a marxist history of the world- counterfire

[frogwoman]

The dialectical tension between value and use-value in the commodity form requires that this “double character” be materially externalized. It appears “doubled” as money (the manifest form of value) and as the commodity (the manifest form of use-value). Although the commodity is a social form expressing both value and use-value, the effect of this externalization is that the commodity appears only as its use-value dimension, as purely material and “thingly.” Money, on the other hand, then appears as the sole repository of value, as the manifestation of the purely abstract, rather than as the externalized manifest form of the value dimension of the commodity itself.


I might be being really thick but I don't really understand this paragraph, and there are loads of others I don't understand either

 

[JimW]

where he talks about the "thingly nature" of something, etc

Right, found it. That's the bit where Postone offers his "brief analysis of the way in which capitalist social relations present themselves" and does what it says on the tin really - he's highlighting that peculiarity of the commodity form in that it appears as things but hides a social relationship. On the other hand, money appears as an abstract but is an "externalised manifest form of the value dimension of the commodity" - it's hiding something concrete. Then goes on to say that capitalist social relations don't appear as what they are but as an apparent opposition between the thing and the abstract which seems natural but in fact hides social and historical realities. An "anti-capitalism" that just opposes the 'abstract' misses out on the capitalist social relations inherent in 'concrete' labour (in the example he gives of Proudhon).

 

[frogwoman]

So if I've understood this correctly his arguement is that Nazi justification for the holocaust was based on a very crude "anti-capitalism" without much sophistication or logic to the argument (he mentions platitudes like "money is the cause of all evil" etc?)

 

[JimW]

So if I've understood this correctly his arguement is that Nazi justification for the holocaust was based on a very crude "anti-capitalism" without much sophistication or logic to the argument (he mentions platitudes like "money is the cause of all evil" etc?)

More like Nazism as a social movement was possible because it had this "anti-capitalist" gloss, which was clearly the tenor of the times (anti-capitalist responses of all sorts in those post WWI decades) but was based on a horrible error that involved seeing only the abstract part of capitalist social relations and then pinning all that on the Jews.

 

[ayatollah]

More like Nazism as a social movement was possible because it had this "anti-capitalist" gloss, which was clearly the tenor of the times (anti-capitalist responses of all sorts in those post WWI decades) but was based on a horrible error that involved seeing only the abstract part of capitalist social relations and then pinning all that on the Jews.

I think you've nicely summed up his position in broad outline , in just a few lines , JimW. Pity Postone couldn't have been a lot more clear with his argument. If it twists ones brain to try and understand a point being made, the likelihood is that the argument is being made badly in my experience, or simply to add unwarrented "academic gravitas" to a perfectly easily explained point.

 

[JimW]

I think you've nicely summed up his position in broad outline , in just a few lines , JimW. Pity Postone couldn't have been a lot more clear with his argument. If it twists ones brain to try and understand a point being made, the likelihood is that the argument is being made badly in my experience, or simply to add unwarrented "academic gravitas" to a perfectly easily explained point.

I definitely don't find his sort of writing easy either, but he does by and large seem to use the jargon with precision and to say something, as of course he has a few more complicated points to add too -why specifically anti-Semitism versus other available bigotries etc. But surely must be a better middle ground between bullet points and brain-twisters.
Not read much else by him but IIRC his longer books on Marxism get flak for being very academese, but also praised for having some genuine insights. Better informed posters here can say which, but was the one on Work and Time I think (not read it)

 

[elbows]

There is a jargon problem with this sort of work, which I moaned about just the other day. But having just read that piece I am at least thankful that he repeats his point in enough ways that it does not seem necessary to fully understand some of the more brain-bending paragraphs. Or at least I am left with some clues as to which concepts to explore further. The abstract and the concrete in particular, especially as mistakes along these lines have not gone away and have been apparent in the response to the financial crisis.

 

[JimW]

There is a jargon problem with this sort of work, which I moaned about just the other day. But having just read that piece I am at least thankful that he repeats his point in enough ways that it does not seem necessary to fully understand some of the more brain-bending paragraphs. Or at least I am left with some clues as to which concepts to explore further. The abstract and the concrete in particular, especially as mistakes along these lines have not gone away and have been apparent in the response to the financial crisis.

That's the bit that stood out for me on a re-read as well, put his finger on why all this talk of bankers was missing the point, something I've struggled to explain when arguing with people who say it.

 

[barney_pig]

I have enjoyed the small amount of Postone that I have read.

 

[ViolentPanda]

this isn't a serious analyses you dickhead, its a 1440 word article.

It's an article that presents itself as serious analysis.

I never said anybody claimed it was central, I'm explaining to frog woman my opinion as to a possible reason why he left it out, as you agree it isn't central to understanding the dynamics of the conflict.

You're (as usual) missing the point: It doesn't need to be central to the socio-political and socio-economic causes of WW2 to be a central determinant of how the war was what it was. Any "history of the world" that ignores such a massive secondary factor isn't worth writing, let alone wiping one's arse on.

even in your own statements you outline how it was a means to an end, the German ruling classes wish to line their pockets, expand their holdings, and embed their influence, there aim wasn't the final solution.

Cause and effect.

The final solution was the aim of a tiny minority. A minority with enough power to cow into submission those who opposed it, and those who acquiesced to achieve other aims, fair enough. in my opinion to say the final solution was central to the aims of the German ruling class, is to put the cart before the horse. The aims of the ruling class in the Second World War, remained the same as they were in the First World War.

Not true. WW1 wasn't about eastward expansion or the effects of eastward expansion. WW2 was.

I'd be interested in you expanding on this.

It's quite simple. Aerial confirmation of the location of various camps and their supply lines didn't occur until early '44, by which time most air-power was diverted to the "carpet bombing" of German cities with a large manufacturing base, and the rail termini and interchanges therein.
It's also sadly the case that any mission to bomb the lines to the deathcamps (i.e. into Poland) in any meaningful way would have put most of the allied bomber groups at the very edge of performance viability in terms of fuel consumption, as well as exposing them to far greater hazard in terms of traversing defended enemy territory. Bomber Command weren't willing to risk losing a significant percentage of craft over and above their usual losses.

again, it was a 1400 word article, I doubt Neil would deny his work could be complemented with further investigation. feel free to point to some complimentary analysis.

anyway thanks for your input, you have agreed with the two central points I wanted to make.
1. The imperialist war analysis works.
2. The Holocaust is not central to understanding the above kind of analysis.

To be fair to Neil, I think in 1400 words he has found A most expeditious way of challenging the dominant ideas about the Second World War. A challenging way that may cause people not as knowledgeable as yourself, to investigate further. now whilst I wouldn't condemn anybody for criticising it, and offering complimentary analysis, I think "having a bit of fun with it" is just sectarian bullshit.
but what can you expect from a bunch of sectarian wankers.

You're an idiot.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Neil has tried to give A 1440 word explanation of the Second World War. Because of that brevity, he has had to cut cut cut. in my opinion he has concentrated on the key points, which are most likely to challenge the dominant ideas about the Second World War.

You're confusing centrality with importance. Was the Holocaust central? No, because until '41 some of the Nazi hierachy still saw Jews as an exploitable asset. Is the Holocaust important to explaining how the war played out? Massively.

 

[Pickman's model]

what serious point?

that you don't think an article of but 1440 words can contain a serious analysis

 

[TremulousTetra]

To take up a point made at the end of post #72 MP3:


is Hitler part of the ruling class, from a Marxist perspective? Do he and his group control the means of production? How autonomous was Nazism? Will the real Nazism please stand up?

This does raise the rather thorny issue of quite what a "Marxist perspective" actually is. A crude reductionist "Marxism" sees "all history as the history of class struggle" for instance (Ok the Communist Manifesto was a crude propagandist pamphlet for the International Workingmens Association, not Marx's considered view necessarily, but it does colour a lot of subsequent "Marxist analysis").. which is quite obviously bullshit, (eg, explain the rise of the Mongol Empire simply though Class Struggle ) but not as catchy as "Throughout history there's been quite a lot of class struggle, which has sometimes been an important driver of events and change" 1.Also, the crude reductionist view that the "ideological superstructure" is completely dependant on , and a direct reflection of , the "economic base" and ruling class interests, rather than often it itself being a semi-independent driver of events, reflecting back on the structure and operations of the economic base, stands in the way of understanding events quite often.

By 1941 and the move to mass industrialised extermination of the Jews, Gypsies, etc, etc, it is quite clear that, whatever their initial cynical, tactical, accomodation with the racial madness of Nazism had originally been, the 2.German Capitalist class was a completely cowed, subordinate player, to the ideology driven dynamic of the Nazi hierarchy and their racist global vision, and they and much of German society generally, had become entranced by the poisonous anti-Semitic ideological world view of Nazism, so that this, rather than the conventional imperialist objectives which drove Germany on the road to WWI, had become one of the PRIME war objectives of the mass of the German population and state - so indoctrinated had they become by relentless Nazi propaganda -- ie, the German state and people were "living the dream", not operating in relation to rational, economics-based, objectives at all.

By 1941, there is an argument that Germany under the by then total control of society by NAZIS had moved significantly away from conventional capitalism - to a peculiar new hybrid "NAZI SS State form" in which conventional market forces temporarily subsumed under wartime planned allocation systems would become permanent (a Planned permanent genocidal expansionist war economy) , combined with the gigantic and ever increasing usage of slave labour at all levels, substituting for wage labourers, industrial and domestic. So that, had for instance, the Nazis made less military tactical mistakes, and got the A bomb first (quite possible - without some mistakes by key German scientists) and won the war in Europe and the Soviet Union, the genocidal, expansionist SS militarist state that would have emerged would have been some quite new sort of industrial slave state, with closer connections to the economic model of Stalinist state capitalism (also using hordes of slave labourers for major projects - but not on the scale of 1940's Germany), than anything that had gone before -- consuming its captive populations in a frenzy of extermination and slave labour whilst ever greater numbers of military age Germans and their collaborators engaged in permanent warfare with the world power blocs led by , on the one hand, the USA, and on the other Japan.. Far fetched possibly, but the operational and ideological dynamics of Nazism in full flood should serve to discourage over-reductionist "Marxist" assumptions about the historical process. In particular a crude Marxism reductionism fails to alert us to the bizarre "circus of reaction" social forms capitalism can resort to rather than give up its power . Remember for much of the 30's the Left just assumed that "the unstoppable force of history" guaranteed the victory of socialism.. "After Hitler.. us" they said, as the round up squads came for the Left. No such automatic dynamic for proletarian victory exists in history I'm afraid.

Two points I've highlighted in your post, one and two.

1. From what you have said, I think you may have been at the Manchester SWP district educational where, I think it was Colin Barker, took up the issue of comrades incessantly using the phrase, the superstructure reflecting the economic base. He rubbished the idea of reflections. And he went on to make an analogy with the tug-of-war, where movement in one team effects the other team. Likewise the base and superstructure are in a dialectical relationship, not a reflective relationship. I have raised that point many times on here at much greater length, so I do agree with you about that.

Another example is the American Civil War. People spoke about the inevitability of the forces of production leading to a victory for the northern states. However, it wasn't the forces of production that ran into battle and won those victories, it was men and women with real dreams and aspirations in the heart.

2. I hadn't read this comment, when I made a similar comment in one of my posts.

my initial comments to this thread, were referring to the remarks made by piggy NOT NF.

Some fun may be had with the latest installment of this series on counterfuck website.
Niel Faulkner has written an 'interesting' account of ww2 which was, apparently, an entirely imperialist conflict, which was marked by horrific massacres by the western powers and soviet union, while the Germans were simply attempting to regain a fair division of imperialist spoils. No holocaust, no death camps, no mass slaughter of Jews, slavs, gypsies, homosexuals etc. No mass terror of civilian populations ( except by the allies).
There is a comments box, can anyone get something past the clusterfuck moderators?

I haven't read the article, and I'm sure your rendition of it is somewhat cartoonesque, but it sounds like a pretty reasonable analysis to me. Is there a better 1400 word analysis you have in mind?

PS I quite liked his stuff in the past on the fall of the Roman Empire. So, I may be biased.. lol

I find the imperialist war and the suggestion that the Germans were interested in a division of the imperialist spoils, a reasonable analysis. Not the only analysis, but reasonable analysis. I don't think this analysis is worthy of ridicule or so gross to have elicited this kind of response.

I think it is a good power relations analysis of how and why the first and Second World War's happened. However, as I said, the German ruling class sought to ride the tiger, never knowing they'd end up inside her. If you are going to do a fuller analysis, a fuller history of the Second World War, you would have to go beyond the crudeness of the 1400 word article, you would go on to a lot of what you have started to point to.

 

[TremulousTetra]

It's an article that presents itself as serious analysis.

no it doesn't. it's a 1400 word newspaper piece.

You're (as usual) missing the point: It doesn't need to be central to the socio-political and socio-economic causes of WW2 to be a central determinant of how the war was what it was. Any "history of the world" that ignores such a massive secondary factor isn't worth writing, let alone wiping one's arse on.

I think you're missing the point.he is looking at it from the global, international perspective, not the perspective of Germany like you are. Was the Holocaust central to the actions Britain, or as he said Churchill motivated by maintaining empire? Were the Americans interested in the Holocaust, or extending their interests abroad? And even the German ruling class, INITIALLY! Did they want a war to create the final solution? Or did they want a war to overcome the problems Hitler's 'solutions' had created? wasn't Germany reduced to a barter economy, as internationally the currency was worthless? They certainly didn't have access to raw materials, markets, etc necessary to an industrial economy. And even Churchill himself acknowledged, the British road to victory on a wave of oil, expansion for germany was vital.

I cant do justice to the arguments involved in short posts, but the thing that plays on my mind throughout this discussion is the question, how autonomous were the Nazis? The price of power, was that swathes of Nazi ideology was jettisoned. Anticapitalism etc. The German economy was not immune from international pressures. Which meant Hitler wasn't immune from international pressures. By the end of the war yes, the insanity gripped the nation, to the point where even though those who might see this would cost everything, could do nothing. Once again, the German ruling class start to ride a tiger.........

 

[butchersapron]

This - and your earlier posts - are the perfect examples of crude economic base determines superstructure as it it's possible to get. Stalin would be embarrassed.

 

[TremulousTetra]

that you don't think an article of but 1440 words can contain a serious analysis

My 1st post.

I haven't read the article, and I'm sure your rendition of it is somewhat cartoonesque, but it sounds like a pretty reasonable analysis to me. Is there a better 1400 word analysis you have in mind?

PS I quite liked his stuff in the past on the fall of the Roman Empire. So, I may be biased.. lol

A link will do Pick.

 

[butchersapron]

Btw, its not a 1400 article, it's 3000 words and two key chapters of a 100 000 word plus book.

 

[TremulousTetra]

This - and your earlier posts - are the perfect examples of crude economic base determines superstructure as it it's possible to get. Stalin would be embarrassed.

No, your missing the point, I'm putting the counter arguments ONLY to "you HAVE TO talk about the holocaust". It is possible to shed some light upon the events of the Second World War, without talking about the Holocaust.

 

[revol68]

The Holocaust may be irrelevant for the allies motives for going to war but in an article that mentions a number of atrocities carried out during the war it's pretty mental to not mention the holocaust, it's almost like the author thinks that the holocaust serves to retrospectively null the allies actual reasons, or atleast that readers might think so. Basically it's typical Socialist Worker paper crap, where complexities and grey areas are either papered over or simply ignored out of the patronising notion that the proles needn't know these details,just jump behind the party line instead.

 

[butchersapron]

No, your missing the point, I'm putting the counter arguments to "you HAVE

No. You are makings hilariously crude base determines superstructure case. The only thing that matters was the economy. It's laughable. Your party did in fact laugh it away years ago.

 

[JHE]

The Holocaust may be irrelevant for the allies motives for going to war but in an article that mentions a number of atrocities carried out during the war it's pretty mental to not mention the holocaust, it's almost like the author thinks that the holocaust serves to retrospectively null the allies actual reasons, or atleast that readers might think so. Basically it's typical Socialist Worker paper crap, where complexities and grey areas are either papered over or simply ignored out of the patronising notion that the proles needn't know these details,just jump behind the party line instead.

Social Worker can certainly be patronising. It can also be badly written and very inaccurate. I've seen nothing to suggest Counterfire is an improvement. In this particular case, though, it seems unlikely that Faulkner wants to treat the Holocaust as a mere detail (as M Le Pen once said it was). It is much more likely that it will get a whole chapter in the Marxoid History of the Universe or whatever the series is called.

 

[TremulousTetra]

Btw, its not a 1400 article, it's 3000 words and two key chapters of a 100 000 word plus book.

Fucking hell butch, I think the imperialist analysis of the first and second world war, is a pretty reasonable analysis, is there a better analysis you have in mind?

 

[butchersapron]

Fucking hell butch, I think the imperialist analysis of the first and second world war, is a pretty reasonable analysis, is there a better analysis you have in mind?

So what if it is? As presented by you here it's a shambling crude disgrace.

 

[DotCommunist]

frogwoman posting

this crude reductionist anti imperialist shit is what makes us look like cunts. i dont buy the fact that the main reason why the allies went to war was because of imperialism anyway - they did it to preserve their own power base in the wake of expansionism by germany. self interest? sure. but don't let your rush to condemn imperialist violence and the crimes of the allies mean that you end up portraying fascism as some kind of thing that's only seen as uniquely bad because the allies were the victors of the war.

 

[TremulousTetra]

No. You are makings hilariously crude base determines superstructure case. The only thing that matters was the economy. It's laughable. Your party did in fact laugh it away years ago.

Well if I believed the base determined the superstructure, or vice versa as some seem to be arguing in this thread, I would be wrong. But I don't, so I ain't. Have a nice day.

 

[TremulousTetra]

So what if it is? As presented by you here it's a shambling crude disgrace.

is there a better analysis you have in mind?

 

[TremulousTetra]

frogwoman posting

this crude reductionist anti imperialist shit is what makes us look like cunts. i dont buy the fact that the main reason why the allies went to war was because of imperialism anyway - they did it to preserve their own power base in the wake of expansionism by germany. self interest? sure. but don't let your rush to condemn imperialist violence and the crimes of the allies mean that you end up portraying fascism as some kind of thing that's only seen as uniquely bad because the allies were the victors of the war.

What?

 

[butchersapron]

Well if I believed the base determined the superstructure, or vice versa as some seem to be arguing in this thread, I would be wrong. But I don't, so I ain't. Have a nice day.

It is however what you have 'argued' - literally all you have said is that only economics counts (and you even get the economics wrong). It's scary just how crudely have reduced a very complex issue.

 

[TremulousTetra]

It is however what you have 'argued' - literally all you have said is that only economics counts (and you even get the economics wrong). It's scary just how crudely have reduced a very complex issue.

In a forum post!

 

[butchersapron]

is there a better analysis you have in mind?

Apart from giving you one myself and referencing others you mean? Or do you mean when I answered your demand for something equally shit yesterday?