Re: [ox-en] Material peer production is possible!
- From: Michael Bauwens <michelsub2003 yahoo.com>
- Date: Sun, 13 Jan 2008 22:25:16 -0800 (PST)
Hi Franz,
I re-used your comments here at http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/franz-nahrada-can-we-produce-for-physical-abundance-or-sufficiency/2008/01/14
I really like your use of the buddhist monks support framework as point of comparison, I had been using it in a more general way to show that medieval societies, much poorer than ours, could support one quarter of the male population, but your use is much precise.
Is your OS yearbook article about biomorphical production available in english? If not, it would be really great to have it in english.
By the way, is there anyway to have a listing of the writings that you are most proud of, and that I could repurpose in the p2pfoundation.net wiki?
I'm sure you have a long productive life ahead of you still, but at the same time, the major operation you have gone through is a good time to think about your legacy. Let's give a second life to your contributions!!
My general reaction about this contribution here is positive, but I would like more details about a proposed mechanism. Did you write anything yet about Christian Siefkes in that regard?
Michel
----- Original Message ----
From: Franz Nahrada <f.nahrada reflex.at>
To: list-en oekonux.org
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2008 10:41:30 PM
Subject: [ox-en] Material peer production is possible!
Michel Bouwens writes:
(p2p production can)
not work with rival material goods, unless you find a solution for
cost-recovery and future investment.
Dear Michel.
the secret is in the word "rival". So, material goods need to be made
"non-rival". Another word for this is "abundant" or (since some
seem
not
to like this word) "sufficient".
at this point there is only one solution, and it is not one
that
depends
on the external economy and its scarcity of value (see the remark on
Dmytryi at the very end of this post). You are right that there
should
be
a sharp distinction between cooperatives and p2p production, but at the
same time it is imagineable that cooperatives work out
arrangements
that
lead to a circulation of material goods and therefore enable
mutual
supply
in a circular process, to some degree eliminating the need for monetary
income. This economy would work in a biomorphical way, the surplus
on
one
point being the input on others.
I think this is not a mere utopian vision, but the tendency
of
automation
is that production is becoming increasingly biomorphical (as I laid
out
in
OS yearbook) - . Increasingly material goods can be produced
wherever
they
are needed, with miniaturized production equipment. Why should
there
not
be a tendency from sharing designs to arranging material flows
that
enable
some parts in the network to provide specialized kinds of goods
and
have
them shared with others, knowing that more and more nodes in
the
network
are doing the same? Automation is the key to reduce the factor of labor
drastically, to embed production in units of the right size
to
establish a
circular exchange.
I have recently seen images of the perfect organisation of the
feeding
of
Buddhist monks by the general population somewhere near you.
Now
imagine
an "order of technoscientists" constantly improving the tools and the
flows between production units which are controlled and run by general
population. Of course this is just a mental model, we do not like to
create an exclusive elite, but for the understanding of the process its
very vital to see that the material system feeds into the system of
culture without expectation of equivalent exchange. Software developers
are the Buddhist monks of tomorrow, but the general population has not
understood yet that feeding them provides abundance.
In the moment when the system of production is sufficiently close to
natural processes like photosynthesis, driven by design
intelligence
and
the general intellect of the global communities of practise (which now
replace our mental image of the monks),, the sharing and moving of
material goods could be done in similar ways like filesharing. You
get
a
taste of this when you look at peer networks like bookcrossing or
couchsurfers, which are allready doing it - use the abundance of the
existing capitalist production process which allready often provides us
with much more than we need - to undermine the monetary exchange
which
is
clumsy, boring and without fun.
Once we really get a grasp of really efficient home production,
the
rules
of the games will change drastically. In this respect I share Stefan
Mertens optimism, allthough I hate to bring it all down to the
notion
or
image of the fabber. There are very interesting intermediate
schemes
which
work at community level - technologically possible, but neglected
from
the
point of view of capitalist production. These are the ones that carry
quality and potential to encompass substantial areas of human needs.
+
Concernig Dmitryi, I think that his rent-sharing models will not
work.
Its
based on a short moment in history, where additional capital
was
provided
in the form of debts in expectation of future profits. Its a
dot-com-bubble dream that is obsolete because there is too
much
business
for the proceeding of business. In this respect I share the
criticism
of
the crisis groups: unless you free production from the
contradictions
of
value and its descendants (money, capital, rent) you will never get
another result than poverty on one side, accumulation on the other,
and
a
society falling way behind its potentials.
all the best
Franz (in recovery)
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