conquering its source –capitalist relations. Furthermore to more effectively combat bourgeois ideology revolutionary political action is called for. It is only by means of revolutionary political action that the working class can emancipate itself from the clutches of ideology. In short action dissolves ideology –not theory. Theory can only play a limited and modest role in combating ideology.
The capitalist world today appears to be a very complex process extremely difficult to comprehend. However it is not as difficult to understand as appearance at first glance. The reason it appears too complex to understand is because capitalist ideology presents the appearance of its being too complex for comprehend. Ideology presents it as a mysterious form of social being that defies comprehension. Consequently the working class despairs of understanding it. This results in many of its best theoreticians giving and succumbing to bourgeois ideology. This ideology, then, has the desired effect. Workers give up on any attempts to understand it. They loose confidence in their own theory and fall back on bourgeois theory. This leads to a situation whereby the working class is totally immersed in bourgeois ideology. This renders the working even more incapable of challenging capitalism. We must resist bourgeois ideologies aim to deceive the working class into believing that contemporary capitalism transcends understanding. To adhere to this view leads to mysticism, superstition and the view that capitalism cannot be superseded by the working class. Such a situation leads to a working class that is rendered passive and acquiescent and that resigns itself to merely living from day to day –getting immersed in distractions.
It is bourgeois ideology and hegemony that makes capitalism appear more complex than it actually is. If ideology and the ideological apparatus is penetrated and the truth established capitalist society will prove less complex than initially appeared. By penetrating through ideology to uncover the real character of society the theoretical conditions are being established that lead to the working class taking direct revolutionary action against capitalism. By successfully uncovering capitalism real nature the historical necessity to eliminate it and replace it with a communist community becomes obvious. The necessary course of action becomes transparent. The reason it is so difficult to know what to do –what action to take—is because of the strength and effectiveness of bourgeois ideology in preventing us from understanding the real nature of contemporary capitalism. It is only by understanding that bourgeois ideology exists and what it is and why and how it exists that we can begin to understand the nature of capitalism. By understanding capitalism by cutting through the ideological veil of secrecy we can understand that capitalism is not so complex and not so difficult to replace with communist society.
The universality of bourgeois ideology expresses itself within the working class. The working class under present conditions in its day to day existence tends to be deceitful in its way of conducting itself. Everywhere we go there is deception and lies. Individual workers say one thing and do another. They say one thing to one person and another thing to another worker. They engage in random and organised deceit in their day to day existence. They pretend that things are good when they are not. They engage in false and superficial friendships. To be in they play along with the group and pretend. They take stick to fit in. At the end of the day there is little or no individuality nor identity left. They are merely surface being incapable of experiencing the truth and consequently incapable of understanding and combating ideology and capitalist society. Bourgeois ideology has become universally pervasive penetrating into the very identity of the worker. This is colonisation in its quintessential form. This is the state of the working class today in the West which is why it has been so incapable of absorbing revolutionary theory and which it lacks both a critical ability and the ability to seriously combat capitalism. This is why individual revolutionary communists fail to make connections into individual workers. They have become incapable of absorbing anything subversive –mere zombies. This is why if an individual revolutionary seeks a serious relationship with any of them they fall into a silence and move away. Under the present cultural conjuncture the conditions do not exist for forming serious relationships and spreading revolutionary thought. The present conjuncture is so bad and bourgeois ideology and culture so pervasive that the working class both collectively and individually has become incapable of serious thought and meaningful relationships. The present conjuncture is extremely reactionary. At present the situation is so bad that it is only very isolated and rare individual revolutionaries that carry the torch of revolutionary communism. It is a very painful experience for such individuals. Yet their task, despite their anonymity, is very special and significant. Without the existence of such individuals their may be no hope. Under such extremely difficult conditions these individuals are carrying the torch of freedom that can be passed onto to their successors. In this way despite the quietness of their activity they are passing on a legacy that may lead to a breakthrough being theoretically being made by other such individuals whereby they can find answers that may lead to winning more individuals to the cause. The task under present conditions is for such individuals is to struggle to develop understanding of what ideology is and how it works and how contemporary capitalist society works. In that way they may discover or help in the discovery of answers that may further promote the establishment and development of communist politics. Such individuals must, despite the difficulty struggle to win even the one single individual over to communist politics. The struggle is the struggle for that one single individual. There is nothing to say that such an individual cannot be successfully struggled for. Such individuals play a silent put heroic and historically significant task.
The prevalence and depth to bourgeois is such as to have produced and intellectual culture that generally excluded the intellectual conditions for the emergence of an even miniscule revolutionary communist intelligentsia. The intelligentsia has been so colonised as to prevent the emergence of such an intelligentsia. The conditions for the emergence of a revolutionary communist intelligentsia are currently absent. This explains why when such individuals rarely appear it is because of a unique combination of conditions that are infrequently present. Bourgeois ideology is so absolute and has penetrated so effectively into the intelligentsia that individual radical intellectuals lack the capacity to develop into revolutionary communist intellectuals. As with the working class they are unable to form meaningful intellectual and personal relationships. There situation is basically similar to that of the working class. Capitalism today has developed to such a degree and such a way that it has its ideology has become so universal, pervasive and penetrating that authentic revolutionary theory and politics has been virtually eliminated which means that it is nigh impossible under present conditions to develop a substantive revolutionary intelligentsia. This means that few revolutionary isolates that may exist can at best at the most optimistic expect to win the one single individual revolutionary intellectual over to communism.
Nonetheless the task of revolutionaries is not merely one of penetrating ideology to produce a correct understanding of events. Revolutionaries must also must outline the kind of organisational forms necessary in the development of a revolutionary working class movement. It must to seek to develop an outline of revolutionary politics.
Although I have stressed the role of ideology is preventing the working class from developing revolutionary action objective factors play a decisive role too. The specific character of objective conditions are a factor as to and in what form a revolutionary working class movement develops. Consequently the emergence of revolutionary action is not simply a product of the penetration of ideology. Whether and how the working class awake to challenge capitalism is a function too of the character of objective conditions. Some objective conditions render this less likely than others. However in general in the absence of ideology it is more than likely that the working class would tend to challenge the system. However to what degree and in what way is a function of the objective conditions. The specific conjuncture of events is crucial.

2006-07-02T13:42:00.000-07:00

A Fragmentary Critique of Terry Eagleton's The Ideology of the Aesthetic.

INTRODUCTION

The following is a discussion of Chapter 14, From Polis To Postmodernism, of Terry Eagleton's book, The Ideology of the Aesthetic. It is a book that needs to be subjected to serious examination because it represents a more sinister attempt by postmodernist ideology to undermine marxist theory from within. Its distinction is that it is a work that is presented as marxist through the nominal use of key concepts of Marx. The concept of the commodity is one that comes principally to mind in this regard. This is a central concept of the book yet it is not the same concept that Marx uses in Das Kapital.

THE COMMODITY AND AESTHETICS
For Eagleton art is to be vulgarly reduced to economics. Let me show this with a quotation from his book:
When art becomes a commodity, it is released from its traditional social functions within church, court and state into the anonymous freedom of the market place
But the point is that art can never become a commodity just as economics or indeed capitalism, itself, cannot. It would be a mistake to suggest that all social phenomena can be commodified. To claim that all phenomena can be commodified is to miss the use-value side of things. It is to mistakenly believe that all can be reduced to pure value: value fetishism. The superstructural dimension of social life can never be reduced to that of the commodity form otherwise it would be an integral part of the economic system and therefore no longer superstructural. It also indicates a misconception as to the nature of the commodity. Things are only commodities under certain conditions. Things are not naturally but only socially commodities. Art works can assume the form of commodities but they are not inherently commodities. They only exist as commodities while in the circulation process. The art work's existence as use-value is the material condition of its social existence as commodity. Its useful condition transcends its commodity existence. If we want to discuss an art work from the standpoint of its quality as art (as use-value) we discuss it in the context of aesthetics. On the other hand, if we want to discuss it from the standpoint of commodity we discuss from the standpoint of political economy. In the latter case we are engaged in an economic discussion and not in a discussion concerning art. Involved here are two distinctly different discourses. Works of art as commodities are no different to any other commodities in that they are all exchange-values. Valorisation makes no specific distinctions since its concerns are abstract.
To say that art is a commodity is similar to claiming that toothbrushes are commodities. It is to impart to the commodity form a natural quality which would imply that art undergoes a qualitative change in its aesthetic nature by simply assuming the commodity form. Just as technology changes radically under the social form of capital while preserving its identity as technology art's form may change but not its substance. Now to reduce the art work to that of a commodity is to deny this differentiation. Art, quite clearly, cannot be confined to the sphere of commodity circulation otherwise it would not be art. It is the specific role it plays outside the circulation process (its use-value) that defines its character as art. Although art may be increasingly drawn into the exchange process it can never be merely reduced to the status of a commodity.
Although individual works of art can appear in the commodity form art, itself, is not a commodity. Even an individual work of art in the form of a commodity is still not simply an exchange-value. It is also a use-value and as use-value it transcends the exchange process, the market, only to take on a new and differentiated role about which the market is unconcerned. Outside of circulation things are no longer commodities and are differentiated into diversity as use-values thereby demonstrating the absurdity of the view that capitalism is one unified process. Once the objects step outside of circulation their unity as commodity is sloughed off and differentiation prevails. What is not appreciated by Eagleton is that the commodity form and thereby the market are ultimately merely the forms through which use-values are produced and distributed. Consequently the power of the commodity is strictly circumscribed. To attach to commodity production more than this is to promote the very commodity fetishism discovered by Marx. It is to mystify the commodity just as Heidegger mystified "Being." The point is that art from the past and into the present still shares the common quality of being art. Just as a toothbrush remains a toothbrush whether it is a 19th century or 20th century one.
The nature and identity of art has not changed over the years despite the greater role that capital is said to play in the production and distribution of art works. Commodity capital can change the form of art but not its substance. It does not determine what is and is not art just as it does not dictate what is and is not a toothbrush.
But for Eagleton art is a production process, and perhaps even a valorisation process, regulated by the law of value and both by individual artistic creativity. Consequently the market determines what objects are art as well as their price. The value of art then is not to be aesthetically determined but instead determined by labour time, by it's value as a commodity. This deaestheticizes art taking it out of the world of aesthetics to slip it into the world of capitalist industry, into the world of economics. Eagleton proves the very opposite of what he intends. Instead of establishing the universalisation of aesthetics he suggests its dissolution into economics
Despite this Eagleton stresses the independence of contemporary art:
Now it exists, not for any specific audience, but just for anybody with the taste to appreciate it and the money to buy it. And in so far as it exists for nothing and nobody in particular, it can be said to exist for itself. It is independent because it has been swallowed up by commodity production.
But art cannot be independent if it has been sucked up by commodity production. He seems to think that art becomes more independent, more aesthetic, by becoming economic. He mistakes the appearance for the essence of reality. In other words appearances (images) are all that Is. anything it is the economic system, if we are to believe Eagleton, that becomes more independent by virtue of consuming art. Capital now has art completely within its economic power so that it is no longer art. But again, even in this context, Eagleton fails to understand the nature of commodity production. He does not seem to grasp that under capitalist commodity production the production process as a valorisation process is also an industrial process. In other words he fails to draw any distinction between simple commodity production and capitalist commodity production together with art's relation to those different forms of commodity production. Art cannot be seriously discussed with regard to the commodity in the absence of any treatment of capitalist commodity production which is distinct from simple (non-capitalist) commodity production

AESTHETICS AND CAPITALIST SOCIETY
In a sense, Eagleton supports the view that art is a form of alienation when he states that the avant garde proclaims that "the problem of art is art itself so let's have an art which isn't art." The primary distinction between this view of the avant garde and my view is that for me only capitalism's overthrowal can lead to art's abolition while they believe art can be abolished within capitalism. For me the withering away means the instatement of the beautiful as a social universal while for them it means the instatement of the banal as universal. The latter is a reformist programme. But unlike the avant garde, Eagleton believes, however contradictorily, that capitalism has already turned art into non-art by economic activity gobbling it up.
Ironically Eagleton claims that what we now have is the wholesale aestheticization of society so that the entire culture of society is saturated by the aestheticization process. Eagleton again reveals his close affinity with the avant garde since to say that the whole of society is aestheticized must mean that it is non-art. That capitalist society has succeeded in so vulgarizing and trivialising art that all is art including the most banal banalities of capitalist life. Capitalism has succeeded in turning art into kitsch. The avant gard's dream has been turned into a reality without artistic struggle. Eagleton's commodity had done that work while the artist is relegated to that of passive bystander.
In support of his argument Eagleton now introduces us to another current within postmodernist discourse. As the following will show it is semiology:
In the early stages capitalism had sharply severed the symbolic from the economic; now the two spheres are incongruously reunited, as the economic penetrates deeply into the symbolic realm itself,...
On the basis of what Eagleton has said earlier he cannot justifiably claim that aesthetics has been universally absorbed by economics while at the same time remaining critical of economic reductionism. If, as he says, the economic system has absorbed art then it has been transformed into economics and relieved of its aesthetic character so that there can be no talk of unity obtaining between the symbolic and the economic. This is reductionism at its most absolute. The avant gardists' artistic praxis would then have reliably reflected the unifying development Eagleton claims to have happened. It would follow logically from Eagleton's account that if art has been swallowed up by capitalist circulation then there is no authentic art. Art has been made venal; secularized and turned into anti-art. Having made this claim he cannot logically turn about to claim for art the opposite: arguing that art has gobbled up capitalist society so that the economic system is regulated by the laws of art.
This is the realization of a completely aesthetic society: utopia. Under this aesthetic utopia the laws of economics are subordinate, if they are to obtain at all, to the requisites of this aesthetic society. He is overpowered by images to such a degree that he sees the entire social landscape as one of images, an entirely aestheticized landscape. Have unemployment and exploitation been aestheticized too: turned into images?
Because of his irrationalist outlook he cannot offer an explanation as to the procedure by which the economic system penetrates the world of art and is consequently transformed into an aesthetic system. Marx has been crudely distorted in order to make Nietzsche's philosophy more appealing.
Eagleton claims that in its earlier days capitalism "had sharply severed the symbolic from the economic". But this is not true. Paper money as a medium of exchange constituted symbolic money. Here in the early days of liberal capitalism was a central symbol indispensable for the reproduction of material wealth. Marx indicates this when he states that
The names of coins become detached from the substance of money and exist apart from it in the shape of worthless scraps of paper. In the same way as the exchange-value of commodities is crystallized into gold money as a result of exchange, so gold money in circulation is sublimated into its own symbol, first in the shape of world coin, then in the shape of subsidiary metal coin, and finally in the shape of worthless counters, scraps of paper, mere tokens of value.
Similarly bills of exchange etc. were symbols. The stock exchange and the joint stock company were, through and through, sustained by economic symbols. Indeed language and economic relations have always been inseparable. Textuality and economics are linked together inseparably. Without economics there would be no text; no language.
In one of his unsuccessful attempts to integrate art and commodity Eagleton makes the following statement concerning The nature of the commodity:
The commodity, as we have seen in the work of Marx, is transgressive, promiscuous, polymorphous; in its sublime self-expansiveness, its levelling passion to exchange with another of its kind, it offers paradoxically to bring low the very finely nuanced superstructure -call it culture- which serves in part to promote and protect it.
Again Eagleton misrepresents the situation. He fails to understand that the capitalist economic system is in one sense the best protector of the superstructure. It creates differentiations and instabilities that provide the conditions whereby the ruling class can promote its class interests. In other words differentiations and instabilities are thrown up in order to protect the identity and stability of the capitalist class and system. The so-called subversive nature of the commodity does not undermine the ruling class as such. The class divisions remain while commodity capitalism remains. Capitalism does not as such subvert its own capitalist class. Neither is it the ruin of the distinctive identity of the proletariat. Commodity capital's qualified subversiveness perpetuates and stabilizes 'the foundationalism' of contemporary society: its ultimate identities.
For Eagleton, it is part of the emancipatory dynamic of bourgeois society to dismantle all sacred spaces. This being so capitalism must dismantle the sacred space of the capitalist class. So the working class is no longer to be the class conscious agent of change. Capitalism undermines Dionysian-like its own capitalist class. The proletariat passively awaits the inevitable advent of socialism. But this has its reverse side since it must also mean that the proletariat is in effect extinct.
If we are to believe Eagleton, the commodity's subversive activity transcends the laws of value. In fact his concept of the commodity has nothing to do with the real commodity of the capitalist process of reproduction and is instead just another name for Nietzsche's will to power:
Traversing with superb indifference the divisions of class, sex and race, of high and low, past and present, the commodity appears as an anarchic, iconclastic force which mocks the obsessive rankings of traditional culture, the commodity integrates high and low;...
If ever there was an eulogy to capitalism and postmodernity then this is it. the commodity, according to the above quotation, promotes democracy, freedom equality and is indifferent to class division! Tell that to the factory workers! It was capital in the form of commodity circulation that helped in the establishment of fascism in Germany. He does not seem to understand that rather than manifesting indifference to class divisions the commodity actually promotes them.
Eagleton continues:
The legitimating forms of high bourgeois culture, the versions and definitions of subjectivity which they have to offer, appear less and less adequate to the experience of late capitalism, but on the other hand cannot merely be abandoned...It is indispensable partly because the subject as unique, autonomous, self-identical and self-determining remains a political and ideological requirement of the system, but partly because the commodity is incapable of generating a sufficiently legitimating ideology of its own.
Given Eagleton's view of the power of the commodity it is surprising that he claims that the commodity is incapable of generating a sufficient legitimating ideology. And if this is the case then it cannot be as Eagleton would have it, that contemporary western society has been, universally aestheticized. Illogically he fails to explain why the commodity "is incapable of generating a sufficiently legitimating ideology of its own" and how the ideology of the subject can be preserved. It is conveniently left vague to what extent the commodity is subversively anarchic. If the ideology of the subject cannot be abandoned because of its indispensability as a legitimating force then it follows that it is not decreasingly adequate to the experience of capitalism. Its indispensability lends it a legitimating force. If the subject remains a political and an ideological requirement of the system then it must correspond to the needs of capital and reflect the nature of capitalism. Consequently it is a social reality. Eagleton's Nietzschean irrationalism allows him to argue that it remains a political, juridical and ideological requirement of the system while being a contingent phenomenon. What we experience here is an eclecticism in Eagleton's views whereby he wants to have it both ways which then leaves him with lots of irrationalist manoeuvring room.
Eagleton believes that the commodity, like Sartre's nothingness, is purely subversive, a negativity, and that it simply dissolves all stable identities:
Ulysses commodifies discourse itself, reducing the bourgeois ideology of 'unique style' to a ceaseless, aimless circulation of packaged codes without metalinguistic privilege, a polyphony of scrupulously 'faked' verbal formulae implacably hostile to the 'personal voice'.
He forgets that capitalist production is ultimately concerned with the reproduction of use-value. He stresses the value aspect of the commodity while ignoring its use-value aspect. He ignores the fact that capitalism is a reified social form through which use-values are produced and reproduced and that its justification depends on its ability to achieve this. And he does not seem to understand that capitalism has not dissolved this identity or meaning. In other words capitalism at bottom is a materialist system through which a specific kind of matter is produced, circulated and reproduced on an expanded scale. And this is the ultimate meaning of commodity capitalism: its stable foundation and the context for foundationalism. It is the difficulties it encounters in achieving this that lead to change. It is not something that develops anarchically and contingently, powered by some hedonistic (Dionysian) momentum that defies all definition and description, mystically beyond language and unrepresentable by it, depending on intuition for its apprehension.
Ulysses marks the historic point at which capital begins to penetrate into the very structure of the symbolic order itself, reorganizing this sacrosanct terrain in accordance with its own degraded emancipatory logic. It is as though Ulysses and the Wake lift a protean dissolution of all stable identity from base to superstructure, passing that great circuit of desire which is capitalist productivity through the domains of language, meaning and value.
Eagleton seems to mistakenly think that capitalism revolutionizes itself because it is inescapably lodged in some non-stop bacchanalian riot: a perverse hedonism that is informed by contingency. No! Capitalism transforms itself in the context of the reproduction of material wealth. It is its periodic difficulties in achieving this that generate the revolutionizing of the forces of production, social relations of production and ideology. All this change is based on a very firm footing: a solid materialist footing. Late imperialist society does have foundation. It is underpinned by meaning. For Eagleton it almost seems as if Ulysses is the new Das Kapital.
Words and images are artificially substituted for reality thereby making the contemporary world appear more appealing. Eagleton in The Ideology of the Aesthetic does not systematically use logic, concepts nor reason.

POSTMODERNISM

Eagleton proceeds to explain how postmodernism has been eager to discredit the concept of totality. He then points out some of the problems that emerge if an attempt is made to abandon the concept of totality.
It is as though any thought can be made to appear as an illicit totalization from the standpoint of some other, and so on in a potentially infinite regress.
But he fails to see that he has already precluded the validity of the kind of comments on offer here. If the commodity in its subversive capacity undermines totalities and stable identities so that there are no foundations then he cannot justifiably retain the concept of totality. Given these views there is no way that Eagleton can logically and theoretically justify certain notions of totality. He hopelessly tries to get around these dilemmas by conveniently making reference to good old English common sense. But he cannot slip from theory to "the empirical" simply when convenient to do so. He must offer us a methodology.
In the following quotation Eagleton is at his best in contradicting what he has already said:
Post-marxism and postmodernism are by no means responses to a system which has eased up, disarticulated, pluralized its operations, but to precisely the opposite: to a power-structure which, being in a sense more 'total' than ever, is capable for the moment of disarming and demoralising many of its antagonists. In such a situation, it is sometimes comforting and convenient to imagine that there is not after all, as Foucault might have said, anything 'total' to be broken.
If, as he argues, the commodity is so anarchic and destabilising how can he claim that the system has never been so total, so solid and stable. Here is a complete contradiction. Again this is a demonstration of his lack of logic, of his postmodernist irrationalism. Furthermore if he argues against the conception that fails to draw distinctions between capital as fascist and capital as democratic reducing them all to that of the one totalizing system then he cannot claim that contemporary capitalism is more totalizing than any specific capitalism that preceded it. Is he now saying that contemporary Western capitalism is even more totalising than Hitler's Germany?
In his discussion of values Eagleton continues to persist with the view that the commodity is non-totalizing:
Aesthetics, as we have seen, arises in part as a response to a new situation in early bourgeois society, in which values now appear to be alarmingly, mysteriously underivable. Once the actualities of social life suffer reification, they would no longer seem to offer an adequate starting-point for discourses of value, which accordingly float loose into their own idealist space. Value must now either be self-grounding, or founded in intuition; and the aesthetic, as we have seen, serves as a model for both of these strategies. Sprung from some affective or metaphysical space, values can no longer be submitted to rational enquiry and argumentation; it is difficult now, for example, to say of my desires that they are 'unreasonable', in the sense, perhaps, of illicitly impeding the just desires of others.
If anything, it is under socialist civilisation that values will be liberated from stable identities and have a free floating character. In contrast, Eagleton is convinced that under capitalism utopian conditions are realized in which there obtains the freedom to choose different values. If there has been a reification of social life then the commodity or capital does not undermine identities but creates stable reified identities: totalizes. Consequently the commodity also generates corresponding reified thought and values. This being so, the commodity generates formal rational structures that are totalizing. Because of this generalised reification, which means the creation of stable identities by commodification values (according to Eagleton's thinking) become detached and "float loose into their own idealist space." Consequently the source of stable identities is also the source of non-reified, freely floating values. This is indeed irony! It is the anarchic character of the commodity that has led to this plethora of values in random movement (Brownian motion!) with no internal connections to each other while simultaneously sustaining stable non-arbitrary identities. How it achieves both is never explained.
Clearly there is no logic to Eagleton's commodity. What he does not understand when he talks about free floating values is that such values promote the interests of capitalism. Their free floating character is the form assumed by reification. Free floating values are the appearance through which bourgeois interests manifest themselves, through which oppression and exploitation manifest themselves. Consequently they are only free floating in a reified and very restricted sense. They merely manifest the appearance of freedom. They are fetishised values. It is their existence in a detached idealized space that is the form assumed by reification so that there is no genuinely free floating values which multiply value choice.
These random values are according to Eagleton beyond reason. However there is no explanation offered as to why these values cannot be subjected to dialectical reason. It cannot be because of their apparent arbitrary character since this trait cannot carry any special authority. If these values are in fact derived from the reification of social life then surely they are subject to rational inquiry and can be shown to be derived from this base. It is not a matter of what seems. Because they don't seem to offer an adequate starting point is just not the point. It is a matter of what is the reality. Seems does not logically entail a must. Values are social phenomena that emerge historically. Their emergence is not simply due to pure contingency. Values are anchored within a specific community. Eagleton does not understand the materialist conception of history. He confuses ideology with concrete reality. so that fantasy is substituted for reality. When he discusses the way contemporary values are understood he is referring to the arguments of ideologues, their ideological constructs, and not to history. He gets entangled in their ideas or images mistaking these for objective reality. Ideas become more significant than things.

CONCLUSION
Overall it can be said that Eagleton operates with two concepts that are central to his study; the concept of the commodity and the concept of the aesthetic.
His concept of the commodity is both overstretched and metaphysical so as to more plausibly explain a multitude of diverse phenomena. It is not the materialist commodity of Marx with its strictly defined characteristics that Eagleton entertains. His metaphysical concept of the commodity is used in an extremely contradictory and speculative fashion to explain diverse and conflicting phenomena. Indeed his concept of the commodity is just another label for Nietzsche's will to power. It is left in an undecided state lacking in any defined identity.
His concept of the aesthetic is quixotic since his notion as to what is subsumed under the concept of the aesthetic covers a vast multitude of diverse phenomena. His definition of the aesthetic is so broad and overextended that it looses all real meaning as a concept of the aesthetic.
The real problem is that Eagleton basically does not see any distinction between capitalism and art. For him capitalism is art and art is capitalism. Commodities are images and images are commodities. Indeed he does not see concrete things since for him such concrete things are merely images (appearances). Reality is a postmodernist fantasy filled with an endless proliferation of floating signifiers. Consequently in accordance with semiology he can see in the most banal of commodities semiological or symbolic significance which is why he can conclude that the most banal of commodities is aesthetic. For semiology it is the symbolic significance of a thing which matters not its utility. This being so it is not the modern weaponry that matters in terms of its massive destructive capacity but its symbolic significance (its phallic significance). All is symbolic! Life is fantasy or illusion. This illusion is a symptom of the pervasiveness of symbolism in capitalist economics: credit and plastic money etc.
These two unduly vague concepts are employed to produce a vast mishmash which presents itself in a very plausible form so that his study appears to be more insightful than it actually is. His stylism plays a prominent role in selling the "package." Eagleton is inherently postmodern but wants to convince both himself and his readers that his conception is marxist.

The Ideology of the Aesthetic. Page 368.
Ibid. Page 368.
In terms of Eagleton's economics it could be then claimed that capitalism has always been an aesthetic system since it might be described as an enclosed, self-moving and self-sufficient system that self-valorises just for the sake of it. One might even add that certain natural processes are, for that matter, aesthetic systems too. His concept of the aesthetic is stretched so far that it looses all meaning as an aesthetic concept. Eagleton is to aesthetics what Hegel is to reason with the his concept of absolute reason. Eagleton idealises aesthetics.
Appearances are mysterious phenomena in true Heideggerrian fashion. Since they lack essence they have to be contingent and thereby mysterious. Their presence is a mystery of "Being." Universal contingency is tantamount to mystery.
Ibid., page 373
Italics mine.
Karl Marx: A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. Lawrence and Wishart. Page 114.
Ibid., page 374.
Inspired by Nietzsche he has reduced the commodity to the status of a metaphysical force; a form of the will to power. If the commodity is intrinsically aesthetic then it follows that aesthetics must be intrinsically subversive.
Ibid., page 374.
For Eagleton the commodity is by nature aesthetic.
Ibid., pp.374-375. He never explains how the movement of the commodity brings about the transition from liberal to monopoly capitalism. It is all too naive to argue that the commodity as subversive and promiscuous is responsible for such historical change. This denies the significance of class as agency. If the commodity is so subversive and promiscuous then it cannot be subject to the laws of capital. If Eagleton is right then contingent rather than causal properties must be principally attributed to the commodity.
Ibid., page 376.
If Eagleton were to have his way this system would be understood as intrinsically aesthetic.
Ibid., page 376. He naively presents Joyce as subversive without acknowledging the ideological character of his work.
Contingency is mystery!
The Ideology of the Aesthetic: pp.380-381.
Eagleton's commodity, when it gets down to it, is not really a commodity but Nietzsche's will to power dressed up in new clothes. Eagleton has Nietzschised Marx and aestheticized Marx's political economy; aestheticized the commodity.
Ibid., page 381.
Ibid., page 382.

Examination of the Paris Manuscrits of Karl Marx

2006-07-02T13:36:00.000-07:00

An Examination of Karl Marx’s Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts (1844)

Notwithstanding the positive developments featuring in the EPM in its inchoate critique of classical political economy Marx had still a long way to go in his development of that critique and the accompanying materialist conception of history In the following chapter this is clearly demonstrated. It is only by highlighting both the positive and negative features of the EPM that it can be put in context in terms both of Marx’s theoretical and political development.

Productive Forces
At the time of writing Capital Karl Marx had well established the concept of the productive forces and their role in determining social development. Even as far back as 1846 the theory of historical materialism had been distinctly formulated as is illustrated in the following excerpt:
The productive forces are therefore the result of practically applied human energy; but this energy is itself conditioned by the circumstances in which men find themselves, by the productive forces already acquired, by the social forms which exists before they exist, which they do not create, which is the product of the proceeding generation. Because of this simple fact that every succeeding finds itself in possession of the productive forces acquired by the previous generation, and that they serve it as the raw material for new production, a coherence arises in human history, a history of humanity takes shape which becomes all the more a history of humanity the more the productive forces of man and therefore their social relations develop. Hence it necessarily follows that the social history of men is always the history of their individual development, whether they-are conscious of it or not. Their material relations are the basis of all their relations. These material relations are only the necessary forms in which their material and individual activity are realized.
The above passage makes clear that even then the primacy of the productive forces had been definitely established. By productive forces Marx means the instruments of production, raw materials and labour power. The concept of the forces of production aptly summarizes these individual forms. But it is also a conceptual expression of the basic unity that these individual components shared: through the material activity of labour mutually necessary relations are established between them. The significant absence of the concept of the productive forces from the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts clearly demonstrates, besides else, failure to comprehend the essential unity that exists between the instruments of production and labour power: that necessary material action. Since the productive forces determine both the material production process and the valorization process that produces the specific social relations of production (bourgeois production relations), the manuscripts must fail to adequately consider the social relations particularly with reference to their origin, development and limitations. Consequently underscoring the manuscripts are presuppositions which prescind from a correct and comprehensive conceptualisation of the character of the bourgeois system of production.
Marx informs us that:
An instrument of labour is a thing, or a complex of things, which the worker interposes between himself and the object of his labour and which serves as a conductor, directing his activity onto that object..2
Clearly then, the specific character of labouring activity is shaped by the specific nature of the instruments. "The productive forces," Marx remarks, "are therefore the result of practically applied energy; but the energy is itself conditioned by the circumstances in which men find themselves by the productive forces already acquired..."3 He also informs us that "instruments of labour not only supply a standard of the degree of development which human labour has attained, but they also indicate the social relation within which men work."4 But this specific human material activity shapes the character of the productive forces. Clearly then there exists a mutual conditioning of both labour and the productive forces in the context of the overall progression of the labour process. Despite this mutuality, it still stands that labouring activity constitutes the basis underlying the productive force's progression. This is why Marx remarked that the "productive forces are therefore the result of practically applied human energy."5 Motion (human material motion) is fundamental, in this context, to the individual constituents and their corresponding material relations that, as a totality, form the labour process. There cannot be a labour process without labour!
Contrary to what the EPM suggests, there can be no, Feuerbach like, immediate relation between men and 'nature.' Indeed, in them, no consideration is given to the forces of production and the corresponding production relations. Instead we are subjected to a simplistic and confused discussion of the hypothetical non-mediated relation between man and nature. The production of objects through labour is naively presented as a simple anthropological exercise:
The worker can create nothing without nature, without the sensuous external world. It is the material in which his labour realizes itself, in which it is active and from which and by means of which it produces.6
The natural relation between man and nature is, by no means, immediate. This metabolism between man and nature is regulated and controlled by labour which is a process between man and nature:7
Labour is first of all a process between man and ,nature, a process by which man, through his own actions, mediates, regulates and controls the metabolism between himself and nature."
And Marx informs us that:
The simple elements of the process are (1) purposeful activity that is work itself, (2) the object on which that work is performed and (3) the instruments of that work.'9
And since, too:
An instrument of labour is a thing, or a complex of things, which the worker interposes between himself and the object of his labour and which serves as a conductor directing his activity onto that object. He makes use of the mechanical, physical and chemical properties of some substance in order to set them to work on other substances as instruments of his power and in accordance with his purposes.10
It follows, therefore, that the Feuerbachian concept of an immediate anthropological relation between man and nature is an humanist illusion. Labour is a process that regulates this "natural relation" which means that "purposeful activity" performed on nature is mediated by the instruments of that work. It is also mediated by the material production relations. As Marx correctly remarks:
The material relations are the basis of all their relations. These material relations are only the necessary forms in which their material and individual activity is realized."
Furthermore the metabolism between men and nature is mediated by social relations of production. And this I discuss under the next heading.

Social Relations of Production
Under the capitalist system of production men's material activity on nature is inextricably bound up with men's social activity. These two forms of activity are inseparably connected in the form of a contradictory unity." Just as the commodity itself is a unity formed of use-values and value, so the process of production must be a unity, composed of the labour process and the process of creating value [Wertbildungsprozess]. In the production process both material products and bourgeois social production relations are produced as a unity in the socio-historical form of commodities. "The production process... considered as the unity of the labour process and the process of valorisation, it is the capitalist process of production, or the capitalist form of the production of commodities." The valorization process is grounded in the labour process, the condition of its existence. The labour process is the means by which valorization is realized." Use values are produced by capitalists only because and in so far as they form the material substratum of exchange value."13 Clearly the development of the productive forces is promoted in the interests of capital accumulation.
Due to the way in which the capitalist system of production presents itself, it has been inferred that the bourgeois production relations are the source of material progress and indeed society as a whole. This standpoint represents a theoretical reversal of the causal relation between the productive forces and corresponding production relations"14. Basically it constitutes a form of bourgeois ideology in which social reality is accepted uncritically as it appears. Parekh Bhiku observes:
Like the empiricist appeal to experience, the positivist appeal to facts seems objective and unbiased, but is not. The facts of an ideologically constituted social, world are inherently ideological. Besides, as we saw, the facts may be illusory or merely apparent as, for Marx, they generally are in the capitalist society. No natural scientist accepts the 'facts' of experience without critical examination; he does not accept the fact that the sun seems to go round the earth or that the air seems simple in constitution. For Marx the social facts are not very different, as they too can deceive and mislead.
Now since the labour process is indispensable to the valorization process it follows that the labour process is endowed with a property that determines whether valorization is possible. This being so it is clear that the hidden key to the valorization process is grounded in matter: the labour process and thereby the forces of production. The totality of bourgeois production relations is the social form through which the productive forces are mediated. Under capitalist society the relationship between the forces and their corresponding social forms assumes a contradictory character. The form --the totality of social relations of production-- appears as form. Thereby form appears as causal determinant of content. Bourgeois ideology uncritically accepts this inversion as a conceptual assumption from which its theories proceed.
We shall now pause to briefly reflect on the independence of the bourgeois production relations from the producers, the latter's existence as things in the form of abstractions: abstractions form the workers. Through the extensive use of excerpts from the corpus of Marx we will create a picture of this reality. To begin with, the commodity, that elementary form, constitutes a social relation of production independent of the human producers: an object in the form of an abstraction that determines their production. This is why Marx can justifiably remark that under commodity production it "is nothing but the definite social relations between men themselves which assumes here, for them, the fantastic form of a relation between things."15 And concerning this same theme he also explains that the "mysterious character of the commodity form consists therefore simply in the fact that the commodity reflects the social characteristic of men's own labour as objective characteristics of the products of labour themselves as the social natural properties of these things. Hence it also reflects the social relations of the producers to the sum total of labour as a social relation between objects, a relation which exists apart from and outside the producers.16 These excerpts having emphatically demonstrated that Marx held to a conception of the commodity-form as a relation of production independent of the producers, as abstractions, we now adduce another quotation as evidence that Marx understood that the form of abstractions from the workers, besides its independence, determined and dominated the producers and production:
These magnitudes vary continually, independently of the will, fore-knowledge and actions of the exchangers. Their own movement within society has for them the form of a movement made by things, and these things, for from being under their control, in fact control them.17
Concerning money as a social relation of production Marx explains:
The special difficulty in grasping money in its fully developed character as money...is that a social relation, a definite relation between individuals, here appears as a metal, a store, as a purely physical external thing which can be found, as such, in nature, and which is indistinguishable in its form from its natural existence.18
This reveals that Marx also recognized that money formed an independent social relation. But since money may function as capital the latter, as a social relation, must be both independent and abstract in the relations posited between itself and the producers. In this connection, Capital explains:
In simple circulation the value of commodities obtained at the most a form independent of their use values, i.e. the form of money. But now in the circulation M-C-M, value suddenly presents itself as a self-moving substance which passes through a process of its own and for which commodities and money are both mere forms. But there is more to come: instead of simply representing the relations of commodities, it now enters into a private relationship with itself, as it were.19
Furthermore, industrial capital, the capitalist production process itself is understood by Marx to be an abstract independent production relation as is evinced by the following citation from the Grundrisse:
The material on which it works is alien material; the instrument is likewise an alien instrument, its labour appears as a mere accessory to their substance and hence objectifies itself in things not belonging to it. Indeed, living labour itself appears as alien vis-à-vis living labour capacity, whose labour it is, whose own life’s expression [Lebensausserung] it is, for it has been surrendered to capital in exchange for objectified labour, for the product of labour itself. Labour capacity relates to its labour as to an alien, and if capital were willing to pay it without making it labour it would enter the bargain with pleasure. The labour capacity's own labour is as alien to it [and it really is, as regards its character etc.] as are material and instrument.20
Overall bourgeois production relations constitute abstractions in the form of things independent of the producers but, in a sense, determining they and production itself. As Marx remarks in Capital:
On closer inspection it becomes evident that capital itself regulates this production of labour- power, the production of the mass of men it intends to exploit in accordance with its own needs. Hence capital not only produces capital, it produces a growing mass of men, the material through which it alone can function as addition of capital. Therefore it is not only true to say that labour produces on a constantly increasing scale the conditions of labour in opposition to itself in the form of capital, but equally capital produces on a steadily increasing scale the productive wage-labourers it requires. Labour produces the conditions of its production in the form of capital and capital produces labour i.e. as wage labour, as the means towards its own realization.21
In connection with all this and in view of what has already been said it is the human producers, the productive forces that essentially produce and determine their specific production relations as independent abstractions and not the inverse. The relation between the political state and civil society, within capitalism, offers a parallel and is indeed indissoluble linked with the above mentioned relation.
It is not, as Hegel misconceived it, the political state as an independent abstraction that determines the existence of civil society but the inverse. It is just this latter theme that forms a motif running through the Critique of Hegel’s Doctrine of the State(1843). Concerning this Lucio Colletti observes:
In 'civil society' [which for Hegel as for Adam Smith and Ricardo was a 'market society': individuals are divided from and independent of each other. Under such conditions, just as each person is independent of all others so does the real nexus of mutual dependence [the bond of social unity] become in turn independent of all individuals. This common interest, or universal interest renders itself independent of all interested parties and assumes a separate existence; and such social unity established in separation from its members is precisely the hypostatized modern state.22
Without the productive forces having attained to a certain level, the emergence of bourgeois production relations is impossible. "For capitalist relations to establish themselves at all presupposes that a certain historical level of social production has been attained. Even within the framework of an earlier mode of production certain needs and certain means of communication and production must have developed which go beyond the old relations of production and coerce them into the capitalist mould."23
As has already been indicated, the bourgeoisie by uncritically reflecting capitalist society in consciousness, as it appears, present a misleading picture in which the abstract social relations of production are posited as the determining force that leads to the growth in the productive forces. They erroneously posit the form through which the productive forces as the causal factor underlying the accumulation of wealth: form determines content. And it therefore comes as no surprise that the bourgeoisie perceive themselves as society's creator. But this is to leave out of the picture the origin of these capitalist relations: genetics is omitted. The bourgeoisie invest capital with a metaphysical essence. They lend it an ontological status that transcends history. This is why the classical economists constitute the Spinozists of political economy. By positing capital as production relation, as being independent of history and by identifying the productive forces in general with capital, they deify the productive forces.24 They invest it with a metaphysical essence a spirit, that determines both their existence and character. We can see then the grounds for the philosophical belief that identifies "alienation" with objectification instead of its identification with a specific historical society. Existentialism then is merely the melancholy side of classical political economy. It is the bourgeois form of thought which sees no solution: it reeks with despair. While the classical political economists were optimistically confident concerning capitalism’s prospects, the existentialists express pessimism and see no real future just an eternal present. One sees the positive aspects of capitalism while the other sees its negative aspects.
Classical political economy introduced ontology into "economics." And it was to be Marx’s task to de-ontologise it, to make it dualistically materialist. We shall see later on in this paper the theoretical affinity that is present between the conceptual underpinnings of Ricardo’s thought and that of Feuerbach and the Marx of the EPM.
Since bourgeois production relations are viewed as natural rather than as historical it follows that the particular is assigned a universal nature. As Bhiku remarks: The idealist, then, universalises the ideas and experiences of his own class, society or historical epoch."25
Classical political economy by positing capital as a thing rather than as a social relation defines it not in terms of form but as content: the universal as opposed to the particular. By this manner of theorising, capital is invested with a universal form. In this regard Bhiku informs us that:
In the course of his investigations into the ideological [idealist] writings, Marx discovered that they were all apologetic in character. They had a universal form, but a particular social content, and did little more than articulate the experiences, modes of thought, values and interests of a particular group or society in abstract or universal language.26
Presented as thing, capital can be made to appear to prevail under each historical system of reproduction. Since the bourgeoisie mistakenly views the growth in the productive forces as both its doing and responsibility, it can quite comfortably suggest that capital is the productive forces whereby capital is posited as the natural property of a thing. This is tantamount to suggesting that the independent abstraction, capital assumes the form of productive forces [abstraction determinate concrete], a conception akin to Hegelianism. What is not explained, of course, is why the abstraction of capital must assume this form. And, since this assumption is made it is not unjustifiable to draw the conclusion that the productive forces are but a form of themselves. In this context, the identification of capital with the productive forces suggest that the forces cannot break through capitalist relations, replacing them with more suitable ones.27 Obviously a specific system of historical production relations are invested with a universal character. The perception of the bourgeoisie lends their particular and transitory class interests a universal dimension. The relation of capital constrains and imprisons their consciousness within narrow mental horizons. so that their vision sees no real future. History is forced into the Procrustean bed of capital causing for the dehistoricization of history.28 The capitalist class endows the world with its own particularity, the exclusive identification of the general with the particular. The perpetuation of capitalism is promoted by such ideological forms. In this connection Bhiku’s apt comment makes sense: "According to the philosophers, when a form of inquiry rests on assumptions, its perception and interpretation of the world is necessarily mediated by them, and therefore inherently limited and distorted."29 But this ideological distortion receives popular appeal since its uncritical description is just as capitalist social reality presents itself. The particular class interests of the bourgeoisie are presented as the interests of all. Its concepts are fixed and the real world is made to conform with them.30 Presenting social relations of production as things may conceal the fetishised nature of social relations of production under capitalism together with the contradictory limits that this reification throws up.
As was made evident capitalist production relations are concrete abstractions [things in the form of abstractions such as commodity capital] which are uncritically translated into conceptual form. Since capitalist relations are abstractions their corresponding conceptual form must be abstract.31 Indeed since the totality of production relations is posited as determinant, the corresponding conceptual forms must constitute the intellectual basis and determinant of bourgeois consciousness. The character of reason is abstract. as are value relations: that is not to declare that bourgeois thought as a historical phenomenon has not played a revolutionary role. As with value relations under capitalism these conceptual abstractions are presented as determining man's knowledge and indeed within specific historical limits they constitute forms for the development of human knowledge.32 Outside these limits they hinder its progress. Like the value relations that are presented as independent [conceptual] abstractions that promote human knowledge[mystically] independently of men's concrete activity on nature. Consequently knowledge assumes a mystical significance [e.g., Hegel]. We see that the inversion presented by capitalist social reality finds its conceptual counterpart; men's social existence determines their existence33. We adduce remarks from Marx’s much quoted letter to Annenkov in support of the above thesis:
He has not perceived that economic categories are only abstract expressions of these actually existing relations and only remain true while these relations exist. He therefore falls into the error of the bourgeois economists, who regard these economic categories as eternal laws and not as historical laws which are valid only for a particular historical development, for a definite development of the productive forces. Instead, therefore, of regarding the politico-economic categories as abstract expressions of the real, transitory, historic social relations, Mr Proudhon, owing to a mystic inversion, regards real relations merely as reifications of these abstractions. These abstractions themselves are formulas which have been slumbering in the bosom of God the Father since the beginning of the world.34
Hegelianism constitutes the classical distillation of the inversion. Under Hegel’s thought the basic abstract concepts are demonstrated to form the ultimate essence of what is concrete reality: these abstractions determine concrete reality.35 In The Holy Family Marx elucidates this matter:
If from real apples, pears, strawberries and almonds I form the general idea "Fruit," if I go further and that my abstract idea "Fruit," derived from real fruit, is an entity existing outside me, is indeed the true essence of the pear, the apple, etc., then [in the language of speculative philosophy] I am declaring that "Fruit" is the "Substance" of the pear, the apple, the almond, etc. I am saying, therefore, that to be a pear is not essential to the pear, that to be an apple is not essential, that what is essential to these things is not their real existence perceptible to the senses, but the essence that I have abstracted from them and then foisted on them, the essence of my idea: "Fruit." I therefore declare apples, pears, almonds etc., to be mere forms of existence, modes, of "Fruit."36
Hegel shares this manner of theorizing with the classical political economists. Since the system of bourgeois relations of production are historically limited their development is only possible within specific limits. Having reached their limits they acquire an explicitly fixed form. This being so the underlying conceptually determining system of bourgeois consciousness acquires an equally fixed aspect. This means that the employment of these fixed concepts in the acquisition of knowledge of social reality produces distorted knowledge since the very object of this knowledge is in motion: fluid not static. Dialectically fluid social reality is forced into a fixed conceptual framework. Since the conceptual structure is parasitic on bourgeois relations, its application produces a conceptual picture of the social world that satisfactorily corresponds with the nature of capitalist relations. This ideologically constituted world prescinds from contradictions and the real character of conflict: elements that threaten the capitalist system of production relations. Concerning this Herbert Marcuse’s penetrating insight deserves to be cited:37
Thus emerges a pattern of one-dimensional thought and behaviour in which ideas, aspirations and objectives that by their content, transcend the established universe of discourse and action are either repelled or reduced to terms of this universe. They are redefined by the rationality of the given system and of its quantitative existence.38
Standing in opposition is the critical method, a form of comprehension which embraces social reality in its movement by means of a critical examination of social phenomena. It constitutes a method whereby the movement of history determines its conceptual expression rather than the reverse relation wherein the fixed conceptual system posits historical development within ahistorical dimensions that gives us an ideologically constituted world. Under these theoretical conditions any new historical development that constitute new qualitative differences may find expressions as new conceptual forms thus investing intellectual progress with an historical character. In contradistinction to this the non-critical procedure obstructs the emergence of new and richer concepts thereby impeding the advancement of knowledge and thus the qualitative development of Social reality.39
To be sure in the earlier stages, while the capitalist system bore a progressive aspect, the nature of its thought more reliably reflected reality. Indeed, to a certain extent, bourgeois thought was conceptually fluid in the interests of capital accumulation since the latter could not proceed in the absence of a reasonably accurate comprehension of the constitution of the productive forces together with corresponding production relations: in a sense capital accumulation is

Terrorism and Leftism

2006-07-02T13:27:00.000-07:00

Terrorism and Leftists

The prevalent view within left liberal to radical leftcircles is that the Mujahadeen and later the Talibanincluding Bin Laden are a product of the CIA, Pakistani ISIand Saudia Arabia. These facts are used to morally discreditWashington and its so called war against terrorism. Theyalso suggest that a large scale intensive war involving bombingwill do more harm than good. It will, they argue, lead tofurther terrorism and even increase regional and perhapseven global instability. They claim that the civilianpopulation will suffer most --thousands to die frombombs, guns, starvation and disease. They argue that insteadof seeking revenge through mass terror Washington shouldseek to identify the conditions that determineterrorism. Washington, they say, must learn that itsforeign policy is the source of this terrorism. Byeliminating these conditions they eliminate terrorism andmany other problems.The above leftist/liberal conception constitutes a rather utopian notion ofcapitalism. It suggests that imperialism can adopt arational procedure that will lead to the elimination ofterrorism within capitalist society. Such is ananti-communist position. It is clear that if it is possible,under capitalism, to eliminate the conditions that breedterrorism then communism is superfluous and not a historical necessity. It alsoimplies that terrorism is a problem for capitalismand that it will benefit from terrorism's demise.This utopian perception also suggests that the issue ofterrorism is a moral question as opposed to a politicalquestion --a class question. It is a perception that tacitlysuggests that US imperialism's war against terrorism ismorally questionable given that it created the veryterrorist leader, Bin Laden, it now wants toeliminate. This argument of liberal and left intellectualsignores the significant fact that the spurious war againstterrorism is merely a hegemonic figleaf for imperialism's attempt toenhance itself geopolitically in its relentless struggle toboth defend and advance its class interests. The latter is the essential morality underlying its policies.In other words it possesses no realconcerns over the morality of terrorism. It merely deploysmoral ideology as a means of disguising its real aims andthe politics that flow from them. It will create an OsamaBin Laden today and eliminate one tomorrow. Its actionsmerely exist in the context of money relations --themaximisation of profit. It exploits Sebtember 11th within thesame (monetary) context. It cares no more nor less about the conduct of a Bin Laden than it does about this or that fireman killed inthe collapse of the WTC skyscraper. Each is viewed withinthe perspective of exploitation, profit and its geopoliticalconditions.Capitalism, as a system of exploitation and oppression,inevitably produces the conditions that lead toterrorism. Consequently to eliminate the conditions thatbreed terrorism is to eliminate capitalism. Capitalism isthe condition that leads to terrorism. Capitalism cannoteliminate itself. Since it will not eliminate itself it is left with no alternativebut the use of force in its attempt to eliminateterrorism. Its use of force is somewhat successful incontaining terrorism. If it were not Washignton would not use it.Clearly its limited success has a contradictory character. Whileit contains terrorism it alsobreeds it. The genesis of Taliban constitutes theconcentrated essence of that contradiction. While capitalismwilfully created the Taliban it now seeks to contain it andeven crush it. Even if it succeeds in this it will needfuture Talibans of one sort or another. A similar situationcan repeat itself again. This is in the nature ofcapitalism. Capitalism both creates and destroysterrorism. This is capitalism inherently contradictorycharacter --its albatross.The crucial point is that terrorism is not essentially aproblem for capitalism. Capitalism produces terrorismbecause it needs it. Its validity is viewed within afunctionalist logic -- this is its morality. Capitalism,in itself, is not concerned if terrorism is responsible for the deathsof over 6000 people in the US. Indeed sometimes it exploits suchatrocities. These deceased mean no more to it than thedeaths of a similar number in any third world country. Thisis why the argument from the liberal/left intelligentsiathat a US worker has more value than a third worldworker is false. To capitalism one is of no more significance thanthe other --their significance is theirinsignificance. Capitalism is only concerned about them fromthe standpoint of its exploitation of their labourpower. Any stronger response by the US bourgeoisieconcerning US deaths is merely an appearance designed todeceive in the interests of maintaining and increasing itsexploitation and oppression of the world working class.Capitalism needs terrorism to obstruct the development of acommunist working class that can effectively challenge andoverthrow capitalist relations. Terrorism is an expressionof the absence of communism within the working class. Ascommunism grows within the working class terrorism will tend to correspondingly diminishes. However under conditions of agrowing communist movement the bourgeoisie deliberatelyfosters terrorism as a device to disarm and undermine thegrowing communist movement. Consequently Bush's declarationof war on terrorism is a war that he cannot and does notwant to win. If anything what Washington seeks is thecontrol of terrorism in the interests of capital. His politics has been the protection of Washington regulatated terrorism by attacking terrorism antagonistic to his imperialist interests.To conclude: The only way terrorism can be eliminated is byreplacing capitalist social relations with communistones. This means social revolution. I care about thethousands of workers killed and injured in Afghanistan andManhattan. This is why I am a communist.

Hamas and contradiction

2006-07-02T06:26:00.001-07:00

Hamas and its contradictory character

Among the many contradictions of the Hamas group is their claim that they dont recognise Israel and their desire for a Palestinian state that includes much if not all of Israeli territory. If it is serious concerning its position then it should not have recognised the Palestian state in its fragemented form by contesting its elections and assuming power as the majority party. Either they recongise Isael of they dont. It is this contradiction that has led to the plausibility of the Israeli governments policy of refusing to supply this so called Arab state with resources. Hamas cannot justifiably blow up Jews while expecting aid and assistance from them at the same time.

The Capitalist State Revisited

2006-06-23T10:01:00.000-07:00

The Irish Economy

2006-06-23T03:55:00.000-07:00

Colonisation and the Celtic Tiger
Paddy Hackett

The term Celtic Tiger is being bandied about ad nauseam. It is a term that forms part of bourgeois ideology and is thereby designed to serve a certain function: It promotes the delusion among the masses that Ireland is a thriving independent capitalist economy. In this way it conceals the bitter inter-imperialist struggle, taking place in Ireland, between American and European imperialism. It thereby conceals the fact that there is a struggle as to what imperialist power Ireland is to be a colony of. There has been virtually no attempt within the mass media to investigate what really lies behind the ideological term, Celtic Tiger.
Even a brief examination of the situation underlying this ideological construct will expose the false image conveyed by this term:
The emergence of the “Celtic Tiger” is a product of Ireland’s growing integration into the European Union; the character of the relationship between the US and the EU; the current erstwhile economic boom being experienced by Western economies and the changing character of capitalism itself.
The EU’s growing economic integration has recently manifested itself in the establishment of the single European currency. Ireland, unlike Britain, has joined this single currency drawing it even closer into Europe. By subordinating itself to a single European currency Ireland has effectively further subordinated itself to the German economy –the strongest economy in Europe and one of the strongest economies in the world. The Irish economy is being effectively colonised by German imperialism in particular and European imperialism in general –further proof of the dependent and oppressed nature of the Irish economy.
This recent step by Ireland, joining the single currency regime, helps explain the increased overseas investment in Ireland and the consequent improvement in economic conditions. The increased overseas investment has been especially accentuated because of Britain’s failure to join the single currency. Overseas capital that would otherwise have gone to Britain is being invested in Ireland. It is this latter situation that particularly explains the phenomenon misleadingly known as the Celtic Tiger.
US overseas investment in Ireland has been the principal investor that helps explain the emergence of the Celtic Tiger. Over the recent past America has succeeded in surpassing Britain as the principal overseas investor in Ireland. This helps explain US interest in assisting in the development of political stability in Ireland with regard to the North. It has nothing to do with a benevolent Washington caring for Ireland due to its past associations etc. with Ireland. The latter is pure ideological bunkum designed to fool the masses. Washington’s interest in Ireland is based on a cold, calculating and unscrupulous strategic decision.
Because of its close historical and cultural ties to Ireland including the sharing of a common language Washington views Ireland of particular strategic, economic and political interest. Given the preceding factors together with the weak and unthreatening nature of Ireland’s indigenous bourgeoisie, it is an ideal national location for US capital investment. Ireland is of particular interest to Washington as a location for its capital investments by virtue of its increasingly closer integration into the European Union. Consequently American investment of capital in Ireland is being undertaken because of Ireland’s existence as a very willing colony of the European Union. It has little to do with the Irish economy in itself and its “concern” for “the friendly Irish”. The latter suggestions are mere ideological garbage. In short Ireland is the beneficiary of its own growing integration into the EU.
Should American capital investment in Ireland proceed as it has it is not inconceivable that it might become overall the biggest capital investor in Ireland outstripping all other overseas investment and even indigenous capital investment itself. Under such conditions the US would emerge as the principal economic power in Ireland effectively transforming Ireland into one of its colonies. Under these circumstances Washington would have an even greater strategic interest in Ireland. It would then be all the more in Washington’s interest to seriously concern itself as to the course of economic, political and cultural developments in Ireland. Washington would then have, in effect, a another foot inside Fortress Europe.
Given this scenario the Provos can be viewed as Washington’s guerrilla army based in Ireland, the UK, and the European Union. Perhaps this helps explain why the Provos have been politically, financially and militarily sustained by elements within the US. Their political and ideological function exists to lend justification to Washington’s political intervention in both Irish, British and even EU affairs as evidenced by the Good Friday Agreement. Washington’s political intervention in the affairs of northern Ireland and thereby in British affairs constitutes the thin end of the wedge concerning its imperialist relationship to Ireland. It forms part of a strategy to increasingly determine and regulate the political and economic character of Ireland. Ultimately it means American rule over Ireland. Colonial control over Ireland may be passing from British to US imperialism. Ireland will then continue to be nationally oppressed.
The economic, political and cultural penetration of Ireland by American imperialism forms part of Washington’s strategy in its struggle with European imperialism. It hopes that by successfully turning Ireland into its colony it can undermine European imperialism from within. By possessing an EU country that is a well behaved colony of Washington it hopes to further its interests within Europe which means increasing its influence and control over Europe thereby weakening European capital relative to itself. Such is the form in which inter-imperialist conflict manifests itself. On the other hand the establishment and development of the European Union is the form by which European imperialism colonises other countries. The EU is Hitler’s lebensraum in different form. It constitutes a form of German imperialist colonisation that does not require a Hitler. It silently supports essentially the same programme as followed by both the Kaiser and Hitler. However this time German imperialism has been much more successful and effective. Colonialism has not gone away. It has merely assumed new and more disguised forms. It constitutes a hidden process of colonisation. European imperialism seeks to colonise Ireland through the medium of the EU while American imperialism seeks to colonise European capitalism by colonising the EU from within. Ireland is the location for this inter-imperialist struggle which is hidden from view by the ideology of which the term Celtic Tiger is a component. Washington will use any European capitalist country in its struggle to achieve this –Ireland. Britain etc.

The State and Capital

2006-06-21T10:39:00.000-07:00

The State and Capital
Paddy Hackett

There is a tendency to divorce the capitalist state from the economic system that corresponds to it. Although there may appear to be justification for this as a theoretical device it can only be justified in a very qualified sense. The point is that it is a false abstraction to create such a theoretical divorce on the whole and especially ideological to create such a divorce inside social reality itself.
Although Marx produced a critique of political economy based on value relations capital has never existed independently of the political state whether that state had an absolutist, liberal democratic or fascist form. It is impossible for capital to exist in any serious way independently of the state. Consequently we cannot justifiably discuss and succeed in understanding both the real nature of the state and capital independently of each other --the one cannot exist without the other. This being so the wage worker can be analysed in the context of the contradictory unity of citizen and wage worker.
The legal relations assume the existence of the state. The exchange between labour power and variable capital is impossible outside a legal framework. This same legal framework is indispensable for the operation of the laws of capital. Consequently the operation of the law of value under capitalism presupposes the existence of the state. This being so it makes no sense to analyse either capital or the state independently of each other. To produce an analysis of the state on a stand alone basis make no sense and simply misrepresents both the real nature of the state and indeed capital itself.
This being so any attempt to promote the view, neo-conservatism, that market relations can serve as regulator in the distribution of wealth makes no sense. If the law of value, as is commonly believed by many Marxists, is the regulator of the reproduction of wealth then the need for a state is superfluous and at best merely supplementary --a mere luxury. The operation of the law of value cannot be explained outside the context of the state. The problem is that communism has not been able to achieve an analysis or critique of the state in the context of the contradictory unity between capital and state. Probably the nearest thing to it has been Marx --Lenin here, we can completely ignore. The latter added nothing new to Marx/Engels understanding of the state and indeed virtually ignored its contradictory relation to the laws of capital.
The law of value means that commodities must sell at their values. In the absence of a state and its legal system this law could not exist in any real sense. In the absence of a state the use values in question would never become commodities since the sellers, if anything, would have their products stolen at gun or sword point. Similarly under modern capitalism in the absence of a state the supermarkets would not be able to sell at market prices since the potential buyers would simply liberate the goods from the supermarkets. In short the equalisation of the rate of profit would be inapplicable. Consequently the law of value in the form of the laws of capital could not exist and neither too could capital. Without the state capitalism could be. Indeed, except for the opprobrium with which the term is associated, it might be incorrect to describe all capitalist societies as state capitalism.
Instead of the laws of capital anarchy would obtain whereby society would reduce itself to one of perpetual conflict between different elements within the population.
This being so it is incorrect to suggest that industrial capitalism emerged as a result of the development of commodity production. To posit economic history in this way is to suggest that economic development and transformation is a history that takes place essentially within the framework of economics. The decisive point is that the development of commodity circulation proceeds within the indispensable context of the state. Implicit then in the development of capitalism and the operation of its laws is the existence of the legal system underlined by state force. Implicit in capital is force and violence. Capital contains within itself violence. It is this aspect of capital that is omitted from analysis of capital through the confining of analysis to the context of economics and even political economy. Political economy is a bourgeois category that mystifies the relation in capital that implies violence. Political economy is a bourgeois mystifying category. It is the traditional position of Marxism to invest the category political economy with an objective scientific neutral category. Lets remember that Marx's Capital was intended as a critique of political economy. The bourgeois category political economy must be critiqued. As I indicated there has been traditionally a tendency to assume, despite Marx's Capital, that political economy is a neutral category and that the problem is the specific form of political economy (Ricardo, Malthus etc.). What is ignored is that Marx's Capital was not political economy but a critique of it as, perhaps, an ideology. The category political as are the categories value, commodity, capital, prices etc are reifications.
What is particularly ignored is that the category political economy contains a violent aspect. It is this violent aspect that must be explicated since it is this aspect that is largely ignored by both left and right. The traditional tendency has been to regard the political economy as clean and at most merely an ideological construct in need of theoretical correction. In short critique of political economy is experienced as an exercise in mere pedagogy in which its ideological character is misconceived as one of mere distorted thought requiring rational adjustment.
Capital, then, implies the political state. As capital develops the state is correspondingly developed. There obtains an internal unity between capital and state. Buried within capital is the state –state capital. As capital develops the state issues out of it. It is a mistaken abstraction to focus on capitalist development to the exclusion of the state.
Capital as a specific social relation of production contains within it a relation of violence to develop out of it in the form of the state. However this dialectical relationship is not simply a logical one –the capital logic school. History is of decisive importance here. The form of the state has its source in the capital relation . However how that form specifically develops is a function of history and thereby the class struggle. Capital then implies a specific form of violence, of force, in the form of the political state. Capital then implies relations of violence and consequently creates an entire structure of violence in the context of politics --the state. Social relations in the form of capital are violent in character, are state in character, are political in character. Capital is a necessarily violent social relation. The mistake is made of presenting capital as essentially a violent-free relation observing economic laws that are equally violent free. Economics is consequently viewed as a violent free zone --a merely academic exercise in need of theoretical transformation (Althusser).
Since economics has a violent aspect to it and is concerned with inherently violent social relations the character of that violence and its form of development must be made explicit. The violence residing in economics must be highlighted. In short capital and economics are forms of violence –reified forms of violence. One might go as far as to assert that the state and capital are a form of the class struggle.
Consequently the only way to transcend political economy is by abolishing the violence inherent in it. This entails the abolition of the violence inhering in social relations in the form of capital. Such a process of abolition constitutes the class struggle. This means that the abolition of this violence by abolishing state capital is a historical process rather than a logical (capital logic) process. However the abolition of violence is tantamount to the abolition of the class struggle. This being so the violence inhering in capital must be analysed and highlighted every bit as much as is value character and what that represents. But we must immediately correct ourselves: The analysis of the value form is simultaneously an analysis of its violent aspect too. Capital cannot be correctly analysed without a corresponding analysis of its violent aspect including its development in the form of the state. It is not so much the content or the function of the state that we are concerned with here. Instead we are chiefly concerned with the form of the state. We establish the form in which the state appears under state capital before we can investigate its content and corresponding functions. Indeed the content of political states may tend to be of a universal nature.
Traditionally capital and even the state has been analysed in this violent free way –in a form that is free of the class struggle. Capital tends to be analysed as if it exists independently of the class struggle. Indeed capital is a product of the way in which the class struggle specifically developed in Europe. Indeed in so far as violence and class struggle is introduced into the discussion this is done in a marginal, external almost incidental way.
Capitalism, then, is a violent conflict ridden system of production. Consequently many of its problems are resolved in the form of violent class struggle --chiefly by way of political violence. Under capitalism the form chiefly assumed by violent struggle is politics. Politics is a fetishised form of violent struggle. At the same time it must not be forgotten that economics is a form of violent struggle too. Economic development is a systemic form of violence and struggle.
Capitalism, then, is a form of organised violence. The development of capitalism is the form of development of organised violence which expresses itself in the form of the development of the state –the form of development of the class struggle. Given that capitalism is essentially a form of organised violence it follows that despite its positive aspect it is still by definition a primitive savage system of the reproduction of wealth.
History in general then has entailed the development of violence. History has been the history of violent class struggle. Violence is the history of its development. Auschwitz and Hiroshima are expressions as to what new forms violence has been developed under capitalist society. Under capitalism violent struggle is both endemic and systemic taking on a dazzling spectrum of forms: from verbal abuse to physical abuse to genocide.
Given the inherently violent character of capitalism it follows that the study of the state is central to the study of capitalism. It is here that violence achieves its quintessentially capitalist character and its chief form --its political form. Violence, then, assumes the political form. Politics constitutes the mystification of violent struggle. Violent class struggle as politics as the state achieves a highly developed, mystifying and veiled form. Consequently violence under daily capitalist existence is not recognised. Its source in capitalism is especially not recognised.
Despite saying this capital assumes the existence of the state. Capital could not come into being in the absence of the state --in the absence of violence. Capitalism requires violence -organised violence- for its existence. However having established itself capital is then the form by which violence is organised and further developed. Under capitalism violence assumes an alienated form which mystifies it and makes it more difficult to highlight. Capitalism is shot through with violence. Capitalism can go no where without holding hands with violence. Capital both assumes and is the source of its development. Capitalism is the dynamic underlying both the development of both violence and the state. Law is the mystified form assumed by violence under capitalism. The state is the mystified form assumed by violence under capitalism.
The state is an abstraction. (The state is the class struggle in abstract form.) The state is a form of alienation from society as community. The state is community abstracted from society. The state is the form in which relations between people assume the form of a thing; relations between people (the class struggle) assume the form of relations between things.
Capital is an abstract social relation that stands independently of people. It is community in the form of an abstraction. Capital, as abstract social relation, implies organised violence in the form of the state. It implies organised force in the form of an abstraction. Capital assumed the existence of the state. Capital cannot exist without a state. It is therefore quite mistaken to view the state as a structure that is articulated onto capital in an external fashion. There is an internal unity between the capital and the state.
Capital can never operate freely --freed from the trammels of the state. if capital were able to operate freely strictly according to its own laws it would undermine its existence as capital. This is why those who say that the market should be the regulator so that capital is state free are presenting a false negative utopia. This is a bourgeois ideology that in a mystified way seeks improve the conditions for profit maximisation at the expense of the working class. It is an ideology that pretends to seek the eliminate the state from capitalist reproduction when its aim is nothing of the sort. It simply seeks the restructuring and reorganising of the state in such a way as to improve conditions for profit maximisation at the expense of the masses. It at most seeks to downsize the state where it is not to the advantage of capital to preserve a bigger state.
The impression is given too that the laws of capital operate purely according to a logic of their own. This in general can never be the case even in the absence of social welfarism. The law of the equalisation of profit and tendency of the rate of profit to fall can never act in unadulterated form. There will always be state elements at play that prevent the free-play of these laws. This is because the development of capital is not a logical process as the capital logic people believe. This is because the development of the capital relation is historical and not a forms of functionalism. The necessary existence of state elements mixed in with capital is an expression of the existence of capital as an historical matter thereby entailing specificity and even contingency. The development of capital is not a logical or rational process freed from the complexities of the class struggle with history and thereby specificity stick all over it. Even in the 1929 crisis the state modified the free play of these laws of capitalism. Despite this fact it must be borne in mind that the laws still work their way through in the last instance. However they operate as tendencies that work there way through more thoroughly at one time than at another. There can then be no simplified description that accurately depicts the operation of the laws of capitalism in their pure form. Any account of what is happening in the real world will tend to be complicated by a manifold of facts all impinging on the situation as a conjunctural one. This is why it is so difficult to explain what is happening in the contemporary world and partly why there are a manifold of conflicting accounts of how the situation developed. It is a very difficult task to analyse and provide an account of the contemporary situation in the world today. Failure by communism to produce an accurate account of the world today is not necessarily a reflection on the bankruptcy of communism. It must be remembered that in the past no such account was ever provided of life under industrial capitalism. All we can strive to do is get close to such an account. It is the incapacity to provide an all embracing account that makes it so difficult to provide the correct strategies and programmes. It also helps explain why there is a manifold of conflicting tendencies within the radical left. Indeed a complete explanation would imply closure and thereby the absence of history.
In every conjunctural situation, besides the basic prevailing tendencies of capital accumulation, there obtain a multitude of factors internally related to these tendencies at work that complicate the situation and render it a daunting task to provide an accurate account of the situation in all its ramifications. This is what make the process historical and not logical or functionalism. However the laws of capital provide a basic thread that makes this task more achievable. It is this thread that the bourgeoisie are incapable of picking up.
The state is necessary for capital’s existence. Capital cannot exist in the absence of legal relations. Law and justice are necessary for capital’s existence. Consequently the judiciary, the courts, the lawyers, the police and the prisons are necessary aspects of its existence. Without these features of the state capital could not exist. Consequently the legislature is necessary in order to create laws. The army is necessary to protect one capitalist country against another –to protect one capital against another and against the masses. The bureaucracy is necessary to organise these various structures and relations guaranteeing their forming an integrated whole. The more apparently benevolent social aspects of the state are designed to assist in the maintenance of the working class in a condition that suits capital’s interests and to promote passivity in the more oppressed strata of the working class. This has all to do with the specific character of the class struggle and the corresponding balance of class forces. Other aspects of the state are designed to generally preserve an environment that allows individual capitals to operate on a level playing field, so to speak –to contain capitalist fraud, cheating and robbing which when not contained can prove detrimental to capital as a whole and even lead to the destruction of capital.
All these functions of the state are necessary aspects of the existence of capital. Capital cannot exist without them. Capital cannot exist without this kind of state, the capitalist state. Capital as a social form logical and historically entails the form of the state. Capital, as a social relation of production, produces the class struggle, violence, in the form of the state. The task is to investigate the specific form of the capitalist the state. The more capital develops the more the political state develops. This state is a sophisticated form of organised violence necessary to capital’s existence –indeed a necessary aspect of capital’s existence. The state is a pervasive form of organised violence transformed into a vast structure of alienated (sublimated) violence existing in diffuse mystified form. The capitalist state is a vast structure of hidden or veiled violence.
The character of the capitalist economic system is such as to present appearances that contradict its essential nature. Its essential nature is mystified. Consequently appearances are mistaken for reality. This means that the mass of the population misunderstand the real nature of capital and its political state. Consequently they mistakenly perceive capitalism as a natural rational, even logical, system that makes sense. This ideology that capital spontaneously generates reinforces the masses acceptance of the system including the state. Spontaneously produced bourgeois ideology further veils the hidden violence of the state –further mystifies that organised violence in the form of the state. Consequently it reinforces the active participation of the masses in their own violent oppression; the active participation of the masses in the perpetuation of the capital relation and organised violence in the form of the state. This produces a situation whereby the masses actually actively participate in their own oppression through the medium of the state. It may even go as far as some elements of the masses even occupying active oppressive positions within the state itself. The state form as a form of the class struggle is a fetishised form of that struggle. As the state it hides the class struggle by actively seeking to present class struggle in a form that obscures it by presenting the members of the working class as citizens. Citizen is a reified category that conceals the existence of class.
Given appearances contradicting and concealing the essence of things under capitalism it follows that capital is a concealing or veiling of being –of social being and thereby social being in the form of the class struggle. But capital’s characteristic of veiling social being simultaneously provides the form by which being is unveiled, highlighted or unconcealed. Capital then while concealing also unconceals through this concealing. Capital yields truth by lying. This is its contradiction. Social being then through capital conceals and at the same time reveals its essence –its truth. The truth or essence of social being is revealed through the development of capital.
Both the state and ideology are forms or aspects of capital.
Just as the capital relations spontaneously produces an ideology that sustains its existence it correspondingly produces a state form that equally sustains its existence. Indeed the state is a form of the capital relation. It exists in the context of the capital relation. Capital then contains within itself organised violence in the form of the state together with a corresponding ideology. Capital, as a social relation of production, contains within itself both violence and ideology –the forms by which its perpetuation and development is guaranteed. As capital develops violence and ideology correspondingly develop. They maintain a dialectical unity with each other. In the course of their contradictory development they take on the appearance of separation from each other in different ways. However in critical situations their unity is reconstructed and they appear as an explicit unity. Perhaps in periods of continuous development these aspects of capital grow apart from each other only to be forcibly reunited in periods of crisis.
The capital relation is both valorisation, organised violence and ideology. These contradictory aspects of capital develop within the form of capital and are eventually externalised in a form that more adequately accommodates the contradictory unity: the contradiction is externalised. Under this form the state, ideology and value assume a fetishised existence independent of each other. Under this form appearance contradicts essence. What appears to be separate is in fact a unity. However this appearance of separation is what further develops bourgeois ideology giving the appearance of separation with all that that entails ideologically and politically.
Given that capital is a reified social relation of production the way in which social relations in general manifest themselves will have a correspondingly reified or twisted form. This expresses itself in consciousness and communal relations taking on the form of ideology and state respectively.

What is Communism?

2006-06-21T10:24:00.000-07:00

Communism: what it is?

The aim of communism is the creation of a classless stateless society in which the people of the world collectively own, control, organise and plan the wealth of society. These conditions are the necessary basis for the fuller development of the individual and relations between individuals. They are also the necessary basis for the fuller development of relations between people and nature. Under these conditions the historical conditions for the continuation of social oppression in all its forms will cease to exist. Under communism the conditions for the free and round creative activity will exist. No longer will the conditions that produce oppressive labouring activity and alienation exist.

However the realisation of communism will not necessarily mean that all problems will inevitably dissolve into heavenly bliss. Communists are not utopian idealists. Instead communist see communist society as the necessary historical conditions that provide the best social conditions for resolving the many problems that confront humanity.

How to achieve it?

To achieve communism capitalism must be destroyed. The capitalist social system can only be destroyed and replaced by communism through revolution. Such a revolution can only be achieved by the organised working class. This social revolution entails the abolition of the state. To realise the communist revolution the working class must organise itself through the communist party. The communist party is the spearhead of the working class. It is the institutional form by which the working class organises itself against the capitalist class. As a party of the working class it must be organised on democratic centralist principles. In the revolutionary process the working class organises itself through the party into broader organisational forms that entail the democratic organisation and regulation of the activity of the workers in relation to crushing the capitalist class and maintaining and developing social relations for the reproduction and distribution of human resources. With the ongoing revolutionary process and the abolition of the bourgeoisie these social forms will develop into truly communist social forms --communism. Communists, as opposed to Leninism and other left counter-revolutionary forms, oppose the setting up of what is called a workers’ state. There is no such thing as a workers’ state. The state, by its very nature, is an instrument designed to oppress the worker. The so called workers’ state set up in Russia by the Bolsheviks in 1917 was an anti-working class state.

What is to be done now?

At present the working class has accepted capitalism and its ruling class. It has chosen capitalism as opposed to communism. In that sense the working class today is bourgeois. This fact reflects itself in the virtual absence, among the working class, of any interest in communist politics. This in turn reflects itself in the absence of any known communist organisations. Consequently individual communists are isolated and politically incapable of exerting political influence. It is impossible for communist, under the present conditions, to practice their politics in an open way without being subjected to attack by the working class. The more conscious elements of the working class are actively hostile to communist politics. Because of the existence of these counter-revolutionary conditions communists are unable to present their politics in a principled way within concrete situations. Consequently communists are confined to producing theoretical work and rendering it accessible to elements within the working class. This means critiquing the theoretical and political developments that have taken place within the working class movement over the last 200 years or so. This means subjecting Marx, in particular to critique. Marx was a significant transitional figure in the history of the modern class struggle. The problem is that despite the outstanding contribution he has made to the development of revolutionary thought he has not been transcended. Theoretically we are essentially fixed where Marx finished off in the 19th century. Revolutionary theory has not succeeded in getting beyond that stage. It is only through critiquing the highest point reached by revolutionary thought that communists hope to get beyond it. Communists then must confine themselves to producing histories of the class struggle, theoretical analysis of political events etc. They must struggle to develop communist theory into an integrated doctrine that provides an understanding of contemporary capitalism in all its aspects. Communists must struggle to form a communist group of intellectuals to develop, promote and organise communism on the theoretical. Such a group will be based on an organised programme of theoretical work.

This means that if the working class choose communism we will be in a stronger position to actively participate in the struggle to achieve it. For the present it is not possible for communists to actively participate in the class struggle as communists.

Irish Economic Development

2006-06-21T10:03:00.000-07:00

Irish Development and National Self-Determination
Paddy Hackett

The driving force that determined the character of economic development in Ireland from the latter part of the 18th into the early 20th century has been British capitalism. British capitalism has grown at the expense of Irish economic development. The economic development of Ireland has been subordinated to and determined by Britain’s mighty economic development.
Economic development is an interconnected process. The specific quality of the production of wealth in the form of commodity production has been its expansion of production through the increase in the social division of labour which produces greater dependence among the producers as well as, of course, increasing anarchy in production. And commodity production in its more developed capitalist form while producing increased indirect socialized production brings about socialized production itself. The latter form widens and deepens such that it proves itself a primary contributor in the creation of the world capitalist system of production.
To argue, as some do, that the locality of North-East Ulster grew separately from the rest of Ireland is to disregard the social character of the commodity form. It constitutes a denial of the mighty revolutionary role played by the capitalist system in turning world production into a world economic system. It mistakenly suggests that British capital exercised no central determining role over north-east industrialization and that the latter developed on a separate independent basis. Besides overlooking the peculiar character of imperialism this is to suggest that capitalist relations today are still progressive capable of promoting independent economic growth in oppressed countries. In this way the very fundamental conditions for the replacement of world capitalism with world socialism is entirely disregarded: that capitalist relations are not adequate if the productive forces are to be satisfactorily increased in the interests of humanity and that contained within bourgeois society are the material conditions for the establishment of socialism.
As already indicated the character of Irish economic growth was determined essentially by British capital accumulation. During the 18th century Irish economic production was subordinated to Britain’s expansionary interests which was then a world commercial capitalist power. This oppressive bond explains why provisioning flourished on this island during the 18th century. It provided much of the basic requirements for feeding the crews of both the military and merchant and naval services as well as the commercial centres of the Colonies. "The provision trade killed, salted and packed the beef in barrel for export." (R.D. Crotty: Irish Agricultural Production; page 15). This trade produced "a whole complex of subsidiary trades, cooperage, tanning and tallow manufacturing among others." (ibid: page 15). But all these trades created a demand for labour power and for the means of subsistence of that demand for labour power. As a result of domestic demand for dairy produce, and even for corn, was increased , which in turn helped to make dairying and tillage in Ireland somewhat more profitable (ibid; p. 15). Besides this British commerce also determined both the growth and character of merchant capital. This ensured the increased centralisation of merchant capital at specific centres in Ireland, especially in the South. In turn this led to the even further social division of labour involving greater manufacturing expansion in or near these centres providing for many of the needs of their growing populations; glass-making and brewing are examples. This was a further stimulus to both population growth and agricultural expansion which, of course, expressed itself in increased social division of labour.
The growth of commodity circulation and consequently commerce, is determined through the increase in the social division of labour both at the national and international levels. Even Ireland was not to escape such economic developments. But instead of this increased division of labour creating a corresponding increased home market, enlargement was restricted; the British home market expanded at the expense of its Irish counterpart.
Whether in the money or any other commodity form, considerable wealth was being extracted from Ireland to Britain’s benefit. This appropriation of Irish wealth was a product of the unequal exchange of labour through the trade that took place between the two islands. The retention of Irish wealth in Britain by both owners of Irish land and sections of the commercial bourgeoisie constituted an added drain on Irish material reproduction. Needless to say the banks had a hand in this process.
As a pre-capitalist form of appropriation of the labour of Irish producers, the rent-form hindered the expansion of national commodity circulation. By siphoning off a large portion of surplus product in the form of rent, the landed nobility left considerably less surplus product available for exchange in the commodity form: this restricted internal commodity circulation.
Through merchant capital, its chief economic mediator in Ireland, Britain exploited Ireland. It served as the transmission belt through which Irish wealth was delivered to the British bourgeoisie. Trading relations in Ireland were promoted in a restricted form by the trader; in his absence, both the export of provisions and other commodities would have been constrained. In the interests of its own expansionary needs Britain’s commercial bourgeoisie determined the growth of both the provision trade and other forms of production. As a result of increased trade the merchants grew more powerful and thereby generated further manufacturing growth. But it had to be a growth constrained within the framework of Britain’s economic interests. By hindering the development of an Irish national commodity market, Britain was depriving Ireland of one of the primary indispensable conditions for the development of an independent Irish capitalist class.
The Irish landed aristocracy played a secondary, although important, role as agent for British capital. By virtue of his private ownership of the land, the landowner appropriated the labour of the peasant producers in the form of ground rent. By means of such appropriation, they were enabled to have surplus product exchanged via the merchant with Britain for its "equivalent" in the general form of money or in the particular commodity form. Within certain limits, this meant that the landed nobility helped determine the character of trade between the two islands and consequently, in some degree, the character of Irish production. He influenced the character of production because of his impact on the material composition of trade. Furthermore, the landlord’s retention in Britain of a substantial part of the surplus product, in whatever form, as already indicated, was a deduction from wealth in Ireland with all the negative effects that followed this. Instead of the peasant producers determining how the surplus product created by them was to be employed, the parasitic landlord class appropriated the large bulk of it, in both its own interests and those of the exploiting classes in Britain. By fostering the export of primary wealth from the country, they were promoting the unequal exchange of labour against Ireland’s interests besides, of course, indirectly strengthening the economic power of the merchants handling the commodities. The harsh reality is that the landed nobility actively contributed to Britain’s growth at Ireland’s expense. The landlord’s were a reactionary class who obstructed independent capitalist development on this island; they were a barrier to production. Without the merchant and the landlord, Britain could not have so successfully subordinated Ireland to its own economic interests
It was British exploitation of Irish producers that brought about restricted capitalist growth in Ireland. And this, only in the interests of British capital expansion together with the corresponding expansion of the British home market. Through British capital’s mode of appropriation of the labour of the Irish producers, it contributed towards its own economic growth as well as the very restricted expansion of Irish production. British capital expanded through the oppressive exploitation of the industrial working class and through the oppressive exploitation of other peoples. British history is testimony to this brutal reality. Irish production helped build the British market. It was the British market that produced Irish capitalism. The secret behind the character of Irish growth is British oppression. Many bourgeois historians prefer to remain at the superficial level of the market where justice and equality appear to reign. To cover up Britain’s oppressive role and its obstruction of Irish independent capitalist growth together with its blockage of the evolution of a national commodity home market, they must ignore the secret of Britain’s transformation into a bourgeois imperialist power.
We must also make it clear too, that the role of the Irish banks increased in importance in transferring wealth from the country to Britain. Much of the deposits lodged with them in Ireland were transferred to Britain. In relation to deposits made in Irish banks in he 19th century Raymond Crotty has this to say: "The banks in turn transferred these savings to the London money market where they earned 2.5% or more. Thus Irish savings were financing British industry..." (Banking on Ireland’s Decline; Irish Times, March 16, 1981).
The transformed economic character of Britain formed the underlying force that led to the industrialisation of North-East Ulster. From the latter part of the 18th century Britain had been in transition from a world commercial power to a world industrial capitalist power which led to a corresponding change in its needs. No longer was the provision trade to continue to play the same relatively important role between the two islands; instead agricultural and cloth exports were to replace it in importance.. The repeal of the Cattle Acts is evidence of Britain’s changing needs. Such dramatic change induced a new social division of labour in Ireland, increasingly subordinated, of course, to the expansionary interests of British industrial capital. This chiefly took the form of the South producing agricultural produce for the growing British market while in the North-East was concentrated linen production for that same market. And instead of these developments forming the basis for a correspondingly increased growth of the Irish commodity home market, they helped enhance forces of production on the British mainland while contributing to the expansion; and all at Ireland’s expense. Instead of Irish agriculture and industry primarily contributing to the independent development of the productive forces of this island, they were, in effect harnessed towards fueling the expansionary requirements of British capitalist production. So the changed internal social division of labour of the Irish economy merely contributed indirectly towards Irish economic development. Consequently, town and country were separating in a very narrow and unbalanced manner, so much so that the town was most developed industrially, after the 18th century, only in the North-East of the country. And one of the results of this was that the surplus land population, unlike in Britain, was not significantly absorbed by the towns. In a sense the separation between town and country developed in such a way that the country was Ireland and the town, Britain. To sum up: The social division of labour in Ireland changed chiefly in the interests of British capitalist growth and, as a result of the successful exploitation by British capital of the Irish producers. Indeed the character and significance of this division was eventually destined to generate tremendous historical and political change in Ireland.
While it may, of course, be true that the modification of the land tenure system in the form of Ulster Custom served as an aid in the creation of the conditions for the industrialisation of North-East Ireland, it must be stressed that the expansionary requirements of the British bourgeoisie proved the decisive element. It must not be forgotten that Ulster Custom was but a mere modification of a land tenure system that, in general, embraced all of 18th century Ireland. In Ireland the land tenure system was a motley medieval system of landownership hindering the development of agriculture and even more importantly, independent capitalist development. Essentially, Irish landed relations served Britain’s interests and obstructed Irish economic growth.
As has been suggested it is not true that Ulster Custom by contrast, with the equivalent situation in the South, necessarily led to a greater surplus product accruing to the agricultural producer which consequently contributed to the creation of the conditions for industrialisation. Agrarian relations then were not simple. Merely because Ulster Custom prevailed in a given region it does not automatically follow that the producers would have secured a bigger portion of surplus product than elsewhere.
As well as the surplus product connected with it many conditions influence agricultural production. And Ulster Custom is not by far the sole determinant of the quantity of surplus wealth produced in the agricultural sphere for investment. Among the factors that may make up for the absence of Ulster Custom are the following: The duration of existing leases; the rate of return of investments on the land; the degree to which investments are undetectable by the landlord so that he correspondingly fails to increase rents; depreciation; investment in labour power; the composition of production and price fluctuations; how crops are related to investment whether land tenure in the form of Ulster Custom is completely absent or present in some degree even though not called such. There are other considerations to be taken into account as well. However it is not the task of this piece to present an explanation and analysis of these factors to the reader
Without the material conditions that produced the circumstances for the industrialisation of the North-East, no amount of modification of the land tenure in the form of Ulster Custom would have had the same results. In so far as industrialisation did take place, it was accompanied by a restricted increase in the Irish home market. But we must again stress that both these developments were determined by British economic developments and were consequently a function of them. 19th century North-East industrialization was not an expression of national independent capitalist development. It was Irish industrial growth of an extremely limited and dependent nature.
By the latter part of 18th century feudal relations were but a medieval obstruction to the forces of production. Indeed, as already indicated the Irish feudal landed aristocracy were a agent in the oppression of the Irish producers; and this was true of the landlords in both parts of the country. To create the best conditions for wider and more rapid independent capitalist growth the abolition of private landownership would have been one of the chief and indispensable requirements. Such would involve the "transformation of the patriarchal peasant into a bourgeois farmer." But, on the other hand, bourgeois "development may proceed by having big landlord economies at the head, which will gradually become more and more bourgeois and gradually substitute bourgeois for feudal methods of exploitation." (Agrarian programme of Social Democracy: page 239 of Lenin Collected Works, vol. 13) And at the time there was no question of either course being underway.
The role played by the Irish landed nobility both North and South, was radically different to that played by the English landed aristocracy. The latter, however impurely, facilitated agricultural capitalist growth, while the former obstructed it. In correspondence with this role, the English landed aristocracy implemented a policy of land clearance resulting in larger farm sizes, while the Ulster landlords permitted increased sub-letting of their lands resulting in smaller landholdings; this obstructed the development of agriculture. Agriculture flourished in England and remained backward in Ulster.
And furthermore, through the instrument of the Irish Parliament and in close collaboration with the London controlled Irish Executive, that same Ulster landed class obstructed the creation of the conditions necessary for independent Irish capitalist growth. Through the medium of the political state they also obstructed the Catholic and Presbyterian producers in advancing their interests through political means; the Penal Laws were but one manifestation of this. Their reactionary character was clearly revealed in their counter-revolutionary opposition to the bourgeois rising of 1798 in which North-East Ireland Presbyterians actively participated.
Quite clearly by the latter part of the 18th century, the feudal relations of production were but a medieval obstruction to the expansion of the forces of production in Ireland. Marxism must identify the central and dominant social relations that determine both the character and growth of the productive forces. And in the period under inspection, this social relation was capital in the concrete form of both British and Irish capital with the latter playing the subordinate and dependent role; this character of the relationship existing between them explains the latter’s oppressed nature.
The character of the development of the world social division of labour basically determined Ireland’s peculiar economic growth. The former took place through a revolution in the relations of production; the replacement of feudal relations with capitalist relations and their subsequent rapid development and expansion. It was expressed in Ireland through the determining force of British capital. And this was further mediated through the merchant and the landlord. Put peasant differentiation was among the chief results, a basic prerequisite for the spread of commodity circulation: In "capitalist production the basis for the formation of the home market is the process of the disintegration of the small cultivators into agricultural entrepreneurs and workers."(Lenin: The Development of Capitalism in Russia; page 71.)

And the home market that formed was narrow and weak and not at all independent, having as the source of its existence the British capitalist system. It was not as some misleadingly believe the medieval landed property relations that formed the central historical force that erected the conditions for an alleged independent capitalist Ulster. For Marxists, on the other hand, feudal agrarian relations, have been under continuous subjection to undermining so that today, in the epoch of capitalist decay, they have no role to play except for the most reactionary way.
18th century southern manufacturing capital was a result of wealth accumulated through the exploitation of the producers of Ireland by the merchant and the landlord. None of these manufactories would have been set up without the extraction of wealth from the Irish producers. In this context, it is clear that linen manufacturing in the South was no superficial phenomenon but an integral part of the Irish economy. Because it formed part of the European linen production, however loosely, which was plunged into international recession then, manufacturing linen production in the South was triggered into decline which was to prove irrecoverable. And since the material conditions were insufficiently mature in the South, its decline had to be irreversible.
Furthermore, outside of this, industries in the South such as brewing and glass-making although having suffered in the economic recession were to experience some sustained recovery following the introduction of more advanced technology. In general any industrial decline that took place in the South over the latter part of the 18th century was a product of the changing character of both Britain and Europe. Britain’s transformation into an industrial power changed the character of Irish economic activity leading to a new social division of labour in Ireland which generated a process of decline in the South. It was the British bourgeoisie that was chiefly responsible for industrialisation on this island. The manufactories were produced from the surplus labour extracted from the producers of this country through exploitation; Ireland was a sphere of exploitation for British capital.
Some commentators misrepresent 18th century southern industry as a development that is dismisssible, that bears no intrinsic connection with the economic character of the South and indeed the entire country. Such an aim is designed to conceal their inability to ascertain the real forces underlying that industrial growth. But more importantly, if the two nations theory is to appear to have any credible standing, they must seem to have verified that the real basis for industrialisation was confined to the North-East region. And since it is a concrete fact that an industrial structure existed in the South in the 18th century, they must offer a reason for its decline that corresponds with their two nations prejudice.
Integrally connected inner relations are a principal feature defining a nation. These relations take principally the form of the home market, however restrictedly, based on the social division of labour in conjunction with all other relations, both cultural and otherwise, that spring from this.
In Ireland its force has been both relentless and brutal. As we have already indicated, over the 18th century and earlier part of the 19th century, Irish economic development was determined by the force of world capitalism which was mediated chiefly through British capital. Through Britain the formerly combined and uneven economic character was combined so as to eventually evolve into a nationally combined development that was both politically and explosively expressed in 1798 through the bourgeois democratic rising that erupted then. The character of Irish national development was a manifestation, at the time, of the form of world economic development and British development in particular. Because of its unique mediating relationship to Ireland, Britain’s oppression of the latter refracted the character of world economic development there. This happened because, if Britain was to compete successfully as a capitalist power with other nations, it must oppress and exploit Ireland as intensively as possible in order to equip itself as much as possible for that struggle; the more it exploited Ireland, the greater its strength and consequently the greater its chances of success. The international struggle for profit itself, and the degree of Britain’s success in this struggle, in turn further reflects itself in this country since it determined in what way and to what extent the appropriation of the labour of the Irish producers was to proceed. And this of course inevitably affected the character of the reproduction of Irish material wealth. And Britain’s success in the 18th century, in its struggle for world commercial supremacy was clearly a determining factor in her transformation into the world’s leading industrial capitalist power which, as we have already said, exercised a transforming affect on Irish economic development in the 19th century. Britain did not exploit Ireland for reasons of moral corruption. She was compelled to if she was to strengthen or even survive as an independent economic power. The underlying forces operating both within British society and at the world level demanded both within British society and at the world level demanded this from her. Despite appearances to the contrary, Ireland and the world were unmistakably growing in unity: through Britain world capitalism oppressed Ireland and consequently stimulated the creation of the oppressed modern Irish nation.
The eventual concentration of industry in the North-East and agriculture in the South, during the 19th century, is concrete proof of the depth and breadth with which the law of uneven and combined development asserts itself. British capitalism’s exploitation of the Irish people was successfully achieved by means of definite social relations of production. Although the indigenous producers were directly exploited through diverse forms (including the rent-form), it could not have taken place so successfully had capitalist exchange relations been lacking. These relations created from diversity the appearance of equality and uniformity.
And because British capital appropriated the wealth of Ireland through these uniform social relations, reproduction of material wealth was welded together, evolving into one Irish national economy: a nationally oppressed economy. Since the combined exploitation of Ireland bore the same uniform character in relation to every part of Ireland (capitalist exchange relations of production), it eventually evolved into combined national exploitation which was ultimately, form the end of the 18th century onwards, expressed in the form of the oppressed Irish nation.
Put very simply and succinctly, the modern Irish nation was a result of the following historical process. Through commodity exchange relations, the universal and combined indirect exploitation of the Irish producers by British capitalism led to the creation of an oppressed Irish bourgeoisie. Through their increasing penetration and growing regularity, these relations together with production itself, created new classes. By this means the growth of an Irish merchant bourgeoisie was stimulated which involved, although restrictedly on account of British exploitation, increased concentration and centralisation of wealth. The consequences of this, of course, was the growth of industrial capital at the centres that had been produced by trade and hence the creation of an Irish industrial bourgeoisie; the small Irish industrial producer was increasingly becoming a common sight along the economic landscape. Growing peasant differentiation was another result of commodity production as was the increasing number of small bourgeois traders. And all these developments of course, were rooted in the social division of labour. Thus an oppressed Irish bourgeoisie together with a circumscribed home market were formed.
But for
"the complete victory of commodity production, the bourgeoisie must capture the home market, and there must be politically united territories whose population speak a single language, with all obstacles to the development of that language and to its consolidation in literature eliminated. Therein is the economic foundations of national movements. Unity and unimpeded development of language are the most important conditions for genuinely free and extensive commerce on a scale commensurate with modern capitalism, for a free and broad grouping of the population in all its various classes and, lastly, for the establishment of a close connection between the market and each and every proprietor, big or little, and between seller and buyer.
Therefore, the tendency of every national movement is towards the formation of national states, under which these requirements of modern capitalism are best satisfied. The most profound economic factors drive towards this goal, and, therefore, for the whole of Western Europe, nay, for the entire civilised world, the national state is typical and normal for the capitalist world." (Lenin: The Right of Nations to Self-Determination).
However history was to prove that the Irish bourgeoisie was too weak and divided to succeed in achieving "the formation of an independent national state." (ibidem)
With the development of trade both internally and externally and consequently the emergence of an Irish bourgeoisie and home commodity market, the social division of labour progressively unites all commodity producers into a unified "productive organism" whose parts are mutually related and conditioned (Rubin; Essays on Marx’s Theory of Value). And since the producers are inseparably inter-connected and mutually dependent through the commodity production relations the basis is formed for the advancement of a common language and culture. This historical movement gives rise to a mass national struggle for the establishment of an independent national state which is a central political weapon through which to establish the political conditions best suited to the promotion of capitalist production and a common language and culture. Clearly then, the creation of an oppressed Irish bourgeoisie, a circumscribed home market and the tendency towards a common language and culture are the chief ingredients that constituted the oppressed Irish nation.
World economic development brought into being a weak Irish capitalist class that was persistently denied an independent national state consisting of a centralised administration, the necessary political conditions for its development into strong independent capitalist class. This meant that the necessary political conditions best suited to the establishment of both a common language and culture were not achieved and that consequently the nation continued to exist in an oppressed condition. This is clearly manifested today in the extremely weak and divided nature of the Irish bourgeoisie as well as in the noticeably divided nature of Irish language and culture the Irish bourgeoisie is an imperialist dependent class, in decline, while objectively the Irish proletariat is much stronger and, in contrast, has been growing in material strength. It is now the only class capable of conquering political power through the establishment of an Irish workers’ republic.
To sum up: Ireland suffered oppression at the hands of the British ruling class while its nature determined the character of Ireland’s economic development. This oppression manifested itself in many diverse forms, one of its chief forms was the uneven and combined development of the northern and southern sectors of the national economy. Furthermore, British exploitation determined the peculiar character of Ireland’s growth into a modern nation and consequently, the complex problems facing the Irish working class in the class struggle. British capitalism crested the Irish nation, but, equally, it created the conditions obstructing its development into an independent bourgeois nation state. Independent economic development is generally not possible in a nationally oppressed country in the epoch of the decay of capitalism.