Re: reform and rev

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 22/01/02 00:11 +0000, I wrote:
> At 21/01/02 12:32 -0500, you wrote:
> > Ian M:
> > What forms of organizing of the 'managerial
> > class', let alone the larger working class of which they
> > are a subset, would it take to have them withdraw consent
> > to the system?
> >
> > ^^^^^^^^
> >
> > CB: That's one of the $ 64 question, innit ?
>
>
> The managerial class would have to organize the social functions of the
> economy, as well as society itself according to a number of apparently
> abstract social principles that appear to stand above society, and the
> classes of which society is composed.


Managerial "class" is of course better called a stratum. Because they do
not have a defined role in relation to the means of production, they will
usually support the class in power, but can be erratic if they start
believing idealistically that their ideology consists of absolute values.
Arkward stratum, but now indispensible in view of the development of the
means of production.

There is no point in Marxists denouncing them repeatedly as lacking in
class courage. That should not be the height of ambition of a
marxist-orientated email list. But their intermediate class position makes
them an important swing factor in the relations of production, and the
struggle for communism.

Chris Burford





> A prtion of them would then have to start worrying about whether what they
> do fits in with these abstract principles.
>
> This happened this weekend when the usually right wing Daily Mail,
> supporter of the Conservative Party, usually, suddenly published a picture
> of the Al Quaida prisoners arriving at Guantanamo, hooded, shackled,
> masked and kneeling, under the front page headline "Torture"!
>
> Sorry to give a political example. Economically the intelligentsia could
> develop ideas about social responsibility further so that they would
> object to supermarkets not selling at least some sort of organic range.
>
> They could become radically insecure at the instability of the economic
> system, and impose social controls out of self-defence. cf the clamour
> after Enron for close monitoring of auditors.
>
> In short the intelligentsia could do all these things in response to the
> question so long as they appeared technical and not primarily motivated by
> any more radical, revolutionary perspective.
>
> That does not however mean that they might not have a progressive
> contribution in making the boulder start to move, while the multitude get
> behind it and start to propel it more rapidly.
>
> So in answer to the question I am suggesting that the privileged
> intelligentsia could not consciously withdraw consent to the system, but
> they might impose drastic reforms through motives of self-defence, in a
> very reformist way. It is up to others whether they accept the reformist
> limitation of perspective.
>
> Chris Burford
>
> London