Workers create all the “wealth” (SPGB, SWP) or “value” (CPGB)?

[J Surman]

BTW, I take it you read the full article here:-http://unityaotearoa.blogspot.com/2012/01/towards-ecosocialism.htmlYes I have, but on which portion to comment?Re the latter part and the proposed ‘realignment’ to ecosocialism: it strikes me as an opportunistic attempt to appeal to a wider audience. Let’s face it we all wish to see growing numbers developing social awareness and heightened consciousness of our situation as the working class, however this looks like a major shift in emphasis rather than a small shift on one aspect of policy.As for the SPGB/WSM I think we simply see what others regard as ‘single issues’ as parts of the whole logic of the capitalist system. Ecology is very much a part of socialism but if one starts incorporating prefixes to each and every part it’d be an awfully long and difficult to pronounce name.(By the way, if you have time to instruct me on how to put quotes in a box for clarity I’m a willing student.)

[Anonymous]

J Surman wrote:

(By the way, if you have time to instruct me on how to put quotes in a box for clarity I’m a willing student.)

No problem.  You simply click on “quote” at the bottom of the person’s post to whom you wish to reply.  Their entire post then appears in the reply box.Any text you do not wish to quote in your reply can be deleted.  You can also reply to individual sections of their post by separating each part by using (quote=name of user) at the beginning of each section of text and (/quote) at the end.  But you need to use square brackets instead of the round ones I’ve used here for demonstration purposes.Example:(quote=J Surman)(By the way, if you have time to instruct me on how to put quotes in a box for clarity I’m a willing student.)(/quote)Simples 

[J Surman]

gnome wrote:

No problem.

Thanks.

gnome wrote:

You simply click on “quote” at the bottom of the person’s post to whom you wish to reply. 

Like this?

gnome wrote:

Any text you do not wish to quote in your reply can be deleted. 

Thanks again.

gnome wrote:

Simples 

-ish!

[Anonymous]

J Surman wrote:

gnome wrote:

Simples 

-ish!

 Excellent; well done JS 

[ALB]

Picked up a copy of Socialist Worker yesterday, literally, from a dustbin and see that they have now made the change from the old version:

Quote:

The workers create all the wealth under capitalism. A new society can only be constructed when they collectively seize control of that wealth and plan production and distribution.

(I imagine they put “collectively” in to avoid giving the impression that they were in favour of individual workers seizing it. back)to the new:

Quote:

Under capitalism workers’ labour creates all profit. A socialist society can only be constructed when the working class seizes control of the means of production and democratically plans how they are used.

That makes them sound like old-fashioned syndicalists who used to talk about the working class “taking and holding” the means of production. But if you read on to the end, you will see that they consider a “revolutionary party” is needed to seize political control.Even so, the front page proclaims “Strikes can beat the Government”. Not true, the most strikes can do is slow down the rate at which things are getting worse — not that workers shouldn’t try to do this, ie they should strike but “without illusions”. Also, article after article blames the Tories not capitalism, so they are playing the old (and Old) Labour card too. I’m just waiting for their announcement that workers should vote for Ken Livingstone as mayor of London ….

[jondwhite]

I never realised quite how damning Ken was of the SWP until I watched this World in Action documentary (from 1993) last night. http://vimeo.com/36763181If indeed they back Ken, members might well ask why they should support someone who vehemently opposes them.

[jondwhite]

Here's another CPGB article making the same claim (I think)http://www.cpgb.org.uk/home/weekly-worker/946/nature-and-programme-wealth-of-nature-and-counterfeit-marxism

[DJP]

Wealth is created by labour being applied to materials supplied by nature.In capitalism all wealth takes the form of commodities and therefore 'value'.So workers do not create all wealth, nature provides a hand, but in capitalism 'value' is created solely by the activity of the workers.

[ALB]

I think Jack Conrad and the Weekly Worker are being excessively pedantic. When the SWP say that "the workers create all the wealth under capitalism" all that they are meaning to say is that the labour that today creates wealth by working on materials that orifinally came from nature is that of the working class. They no more mean to say that workers create the materials that originally came from nature than we do when we refer in Clause 1 of our Declaration of principles to "the working class, by whose labour alone wealth is produced".But let's be pedantic. Conrad is claiming that Marx's statement in the Critique of the Gotha Programme denying that labour is "the source of all wealth" refutes the SWP statement. But does it? Does saying that labour "creates" or "produces" all wealth mean that it is "the source" of all wealth too? I wouldn't have thought so. Labour is not the source of all wealth. It is just that without labour wealth can't be produced, i.e nature can't be transformed.And when Conrad raises the point that peasants and artisans also produce wealth (by their labour) this is the sort of objection that we expect pedants to raise against what we say in our Declaration of Principles:

Quote:

when visiting Greece, I enjoy drinking the rough village wines sold along the roadside by small farmers; I buy newspapers from my local British-Muslim newsagent; and I get my shoes repaired by the British-Bengali cobbler over the road. Such little businesses produce use-values and therefore, by definition, wealth too. With such examples in mind, it is surely mistaken to baldly state that “workers create all the wealth under capitalism”.

But even he seems to think he's gone too far here since he adds:

Quote:

In theoretical terms, forgetting or passing over petty bourgeois commodity production is a mote, a mere speck of dust, in the eye of the SWP’s ‘Where we stand’ column.

What does he want them to say: that "workers create the great bulk of wealth under capitalism" or us to say "by whose labour most wealth is produced"?And, to end on a really pedantic note, what wealth does his "local British-Muslim newsagent" produce?

[Author]

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