Work

[enigma2517]

Here's a post-structuralism question. Assume that we've overthrown the cappies and have established our egalitarian society. What now?

Obviously, work must commence. Labor is what keeps our society running. Therefore, in an effort to support ourselves and each other we will perform labor on a regular basis. However, this time the labor will be solely for our benefit. We will receive the full fruits of our productivity and will also have as equal of a share as possible in the decision making regarding how we do this work. The prospect of this is why people will begin to gravitate towards communism as a search for liberation of wage-slavery commences. No doubt, these sort of working conditions will inspire and encourage workers to remain productive.

But heres a question to ponder.

Assuming there is state apperatus directing development people will choose to do whatever kind of work that they please. However, would the jobs that are sought out match those necessary to run society. Will this quotas match up? I mean, a collective of x size will need a y number of z type of workers. How will these things fall into place? Surely people will want to be one profession more than the other, so how will these interests align (or clash) with the current material needs and demands of society?

We obviously can't MAKE people live in specified economic arrangements, we can only come up with some fancy communist way of making it the most desirable course of action thus appealing to the decision maker to do so on his/her own. But....how?

[New Tolerance]

Well, it would depend on what happens next. Would there be a large flow of labour from one sector of the economy into another? (ie everyone decided that they want to be video game testers) If that happens it would be a problem. But I highly doubt that it will happen, as people are most confortable doing jobs that they do well, which is pretty much how they are distributed in society already anyways, in industrialized nations at least. (Now one might ask, if that's the case then what the hell is the point of communism?) The exception now is that these people can do what they are good at doing without being exploited. Or maybe I miss understood the problem you are presenting.

[antieverything]

I've always found humorous the idea that an individual in a communist society just chooses a job off of the comprehensive job list[tm].

I would propose two different methods for finding employment. Either an individual applies for a job by applying for membership in a cooperative enterprise similar to how it is done today (only the workplace is worker-run and state-owned) -or- the individual goes to the state employment office in her or his community and gets a temporary job working on a public works project or something.

It would be logical for worker-cooperatives to have their own training programs and hiring tracks so as to get the best workers.

Of course, this is a model of a transitional market-socialist society in preparation for the spread of socialism world-wide and the potential dumping of the market alltogether.

[enigma2517]

New Tolerance: Wow I never really thought of it that way. Depending on where you live (amount of economic disparity present) you may or may not choose what job you have. I highly doubt all those people really want to work in factories all day. While more professional (i use that term losely) jobs like teacher, lawyer, doctor, etc. are achieved by choice. Basically, do you think that what you say about people already doing what they do best really applies to a significant majority of workers under capitalism? Maybe so in the States but definetely not in...Thailand...or something.

[Latifa]

Don't use videogame testers as an example. There are two breeds of video game testers, those who are not payed anything, and those who are required to actually fix any problems they encounter ( so they require programming skill, which most find as boring as sin )

If you can think of a better example, please do so.

[Anti-Prophet]

Poeple wont have 'jobs' in a communist society. People will do what they want to do. If nobody wants to be a porn star there simply wont be any porn, if nobody wants to clean the toilets then the toilets will be dirty, is everyone wants to be a video game tester then society will go down the toilet. But of course that wont happen because communism will bring about a diferent mentality than the one we see today. Individuals will understand the need to sacrifise a little of their time to contribute to society. If this doesnt happen then communism simply wont work.

"In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic."-Marx & Engels The German Ideology Private Property and Communism

[New Tolerance]

New Tolerance: Wow I never really thought of it that way. Depending on where you live (amount of economic disparity present) you may or may not choose what job you have. I highly doubt all those people really want to work in factories all day. While more professional (i use that term losely) jobs like teacher, lawyer, doctor, etc. are achieved by choice. Basically, do you think that what you say about people already doing what they do best really applies to a significant majority of workers under capitalism? Maybe so in the States but definetely not in...Thailand...or something.

First of all, yes, what I'm saying only applies to industrialized societies, not places like Thailand.

I didn't mean that people are already doing what they are best at, I said: people like doing what they do best, which in this case is what they are already doing (I'm talking about the transition phase to communism). Since in this highly specialized society, people who farm, mine, or teach for example, usually just don't have the skills to perform other specialized taskes, thus what they are already doing is what they do best (since they don't know how to do anything else. That is not to say that they never had the capacity to do something else however). Thus when the transition to communism comes, most people won't simply flood into one area of labour that they have never participated in. Ie: architects, factory workers, doctors won't all of a sudden start "pursuing their life long dreams of becoming pimps" (due to the objection to the video game tester example, I've decided to use this more comical example)

Further more, why don't people like working in factories? Factory work can be fun, it's like carpentry. The reason people don't like factory work is because of the dungeon like conditions (not in all cases of course), or the workers' specialized taskes which force them to perform the same thing over and over again. For a carpenter, making one ornate chair can be fun, but making the same chair over and over again X 3 billion times incites the will to commit suicide.

The first problem can be solved when the exploition of labour ends, and factory conditions improve, that concept is familiar.

The second part of the problem could end (I use the word "could" as I'm about to use a single example, even though a variety of solutions maybe needed to solve this problem) when we simply reorganize workers to do shifts of labour, so that they aren't forced to do the same boring thing over and over again. For example, we let the worker volunteer for several jobs, a person can assemble cars in the morning for an hour, then move on and write newspaper articles for another period of time while someone else who have also signed up to assembling automobiles can fill in on the first job and so on. The job of the committees would be to organize the timetables so that the workers get what they want, instead of the industrialists forcing the labours to organize their lifes so that the managers get what they want.

This is a practical solution of course. More radical theories may imply that everything will simply fall into place and no such coordination is required.

[Snitza]

Originally posted by [email protected] 4 2004, 11:05 PM
Assuming there is state apperatus directing development people will choose to do whatever kind of work that they please. However, would the jobs that are sought out match those necessary to run society. Will this quotas match up? I mean, a collective of x size will need a y number of z type of workers. How will these things fall into place? Surely people will want to be one profession more than the other, so how will these interests align (or clash) with the current material needs and demands of society?

We obviously can't MAKE people live in specified economic arrangements, we can only come up with some fancy communist way of making it the most desirable course of action thus appealing to the decision maker to do so on his/her own. But....how?
Well, I think you're assuming a little too much here to begin with. For starters, you speak of "quotas" and the "need" for x, y and z, but we need to suppose where these needs and quotas originate from.

Firstly, let us presume workers' communes and communal places of work. In this instance, where local democracy is in place for cities and towns, the quotas would come from who else, but the people?! If a hospital needs to be built in town x, and this requires y construction workers, then a vote will be put across the locality as to whether or not to use the local resources for the hospital, to ask another city or locality for them, or to not build the hospital at all.

If the vote passes, and town x wants to build a hospital, then all those experienced in construction work can "volunteer" for duty in help building. If someone is a skilled worker and construction-type person, but does not volunteer to help build, this will be looked upon very badly by everyone else. I imagine this prestige scar wouldn't just be the case in communist society, but even today in class society. If someone actively refuses to help out his townsfolk in a project that everyone knows he can do well, other locals may refuse him whatever service they provide as "retribution". Or, a vote may be cast to "punish" him or her in some way. I digress..

If there is a lack of the needed type of workers in town x, let's say they only have 50% of the workers required to build the hospital before winter, then options need to be reviewed. They could send requests to other towns or cities(big cities would most likely have a 'surplus' of workers for any type job) to come and help them build.

Those who travel from far away to help out town x would be looked upon favorably, of course. It's "human nature", almost, to respect someone who goes out of his way to help you. If this is true, then there would be plenty of incentive for those in other cities to come and perhaps live for a year in town x, helping to build the hospital. They would be appreciated by everyone, and probably would get service benefits from nearly anyone.

If for some reason, no workers abroad are available to come and help build the hospital within the time agreed upon, then those who want to build the hospital(which would have to be atleast 50% of the population, considering the vote) could "market" the "job" offers to potential construction workers with any added benefits they would want to throw in. If a man who makes and gives baked goods to people has a desire and interest in the hospital project, he could give the incentive to potential workers of getting a "front of the line" ticket for all orders from his bakery, for instance.

Countless other incentive offers could be created to get y amount of workers for the job.

You mentioned that we can't "make" people become a certain profession. But if that profession is very much needed by a society, then the society will create favorable conditions for that profession to grow. Because all societal needs will be based on real democracy, and what people need, there won't be as many people working bullshit jobs(lawyers, for instance) as there will be working at something that is appreciated and is genuinely useful to society.

Otherwise, they could get lynched!

[enigma2517]

So how do we prevent this whole "incentives" and special deals thing from getting out of hand? Isn't it possible that giving people preferential treatment like that would eventually just lead right back capitalist style employment, maybe minus the money part?

I've heard the prestige argument and it sounded very good to me, at least on the outside. However, I find that whenever I apply these theories I hold my hometown in mind. Its relatively small and people enjoy a pretty good sense of community, i.e. knowing each other personally. But what about major cities? Production forces will exist in huge waves, not small, closely-knit, interpersonal types of groups. How do we develop that communal sense of shunning then?

A man refuses to do work and is therefore chastised by all of his coworkers and any other people he is in immediate contact with. But what then? He goes to the supermarket. Being in the city, its huge. The line attendent doesn't know who he is. The dry cleaning lady doesn't know either. Worst case scenario, he can always walk a few blocks and just get the quality service from another regional commune. See the problem? Or we could make people wear stars like jews in nazi germany.

Although now that I think about it, while we can't MAKE people use modern day ID cards, we can certainetly allow communes to make that decision as a requirement for membership. Want to join us and share the wealth? Great. But you gotta get one of these. And this card will somehow reflect the individuals performance....some kind of wacky communist karma points system ;)

I don't really know...I'm just rambling now. I'll be waiting for your response.

[redstar2000]

One of the things that makes work (any kind of work) potentially or actually depressing in class society is that there's no escape. If you want to keep eating, then you've got to keep working.

I suspect that the knowledge that everyone would have in communist society -- "if this task becomes intolerable, I can quit and still eat" -- will go a long way towards making many distasteful tasks less distasteful.

Perhaps the most irritating jobs will be done on a "two weeks on, two weeks off" basis...or even "one week on, three weeks off".

Certainly the most physically demanding jobs should have drastically shortened hours...perhaps a 4-hour or 3-hour shift. Since there's no one trying to "make his next billion", there's hardly any reasonable justification for the hours that people work now.

:redstar2000:

The Redstar2000 Papers (http://www.redstar2000papers.fightcapitalism.net)
A site about communist ideas

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

1. For the record, this is not a "post-structuralism" question - post-structuralism is a pretentious po-mo term to describe a broad body of ideas that begin with a critique of structualism, and maintain that maintain, in analysing culture, lanugauge, literature, and so on, that one can not look at culture impartially and in ahistorical terms. Gar.

2. Strangely, I think Ursala K. LeGuin's science fiction novel, The Dispossessed offers one of the most interesting, and potentially useful models for dealing with questions of "What shit needs to get done?". Syndicates, co-ordinated through central hubs, allow a method by which one might discover what needs to be done, when, how, and so on. One applies themselves where they feel they might be most useful.

3. I think dealing in terms of "work" is silly, and a reflection of the understandings that have been impossed on us by dominant, capitalist ideology. We need to start dealing in terms of real questions of "Who will help me bake this bread?" instead of abstractions. To borrow from a favorite folk musician, "I am young, rock and roll is my religion, when I get old I'll be in the park feeding pigeons; in between I'll probably drive a truck - but work sucks!" (So enough fetishizing it!)

4. I have been distracted by MSN. I will proofread this later, and likely take back everything I've said. Dig.

[antieverything]

I really think it is intellectually masturbatory to speak of work as if it is a concept that will die with capitalism. "Work" simply refers to activities that deal with the production of goods and services. The fact that this activity is so far removed from "leisure" (which is itself alienated in capitalism) in capitalist society doesn't make the concept of work any less valid. You can be as situationst (or post-situationist or any other bullshit label you use to make yourself feel smart) as you like but it doesn't mean the problem of the organization of production will simply disappear in post-capitalist society.

So...quit jerking off and start addressing reality, folks.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by antieverything
"Work" simply refers to activities that deal with the production of goods and services.

Indeed.

But can you deny that a post-capitalist society must handle these tasks in a very different fashion than has hither-to been the case?

If it's just going to be "the same old shit", then why bother with a revolution at all?

:redstar2000:

The Redstar2000 Papers (http://www.redstar2000papers.fightcapitalism.net)
A site about communist ideas

[antieverything]

But can you deny that a post-capitalist society must handle these tasks in a very different fashion than has hither-to been the case?
That's not at all what I said. I was simply responding to the utopian idea that post-revolution, work will simply cease to exist or that it will simply organize itself without any sort of mechanism to ensure that everything that needs to get done gets done.

The idea that people will work everything out themselves is as misguided as the idea that the market will work everything out.