Re: [ox-en] Selbstentfaltung and garbage collection
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Sat, 09 Feb 2002 23:24:11 +0100
Hi Kermit and all!
Thanks for this very insightful post, which putting Oekonux ideas in a
larger context. Just a few points.
2 weeks (20 days) ago Kermit Snelson wrote:
Stefan Merten:
People can enjoy the craziest things - why not coal-mining?
To some extent, that's true. Some children actually do want to collect
garbage for a living when they grow up. They like the big trucks, I guess.
Then there's the story about the guy who loved his job on the roadkill
removal crew [überfahrene Tiere von der Straße klauben] because the side
benefit was "all you can eat!" :)
On a more serious note, one very good reason not to enjoy coal-mining is
black lung [Anthrakose, Kohlenstaublunge]. But I've been reading your posts
carefully, and realize that you will probably answer by arguing that a
society based on Selbstentfaltung will develop technology that makes
dangerous jobs safe and humane, automates them, or eliminates their economic
necessity altogether.
You got the point :-) .
Of course, it would take an expert in the field to
verify whether specific assertions like this are tenable.
You may need an expert to verify whether it it tenable. However, given
the world of today I think it needs little phantasy being at least
imaginable.
More and more I think that's historical new. When industrialization
started this was not thinkable because there were numerous jobs which
could not be automated away - at least not while maintaining the level
of output of production. At the moment capitalism already shows us how
this is possible today - (structural) unemployment being the result.
But more broadly, I now realize that your claim is that Selbstentfaltung is
the source of what Machiavelli might have called "constituent power", namely
a faculty natural to human beings that, if unrestricted, suffices to create
a productive and happy society without resorting to force.
Sounds plausible.
It therefore
falls within that large category of what could be called natural law
theories, which the famous jurist Hans Kelsen identified as favoring a
non-coercive, anarchic social order.
Hmm... I don't like the term "natural law" here because it has nothing
to do with nature. But for now I'll accept the term.
Of course, not all natural law theories agree on which human tendency
creates this "constituent power."
Indeed there may be more than one. Perhaps historical changes make one
of them more plausible than others. Paticularly that links to the
(Marxian) thought, that the form of a society is closely related to
it's historical possibilities.
Yes, in this framework I'd say, that given the (Western) world of
today, self-unfolding is the contemporary "constituent power".
Adam Smith's "invisible hand" theory says
it's selfishness that does the trick. Antonio Negri in _Empire_ (2000)
proposes that creativity, making and production (he uses the Latin word
"posse" to name this faculty) can, if completely unrestricted, suffice to
create a just society. (This idea is an uncredited borrowing from Georges
Sorel's 1908 syndicalist classic "Reflections on Violence", which calls it
the "ethics of the producers.")
Well, until now I just read some reviews of _Empire_. From that I'm
not sure what Negri says and how much this is compatible with our
thoughts. At least it seems one of the more interesting books in the
last few years.
Common to all natural law theories, however, is a heavy preference for
culture over positive law (which Kelsen identifies as a coercive order
identical with the state) as the preferred way to organize a society.
And it's obvious that this needs to be the case. If something is
"natural" you don't need a policemen to force it down peoples throats.
In this context, it seems to me that the idea of Selbstentfaltung relies
rather more on the concept of the individual (i.e., the "Selbst" in
Selbstentfaltung) than do many related communitarian theories of natural
law, especially the Japanese.
I agree. The - I might say - identifiable individual is very much in
the center of the picture. In fact in my anarchist past I heard little
which related so much to me as Oekonux does. Given the success Oekonux
has related to anarchist thoughts I guess it's not only me who feels
touched in some way.
In any case, I believe that placing the
Oekonux "Selbstentfaltung" thesis in the historic and intellectual context
of legal theory might prove more helpful in exploring such questions than
arguing over the meaning of words like "exchange" or "trade".
I'd say, it may prove *also* helpful ;-) .
Mit Freien Grüßen
Stefan
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