Some Thoughts on Positive and Negative Liberty (Pt 1)

The positive/negative liberty dichotomy always bothered me. Not so much because it is necessarily wrong (though it is, as I'll explain), but because Isaiah Berlin and the propertarian (free-market) conceptualization has been the primary narrative on the subject. This is not to say that I dislike Berlin per se, or that he is undeserving of his acclaim. But this does speak to the imminent need for the ruling narrative to fit into the vision of the ruling class.

Indeed, Berlin starts his essay, Two Concepts of Liberty, by blasting so called "fanatically held social and political doctrines" reflected in the works of Marx/Engels as "dangerous ideas." To Berlin, this speaks to the supreme importance of ideas in shaping our world. Yet for all of his inquiry, the materialist conception of history is lost on Berlin. He claims without irony that "political theory is a branch of moral philosophy," perhaps ignoring just how many transfers of wealth and power occur as a result of the material conditions of society rather than abstractions like "morality" - abstractions that have their own place, but not as the foundation of rational inquiry into the movements of society. With Marx, the moral foundation is absolutely critical - but only in guidance.

Individualism: The Basis of Socialism

This is part 3 of a 3-post series dealing with the Marxist concept of Socialism and Individualism.

Part 3: The Basis of Socialism


Socialism is on the one hand the transfer of the control over the means of production to the working class, in order to relieve this oppression. It is to overthrow the irrational, free-market state of political economy. But it serves a far more fundamental purpose for human society. As we have seen, socialism seeks to abolish the state of things wherein human labor is objectified. Human labor should, given the conditions of emancipation, serve the essential interests of the human being in the context of satisfied human needs. Erich Fromm:

"For Marx, socialism (or communism) is not flight or abstraction from, or loss of the objective world which men have created by the objectification of their faculties. It is not an impoverished return to unnatural, primitive simplicity. It is rather the first real emergence, the genuine actualization of man's nature as something real. Socialism, for Marx, is a society which permits the actualization of man's essence, bu overcoming his alienation. It is nothing less than creating the conditions for the truly free, rational, active and independent man; it is the fulfillment of the prophetic aim: the destruction of the idols."⁷

The socialization of the political economy is in keeping with the rejection of values, processes and constructs which do not meet the essential interests of a society of human beings. It is the judgement of capitalism, and all forms of organization, for the specific value in terms of rights and privileges it bestows on its members.

Individualism: The Freedom of Independence

This is part 2 of a 3-post series dealing with the Marxist concept of Socialism and Individualism.
 
Part 2: The Freedom of Independence


Human existence is a social phenomenon. The "individualist" ideal of capitalism seeks to privatize the sum of human relations in order to free the human being. Indeed, the many libertarian ideals seek to arrange society in such a way that "nobody steps on anybody else's toes." Property should exist as an extension of the individual. And the individuals, in turn, voluntarily exchange property.³

“The rate of privation between members of society is precisely the antithesis to the rate of independence or individualism.”

The facts, however, paint a different picture. The calculus of human "utility" posits that the disutility of uncomfortable jobs should incur greater pay - the opposite is true. Jobs with less autonomy, greater physical requirement, greater tolls on health and dirtier conditions tend to pay less. The social supply of labor, rather than the individual valuation of labor is the chief determinant of the value paid to workers. It is precisely this irrational construct which determines that an increase in the available productive forces of society, that is an increase in supply of labor, should instead decrease the value and incentive of a worker. What appears as an obvious supply-demand function is in the aggregate an irrational transfer of value to a minority - the capitalist who can pay his or her workers less, and yet has more supply (labor) available, and a larger potential market (laborers as consumers).^{3, 4}

Individualism: The Myth of Utopian Socialism

This is part 1 of a 3-post series dealing with the Marxist concept of Socialism and Individualism.

Part 1: The Myth of Utopian Socialism

Socialism: the penultimate state of equality. Everything shared, the power and interests of each individual so intertwined that the most minor discomfort will be done away with: Utopia. But Utopia is, by definition, an unattainable state of things: it means "no place." Nature itself precludes perfection.

But socialism isn't a utopia, either. The closest proximity it ever gets to Utopia is that socialism defines the conditions which allow for humans to strive for utopia. The daily struggle to subsist, wherein basic human need resolves itself into conflicts between individuals, stands in the the way of Utopia more than nature. But the triumph over the conditions which create these conflicts could allow humans to redirect their efforts.

If the problem of hunger is restricted to our history, we can then seek to resolve the intricate issues of human inter-personal relations. The state of the individual in need is a state of oppression, for the simple reason that it disallows the free actualization of the human being: in such a state, one is tied above all to the very struggle to exist before one can exist as a free person:

Paving an Interstate on the Moral High Ground

Lev Lafayette reminded me of something easy to forget:

On one level such attitudes are the result of an apparent inability to consider life from the perspective of a person living in such countries. For decades these countries have been ruled by absolute monarchs, dictatorships, or regimes with only a pretence of democracy, all of which have engaged in gross violations of basic human rights. -Lev Lafayette, How beautiful is freedom / Isocracy.org

The same kind of alienation occurs throughout human activity every day. It variously manifests as the structural-procedural diminishing of general human interests to the end of efficiency, political maneuvering and one-sided interest-fulfillment, to things like the very structure of language meant to engineer - consciously or not - the refutation or dilution of interests competing with one's own.

Authority is Only Acceptable When it is Turned Against Oppression Itself

The best approach to the application of authority to situations of oppression is a materialist one. Exercises in avoidance and punishment rarely do much to solve the issues of oppression and exploitation. The underlying social relations have to be confronted to resolve oppression, and this can only occur by an open, systematic inquiry into the relations of oppression. Furthermore, the rate at which oppressive authority figures are able to freely express their own bigotry is directly proportional to the depth and accuracy of investigations into the same oppression.

Authority does, in fact, develop legitimacy when turned against oppression (and by extension oppressors). For that reason, leftists frequently correlate bigotry in language with oppression that follows a bigoted division. Leftists internalize a phobia (embodied in a self-restriction) of (from) the language of the oppressor, and this is not to be ashamed of. As the oppression diminishes, so, too, will the sting of the language and the internalization of authority against that language. This is all in keeping with a revolutionary overthrow of the structure of oppression, and fine at that.

What needs to be questioned, however, is the pedantic nature of this phobia when you apply it socially. The fact is that it does nothing to reveal and excise the oppression it seeks to confront. To ban the language of the oppressor is to conceal the identity of the oppressor. It internalizes the sense of oppression on all sides. It fights against the recognition of oppression and in fact insulates oppression.