Re: Aussies the world's hardest workers?

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

yeah, the problem is that proletarianization was incomplete. The workers, though they initially lacked direct access to the produced means of production, could go to the land to directly attain the means of subsistence, so they didn't have to go to Mr. Peel _et al_ for their subsistence. Some could even become petty capitalists. This is why some settler colonies tried to restrict access to the land and others used slave-labor and the like. 
-- Jim Devine
(put a prawn on the barbie! BTW, "jumbo prawn" makes more sense than "jumbo shrimp.") 

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Grant Lee [mailto:grantlee@xxxxxxxxxxxx] 
	Sent: Sun 5/2/2004 5:16 AM 
	To: PEN-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
	Cc: 
	Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Aussies the world's hardest workers?
	
	

	I said:
	
	> As Marx, among others, alluded, a
	> distinctive thing about the later settler colonial societies was that they
	> imported not only the workers from Europe, but also fully-devloped
	> capitalist relations of production ("unhappy Mr Peel").
	
	Correction: Marx was alluding to the _incomplete_ transportation of British
	relations of production to the settler colonies, i.e. free labourers quickly
	realised their (temporarily) great bargaining power (in circumstances in
	which convict labour was not available), and took full advantage of the
	situation, by becoming self-employed and/or demanding higher wages and
	better conditions.
	
	I love this quote, in part because it's probably the only place that Marx
	refers to my own neighbourhood:
	
	âA Mr Peel, [Edward] Wakefield complains, took with him from England to the
	Swan River â means of subsistence and of production to the amount of
	Â50,000. This Mr Peel even had the foresight to bring besides, 3,000 persons
	of the working class, men, women and children. Once he arrived at his
	destination, âMr Peel was left without a servant to make his bed or fetch
	him water from the river.â Unhappy Mr Peel who provided for everything
	except the export of English relations of production to Swan River!â (Karl
	Marx, 1976, _Capital_, Vol. 1, Penguin, London: 932-933.)