One thing that both David Ellerman in the present age and Henry George in the 19th Century, both have cogent criticisms of Marxism from the left, from a Human Rights/fundamental rights point of view. Henry George Considered Marx a "muddle-head". Ernst Wigforss made corrections to Marxism that made it effective in Scandinavia based on similar critiques to those of George. Ellerman explans why. These critiques explain both why Marxism doesn't work as advertised, and why even when it works as promised it fails.
This post follows on the post titled "The Fraud of Rented Labor"
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| http://www.cooperative-individualism.org/holmes-john_henry-george-and-karl-marx-1947-159.pdf |
Ellerman explains how Marx, Lenin, and the Russian Revolution have set back the Left for over a century. More like a century and a half.
“As if the central question was whether people should be publicly or privately rented–with the Great Capitalism-Communism Debate and Cold War being like a ‘Peloponnesian War’ over whether slaves should be publicly owned (Sparta) or privately owned (Athens).”
To summarize:
- Marx:
- “brought a knife to a gun fight.”[Ellerman]
- “He brought a value theory to a property-theoretic fight.”[Ellerman]
- Both Ellerman and Henry George believed that:
- “His “labor theory of value and exploitation” is inherently superficial” and Ellerman adds "and thus the favorite foil in economics.”[Ellerman]
- “But that is not worst of it.”[Ellerman]
- “By misunderstanding the basis for the employer’s appropriation (i.e., the human rental contract), he ended up attacking the idea of private property!”[Ellerman]
- “This allowed the employers (“capitalists”), who are the beneficiaries of the whole fraudulent human rental system, to appropriate the positive and negative fruits of other people’s labor by “renting” them; and to parade as the defenders of private property that is supposed to rest on the principle of people getting the fruits of their labor!”[Ellerman]
- Thus: “How screwed up is a so-called “critique”” that:
- “allows those who violate human rights (to the fruits of your labor or to self-government)”
- “to parade as the “defenders of human rights”!” [Ellerman]
- “The conclusions of these arguments is that, contrary to Marx”
- the Left should be arguing for the abolition (not nationalization) of the whole system of renting human beings:”[Ellerman]
- “In the name of inalienable rights (no renting of human beings);”[Ellerman]
- “In the name of private property (getting the fruits of one’s labor);”
- and In the name of democracy (in the workplace).”[Ellerman]
This argument draws on the Swedish thinker Ernst Wiggforss for much of it's inspiration. But it also, unconsciously draws on Henry George.
For a Detailed discussion continue:
Critiquing Marxism
Henry George's critique of Marx would have hinged on:
- His definition of capital,
- Marxes failure to to differentiate between natural things, land, raw materials, "nature's bounty", capital, and labor; As George had.
- Marx lumped money (gold and silver), portable wealth and natural resources into Capital.
- Marx almost favored the modern lumping of all wealth portable, fixed or land into "capital."
- Marxes Failure to appreciate the inalienability of labor and capital.
- Henry George Saw a person's labor as sacred and appreciated lincoln's maxim that labor comes before capital.
- HG saw a person's capital as inalienably his own product of labor to be protected from taxation and valued.
- Unearned rents and income from mere ownership of property he saw as a drain on the natural rights of a person to possess the products of his labor.
On the other hand:
- “Although Marx would have personally favored abolishing the (private) wage-labor relation,” he had:
- “no theory of inalienable rights to critique wage-labor per se;”
- “no labor theory of property about workers appropriating the whole product;”
- “ and no theory about democracy in the workplace (or elsewhere).”
Why Marxes theory of labor is "muddleheaded"
Marx did have his "labor theory of value." Though that didn't completely originate with him. He defined the value of goods as the "'socially necessary abstract labor" embodied in a commodity. But if one understands that labor is inalienable, inseparable from the product of labor, including capital, then one can see it's not "abstract" at all. To the labor his creations and the things he works on are tangible creations. To neglect that argument is why Henry George and other socialists of his own time saw him as muddle-headed.
In his theory labour can and is alienated.
He was right to criticize the alienation of labor and capital. But his theory hinged on the notion that labor and capital can and are alienated from:
- The Product of their labor
- The Act of Production
- Autonomy
- From each other
And Marx despised Bourgeoisie society:
“Above all,” thus Marx, “we note the fact that the so-called rights of man, the droits de l’homme as distinct from the droits du citoyen, are nothing but the rights of a member of civil society, i.e. the rights of egoistic man, of man separated from other men and from the community.” [Marx&HR]
To Marx, this alienation was necessary for his theory, so the notion that they would be inalienable seemed absurd to him.
“the capitalist production system [] reifies labour into the "concrete" concept of "work" (a job), for which the worker is paid wages—at the lowest-possible rate—that maintain a maximum rate of return on the Capitalist's investment capital; this is an aspect of exploitation.” [Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844]
Ellerman writes that “Marx only had a labor theory of value and exploitation–which, even if it were not otherwise flawed, would only imply that workers were not paid the full value of their labor power.”[Ellerman]
To Marx one of the main evils of the Capitalist system was:
“that labour expended during the so-called normal day is paid below its value, so that overtime [was] simply a capitalist trick to extort more surplus labour. In any case, this would remain true of overtime even if the labour-power expended during the normal working day were paid for at its full value.” [Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, Chap. 10, sec. 3 (my emphasis)] [Ellerman]
Alienating a Right that is inalienable, is destructive and oppressive.
But his theory of alienation describes a form of slavery that results when basic rights are denied. The alienation he describes is the result of taking away a basic right subordinate to a person's right to pursue happiness, own himself, actuate his potential and have a share in the product of his own being. What he describes are symptoms of enslavement, of the absurdity of pretending that workers are renting their labor when in actual fact they are as enslaved as the antebellum slaves of the South and of European Colonialism.
Faulty Diagnosis leads to Faulty Results
Marx's solution to this was worker revolution, seizing all private property, and further denying the rights of workers. By disparaging natural rights theory, lumping pretty much all wealth into "capital", & not differentiating between natures bounty (land) and actual capital he also denied the link between man's labor and his property. This was a fail.
If a person has a right to property in the product of his labor, he has a right to capital even when someone else owns the property he is working within or with. When a right is inalienable, that means it cannot be separated from who a person is. Alienating labor from capital is destructive to both the function of the workplace and health and well being of workers. That is why Henry George referred to Marx as "muddle headed." (and Marx reciprocated).
When the Cure is worse than the Ill
Marxism contributed to the demise of labor rights, by ignoring this human rights case and thus setting it up so that later Marxists gave workers a choice between being wage slaves to private persons or wage slaves to the Government. That choice was not only not attractive but gave a rationale for employers to treat workers as rental units rather than as having a natural right in the enterprises they all were mutually involved in.
Correcting Marxism
Ernst Wiggforce movement's revision of Marxism, from a revolutionary to a reformist organization, hinged on restoring the natural rights argument to the socialist movement in Scandinavian countries. That is one reason why Scandinavian Social democracy is more healthy than Bolshevism or pure socialism.
Ellerman notes:
“The alternative to the human rental system is the genuine system of private property and non-fraudulent market contracts where is every one is a member of the democratic enterprise where they work so all people are jointly working for and governing themselves in the workplace–and jointly appropriating the positive and negative fruits of their labor.” [Ellerman]
In the Georgist schema, like Liberalism before the Post Civil War era, labor has natural rights and labor is who should be rewarded, compensated for their efforts. If one also accepts the argument that no person has a right to own privileges that come from nature's bounty or that are unearned, then it is obvious that unearned wealth and unearned income (rent) are an ill because they alienate labor from it's own product and create classes of people who are entitled (sometimes literally) and don't even understand capital or labor. The result is that the people closest to production (labor and local government/management) are alienated from both the fruits of the work and management over the work.
The way forward in human economy starts with critiques of Marxism, Henry George, Keynes and most of modern economics; tempered with contextualization and a deep understanding of what natural rights theory is really saying. If we want to move forward and not simply self destruct we need to work, work at our studies. Work at improving society and save each other.
Henry George on Marx after his death
He Honored Marx for:
- For being:
- For Seeing and teaching that:
- Henry George Also felt that Marx's
- How Henry George Might have Corrected Marx.
“the founder of the International — the first attempt to unite in a “holy alliance of the people” the workingmen of all countries; he taught the solidarity of labor, the brotherhood of man, and wherever his influence has reached it has tended to destroy those prejudices of nation and race which have been in all ages the most efficient means by which tyranny has been established and maintained.”
Of Course in Actual Fact, Marxism as a revolutionary creed led to tyrannies worse than Henry George (or Marx) could have imagined.
“the road to social regeneration lies not through destruction and anarchy, but through the promulgation of ideas and the education of the people. He realized that the enslavement of the masses is everywhere due to their ignorance, and realizing this, he set himself to work to master and to point out the social economic laws without the recognition of which all effort for social improvement is but a blind and fruitless struggle.”
Subsequent events proved Henry George Wrong here too.
Redeeming Marxism
Unfortunately, Marx's narrative was revolution, not merely education. The Swedish Thinker Ernst Wigforss would transform Marxism along Georgist principles, but the main movement went off on a road of conflict and violence.
“The Left was “side-tracked” for over a century by Marx, Lenin, and the Russian Revolution and the ensuing Great Debate about whether people should be publicly or privately rented.”[Ellerman]
“memory will be cherished as one who saw and struggled for that reign of justice in which armies shall be disbanded and poverty shall be unknown and government shall become co-operation, that golden age of peace and plenty, the possibility of which is beginning even now to be recognized among the masses all over the civilized world.”
Of course, thanks to Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao and others, Marx is remembered differently. Though Marx contributed to a host of disciplines, including the science of Economics. Bolshevism has been a blight on his memory.
My Friend Rick DiMare writes on how HG might have corrected Marx here:
Further Reading
- Related Posts:
- http://holtesthoughts.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-fraud-of-renting-labor.html
- http://holtesthoughts.blogspot.com/2018/04/justice-and-injustice-and-legal.html
To Read Professor David Ellerman's draft papers:
- https://cosmosandtaxis.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/ellerman_ct_vol5_iss3_4.pdf
- Neoabolitionism: http://www.ellerman.org/neo-abolitionism-and-marxism/
- Case Against the Employment System
- http://www.ellerman.org/the-case-against-the-employment-system-based-on-the-norms-of-ordinary-jurisprudence/
- In the following post my brilliant Lawyer friend explains and cites from both Henry George and Karl Marx:
- https://www.facebook.com/notes/common-wealth-tax/doc-167-how-henry-george-might-have-corrected-the-marxian-communist-manifesto/1594287590684378/
- http://www.cooperative-individualism.org/holmes-john_henry-george-and-karl-marx-1947.htm
- http://www.georgistjournal.org/2012/09/25/henry-georges-letter-at-the-funeral-of-karl-marx/
- Muddlehead Quote source:
- http://www.cooperative-individualism.org/holmes-john_henry-george-and-karl-marx-1947-159.pdf
- https://www.facebook.com/notes/common-wealth-tax/doc-167-how-henry-george-might-have-corrected-the-marxian-communist-manifesto/1594287590684378/
- G.W.F. Hegel had a well developed theory of human rights:
- http://www.inp.uw.edu.pl/mdsie/Political_Thought/Hegel%20Phil%20of%20Right.pdf
- However, Marx's underlying attitude was more Hobbesian than enlightenment. He was more influenced by Fuerbach and Hobbes than Locke or the enlightenment. And his revolutionary theory suffered as a result. This article explains it better than I'm prepared to:
- http://www.cicerofoundation.org/lectures/Marcel_H_Van_Herpen_Marx_and_Human_Rights.pdf
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