On Sat, 2003-05-03 at 09:28, Alison Croggon wrote:
> This is I guess a variation of the artist being "inspired" (and I
> recall we talked about childbirth and raising being also
> "unproductive labour"). Although there is a certain accuracy in
> Marx's attitude, in that only Milton could have written Milton's
> poems, I have the same problems with Paradise Lost being classified
> as unproductive labour, although no doubt perversely I totally resent
> being classified as a small business (a "lone trader") under
> Australian tax law. It elides something crucial about this kind of
> work (making poems or making children) as a human activity, lifting
> it apart from proper or productive labour. The old question, when
> are you going to get a proper job? and so on.
>
> Best
>
> A
> --
Alison, I am a bit worried about this reading or direction. But first, a
difficulty wrt Marx needs to be cleared out of the way. Marx has a
radically hands off approach to creative artists, which I support.
Revolutionary marxists have no right to tell creative writers what they
can and cannot write and then to lock them up or shoot them if they do
not comply with this demand. Unfortunately Marx's name is attached to
something called Socialist Realism, as argued by the Stalinist communist
parties. So in talking about Marxist politics, I feel a need to make it
clear that I am in no way being prescriptive. I have had differences and
fights with the Australian and European communist parties, which I don't
consider to be revolutionary Marxist parties but Stalinist reformist,
over this question of Socialist Realism which seeks to direct writers in
what they can and cannot write with The Party being the judge of this.
These Stalinists would respond, and have claimed, I am not a marxist and
call me an anarchist. In the end, anarchists and marxists want the same
thing. A society without class exploitation or any form of
discrimination or oppression. We disagree over strategy and class
analysis. But rather be called an anarchist then a supporter of
Stalinism, any day. Rather be a road sweeper then a judge. Too much
writing is concerned with judgment, including Socialist Realism. Rather
be a marxist modernist road sweeper then a Neo-Hegelian Socialist
Realist judge.
The concern I have is to say unproductive labour elides from productive
labour implies all labour should be elided into productive labour. This
is precisely the tendency and direction that capitalist production and
expanding markets seek. The industrialisation of the arts and university
education and research is an example of this historical movement. To
expand markets is essential to capitalist production which means turning
everything it can into commodity production. To be concerned about the
notion of unproductive work in such a way as to say it should be
productive is to express a protestant work ethic which is a type of
Weberian ideology which supports and encourages the exploitation of
workers and seeks to expand and maintain this exploitation. And along
with this comes all the other forms of oppression which function to
maintain this exploitation. It becomes a pro-capitalist argument which
then demands and binds oneself into a politics of compromise, which when
you keep following the argument, becomes one of support for the war in
Iraq and Pax Americana, even if this is a compromised support expressed
as opposition. (Since expanding capitalist markets are essential to
capitalism.)
A good example is the war on drugs as capitalist expansion of markets.
Taking an example, just to illustrate: say I am a well off advertising
executive living in the USA who already has three television sets and
other electrical goods produced by Sony and don't need anymore. This
limits the market in these goods. But I would like some cocaine, so I
buy it on the blackmarket. As a result, my excess income goes to small
drug dealers who can then make income not otherwise available to them,
that passes on to the larger suppliers, on to the money laundering
providers and so forth. All this extra money can then be used to buy not
just one but along the chain six, a dozen and more televisions sets and
by continuing to keep the blackmarket going, more electrical goods, CDs
and so forth. Sony, as a large capitalist corporation then manages to
sell all these extra products and to expand their market in this way.
For this to happen cocaine must be illegal, but not so sufficiently
policed as to wipe the illegal drug market out. The illegal drug market
is the second largest market in the world, all to the benefit of the
expanding so-called legal capitalist market. Along with this comes not
only an expanded capitalist market but discrimination against drug users
as addicts, as was very well demonstrated by contributions to the thread
on alcohol on this list. This is called userphobia which links to racism
and homophobia and which also scapegoats women as poor mothers if they
use drugs, yet the market also requires they use drugs. A whole raft of
discrimination, exploitation and oppression comes with capitalist market
expansion. Also, about 80 percent of the profits from cocaine remain
within the USA and only 20 percent goes to the South American
distributors and producers. Cocaine is also used as an excuse for US
military intervention in South America and to remove indigenous peoples
from their land, which again acts to expand capitalist markets. It
doesn't harm the cocaine trade but merely displaces it and makes sure
the price of cocaine does not become too cheap which would threaten the
market expansion of corporations like Sony.
Marx's analysis of capitalism is more pertinent today, during late
capitalism, then it was in the 19th century when he wrote Capital. It is
interesting that the three theorists most associated with Modernism,
Freud, Nietzsche and Marx, are often the most misunderstood. Perhaps I
am coming to better understand what deLanda was saying: we are not yet
Modernist.
Finally, be careful with placing Marx's silkworm example next to
childbearing. It could elide into saying childbearing is woman's nature,
which then elides into Aristotle's Flower Pot theory of
(Hetero)Sexuality. (I am not saying you are doing this... more be
careful with the argument.) To say childbearing should be considered
productive work in Marx's terms elides precisely into this Aristotlian
argument. Although it has been some time since I have read Irriguay
there is an underlying assumption that there is an essential natural
woman to be found in her writing. I also disagree with her strategy of
jamming the mechanisms, which in the end is ineffective. I tend more to
socialist and materialist feminists, including Donna Harraway, then the
sort of idealisms Irriguay gets caught up in which fold back onto and
end up supporting oppression and exploitation. Biology becomes woman's
destiny in this approach, confining women to childbearing, perhaps like
the Hand Maiden's tale.
I am not sure about Milton being a silkworm as being an inspired artist
which buys into Kant's concept of the creative artist as genius. Marx is
very critical of this notion of genius which appears again in Hegel. But
then I have to wait for the books to chase this up.
Best wishes
Chris Jones.
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