Life Without Money : Wed 30 May

[Jean-Luc]

Discussion on recent book Life Without Money edited by Anitra Nelson and Frans Timmerman.
Join Derek Wall (Green Party councillor, former Principal Speaker for the Green Party and author of Babylon and Beyond, The Rise of the Green Left) in conversation with editor and contributor Anitra Nelson (over from Australia) and contributor Adam Buick (regularly published in the Socialist Standard) at
Bolivar Hall, 54 Grafton Way, London W1T 5DL, on Wednesday 30 May at 7.30pm (off Tottenham Court Road, nearest tube: Warren Street).

Come and participate in this stimulating discussion on why we, as a society, need to go money-free and how we might do it. Come and comment, question and bring stories of your experiences.

 

[love detective]

get rid of the pope and retain catholicism

 

[Jean-Luc]

get rid of the pope and retain catholicism

You mean, as opposed to getting rid of catholicism and retaining the pope?

 

[love detective]

as opposed to getting rid of catholicsm

 

[littlebabyjesus]

From the blurb for the book: they explore

a collective labour-credit system

or

money

as it is sometimes known.

 

[Jean-Luc]

as opposed to getting rid of catholicsm

But how could you get rid of catholicism without getting rid of the pope?

 

[love detective]

The point being made is what is the point of getting rid of the pope and retaining catholicism

 

[goldenecitrone]

But how could you get rid of catholicism without getting rid of the pope?

Ask Henry VIII.

 

[Hocus Eye.]

Well that's one thread successfully hi-jacked. I suppose it saves entering into debate.

 

[love detective]

what do you mean hijacked?

My post was a criticism of the view that you could just get rid of money and that will somehow magically get rid of the underlying debilitating essence/logic (which gives rise to the expression that is money) that underpins a capitalist system

hence the analogy to it being like getting rid of the pope (money) but retaining catholicism (capitalist social relations)

the ills that money causes in a capitalist system are an expression of that system, not its cause

 

[Jean-Luc]

The point being made is what is the point of getting rid of the pope and retaining catholicism

Agreed, there is no point in trying to get rid of money while retaining capitalism (in fact, it couldn't be done or wouldn't last very long) but equally can capitalism be abolished without also abolishing money?

You're on record in another thread (the one on "Why We Need Communism") as wanting to retain the pope (or at least the parish priest) when you wrote, for instance:

This is because if productive assets are held & managed in common, and the distribution of the fruits of those productive assets managed in an equitable manner and according to need, then the existence of private ownership of personal items in no way contradicts the aims & objectives of that society. In fact the existence of some kind of secondary market could actually facilitate the smooth distribution of the collectively produced use values between people. If my child has a small bike and has grown to big for it, and someone down the road has a small child who wants to learn to ride a bike and someone else further down the road has a child who is nearly grown up and no use for their bigger childs bike. An effective redistribution of those originally distributed use values could take place to ensure the ongoing needs & wants of society's citizens are met. Now the effective redistribution of those bikes is not likely to happen by barter as that demands that all parties are close by each other and have things that the other wants. So some kind of money token would need to be used to facilitate the redistribution of things between these parties. So here we have 'money' being used within a 'market' within a non exploitative society for non exploitative ends, i.e. being used in a manner consistent with the objectives of the society it is part of - to ensure the efficient distribution of use values to those who need them.[/quote}

 

[littlebabyjesus]

ld's quoted post is an illustration of what money is for. It might seem an obvious point, but why would you want to get rid of it? There is also the question of personal choice in consumption. In a system of equitable ownership, there still needs to be a means of rationing finite resources and allowing people to pursue their own paths - that means some kind of money, some kind of token representing value that allows people to consume their share of resources in the way that they want to consume them. I can't see any way around that, and I also don't see any reason to want to find a way around it.

 

[love detective]

You're on record in another thread (the one on "Why We Need Communism") as wanting to retain the pope (or at least the parish priest) when you wrote, for instance

can capitalism be abolished without also abolishing money?:

what i've said there is entirely consistent with what i'm arguing here - i.e. if a more progressive society is ever to come about, then the essence of the current mode of organising society (the production of use values as commodities by wage labour) needs to be obliterated and not just its surface/phenomenal expressions

the pope is an expression of catholicism

money as we know it today is an expression of capitalism

getting rid of either the pope or money in isolation (if either was even possible) as expressions of their underlying essence does not confront that underlying essence and left untouched something else would crystalise/manifest from that essence to replace what was temporarily constrained

some kind of money token however which itself was a crystalisation/manifestation of an entirely different set of underlying social relations would be entirely consistent with those underlying social relations

so clearly money as we know it today (i.e money within capitalism) would also be obliterated if its underlying essence which produces it was obliterated, but there's nothing to fear from some kind of 'money like token' arising from a new set of social relations, if a problem did arise with it it would be a problem with the underlying social relations that gave rise to it

 

[kenny g]

Interesting approach LD. Are you coming to share it at the meeting? My response would be that the need for a money-like-token would be a sure sign of a problem with the underlying relations.

For a blunt example, I am not sure that a "money like token" would be the best way to resolve the issue of rotting grains sitting in silos whilst people starve.

In this age where google/ facebook use complex algorithms to identify individual's potential desires, constructing a real needs satisfaction model doesn't seem as outlandish as in the past.

 

[Jean-Luc]

If my child has a small bike and has grown to big for it, and someone down the road has a small child who wants to learn to ride a bike and someone else further down the road has a child who is nearly grown up and no use for their bigger childs bike. An effective redistribution of those originally distributed use values could take place to ensure the ongoing needs & wants of society's citizens are met. Now the effective redistribution of those bikes is not likely to happen by barter as that demands that all parties are close by each other and have things that the other wants. So some kind of money token would need to be used to facilitate the redistribution of things between these parties.

Why would you need "some kind of money tokens" to recycle old tricycles? This is not even needed under capitalism. Haven't you heard of freecycle?

 

[kenny g]

There is the efficiency argument, that some means of communicating inefficiencies in production are needed so that people have sufficient information to enable them to choose not to over or wastefully consume.

Not sure that tokens would be the best way of resolving that issue though. Tokens are very much pre-telegraph IMHO.

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

Why would you need "some kind of money tokens" to recycle old tricycles? This is not even needed under capitalism. Haven't you heard of freecycle?

What if a recycled tricycle isn't what you want, for some bizarre reason? What if you've got a city of several million people and they need food, where's it going to come from?

The ideas behind money free systems tend to lead pretty quickly to advocating some sort of Year Zero agrarian commune system IME. Fine if you want to set up a small commune, not so much use generally.

 

[phildwyer]

No need to get rid of money, just abolish interest.

Money would then become once again what it should always have remained: a means to an end, not an end in itself.

It would revert to its proper function as a means of exchange, and relinquish its unnatural and usurped function as an object of exchange.

It would be relegated to the status of a merely customary, human idea. It would stop behaving as though it were an independent, living thing, with the ability to reproduce.

Is interests and aspirations would once again be subordinated to those of the human beings whose activity it represents.

Job's a good 'un.

 

[kavenism]

No need to get rid of money, just abolish interest.

Money would then become once again what it should always have remained: a means to an end, not an end in itself.

It would revert to its proper function as a means of exchange, and relinquish its unnatural and usurped function as an object of exchange.

It would be relegated to the status of a merely customary, human idea. It would stop behaving as though it were an independent, living thing, with the ability to reproduce.

Is interests and aspirations would once again be subordinated to those of the human beings whose activity it represents.

Job's a good 'un.

That's an interesting idea. Under Islamic law earning interest is banned. Does anyone know if that fact is known to have a direct effect on inflation rates? What's the comparison on rates of inflation in Islamic countries compared with the West?

 

[butchersapron]

Under Islamic law earning interest is hidden - not done away with.

 

[Jean-Luc]

No need to get rid of money, just abolish interest.

How? But, more important, what would be the point? Profit would still be left and it's production for sale on a market with a view to a money profit that's the problem, not lending money at interest. In fact modern interest is just a subdivision of profit.

As to Islam, Butchersapron is right. It's just hidden and called something else just as, at the end of mediaeval times, usury was hidden and called .... interest.

 

[kenny g]

The ideas behind money free systems tend to lead pretty quickly to advocating some sort of Year Zero agrarian commune system IME. Fine if you want to set up a small commune, not so much use generally.

People having to live off their own production i.e more organised form of allotments or DIY is no more a direct consequence of moving beyond money based economics than it is a result of current ways of living. Plenty of people currently subject themselves to doing DIY and allotments on their days off as they can not afford the alternatives.

 

[Jean-Luc]

What if a recycled tricycle isn't what you want, for some bizarre reason? What if you've got a city of several million people and they need food, where's it going to come from?

Same as now. Grown in fields, transported, processed and made available in stores? Why would money be needed for this? It's essentially a question of organisation. Money only comes in, under capitalism, as a measure of profitability and a means of restricting access to what has been produced. I'm sure Love Detective would agree on this.

The ideas behind money free systems tend to lead pretty quickly to advocating some sort of Year Zero agrarian commune system IME. Fine if you want to set up a small commune, not so much use generally.

That's my experience too and the book does contain contributions by people coming from here (freegans, people retreating to rural communes and what sounds like an awful community in the US using "labour-credits" called Twin Oaks). But other contributors rejects this trying to"live without money" within the confines or on the margins of capitalism and envisage a society-wide change in which money would become redundant and in which modern technology could be used to provide plenty of what people need. One chapter , by John O'Neill, specifically answers the "efficiency argument" raised by Kenny g.

 

[love detective]

Same as now. Grown in fields, transported, processed and made available in stores? Why would money be needed for this? It's essentially a question of organisation.

Agree with this, there's nothing inherent in the process of production of use values that requires money or money like tokens for it to happen - it's a question of (social & technological) organisation as you say. But what you are talking about here is primarily production. When it comes to distribution it's not quite as simple.

Money only comes in, under capitalism, as a measure of profitability and a means of restricting access to what has been produced. I'm sure Love Detective would agree on this.

Wouldn't agree with this though (as in both your description of money under capitalism, or the inference that the role of money under capitalism would have the same role in a non capitalist progressive society)

In a non-capitalist progressive society where productive assets are owned/managed in common and their usage is towards providing the use values that everyone needs to fulfill their potential as human beings - there would still need to be some system of restricting access to what has been produced.

Such a society wouldn't last very long if I could rock up to a farm as an individual and say i want to take their entire annual output for myself, and i don't care if everyone else starves to death as a result. So it's obvious that in such a society, there would need to be a means of restricting access to what has been produced (even more so if such a society was one which was faced with swathes of resource & environmental problems which meant it wasn't capable of producing an abundance of everything that was required).

Access to use values would of course be on a basis of need not money, however this process would still need to be managed/controlled to make sure that the primary purpose of that society was fulfilled and sustained (i.e. ensuring people get what they need). One way of doing this is that people just get a direct allocation of use values, appropriate to their need, from some central distribution centre. Another way is that they get regularly issued with some kind of money like tokens, appropriate to their need, which they can then use to pick up what they need from chains of decentralised distribution centres (shops) at their own convenience. Either way there would still involve some kind of system to restrict access to what has been produced. And 'money like tokens' would still be used (in an ideal sense) even if people got a direct allocation of output, as their allocation would represent 'money like tokens' which would represent their total 'need' that they can then use to draw down their share of what they need.

You might argue oh but what if people started trading/accumulating those money tokens etc - but you'd have exactly the same problems to face if there was no money like tokens as people could just trade/accumulate the use values instead (or see the emergence of one use value as an actual money currency itself), so the exact same issues would arise. But either way even if people did trade stuff, the fact that productive assets would be owned/managed in common and their usage directed towards the production of use values for need, would mean that these use values/money like tokens that people might start trading would never have the capacity to be used as capital. All the trading would represent was the recycling of previously produced use values around society from those who didn't need a particular use value any more to those who did. So nothing wrong with that, and i think I mentioned this before re a secondary market which would exist to further ensure that people got the use values they needed

So I don't see anything bad, in and off itself, of having a system to restrict access to what has been produced (i.e what you say is money's role). It would just not be the negative one that we have today which is through effective demand in the market and one that is designed to prevent people getting what they need, but a positive one designed to make sure that people get what they need (or if that cannot be done, due to environmental/resource issues, at least a fair share of what's been produced)

 

[Jean-Luc]

In a non-capitalist progressive society where productive assets are owned/managed in common and their usage is towards providing the use values that everyone needs to fulfill their potential as human beings - there would still need to be some system of restricting access to what has been produced.
Such a society wouldn't last very long if I could rock up to a farm as an individual and say i want to take their entire annual output for myself, and i don't care if everyone else starves to death as a result.

Why would you (or anyone else) want to behave in this sort of way? Why, in conditions where you would know that the stores would always be stocked with what you need, would anyone want to take any more than they needed? Surely you don't think that humans are "naturally" greedy, do you? Even today, under capitalism, this is not how people behave when things are free at the time of use. You've probably got free phone calls or texts, are you phoning or texting all day? Or only when you need to? In other words, in established and permanent conditions of open access to what they need people take only what they need.

One way of doing this is that people just get a direct allocation of use values, appropriate to their need, from some central distribution centre. Another way is that they get regularly issued with some kind of money like tokens, appropriate to their need, which they can then use to pick up what they need from chains of decentralised distribution centres (shops) at their own convenience.

This wouldn't be as bad as what happens now but I still don't like the sound of it (except perhaps if some temporary shortage occurs as through some natural disaster) as who is going to decide what an individual needs? In any event, you now seem to be envisaging "money like tokens" not just for "secondary markets" but for basic needs too.

 

[phildwyer]

Under Islamic law earning interest is hidden - not done away with.

That's arguable.

The point however is that interest (riba) is unambiguously recognized as sinful in principle. Regardless of how often the principle is transgressed in practice, that nevertheless constitutes an important theoretical and ethical advance on the West. Modern Western society recognizes no ethical objection to interest even in principle.

 

[phildwyer]

As to Islam, Butchersapron is right. It's just hidden and called something else

That's not entirely true.

Of course, nothing is absolutely forbidden to a Muslim except idolatry. As with all issues, there is a huge range of opinion and practice within Islam over what constitutes riba (though there is no dispute that riba is sinful). Broadly speaking though, it's fair to say that the ethical strictures against interest generally act as a safeguard against the kind of "financialization" of capitalism in which the West has indulged over the last 30 or so years, with its endlessly more arcane and perverse forms of usury--derivatives of derivatives etc. That whole way of thinking goes against deeply-ingrained Islamic assumptions and habits of thought, and I doubt whether that kind of capitalism could have emerged out of Islamic culture.

 

[phildwyer]

at the end of mediaeval times, usury was hidden and called .... interest.

Not really: usury was practiced on a whole new scale in Renaissance Europe, compared to Medieval.

 

[rorymac]

Personally I just wanted credit to continue forever .. the crunch has done me like a kipper
I was living within my means

Like I wasn't gambling or anything tbf

When you look out of an aeroplane you see oceans and countryside .. there's no way there's too many of us that we can't all make a decent living/wronguns aside imho

 

[SpineyNorman]

Unfortunately I don't need to imagine life without money