BobKKKindle$
8th June 2006, 16:02
Dear all: I had an interesting conversation without a good friend at School today. he is a hard core Capitalist, but he is a good guy and serves as a neat 'ideological testing ground' ;) We were, suprise, discussing Socialism vs Capitalism. I argued that workers councils should have control over the MoP and the commodities they produce, on the grounds that commodities are essentially stores of labour value, and workers are not payed the full value of the goods that they produce, (surplus value) and the Capitlaist had no right to derive the monetary benefits of the commodities because they did not take part in the produciton process and served no purpose except to provide the means of production (which were produced by workers in the first place, as I pointed out)
In many ways, he agreed with me in principle. Or, Rather, he answered 'tough' to many of my arguments (which suggests he could not answer) However, eventually he said that as well as Worker Control may sound nice, the technichal sophistication of modern commodities and assembly lines meant that an educated management class needed to exist in oder to control the MoP and coordinate production, and that a new elite would inevitably rise after the revolution. I tried to prove that the factor of production 'enterprise' (bourgeois economics) was now redundant, citing the success of the Mondragon Cooperative and Factory occupaitons in Chile. I also said that there was likely to be greater innovaiton when the workers were in control, because they would recieve the full benefits of the commodities.
However, I would appreciate it if a comrade could show that workers councils/control work well (better, even) on theoretical grounds; eg an examination of the economics and sociology involved; or through statistical evidence (preferably the former) because I was not entirely satisfied with my answers.
thank you!
In many ways, he agreed with me in principle. Or, Rather, he answered 'tough' to many of my arguments (which suggests he could not answer) However, eventually he said that as well as Worker Control may sound nice, the technichal sophistication of modern commodities and assembly lines meant that an educated management class needed to exist in oder to control the MoP and coordinate production, and that a new elite would inevitably rise after the revolution. I tried to prove that the factor of production 'enterprise' (bourgeois economics) was now redundant, citing the success of the Mondragon Cooperative and Factory occupaitons in Chile. I also said that there was likely to be greater innovaiton when the workers were in control, because they would recieve the full benefits of the commodities.
However, I would appreciate it if a comrade could show that workers councils/control work well (better, even) on theoretical grounds; eg an examination of the economics and sociology involved; or through statistical evidence (preferably the former) because I was not entirely satisfied with my answers.
thank you!