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Originally Posted by !@#$%!
i understand that part of the refutation of capitalism has to do with debunking the notion of scarcity, which the article linked claimed it's inexistent among the !kung, and porky claims would not exist under communism. but scarcity can be very real even in non-human systems-- biological ecosystems go through boom and bust cycles-- humans didn't invent famines, plagues, and natural disasters. we can't just wish that shit away.
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Part of why I said what I said on the first page (I assure you this isn't me being smug) is because there are communisms which agree entirely with the generalised principles of exchange and scarcity but endeavour to incorporate, develop or control it. I don't personally see communism as a radical eschewing of capital but a better (and therefore idealised) version; the big problem is that it implies centralised controls that inevitably share peculiar borders with bad fascism (which is why I don't endorse it as I've yet to resolve that knot). That old chestnut about 'democracy is the best form of government...'.
So essentially my position is that of an economic agnostic. I don't like the free market, and the denigration or alienation of non-free market/ neo-liberal forms of capitalism is worrying. We may be heading towards a variety of new economic eras (Adorno writes well on this in relation to Homeric myth) or we may be heading for more of the same. While I don't consider myself a commie, I think any argument which points to neo-liberalism as a teleology of exchange is dangerous. This is a problem on both sides of the argument - some communisms
are proposing a radical and dramatic break; many of them (arguably Das Kapital) are not.
Problems in the dialogue, always bloody problems in the dialogue.