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Originally Posted by Glice

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.

it's exactly that knot-resolving i'm trying to work out here. all my life i've believed that market controls were just and necessary; now this economist comes and shows me how wrong i am, that price controls cause famines, that the minimum wage increases unemployment. it's a bit of a shock. now he's telling me that working conditions in the XX century would have improved with or without unions-- that i'm finding hard to believe, and this is his weakest argument so far, but i have to follow his reasoning to the end before passing judgment.

thanks for the followup, by the way.

Originally Posted by fugazifan

i think that the whole point is to have many coops that function on a smaller level rather than try to compete on a global scale.

that ship has sailed. i don't know what could stop global trade at this point. by the way, a lot of formerly "poor" countries are benefiting from this arrangement. china, for example, is no longer subject to famines-- they can buy food abroad (the world has a food surplus, as we speak, and trade allows its distribution).

let's take the greap leap forward, baby

Originally Posted by RanaldoNecro

!@#$%!

Have you looked into the corrosive effects of monetizing everything? Why don't you do a comparative study and get back to me.

money is just the language of exchange. exchanges would happen with or without money-- only more clumsily. you ever read the illiad? it all begins with bickering over sex slaves (aka "concubines"). the greeks had no monetary system at the time, but they knew how to split the loot-- "tripods," "oxen," "slaves," "honor," whatever. everything has always had a price, it just wasn't clearly written out on a label.

and how do i study "corrosion" outside of chemistry anyway? how "corroded" was achilles when agamemnon took briseis to compensate for having to give up chryseis? 50% corroded? 90%? reversibly or irreversibly? did the death of patroclus de-corrode him? and how corroded was agamemnon anyway? cuz he seems like the real rat fucker of the story.

i really don't understand what you mean. i suppose you believe in what you believe with great feeling, but i can't make sense of it.

edit - i must add that the only time i remember being a part of a non-monetary economy was when i was a baby. i would say to my parents "gimme" and they would. i even believed in santa claus for a while-- magic bicycles materializing from thin air! but i can't expect that out of life anymore. people have to sweat to get it made.