Organisation of work and free access

[Ed]

Sotionov wrote:

2. People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work, and will avoid it if they can.

This is a sweeping generalization. Who's to say what is dirty? Who's to say what is hard? Number crunching could be hard to one person and manual labour could be hard for another. These are both terms which are left to the interpretation of the individual. And some people even enjoy dangerous work. Why else would people drive fast cars or sky dive etc for leisure time if an element of danger is not enjoyable. You seem to be focused on your personal preferences and projecting them on to others. Which I'm sure you'll agree is not a scientific way to view evidence.

[LBird]

Sotionov wrote:

I will repeat my position which was not concretely answered, and I will rephrase it a little.Today we have two facts of life:1. In order to provide for people's needs, people need to work.2. People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work, and will avoid it if they can.Now, I see three positions you could take in relation these facts.- If you don't think that these two facts will be overcame with the abolition of capitalism, then we are going to need mechanisms to ensure that if someone consumes, he should also contribute accoding to his abilities….

[my bold]I agree. These 'mechanisms' will involve rethinking and reordering social structures and ideologies, which is why I've mentioned 'social authority', the concept of the 'social individual', the social determination of 'free access', and most importantly of all, democratic control, involving mandated, revokable delegates. Communist mechanisms, in fact.

[ALB]

Sotionov wrote:

Today we have two facts of life: 1. In order to provide for people's needs, people need to work. 2. People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work, and will avoid it if they can.

You beat me to it, Ed. (1) is a "fact of life", but (2) is dubious and is not universally true. People are prepared to work "hard" if they consider what they are doing is enjoyable or necessary. What work is "dirty" is in the eye of the beholder. And some people consider it an honour to do "dangerous" work (eg lifeboat crews or mountain rescue teams, even soldiers).

Sotionov wrote:

If you don't think that these two facts will be overcame with the abolition of capitalism, then we are going to need mechanisms to ensure that if someone consumes, he should also contribute according to his abilities.

This does not follow even on its own terms. There are plenty of people even today who consume without contributing to production (eg the young, the old, the sick) — another "fact of life" that will no doubt continue (and probably be extended) in a socialist society. So this claim would need to be revised to: if people are to consume, "mechanisms" will be needed to ensure that enough people work.But what does "mechanisms" mean? It sounds ominous and seems to suggest some form of economic coercion tying what some persons are allowed to consume to the amount of work they do. But why?Obviously, because "in order to provide for people's needs, people need to work", arrangements will have to be made to ensure that the needed work is done, but it does not follow that these have to involve economic coercion. It could just be a purely organisational matter, matching the work people like or are prepared to do with the work that needs to be done. It need not involve any restrictions on what those who work consume, i.e there does not have to be any link between an individual's contribution to production and their consumption.

[alanjjohnstone]

Just been reading Andrew Kliman and he introduced me to a concept that Marx held that was quite new to me. "…In the German Ideology, he and Frederick Engels noted that “ancient communal and State ownership … is still accompanied by slavery,” and they referred to the communal ownership of slaves as “communal private property” (emphasis added)…."  Kliman classifies such things as co-operatives as such. But since they are only a change of legal title and not a change in the mode of production.  You argue that private property in this sense will continue, depriving those who are deemed unworthy access to society's fruits. You claim that it need not be oppressive.   Following your argument that there will still exist freeloaders who will not contribute and do not deserve a share in what is available i would suggest that these hypothetical people would simply still take. Therefore in your world there has to be means to deny them which means an authority designed to enforce it and if they do take without permission, they must face a penalty/punishment. Bakunin you say suggests  deprivation of political rights, a formal means of ostracisation, ie they are refused a say in the way things are decided and run. You say it is not suffice.  Exile simply exports the problem to another community.  So let us hear an alternative form of social control you think is suffice if it is not what we have existing to day in the form of a co-ercive and very opprssive police, courts and prison system.  Another thought is that under your "exclusive access" for "deserving" freeloaders , the poets, the painters and the writers we will have to have something akin to the Russian Writers Union laying down what they consider to be acceptable artistic expression. I touched upon this but you appeared to ignore that point.   One of the major objections to means testing in the welfare state and why universal benefits are preferable is that there is unnecessary and time-consuming and socially wasteful verification for eligibility procedures. A whole bureaucracy is created to ensure the "able-bodied" are not provided for. Even then the loopholes exist for some to exploit and others fall through the safety-net due to the regulations fails to cover their particular situation.   As i said in  previous contribution, one  purpose of socialism is to minimise adminstrative structures and make society self-regulating…which involves people self-policing themselves for a want of a better word   

[Sotionov]

Ed wrote:

This is a sweeping generalization. Who's to say what is dirty? Who's to say what is hard?

Watch the show Dirty Jobs. Anyone who thinks that such work could be done solely by volunteers is simply utopian. Anyone who thinks that mining neccessary for a society with the present kind of needs could be done by volunteers, is beyond delusional. Sorry, but that's just a fact. If you give people free access to fulfull their needs and leave them to do only what they want, when they want it and how much, that kind of system would collapse within days, his has been shown on the example of communes, and is to even more true of the society at large. The only people who would volunteer to mine, when they can do anything else or nothing at all- would be the ones that have some sort of masochistic disposition, and that part of the population is surely not going to mine enough to sustain an industrial economy. It just brings us back to what i already said- the only way one could imagine that a free access system would be sustainable is to dream about technological utopianism or the utopian concept of a 'new man' comming into being. 0 

ALB wrote:

People are prepared to work "hard" if they consider what they are doing is enjoyable or necessary.

The considaration of the neccessity of something being done is antitechical to free access. You know that you will not be denied anything even if you don't do anything, let alone if you don't do the hard, dirty and dangerous work. 

Quote:

What work is "dirty" is in the eye of the beholder.

Yet there is a tendency of how people percieve the "dirty", and it is somewhat connected with the biological response to stink, but also to other thigs that can be objectively defined as dirty.  Some work is objectively easier then another, likewise with dangerousness.We can see from the examples of communes (cooperative, democratic economical communities), it follows as a rule- if there is no system that establishes a portion of the labor quota that an able member has to dedicate to cleaning- the commune will be dirty. Sure, there are people who like to clean, and people who are extraordinarily diligent and socially responsible that do the cleaning, but they are simply not in lagre enough a number neccessary for the community to be clean, and their number is also logically to be expected to reduce due to the indignation of them seeing that they do all the cleaning and that the majority as a rule chooses to do the easier and more pleasurable work. This is more true to the proportion of the size of the community.With the lack of mechanism that makes sure that (hard and dirty) work gets done, the vast majority will not volunteer to do it, and it is perfectly natural and expected for people to strive to reduce their discomfort and increace their comfort as much as they can. To dream about an emergence of a race of 'new man' who will go against this biological imperative only propelled by his own will-power, without any external motivation (even if he does or doesn't- he's not denied access to anything)- is to delude oneself and be utopian.  

Quote:

Sotionov wrote:

If you don't think that these two facts will be overcame with the abolition of capitalism, then we are going to need mechanisms to ensure that if someone consumes, he should also contribute according to his abilities.

This does not follow even on its own terms. There are plenty of people even today who consume without contributing to production (eg the young, the old, the sick) — another "fact of life" that will no doubt continue (and probably be extended) in a socialist society. So this claim would need to be revised to: if people are to consume, "mechanisms" will be needed to ensure that enough people work.

You didn't seem to notice that I wrote "according to abilities".

Quote:

But what does "mechanisms" mean? It sounds ominous and seems to suggest some form of economic coercion tying what some persons are allowed to consume to the amount of work they do.

Mechanisms of "economic coercion" need not be ominous, they can be democratic, non-oppressive and humane. E.g. if an able-bodied person would to comsume and not contribute, and the democratic community decides to deny him the possibility to consume beyong the neccessities of life, what is there ominous about that? It's not only just, it's beyond just, being that the community is so merciful as to feed, clothe (and similar) it's own exploiter.

Quote:

Obviously, because "in order to provide for people's needs, people need to work", arrangements will have to be made to ensure that the needed work is done, but it does not follow that these have to involve economic coercion.

Propose to me some other mechanism. Bakunin speculated of a possibility of a sort of political mechanism- that an person consuming and not contribution would lose their political right to participate in the organization of the community, but I don't see that as sufficient.

[Sotionov]

My suggestion would be to go with the libertarian communist model which SPGB accepts under the name of socialism- a democratic society functioning on the principle of "from each according to their abilities, to each according their needs", but with mechanism that ensure that the first part of that principles doesn't get degenerated into "from each according to their mood, or not at all". To call that not chaning the means of production is beyond intellectually dishonest.I will explain my concrete views about the organisation of socialist communities, but please first read all I have to say, including the finishing explanation before thinking about a reaction to my view.So, what mechanism do I conrectely mean. I mean firstly communities deciding what do they want to produce in order to meet their basic and general needs, and calculates what they need in order to produce it, including aproximately how much labor and on what jobs etc. Obviosly that would include labor needed for the functioning of the system, like making sure electricity doen't go out, that the roads are clean and repaired, etc, etc. I don't need to explain this to you, you all support this kind of socio-economic system.Where our vies differ is that I think that communities should institute labor quotas, of course- for everyone except the children, old, sick, disabled, pregnant and nursing. E.g. in one community it might proper that everyone not falling into that category would need to contribute 20 hours a week in order for the needs of the community to be met. So, the community would institute a labor quota that says that each adult and able person should punch in 20 hours a week doing any work that sees to producing products and services that the community deems socially neccessary and includes it's plan of production or that seems to the proper functioning of the system, as I mentioned, which would also be organized by the community as socially neccessary labor.That labor quota would include a condition that e.g. 4 hours a month needs to be done on jobs that the community sees that there is an insufficient amount of people normally appying to do, those being the "dirty jobs" that is- jobs that are harder, dirties, more dangerous then other, or that the people in that community simply find less pleasurable and appealing.If some people want some product that the community hasn't included in their production plan, they are perfectly free to produce it themselves outside of their work week, and if they don't know how and don't want to learn, they are also free to persuade those who do know how to make it for them, or to persuade the community to put those things in the production plan on the next meeting.Outside of the 20 hour work week in which the able person contributes to sustenance of the community and it's system, he is perfectly free do what he wants, as long as he doesn't commit any anti-social acts (aggression, harm, bullying, oppression, vandalism etc.)If an able person does his share- he get's full access to the products and services that the community provides, if he doesn't- he's access is reduces only to the neccessities of life.Of course, just like with the planning and production, all the details of the labor quota system would be worked out by the community itself.Now, after explaining my view, I want to give the finishing explanation I mentioned. It is important that I point out, and it is important that you understant that these mechanisms by which a community would regulate contribution to production are by definition only a contingency plan to the assumptions that I've mentioned in my previous messages. Please bear with me and see what I mean by this.As I have mentioned, we have two facts of life that are hardly ever to change:1) in order for us to consume, we need to produce, if we want anything except the living standard of a hunter-gatherer tribe, we have to labor, because no one and nothing is going to make what we need istead of us- the working people;and 2) people in general don't like doing (hard, dirty, dangerous) work and will avoid when they can, and will choose the easier, cleaner and safer work when they can.Even if we are to assume that technological advancment will give us machines that will produce and do everything, or assume that people in general will have a conversion to saintly figures that will labor and produce all the things we want without any external circumstances motivating them to do so, these mechanisms I talk about do nothing to dispell such assumptions that we might have.Even if technological utopianism, or the utopian concept of the new man do become reality, even then can the mechanisms I talk about stay instituted, and stand there superflous, being made unneccessary by practice- by reality.If one really thinks that one of those facts of life, or both of them, will be made obsolete with or shortly after the establishment of socialism, then there is no reason to opposse the mechanisms I talk about. He should be ready to say- sure, let us institute such mechanisms as a back-up, and they will become unneccesary shortly after the establishment of socialism. For it is irrational to opposse puting a safety net under the walking-rope, even if one is confident that he will cross it, because one can never know the future and know for certain what will or will not happen.

[ALB]

In the course of the discussion you have changed your position from

Sotionov wrote:

People don't like to do (hard, dirty and dangerous) work, and will avoid it if they can.

to

Sotionov wrote:

people in general don't like doing (hard, dirty, dangerous) work and will avoid when they can, and will choose the easier, cleaner and safer work when they can.

I don't if this know if this change is significant but all you are saying is: People don't like doing work that they don't like to do. Which is true by definition rather than a fact of life! Can't disagree with that.Your question boils down to how, in a socialist society with free access, can people be got to do work they might not like doing? In other words, a variety of "Who Will Do the Dirty Work?" which opponents have long put to socialists and which socialists have long come up with various answers. Here, for what it's worth, is the one given by William Morris in 1883 (in Useful Work versus Useless Toil):

Quote:

Socialists are often asked how work of the rougher and more repulsive kind could be carried out in the new condition of things. To attempt to answer such questions fully or authoritatively would be attempting the impossibility of constructing a scheme of a new society out of the materials of the old, before we knew which of those materials would disappear and which endure through the evolution which is leading us to the great change. Yet it is not difficult to conceive of some arrangement whereby those who did the roughest work should work for the shortest spells, And again, what is said above of the variety of work applies specially here. Once more I say, that for a man to be the whole of his life hopelessly engaged in performing one repulsive and never-ending task, is an arrangement fit enough for the hell imagined by theologians, but scarcely fit for any other form of society. Lastly, if this rougher work were of any special kind, we may suppose that special volunteers would be called on to perform it, who would surely be forthcoming, unless men in a state of freedom should lose the sparks of manliness which they possessed as slaves. And yet if there be any work which cannot be made other than repulsive, either by the shortness of its duration or the intermittency of its recurrence, or by the sense of special and peculiar usefulness (and therefore honour) in the mind of the man who performs it freely – if there be any work which cannot be but a torment to the worker, what then? Well, then, let us see if the heavens will fall on us if we leave it undone, for it were better that they should. The produce of such work cannot be worth the price of it.

So, basically, there are various possible practical ways (that don't assume a "new Man") of dealing with the matter but there's no point in drawing up a detalied blueprint (or "mecanism") today.This is a discussion forum so there's no harm in discussing your "mechanism", but knowing full well that it is only an abstract intellectual exercise that will probably have no bearing on what future socialist society decides.Your proposal is that it should be democratically-decided that every able-bodied person should do some many hours a month of what might be called "community service". That sounds reasonable. I would imagine that most people would go along with that and do it. But, you object, what about the one, or maybe ones, who refuse or fail to do this. You want to "punish" them by depriving them of free access, but how? Everyone else will be able to take freely from the common stock of wealth set aside for individual consumption; the recalcitrant individual turns up at the store but who's going to tell them what they can and cannot have? Or, for that matter, stop them taking what they think they need?When we've been drawn into discussing this hypothetical case we've generally answered that it is likely to so rare as to not to need to bother about, and certainly not worth erecting a complicated structure to deal with. But the basic answer is given above by Morris: there is no point in us today working out a "mecanism" for a problem which might not arise or, if it did, not in a form that we can know. Even if we were to, it would just be an intellectual exercise since what would actually be done would depend on what people at the time decided in the light of the exact circumstances of the time, not on what we today might think they should do.In other words, future socialist society will deal with the problem if it arises and there's no point in us today drawing up a blueprint, not even a "contingency plan", of what they should do.

[LBird]

Sotionov wrote:

To dream about an emergence of a race of 'new man' who will go against this biological imperative only propelled by his own will-power, without any external motivation (even if he does or doesn't- he's not denied access to anything)- is to delude oneself and be utopian.

Sotionov, I’m sympathetic to your wish to hear of some social ‘safety mechanisms’ (or safety nets under a walking rope, as you put it), but I think you seriously underestimate the ability of humans to change their ‘natures’ under different social circumstances.To talk of a ‘biological imperative’ within humans (an ‘imperative’ which can’t be altered by society), or to use the term ‘utopian’ to describe any social arrangements which are different to those of today, is essentially to be employing a conservative ideological framework. I’m not calling you a conservative, but I am pointing out the philosophical roots of one of your ideological building blocks. What’s more, it isn’t a building block shared by most Communists, who tend to be more historical in their outlook, and stress ‘change and society’ over ‘fixity and biology’.As I’ve said, I think that your wish to discuss future ‘social mechanisms’ is worth pursuing, but for me the basis would be the difficulties of a transition from a bourgeois ideologically-based society to a new Communist-inspired one. That is, I see it as a malleable social issue, not a fixed biological one. And further, I think I could be persuaded otherwise about the need for ‘safety mechanisms’ by the other posters. Certainly, ‘numbers’ would be a big factor, here. A few incorrigible lead-swingers would be pitied rather than condemned.Within history, we have many examples of humans proving the incorrectness of the theory of the ‘biological imperative’: one only has to look at wars like the First World War, where (at least for the first half) millions of men willingly climbed out of trenches, laden like donkeys with masses of equipment, and slowly walked towards impenetrable banks of barbed wire, whilst being mown down by intense machine gun fire. Why? Because of the social power of ideas, like Nationalism and Comradeship. Their individual wish to defend their own country, combined with their wish not to be thought a coward by their comrades, meant that any ‘biological imperative’ to live, was overcome.It’s not utopian to learn from history. If even death can be embraced willingly, due to the power of a particular consciousness, surely cleaning toilets, etc., will present less of a challenge for humanity?

[alanjjohnstone]

“I think that communities should institute labor quotas.  theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ursula-k-le-guin-the-dispossessed  You probably know the book but i recommend Ursula Le Guin’s novel, The Dispossessed, was set on a planet that was unable to provide an abundance and therefore did have what you propose have various quotas and job- organising. In the book the network of administration and management is called PDC, Production and Distribution Coordination. They are a coordinating system for all syndicates, federatives, and individuals who do productive work. “They do not govern persons; they administer production. They have no authority either to support me or to prevent me. They can only tell us the public opinion of us — where we stand in the social conscience. Volunteers and selection by lot…. A bit like conscription and a labour militia. =============================================================================================== “The human/computer network of files in Divlab was set up with admirable efficiency. It did not take the clerk five minutes to get the desired information sorted out from the enormous, continual input and outgo of information concerning every job being done, every position wanted, every workman needed, and the priorities of each in the general economy of the world-wide society.” “All right, but how do you get people to do the dirty work?” “What dirty work?” asked Oiie’s wife, not following. “Garbage collecting, grave digging,” Oiie said; Shevek added, “Mercury mining,” and nearly said, “Shit processing,” but recollected the loti taboo on scatological words. He had reflected, quite early in his stay on Urras, that the Urrasti lived among mountains of excrement, but never mentioned shit. “Well, we all do them. But nobody has to do them for very long, unless he likes the work. One day in each decad the community management committee or the block committee or whoever needs you can ask you to join in such work; they make rotating lists. Then the disagreeable work postings, or dangerous ones like the mercury mines and mills, normally they’re for one half year only.” “But then the whole personnel must consist of people just learning the job.” “Yes. It’s not efficient, but what else is to be done? You can’t tell a man to work on a job that win cripple him or kill him in a few years. Why should be do that?” “He can refuse the order?” “It’s not an order, Oiie. He goes to EMvlab — the Division of Labor office — and says, I want to do such and such, what have you got? And they tell him where there are jobs.” “But then why do people do the dirty work at all? Why do they even accept the one-day-in-ten jobs?” “Because they are done together…And other reasons. You know, life on Anarres isn’t rich, as it is here. In the little communities there isn’t very much entertainment, and there is a lot of work to be done. So, if you work at a mechanical loom mostly, every tenthday it’s pleasant to go outside and lay a pipe or plow a field, with a different group of people…And then there is challenge. Here you think that the incentive to work is finances, need for money or desire for profit, but where there’s no money the real motives are clearer, maybe. People like to do things. They like to do them well. People take the dangerous, hard jobs because they take pride in doing them, they can — egoize, we call it — show off? — to the weaker ones. Hey, look, little boys, see how strong I am! You know? A person likes to do what he is good at doing…But really, it is the question of ends and means. After all, work is done for the work’s sake. It is the lasting pleasure of life. The private conscience knows that. And also the social conscience, the opinion of one’s neighbors. There is no other reward, on Anarres, no other law. One’s own pleasure, and the respect of one’s fellows. That is all. When that is so, then you see the opinion of the neighbors becomes a very mighty force.” “No one ever defies it?” “Perhaps not often enough,” Shevek said. “Does everybody work so hard, then?” Oiie’s wife asked. “What happens to a man who just won’t cooperate?” “Well, he moves on. The others get tired of him, you know. They make fun of him, or they get rough with him, beat him up; in a small community they might agree to take his name off the meals listing, so he has to cook and eat all by himself; that is humiliating. So he moves on, and stays in another place for a while, and then maybe moves on again. Some do it all their lives……" ====================================================================================== What i think is at the bottom of this discussion is that you do not agree that we are capable of producing a world of abundance, which Le Guin's world was not able to do. Really, this is not an ideological issue of disagreement. It can be answered by producing current facts and figures, and adding projections to them if necessary.   The conclusion is that we do not have a natural scarcity but an artificial one imposed upon us. Technology and resources are available right now to eliminate want and raise living standards for the majority of the world's population. This is not speculation , not guess-work but the actual real situation. It is not science-fiction but science fact. We have the resources and the knowledge to do this now and  imagine the potential of 3-D printing will bring. It is not utopian dream of a never-never land to have free access and to take according to needs.   We can debate continuously about the mechanisms of "from each according to ability" and i am sure there will never be just one way of adopting it.  Nobody is saying it will be done overnight. There will be trial and error.  We will not immediately fall upon a perfect system. Experience and experimentation will determine what society has need of at a given moment.  Your differences with the WSM are not that great that you should not join us. 

[Ed]

Sotionov wrote:

Ed wrote:

This is a sweeping generalization. Who's to say what is dirty? Who's to say what is hard?

Watch the show Dirty Jobs. Anyone who thinks that such work could be done solely by volunteers is simply utopian. Anyone who thinks that mining necessary for a society with the present kind of needs could be done by volunteers, is beyond delusional. Sorry, but that's just a fact. If you give people free access to fulfull their needs and leave them to do only what they want, when they want it and how much, that kind of system would collapse within days, his has been shown on the example of communes, and is to even more true of the society at large. The only people who would volunteer to mine, when they can do anything else or nothing at all- would be the ones that have some sort of masochistic disposition, and that part of the population is surely not going to mine enough to sustain an industrial economy. It just brings us back to what i already said- the only way one could imagine that a free access system would be sustainable is to dream about technological utopianism or the utopian concept of a 'new man' comming into being. 0

I have seen that show, it's where I got the sewer cleaning example I used earlier. You posit only two outcomes either technological advancement or coercive forces as the only way that certain jobs will get done. Here's something you don't seem to have considered. That jobs are worse now because they are run in such a way as to maximize profit at the expense of the workers doing those jobs. Improving the conditions under which we produce has been a major factor of class struggle under capitalism. From the eight hour day to health and safety legislation fought for by unions. It seems clear that if workers decided how to produce and under what conditions they produce, they would take every opportunity to minimize risk of injury and maximize enjoyment of production. Making these so called bad jobs….not so bad. (Even though good and bad are still completely subjective terms). There is also a hierarchy under capitalism of what jobs are good and bad, for instance doctor = good, hospital cleaner = bad. Yet one cannot do without the other. A doctor working in a filthy environment would lose patients and put himself at risk. While the hospital cleaner will at some point in their life need a doctor. This idealist notion of good and bad jobs will be done away with. Production can be made safer right now without the need of extraordinary technological advances. An example could be deadlines. The owner must have enough of a product produced in a certain amount of time to make sure he has enough profit left over after paying the workers their wages. So losing days maybe even weeks to ensuring workers safety let alone enjoyment of their jobs is not his priority. It's not even the workers priority under capitalism to stay safe. They need the money and to get the job done as quickly as possible so they can get a few hours with their families in between sleep and getting up for the next shift. That's the way it must be under capitalism, but it's not the way it must be. What if workers main priority in producing was health and safety? What about if a priority was enjoyment while producing. What if hours were cut short so they weren't at work for so long, weren't as tired. Would all of these things lead to safer and more enjoyable workplaces?

[alanjjohnstone]

At the present those who are employed in hazardous and unhealthy jobs do so because they have to, and are often in the job from16 to 60, 8 hours a day , 5 days a week, with a couple of weeks off a year.  Socialists are not suggesting that this will be the normal acceptable practice in socialism.  These jobs will not be done by the same people all the time. All able-bodied workers – of both sexes- will take turns at this work on a rotational basis that will be decided by those involved and not by you and i right now.  Some might not go along with your slightly disparaging dismissive use of "new man (and woman)" but we should not forget that this work will be carried out by socially conscious men and women who appreciate that society now belongs to them and therefore the less pleasant tasks must be performed by them. Don't you ever clean your own toilet in your own house? Or get sweaty and dirty gardening?  In the knowledge that we own and control the Earth, and all that is in it and on it , i think it unlikely that people will refuse to tackle the dirty jobs.  If the health and safety is an issue and people decide that it is toodangerous to expect people to engage in such work – so be it – we will have to do without,  or what is more probable , find an alternative second best choice which doesn't carry as much risk in obtaining.  We shouldn't force…or bribe …or morally blackmail such workers. 

[Sotionov]

ALB wrote:

But the basic answer is given above by Morris: there is no point in us today working out a "mecanism" for a problem which might not arise or, if it did, not in a form that we can know.

Might not, or surely not to arise? Because if we cannot be sure that is will not arise, and we cannot- being that we cannot know the future, it is irrational and irresposible to base out struggle for a new society based on assumption, and not to plan mechanisms that will prevent the society from collapsing if the assumptions were not to come true, or at least until they come true.As I said, if one doesn't hold utopian views, the mechanisms I talk about are neccessary for preneting the democratic and cooperative society from failing. On the other hand, if one is confident in his utopian views, there is no reason to opposse the mechanisms I propose, because if you are right, they will be made superfluous by practice, just like a safety-net is made superfluous when one crosses the walking rope.

[alanjjohnstone]

I should add if people cannot change then all this discussion is rather pointless because there simply will not be a socialist revolution without people changing and no socialist society to dissect how it will  function. Having struggled for a new socialist society which we argue must pre-suppose a mass socialist movement and big changes in social outlook and it may well indeed be an assumption but surely  that the desire for socialism and all which it entails and the actual revolutionary process will indeed influence how people will behave in socialism and towards one another. If too many people once having achieved socuialism then decide to not work, then socialism will fall apart The socialist revolution entails workers acquiring a class consciousness , or participating in political and industrial organisations to expropriate the rich and re-structure production, not just who will do the work but how things are produced and distributed. This will require decision making, and interactions with one another. I am quite reluctant to lay down expectations of what sort of procedures will evolve. We can only generalise with broad brush-strokes.the picture of what may happen.  We should also rememebr that we are not starting a new society from a blank sheet of paper. Suppose the revolution was tomorrow and we had socialism people will still carry on their duties , business as usual, for the immediate time being, while at the same time adapting and changing their work-places. All those in wasteful socially useless jobs will have to be re-deployed , slotted into other work. No doubt insurance actuaries with their flair for statistics and projections and demographics will orientate themselves to planning and administation. Ex-army will find that they can remain in uniform and be used in natural disaster relief work,  sent to build bridges or whatnot. Use your own imagination on how particular jobs in capitalism will disappear entirely, or become transformed into more socially productive jobs in socialism. We are talking millions upon millions of new labour-force now released from retail and commerce to be made available to lessen the hours of work for others.

[Ed]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

These jobs will not be done by the same people all the time. All able-bodied workers – of both sexes- will take turns at this work on a rotational basis that will be decided by those involved and not by you and i right now. 

To be honest Alan I don't agree with this part. I think it's certainly an option, but a little too prescriptive at this time to give any definite answer on the subject. A better way to put it I think would be people should not be forced to do the same occupation forever.agreed with the rest though

[ALB]

Sotionov wrote:

As I said, if one doesn't hold utopian views, the mechanisms I talk about are neccessary for preneting the democratic and cooperative society from failing. On the other hand, if one is confident in his utopian views, there is no reason to opposse the mechanisms I propose, because if you are right, they will be made superfluous by practice, just like a safety-net is made superfluous when one crosses the walking rope.

I don't know what you expect us to do. Adopt your scheme as our official policy? But what would be the point? Besides trying to dictate to the future, this would be to commit ourselves to something that might exclude people who were socialists but disagreed with this particular blueprint. There's nothing stopping a particular socialist holding this view as their own personal view, but it's not the sort of thing to make a party policy.Much more worrying, though, about your proposition is the thinking behind him it, identified by LBird as a reflection of the bourgeois ideology as to what "human nature" is.  It's that that's really unacceptable..

[Author]

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