Re [7239]: Jurriaan: I'll pass over the first part of your post since you've said what you want to say and I've done the same and we don't seem to be getting anywhere. Your comments about an "infantile reading of Marx" and "infantile Marxism" are not appreciated and not helpful. Moreover, I have for many years in many ways *emphasized* the role of use-value in Marxian theory so you are basically arguing with the wrong person about the wrong question. I can understand, however, why you might believe otherwise since you are not a listmember and only selectively read my posts (this is not a criticism.) I do, however, want to follow-up on a few issues. > Now as to your new points: the professional investor as a speculator > is usually completely orientated to getting the maximum rate of > return, he doesn't mind if he makes his profit from a truckload of > oranges or the sale of a house, and what people end up doing with > those resources is no great concern of his. Nevertheless even the > professional investor or speculator is still vitally interested in > "use-values" because it is part of his market knowledge, he needs to > know what sells where and why at what time. Of course, the bourgeoisie > as a class contains many different divisions and strata. But they are > all interested in the use-value of products. a) capitalists who have money-capital that they invest in stocks and bonds are *investors* rather than merely being speculators. Their concern is in general only the expected RRI. Thus, when you say "speculators" I think you mean the form in which *most* investment in corporations happens today. b) capitalists who invest money-capital in stocks do *not* have to have "market knowledge". Indeed, as investors they need not know anything particular about the market where they are investing money- capital just as they need to know about corporate accounting or the law. There is, after all, *specialization* and a *division of labor* in financial markets: thus, investors typically hire *others* (often working in brokerage houses) to make recommendations about where to invest their money. When a recommendation is then made, the main -- and often *only* concern -- is whether or not the recommendation is to "buy" or "sell". Furthermore, with the proliferation of *mutual funds*, investors need not even know that since the directors of the mutual fund make their investments for them. c) *Of course*, industrial capitalists are concerned about use-value to the extent that they are also concerned about exchange-value since without use-value then no exchange-value. Yet, despite this, their focus is not in general on use-value _primarily_ or on the production of a _particular_ commodity -- their focus in general is on obtaining the highest possible RRI. The reason, in part, that I don't want to give up on this insight is not only because it is important from the standpoint of comprehending the *migration of capital* between firms and branches of capital (which, of course, does not imply that there is "perfect mobility" of capital) but also because it has contemporary relevance in terms of understanding corporate trends such as *diversification* and *conglomerate mergers*. > You can talk all you like about "levels of abstraction", "individual > capitalists" and "cultural/ emotional attachment to the product or > branch of activity" etc. but the real point is that NO real > capitalists are indifferent to the use-values being produced and sold, > ultimately precisely in function of the quest for surplus value. Hence > also phenomena such as "quality circles", "total quality management", "Quality circles" are not primarily about quality: they are an effort by management to increase the *intensification of labor* in the production process. They are attempts to divide workers and foster 'labor- management cooperation' using the *pretext* of increased quality. More broadly, they are generally a component, not primarily of the marketing strategy, but of the firm's *production strategy* and have historically arisen and are part of "lean production" (just-in-time; kan-ban) systems and are modeled on the experience in large Japanese industrial corporations. > "trade associations", "Trade associations", at least in the US, are primarily focused on lobbying activities. >"customer and public relations", Public relations departments, like trade associations, are often focused on *legitimation* and *state policy* rather than sales. > If anybody is "indifferent" it is more likely to be the Fordist or > post-Fordist worker who day after day has to crank out commodities for > which he personally maybe doesn't really care a hoot. What capitalist > management tries to do, is to make sure that the worker "cares" about > the product being produced and sold, sufficiently so that it is > produced well, fast and sold in large quantities. I agree that individual workers are often indifferent to the quality of the commodity product. However, management within a (post-) Fordist system does not approach the issue in general from the standpoint of quality. Rather, they tell workers to simply "do your job". This is, in part, a consequence of the design of the labor process in the factory where the individual worker is trained in a very specialized group of tasks and need not know much if anything about the inner workings and design of the finished commodity. Thus, the knowledge of many autoworkers in an automobile assembly plant may be limited to the common knowledge by consumers about automobiles. > Of course you can twist what I say into an apology for capitalism, Why would I want to twist what you say or vice versa? > As regards my statement that capitalists are concerned about the > social consequences of their actions, this is especially true for > large corporations which have a big effect on the society they operate > in. They cannot very well ignore the state, politics, population and > the legal system of the countries they operate in, and they have to > concern themselves with all sorts of social issues. Just study the > behaviour of e.g. Monsanto or IBM or Microsoft for example. You can > say they have this concern with definite private motives, or that they > don't have the right concerns, but you cannot say that they are not > concerned with, or unaware, of the social consequences of their > activities. Firms are concerned that, e.g. if they violate the law, then they are not caught. They are certainly concerned about the laws themselves and spend large amounts of money lobbying the state for changes in the law that benefit them. For the same reason they are concerned about politics. Yet, their goal in general remains the same. Thus their focus on the state, politics, population, and the legal system is still primarily about attempts to benefit capitalist profitability and reproduce an institutional environment in which they, as individual capitalists and/or as a class, benefit. As for Microsoft, well .... I think the larger part of Microsoft's 'social concern' is simply public relations and is related to attempts on their part to soften actions by the Justice Department against their violations of anti-trust law. Their *lack* of 'social concern' can be seen in other ways, e.g. their use of prison labor to package software. Now, on the other hand, Bill Gates is an interesting character. I would liken him somewhat to Andrew Carnegie who, while one of the most ruthless anti-union capitalists, then gave away just about all of his money near the end of his life. It is a case of a lifetime of "accumulate, accumulate" followed by a spurt of "deaccumulate, deaccumulate". Yet, of course, Gates has -- quite literally -- billions of dollars to burn and his giving away a significant proportion of his personal savings -- in addition to being a tax write-of -- is probably a way that he can rationalize *to himself* his own life. > I can assure you that I have assiduously studied Marx's Capital and > other writings, plus all the important commentaries. Of course. Was that ever in doubt? > But that does not > mean that we don't have to do our own thinking. Of course. > It doesn't mean we > should take what Marx says as holy writ. Of course. In solidarity, Jerry
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