Disenchanted?

A couple of years removed from the formal sphere of academic theory I find myself frequently contemplating the day to day manifestations of anger and depression of many in my social circles.  Regardless of what class analysis would point towards, I don't really see frustration directed towards the wealthy elite, that is, the appropriators of the surplus are not the target of the youngest working generation's frustrations.  It would seem that those becoming insanely wealthy off of appropriating labor are at most an abstract concept that exist elsewhere, and can't really be fought.  For most of the working class, the wealthy elite have become, at best, an object of scorn.  There seems to be a general (if unspoken) consensus among many of my peers that there is no point in fighting against something that cannot really be changed.  Just a few years after the occupy movement the "1%" have become non-relevant to most people as a place to manifest discontent as we search for meaning in our day to day lives.   

Throughout history a person who is unsure of the source of their next meal will not fight for the well-being of their fellows, they will fight to find dinner.  A better life is an abstract concept when faced with a major obstacle (such as subsistence calorie intake), trumped by the immediate need...  The major obstacle for most American workers is not material survival, but rather relevance and meaning. The average working American does not rile against the abstract concept of a wealthy elite stealing their surplus labor, rather they fight for meaning in their day to day processes.   These manifestations, albeit often misplaced, can be witnessed in attitudes towards the role of labor in life.  Most Americans do not want to be defined by their work (which historically has been very different), instead most of us fight to leave their work "at work" whenever possible.   Modern wealth and production gains have replaced physical needs with the need for meaning in labor.  Or when meaning is not perceived as possible, the intentional stripping of all meaning out of labor.  

Meaning, and therefore fulfillment, will not necessarily be found in the tasks preformed as wage labor (although that remains a common desire), but if not defined by our labor then defined where?  If meaning does not come from the labor preformed for a wage, then the meaning of laboring to build a better life/standard of living for one's self and loved ones becomes an option.  Sadly in modern capitalism both of these forms of meaning is generally lacking for a majority of those who are forced to labor without ownership of the means of production.    

When survival is not really in question, but material meaning (growth of standard of living) beyond surviving paycheck to paycheck is unobtainable for most, what is left for the average working person? The work itself is generally viewed as something to be forgotten as quickly as possible after the wage is earned....  If society is not ready to change the system of production to one of non-exploitative labor perhaps smaller changes towards greater individual control in the work place?

I witness people, day to day,  becoming more depressed, if not economically, certainly in spirit, by the perceived notion that change is not possible, and that they just "do as they are told" for fear of losing the ability to reproduce their own labor.  From the first days of industrial capitalism to the present people have been working to earn enough to survive to get back to work.....Perhaps now that basic physical needs are easily met for most workers the point has been overlooked that other needs of the working class are not even on the radar.

The plight of the worker in modern American capitalism is not one of physical starvation but rather a starvation of power and control.  The youngest working generation only knows of the middle class as a concept from history and reacts by treating their lack of relevance (in the work place and in society) by medicating themselves (or allowing their anger to build without any concrete direction).

American society may be a long way from a class based revolution, but I see more class consciousness in the generation just entering the labor force in statements such as "do I really want to go out again tonight?  What's the point? " than I have ever witnessed in my own generation.  I don't know if mass worker ownership will appear suddenly.  However, I have witnessed small amounts of empowerment and hope in worker self management processes.  These processes are not widespread and even where they exist are not presumably not that entrenched or strong but they do have potential.  Convince a young worker to sacrifice for a communist revolution?  Never happen.  Convince a young worker in a capitalist enterprise that they deserve more of a say in the direction of their enterprise as well as their own day to day?  Might actually be something the masses are ready to embrace?  

Disenchanted?  Sure.  Find a Marxist who isn't?  Hopeful?  Always.      

The Next Time Someone Asks Me for a Cigarette...

...I am going to denounce them as a communist and suggest they move to Russia with their like-minded brethren. 

I suppose this post would be more accurately titled:  "Some Thougths on the First 100 pages of David Graeber's "Debt the First 5000 Years", but the cigarette example, lifted from Graeber's book, has more literary flair.

I have been reading Debt: The First 5000 Years, by David Graeber
In "Debt" Graeber is bold enough to suggest that at the most basic level many human interactions are communistic in nature. He suggests that  "From each according to their ability, to each according to their need" is how we respond to many situations in life.  Graeber suggests that people act according to this tenant of communism in many daily situations including those in which a smoke is "bummed".   

I have the ability to give someone else a smoke, they have the need for it.  The person asking me doesn't think much of the asking (according to Graeber they think far less of asking for a smoke than they would think of asking me for an equivalent amount of money or food), and I am not meant to think much of the giving.  It is second nature to provide for each other in a community setting.  If nothing else being a communist costs me at least half a pack of smokes a week.  That aside, Graeber's book seems interesting so far:  The argument that "communism" is not a system of political organization (he brings up the point that most prominent regimes have tagged themselves as "socialist" and "communism" will come far in the future after Marx's "withering of the state"), but rather something that is one of the basic (Graeber describes 3) ways in which humans interact with each other daily in regards to our material world is something that I would like to explore further.

An idea that has been nagging me for awhile is that as we form groups and arguments, (and yes...institutions as well) to organize production, we are essentially just expanding upon interactions that we are already familiar with from the processes of our daily lives, childhoods, etc.   The past is of course the strongest predictor of the future.  Reading the beginning of Debt, (for the record, is itself critical of capitalism), has brought back to the front of my consciousness the idea that the way out of capitalism (as well as its contradictions and problems), and into another system (albeit with its own sets of contradictions and problems to be sure), with a stronger sense of justice from a class perspective, might be steps towards decentralization of power and slightly more anarchy in our organizational processes (both political and economic).  The idea, somewhat re-introduced by Graeber that many humans default to a variety of communistic practices in our daily interactions revives my hope that post 20th century capitalism our material lives can remain rich, while at the same time becoming less institutionally exploitative of each other, if we work at it that is. 

There is tone to Graeber's analysis that suggests an arrogant rationalism behind many of his arguments, This is perhaps not a bad thing as the implications I have drawn out of the first 100 pages of his book seem quite positive, and possibly even hopeful for our future as a society.  So far "Debt" is proving to be an enjoyable and thought provoking read.  Chances are I will have more to write about it here in the coming days (especially if I find something to be more critical about).  

The Economics of Ozzie Guillen (for Luke)

So good ol Ozzie has been in the news again.  Here is a quick synopsis from the Huffington Post:
Because a lot of my readers are not baseball fans a quick background:
Ozzie is a former player, then the manger of the Chicago WhiteSox, now the manager of the Miami Marlins

(Miami Marlins as in Miami Florida, home of a huge Cuban refugee community).

Last week Ozzie said this:
"I respect Fidel Castro. You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last 60 years, but that son of a bitch is still there."

My temptation is of course to attempt to explain to non-Cuban Americans how I think Cuba is better off with Castro then it would have been without him.  But....that will have to wait, and the man did cause a lot of damage as well. 

For now, The Marlins response to Guillen's comment is where my problem lies. 

This is a team with a new stadium, a new name (formally Florida Marlins) that is attempting to build a new image.  This type of thing is exactly the reason they hired Guillen.  This is the first time in my baseball loving memory that the Marlins have been national news for more than 12 hours (other than winning the World Series).  Suspending Guillen for 5 games, when behind closed doors he was probably given a huge bonus for drawing attention (exactly what they are paying him to do), assumes that all baseball fans are ignorant asses that can't grasp why the Marlins would hire a loudmouth ass to be an ineffective on-field manager in the first place. 

Sorry for the rant, but it was promised!