Re: [ox-en] extrinsic motivation = coercion
- From: Stefan Meretz <stefan meretz.de>
- Date: Sat, 2 May 2009 12:44:34 +0200
On 2009-05-01 16:52, Diego Saravia wrote:
Behind money
there is exchange _value_, which does only exist, because we do not
produce societally, but isolated. Isolated producers have to
exchange their products, societal producers do not.
all we produce is in a huge system, formed by "families" or
something like that
I don't mean families, but private producers, companies, capitalists.
could you spoecify better what are you thinking about?
Could you specify your question?
Thus talking about value in the sense of objective value is more
correct then talking about money.
yes, but diferenet concepts.
value is about work inside a product
Nope. Value is only a social relation. There is nothing "inside" a
product which creates value.
"monetary value" or beter "price value" or better "exchange value"
is diferent and not proportional with value
Yes, price and value are different. Price is a local phenomenon, value is
a societally average measure of exchange relations. Prices are
fluctuating around their value.
both values (call them ?-value) are not conservative, nor constant,
nor related only to the product,
values depend on social conditions, and that change
True, nevertheless, value is an objective measure.
I could have a product that today have a ?-value and tomorrow have
other, without changing it
True in a very general sense, but in average this does not happen,
because social relations did not change so rapidly. But you are right:
value is only a social relation. The bad thing is: We can't escape from
this social relation, it determines our actions, which is named
fetishism or alienation.
In any society where you continue to have value (or money) as an
objective measure of social relationships, you have alienation. This
never can be a free society.
The difference here in the list between the, say it friendly, "money-
modifiers" and the "get-rid-of-money" fraction is, that the money-
modifiers assume, that value/money can be changed at will. They assume,
value/money is at least to some extent a "subjective" measure which can
be "formed". While the "get-rid-of-money" fraction (at least: me) knows,
that value/money is an objective measure which can not be changed at
will, which at least after some time will develop its own nature as an
objective societal mediator in a society, where producers act isolated
and not societally. Again: In a society where producers act societally,
value and thus money has no longer any function, because the role of ex-
post mediation (via markets) was replaced by an ex-ante-communication --
like in free software.
But value, on the other hand, is more
confusing, because it is widely used in a completely different
manner as
_subjective_ value. Subjective value is what we feel something is
worth.
you are speaking about utility?
No.
(neo) or liberals define utility to get exchange value derived from
utility
Yes, I know. They can only think in terms of "appropriating value".
Objective value is a form of societal mediation when you have
isolated producers (via exchange, commodity, money).
first time I heard about that definition. I think "objetive" is not a
good word near value.
It is an absolutely necessary clarification. Otherwise you are moving to
the liberal interpretation of economy (based on prices and subjective
value).
My definition is really not new, you can read at Marx' theory. This
explanantion was only buried under tons of readings of Marx by the
traditional workers movement, which were handy, but too simple. They
need it for class struggle purposes, which I completely understand. But
it was too simple and it proved wrong when trying to build new societies
on the ground of their simplistic or substancialistic value theory. The
very core was the assumption, that value (and money) can be treated in
the interests of the people. You can recognize the same fault as
liberals do: Objective value does not exist, we treat value as a
subjective measure for just distribution. Well, they failed, independent
if social-democrats or communists tried to apply it.
I am not eager to reproduce this fault with peer production.
was not discovery by marx, nor adam smith, its "biblical"
we were expulsed from paradise and coerced to work
Not true. This is one of the big myths of our times. We as humans
do not need to work. This sounds weird, but a proof is simple. Just
look at our daily live. Say you have an 8-hour-job. Then during one
third of the (week) day, you "work" and produce something useful
(hopefully). During two third of the day, you don't "work", but you
do other things, most of them are useful too: Relaxing, child
caring, communicating, writing on ox-list, making history or
anything else. Without these things you are doing -- simply because
you live your life -- society would not exist. These _are_
necessary activities, but they are not "work"!
why are you not calling them work?
This could be one option: Call everything "work". And indeed there was
and is a tendency in emancipatory theory to extend the realms of
activity which should be called "work" (love work etc.). But then you
loose the potence to discover differences between types of action, free
and coerced/aliened ones.
For me work is an aliened activity. You do it because you are coerced to
do it. The type of coercion does not matter, be it physical personal
oppression or indirect coercion via money. Nothing explains it better
then the cite: "Who do not work should not eat". This slogan was used by
church _and_ liberals _and_ workers movements. Creepy.
"Work" in sense we all know does only exist, because a lot of means
we need for our living are only available via money. And they are
only available via money (which coerces us to "work"), because
production is organized in the silly isolated way described above.
I think you are using a circular definition
you define work as something for exchange (better do not use money
here)
and then you say that exchange and work are not diferent, OK you are
right, is not falsable
but the point is that a lot of us think of work as something more
general
Well, this is up to you. I propose to better give up this naturalistic
definition of work. I prefer to use the word producing. We humans are
producing our livelihood, but we don't need to work for that goal.
Working is the type of producing livelihood in non-free societies.
I would say that prosume is about work
child caring is work (prosumed, usually)
How do you distinguish child caring in a kindergarten done by
professionals for money and giving your child a kiss? Is both work? What
is your kiss worth?
Thus the challenge is to free the one third (or less) of the day
from "work" by finding ways to produce societally from the
beginning on, and not to produce isolated making is necessary to
use a stupid ex-post mechanisms like exchange, money and so on.
you want to form a only one family society.
No, surely not, as explained above. The type of immediate personal
relationships in families is different from societal non-personal
mediation in society. But in a sense you are right: The challenge is to
develop a type of societal mediation, where humans do and produce freely
what they want resulting in a good living for all. Looking at wasted
energy of so many people due to oppression, unemployment, and de-
motivation, this is absolutely possible. And peer production is a germ
form of that.
perhaps that society exists somewhere sometime, sure in the beginins
of human kind, must read antropology.
Yes, one source of information, but also des-information.
Because humankind always produced a surplus (=more than they need
for
humankind always work?
As you can read above I distinguish between producing and working.
marx use work as a definition of human being
With his definition he was too general. Today he would understand this.
Marx was not perfect, he was a child of his time.
animals work?
Does not exist.
ok, but we are biological items :)
True, but our determination does not come from being natural
beings, but from being societal humans.
animals also form societies
Nope. I know that some name social animal structures a society, but this
is one of the false generalizations to be made. If you do this false
generalization, it is a clear indication, that you did not understand
what a society is.
An explanation of social processes using
biological terms is a biologistic one
ok, circular definition
Ok, more precisely: "An explanation of societal processes using
biological terms is a biologistic one."
The problem behind that is, that in english it is very uncommon to
distinguish between "social" and "societal". Animals build social
structures, but not societies.
and thus misleading and dangerous.
?? what kind of fundamentalist is that speach?
Fundamentalist? I don't know, what you mean.
One example. Darwins approach explains the evolution of species. The
german nazis took his biological theory to explain social behavior and
justify their eliminatory policy: "Survival of the fittest". This a
biologistic interpretation and dangerous application of a biological
theory.
sun orbit earth? is dangerous to think otherwise?
Think what you can think and be aware of traps.
Ciao,
Stefan
--
Start here: www.meretz.de
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