From: michael a. lebowitz (mlebowit@SFU.CA)
Date: Tue Sep 28 2004 - 14:34:22 EDT
At 07:24 28/09/2004, you wrote:
>Under European feudalism the urban population tended to experience
>a long term growth. Given that the urban mortality rate
>due to infections was higher than the rural level, this
>implied that the urban population was growing due
>to inflow from the countryside.
Yes, there clearly was an inflow--- but much of the population increase was
accompanied by the clearing of forests, draining of fens, etc, ie., did not
at all represent an urban/rural shift. Indeed, when such geographical
expansion tapered off was the point at which population growth did.
michael
>Thus from generation to generation there was a
>recruitment into urban trades. This may have been
>contrary to the wishes of feudal lords, but nonetheless
>urban areas did grow and experience a labour inflow.
>
>The mobility of labour under slavery was obviously
>much higher so we need not discuss that.
>
>I don't know enough about pre-capitalist Japan, China
>and India to know if there was a similar migration
>into towns there.
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: OPE-L [mailto:OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU] On Behalf Of Gerald A. Levy
>Sent: 28 September 2004 02:41
>To: OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU
>Subject: (OPE-L) Re: tendencies for equalization
>
>Hi Paul C.
>
>You identified an issue as:
>
> > Whether in a pre-capitalist society there would
> > be
>
>(should be "was" rather than "would be")
>
> > enough long term mobility of social labour between
> > trades to enforce the law of value. .
>
>Which pre-capitalist social formation are you thinking of?
>
>*Every* pre-capitalist society in which any significant
>percentage of products were produced for the purpose
>of exchange was a *class* society in which the mobility
>of labor was *strongly* and *systematically* restricted
>by the existing relations of production.
>
>The mobility of labor under feudalism was *severely*
>restricted by the feudal lords and the customs and traditions
>associated with that mode of production. Basically, there was
>*no* significant mobility between trades (this was also true
>in the period of merchant capitalism). To refer to
>a "tendency" where workers try to get out of sectors
>where wages or "returns to labor" rise because
>workers "try to get out of sectors where wages are low,
>and to get into sectors where they are high" (quote
>from a 9/17 post by Allin) makes *no* sense under feudal
>relations of production because laborers could not --
>except in highly unusual situations -- choose which sector
>or trade they wished to be in. In the "Asiatic mode of
>production", as well, there was no significant mobility of
>laborers in different crafts.
>
>As for social formations where the slave mode of
>production dominated, it makes no sense whatsoever
>to talk about the effort of slaves to leave one sector and
>enter another in search of a higher "return to labor."
>
>So (to repeat) which pre-capitalist social formation are
>you thinking of?
>
>In solidarity, Jerry
---------------------
Michael A. Lebowitz
Professor Emeritus
Economics Department
Simon Fraser University
Burnaby, B.C., Canada V5A 1S6
Office Fax: (604) 291-5944
Home: Phone (604) 689-9510
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