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   Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 06:00:59 JST Rasmus Fleischer

   It doesn't matter if you call it communism or anarchism or just human emancipation – here is a four-point, spot-on, invariant definition of its horizon

   (I've always been a bit sceptical of Alain Badiou, but this just nails it.)

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     Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 17:01:08 JST Rasmus Fleischer

     in reply to

     btw, can anyone help me decode #Badiou's reference to "what #Marx called the polymorphous worker", i.e. which original German term is so translated?

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     Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 17:57:44 JST Rasmus Fleischer

     in reply to

     • Loukas Christodoulou

     @Loukas "What does it mean to organize?" is a very relevant question indeed!
     I'd say (with Marx) that the capitalist mode of production – just like that complex of social forms we call "the state" – is very much organized by humans. But we organize it mostly in a non-relective way, "behind our backs".
     I do not say that a deliberate exit would be easy. But I also don't think that capitalism (or the state-form) can reproduce itself. So in the end it is up to us humans if what comes after will be something better or worse.

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     Loukas Christodoulou (loukas@mastodon.nu)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 17:57:45 JST Loukas Christodoulou

     in reply to

     @rasmusfleischer I'm hoping that it's part of Marx's classical frame of reference and is an original Greek term for him as well.

     On the other point - it begs the question. Is it actually possible to organise society and organise production?

     Is capitalism an 'organisation' or just an outcome? It strikes me that anything that replaces 'capitalism' will have to be likewise based on accidental outcomes as much as policy decisions.

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     Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 18:25:10 JST Rasmus Fleischer

     in reply to

     • kravietz 🦇
     • Loukas Christodoulou

     @kravietz @Loukas Thank you for your remarks & links – will print it for reading later today.

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     kravietz 🦇 (kravietz@agora.echelon.pl)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 18:25:11 JST kravietz 🦇

     in reply to

     • Loukas Christodoulou

     @rasmusfleischer @Loukas

     But this is already happening, at least as it comes to items 1-3. Current social and economic reality of most countries in the world includes a very broad spectrum of entities, some of them operating for profit and on private property, and some operating on non-profit basis and on public property. And in the same way, countries described as “communist” such as China (following their self-description) also have a very diverse economy, incorporating private sector, which in China outputs over 60% of the GDP (which I have actually realized when I started to analyze Chinese economy disputing their labeling as “communist” by both right-wing opponents, as well as left-wing supporters claiming “China proves success of communism”):

     https://write.as/arcadian/communist-china-really

     The success of countries with hybrid economy (and EU economies are already classified as “socialist” by its critics from US and UK due to large share of public sector, while ignoring the large share of private sector) is in their flexibility and ability to respond quickly to changing external environment. Private and public sector have very different characteristics and respond to different challenges. Denying either of them for ideological reasons always leads to an impaired economy.

     This could be clearly seen in the Eastern Bloc in 20th century, but also in some sectors in the US, where neoliberalism is an ideological limiting factor. Here however comes yet another important difference - this ideological bias in the US is probably strongest out of Western countries, but is still a fraction of the ideology-imposed cognitive bias in the USSR and the Eastern Bloc. Which is precisely why USSR has collapsed, and US has not.

     Now as it comes to postulates raised by Badiou, it’s not really evident from the context to what extent he raises them as a general direction of development of humanity (in which case they are already happening), and to what as hard goals that must be not merely proposed but actually enforced.

     Because this Marxist radicalism, which categorically insisted on a “violent revolution” as means of “cleansing the society” in order to then rebuild it from scratch, was exactly what Bertrand Russell described as the factor that planted the seeds of collapse in the Soviet project back in 1920’s:

     https://write.as/arcadian/a-socialist-view-on-the-beginning-of-the-bolshevik-revolution

     And having so far skipped Badiou’s 4th postulate, I’m a bit concerned that he might actually share that radicalism, because if “dismantling the state” is “possible”, then the logical next step would be to start “dismantling” it, which is what all revolutionaries are claiming they do.

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     Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 18:31:10 JST Rasmus Fleischer

     in reply to

     • kravietz 🦇
     • Loukas Christodoulou

     @kravietz @Loukas For now, I just want to say that indeed, "post-capitalism" is already happening – in a myriad of ways, some of which are promising, others pointing in very dystopian directions.
     As for point 4, we see both an increasing number of "failed states" and contradictory forms of supranational sovereignty (which does not mean that capitalism can do without its established state-form). I also think that Graeber & Wengrow (The dawn of everything) makes some really useful remarks on what we mean by "the state".

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     Rasmus Fleischer (rasmusfleischer@tldr.nettime.org)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 19:14:51 JST Rasmus Fleischer

     in reply to

     • Loukas Christodoulou

     @Loukas 100 % agree that capitalism is not the creation of one certain class and that its abolition cannot be thought as the triumph of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie.
     #wertkritik

   • Embed this notice
     Loukas Christodoulou (loukas@mastodon.nu)'s status on Friday, 17-Mar-2023 19:14:52 JST Loukas Christodoulou

     in reply to

     @rasmusfleischer I agree it's up to us - or rather I agree that this is the only meaningful political stance.

     However I just want to avoid the idea that there is a definite bourgeoise which produces a defined capitalism and fall into the trap that a similarly defined proletariat would produce a defined socialism.

     Because often what happens is a state of affairs made up of a mess of unintended outcomes. Which is why I'm sceptical of the idea you can organise freedom (TM Björk)