Post Capitalist-Society – Join The Debate.

Great questions.I think Marx and Engels efforts to develop a science of social change may contain some insights which will prove useful in approaching this topic. Then, as now, differing ideas were floating around about what new society should entail and how to bring it about. "Scientific socialism" was their effort to ground such inquiries in really existing, concrete conditions ( as opposed to "utopian" visions).One insight which I think has enourmous implications for where we find ourselves today is the proposition that social revolution begins when the forces of production develop to the point that they come in conflict with the relations of production.This is certainly an accurate anaylsis how how bourgeois society conquered feudal society, and may have bearing today as we see new technologies like artificial intelligence, robots, and three-dimensional printing ( to name a few) threatening traditional employment.It is important to note that Marx wrote that the conflict arises because the old familiar relations of production resist (act as a "fetter" upon) the new, more efficient and powerful productive forces. The old relations must eventually be swept away or progress will be thwarted.We can already see evidence of this conflict emerging. But here's the bad news…Despite Marx's optimism about the inevitability of the proletariat to achieve class-conscienceness and achieve the "end of human prehistory" we can see today the danger of a very different outcome.In the past (sticking to the schema of historical materialism) when a ruling class has been overthrown it has been replaced by a new technology-bearing class. Today we have such a new techology-bearing class threatening the bourgeois order and stealthily accreating power. Silicon Valley (for lack of a better all-encompasing designation) is changing the rules of capitalist property rights, the legal foundation of capitalist society.The new technology-bearing class, for the gifts they bear, assume acess to all your private data, your photos, you emails, your texts. They assert the right to track you, online and in real life 24/7. They listen to your conversations in the privacy of your own home and have even been caught turning on your cameras without your knowledge. The content you produce online and the data you produce as you live your life are theirs to profit from. Examples of a new order of property rights abound. In the future, when you buy a self-driving car you will not actually own a self-driving car because you will not own the operating system. The tablet my wife bought me for Christmas has a camera which I've never used because I refuse to agree to Microsoft's terms that they should have access to my photos. (Imagine a camera manufacturer making such a demand in the predigital age.)This is how power is accreted. Property rights are the legal expression of the relations of production, the undermining of these reveals the transfer of power to a new class. This is not the long-anticipated victory of the proletatiat.The goal of development of technology is to give Man greater mastery over nature; to deliver us from necessity to freedom; to emancipate us, to allow a fuller development of human potential. We are on the threshold of finally developing the technologies which can usher in the "end of human prehistory," but tragically we face the possibility of becoming enslaved by these tecnhologies, or, more accurately, by the new class bearing them.

I think that it's important to acknowledge that Marx's theory about conflict between forces and relations of production is not a theory of 'technology being the driver of change'.Marx's 'forces of production' and 'relations of production' both involve social theory and practice. That is, it's not a theory of 'stuff' (forces) driving 'ideas' (relations).Marx is making the point that the theory and practice of our social forces comes into conflict with the theory and practice of our social relations.Without that acknowledgement, it's easy (and often has been done) to fall into 'technological determinism', where workers are regarded as passive, and have to merely await suitable 'techological development'. There are as many 'ideas' in the forces as in the relations.Democratic Socialism won't come into being without our changing of our theory and practice in all areas of social production. Social consciousness is central to change. 'Fetters' start with our ideas, which are often those of the ruling class, and we have to criticise them. Self-development of the proletariat is the key, not technological change.

The simple answer to this 'response' is to point out that 'cooperatives' are not 'the kernel of the new society'.Cooperatives are actually 'the kernel of the old society within the shell of the old', yet another version of 'market exchange'.This is exposed by their 'wanting something better now' (ie. within capitalist relations).All we can offer at present is a view of the future, because we're nowhere near making 'something better now', and we should concede that to supporters of cooperatives.For us, World Socialism is 'The Cooperative', not a continuation of market (or other) competition between a plurality of 'cooperatives', each concerned only with itself, but a singular world cooperative in which all social production is controlled democratically. That is, a Democratic World (not individual production by either biology or social sub-groups).If workers simply want better conditions within capitalism now, we should point them to unions or cooperatives, and openly say that we wish to build consciously for our future, a building which is critical of what exists (rather than pragmatically uses what exists).We democratic socialists have different aims to cooperatives, alan. The 'pragmatic now for accepted old' doesn't have our aim of 'critical now for created new'.

Sorry, alan, I didn't meant to imply that you didn't understand – I was merely trying to reinforce your position!I've always acknowledged that it was yours and ALB's excellent posts on LibCom about 'economics', during the debate with some sects that I can't remember at this moment, that did teach me to suck eggs, that prompted me to look up the SPGB.Whether that latter move has been a success or not, I'll leave to others to judge!

The lesson of Michael hanneke's movie Time of the Wolf is that we have already seen what a post-apocalypse looks like, we see these things all the time, in Bangladesh, Mexico, etc.  pace Hollywood, they don't involve people in leather having high speed battles with improvised weapons, and reverting to some sort of tribal atavism.  They usually involve people looking scared, helpless and dislocated, sitting around waiting for help.The relevence of this little aside is that we have also seen what real post-capiotalism without active socialism looks like: megaslums, humans by their millions consigned to scrapyards and literally living off the detritous of the rich.