indeterminacy & the balance of power

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

Title: indeterminacy & the balance of power

[was: Waiting for Godot bis]

Contrary to what's implied below, I never proposed that anyone >assume that it [history] will play itself out before our eyes in stately and scientifically predictable fashion< --- nor did anyone else on this list make such a proposal.  That kind of vision fits with the mechanical Marxism that was popular with many in the 2nd and 3rd Internationals, in which the "forces of production" develop, pushing society through (somehow) pre-determined "stages" toward socialism.

Rather, my attitude is that there's a big indeterminacy in Marx's theory of history that prevents it from being predictive in this way, one that was hidden by his own optimistic extrapolation of empirical trends of his day (i.e., the development of economic and political organization and class consciousness of the working classes of Northwestern Europe). That extrapolation -- which is not a result of his theory but an assumption -- hid the indeterminacy of the so-called "subjective factor." Just because capitalism develops doesn't mean that the working-class movement develops in terms of organization and consciousness. Just because people get screwed by the system doesn't mean that they automatically revolt. (Lenin seems to understood this. Those who thought that the rise of Hitler would stimulate the working-class movement to revolt were shown the falsity of their views.)

But what I was saying -- and what Aldo misunderstood -- was that there's a pretty predictable component to an unpredictable process, i.e., the fact that political results in the state reflect the balance of power between classes (and other social groupings) in that part of society outside of the state. (This really only applies for liberal capitalism, where there's a relatively clear-cut division between the centralized state and the rest of society.) It's "pretty predictable" because flukes happen.

Unfortunately for us, what this says is that we can't simply lay back and propose "good ideas" to bourgeois politicians and hope that they follow up on them. Even if they _are_ inspired, they're likely to receive a sh*t-storm of resistance from the big money boys and various other conservative forces. So the politicians will  pull back and their initiatives will be junked. As we said before, the most "progressive" initiatives come from the politicians when the masses are in motion, as in the 1930s or the 1960s in the U.S. (Of course, Nixon combined his progressive programs (OSHA, the EPA) with COINTELPRO.)[*]

This says that what's needed is an active effort to _organize_, to change the balance of power in society. It doesn't say anything about predicting history, except to say that if someone doesn't organize (or if the movements don't rise "on their own"), things will get even worse. It says that the rise of Dubya is partly -- or largely -- a result of the _weakness_ of the labor movement, the civil rights movement, the feminists, the environmentalists, the anti-imperialists, etc., in the United States.

[*] OSHA is the Occupational Safety and Health Act; the EPA is the Environmental Protection Act; COINTELPRO is the Counter-Intelligence Program, which infiltrated and sabotaged dissident groups.

Jim

Aldo wrote: >....Where I part company with you - and others of the group - is where you
state somewhat succintly: Movements are not directed by people. Let me
explain.

>'Movement' is a construct, a convenient shorthand for compressing the
multifarious interactions into a term. Such shorthands were first
developed in mechanics, and they worked in predicting how fast an apple
would fall from the tree, and why. They worked because the determining
factors involved were few, and their interactions were ruled by simple
relations - mass, distance, and acceleration.

>At the latest since Plato the West tried 'the conquest of abundance
inherent in human life and society' - in the words of Paul Feyerbabend -
i.e. to distil essence behind contingence, to look beyond the shadows
moving inside the cave and discern the unmoving truth. It is a Faustian
bargain - the attempt to squeeze life's complexity into an eternal law.
Forget it, and take squarely Margarethe by the hips [???!???] - you'll enjoy it
more.

>We are in the world of pure non-linear interaction systems. To draw
predictive conclusions is pure sin of reification. By the same token that
you'd refuse the use of 'intelligence' as an operable concept, you should
refuse the use of 'movement' as an operable tool. The Chinese, ever the
wise, knew that we could not draw conclusions from history. That's why
they gathered anecdotes, leaving to the individual the responsibility of
applying the analogy to the concrete situation.

>The factual experience is that people do make a difference - hence by
Popper's law your assertion is falsified. By their stupidity - as when
Marshall Ney rushed up the hill of Waterloo leaving the spikes for the
British guns behind. He took the guns, but could not spike them, he was
repulsed, the British started during the guns again, and the battle was
lost. By chance - Krakatoa's explosion in ca. 550 AD brought the plague
to Europe and weakened Byzantium to a point that it never recovered. The
kingdom of Saba was destroyed and Islam could emerge along the new trade
routes of the Arabian interior. Or by creating new technologies - as when
my dear Swiss rolled down from the forest above logs and stones on the
advancing Austrian armour at Morgarten and gained their freedom. And I
could go on forever.

>History is a fascinating mix of structures, multiple layers, fractal
recurrences and contingencies, and you can never sit back and assume that
it will play itself out before our eyes in stately and scientifically
predictable fashion. In Medieval times philosophers kept a skull on their
desk to remind them of their vanity and inanity. I'd keep a model of the
earth on my desk - without its oceans. It would then look like a
misshapen pear, battered by meteorites, drawn apart by internal forces
and imperfections. That's what life is all about. Life is no more than
fluff in a corner of a poorly cleaned room.

>Conclusion? Sometimes people trigger movements like avalanches, sometimes
they can ride them for a while, and sometimes 'movements' emerge
spontaneously looking for a leader. You never know, and you'll never know
unless you are prepared to look with much curiosity - and the wisdom to
know when you better leave the hornet's nest alone....<