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Re: [ox-en] Copyfarleft: Response to Stefan Meretz



Hi Michel and all,

On 2008-01-09 09:41, Michael Bauwens wrote:
I feel completely missinterpreted having an orthodox
marxist perspective (and I wrote it explictly in my paper). This is
completely wrong. In my
view the opposite is true: You follow an orthodox marxist approach,
while saying you don't. However, while following a traditional

I think neither of you has a traditional marxist approach, I don't
think Oekonux has, and neither is Dmytri, which I think uses a lot of
pre-Marxist analyst, and I don't mean that in any pejorative sense. I
think you both use the Marxist legacy in an open manner,
accepting/rejecting various parts according to what you both see as
the new requirements of the times

From a meta perspective of the dispute one can say, that sharp 
distinctions may help in getting new findings. This taken into account 
I play a role in that sense. When arguing I mean it serious of course, 
but not too serious.

don't want to improve capitalism, I don't want to talk about better
ways of earning a living inside capitalism. However, don't
missunderstand this rejection: Of course, we all have to make our
living inside capitalism by using capitalist forms (by fulfilling
the roles of being a capitalist
or a worker). This is our daily life. However, this has nothing to
do with any emancipatory approach. There is no emancipation inside
capitalism.

Stefan: I do actually think that Oekonux has many accomodationist
features ,i.e. you are happy to see free software grow within the
existing capitalist system, and your form of struggle takes the form
of a constructive approach in support of free software. I use
accomodationism again without pejorative intent.

What do you mean with accomodation? Having a bed in a hostel? Or 
adaption? Sorry for asking stupid questions...

I actually disagree with your last statement: "there is no
emancipation" within capitalism. No absolute emancipation, of course,

When you mean capitalism-overcoming with absolute, then I agree. And I 
agree that there is "relative" emancipation in capitalism, however, in 
my view the best times for relative emancipation (I would call it 
civilization) are over.

the very system is based on alienation, but within the system, which
is the only one we have, there can be various degrees of surplus
allocated, power balances, and rights for the producers vs. the
owners. One of the features of neoliberalism has been to drastically
reduce the surplus value going to the producers,

You mean the immediate producers (workers)?

but it has been 
different in different epochs. The reason I'm saying this is that we
should proceed not on the basis of absolute claims, but that, keeping
them in mind, we should see how we can advance, both within and
'without' capitalism. Anything that strengthens the freedom, equality
and part of the surplus going to the real producers is an advance,

Agreed. The question is what a strenghen of freedoms means. In view 
copyfarleft weakens freedom, although it is aimed at securing closed 
but commonly used resources.

and until we get there, we will never know if a total alienation-free
society is really possible.

True. However, we should think of it today, not when sitting in another 
trap like real socialism etc. This is why I make my intervention here.

I'm personally wearly of all or nothing approaches, in which, from a
position of absolute purity, everything which actually concretely
makes the lives of the many better, is rejected.

Free software makes the lives of the many better _because_ it is an 
expansion of freedom. I am a radical freedomist;-) Let's expand the 
principles of free software to physical spheres. That's Christians 
approach I like (peerconomy.org).

I am not interested in solutions for some partial groups on costs
of others. I am interested in solutions, where the selbstentfaltung
of an indivdual is the precondition of the selbstentfaltung of all
-- and vice versa.

Sure, but since the existing reality is all we have, you can only
operate from within it.

In this general sense it is true. But it is too general. I propose to 
check every idea on whether it operates in the mode "on costs of 
others" or in the (free software) mode "selbstentfaltung being the 
preconditon of the selbstentfaltung of others -- and vice versa"

There is no principal improvement of capitalism. Current capitalism
as a self-organizing economy is by its logic the best capitalism we
can get.

I don't understanding the meaning of this, sounds like Hegel or
Leibniz 'best or realities' ... Realities are co-constructed, through
struggles and world-creation etc... it can go many ways, the current
situation is certainly not optimal, and not the only potential
available ... If the feminist and anti-racial movement had thought
that way, just letting capitalist self-organization proceed, the
situation would be infinitely worse.

I want to address that we -- seeking for (partial or absolute) 
emancipation -- are part of the game. The self-organizing logic of 
capitalism is the most effective stabilization and development 
mechanism we have in history. Capitalism needs opposition, need 
irritation, needs movements pointing on "unjust" circumstances etc. 
However, basing on inclusion/exclusion logic this self-organzing logic 
operates against the majority of people. A cybernetic machine is not 
interested in climate change, except, when you can make money from.
And this logic includes a somewhat deadly end: It eliminates 
systematically the basis where it is living from: eating labour and 
transforming labour to value.

This is not a luxury I use, I only claim, what is. Capitalism bases
on exchange of equals. Its the law. Read any constitution.

but the constitution is not applied, the theory is just that, a
fiction ... so let's not proceed as if it were true

I think more or less, the constitution is applied. Arbitrariness and 
infringements are not the rule, we live in a democracy with shared 
power. This cannot be simply denunciated as fake or bourgeois ideology.

Ciao,
Stefan

-- 
Start here: www.meretz.de
_________________________________
Web-Site: http://www.oekonux.org/
Organization: http://www.oekonux.de/projekt/
Contact: projekt oekonux.de



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