Mutualist: Freedom of Association

Great I'll bring my cobbler's tools and my spectacles, which by the way I traded for a wagonload of bricks and mortar to the optimetrist in a nearby township

I'm not sure I can top pigeon's post, but - to my knowledge - there are no mutualist anarchist groups. There are some anarchists who find value in Proudhon's work but I don't think I've ever met a self-identified mutualist, I'm afraid.

mutualism = steampunk capitalism

boozemonarchy

mutualism = steampunk capitalism

What's "steampunk" mean?

This?: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=steampunk

It was originally a subgenre of the sci-fi genre known as cyberpunk. I guess Sterling and Gibson started it with their The Difference Engine. That book was quite good, evens mentions Marx, but steampunk has become a bit of a hipster fashion these days.

I don't use facebook so maybe you can explain here what you mean by 'mutualist'?

Freedomofassociation

Hi everyone,
If there are any anarchists in here who have mutualist leanings; I have created a Facebook group called 'Mutualists: Freedom of Association'. A place where we can talk, share ideas and meet new friends. It is a public group so feel free to join.

It is the only group on Facebook devoted to these ideas.

boozemonarchy

mutualism = steampunk capitalism

What a load of bollocks...

if you read Proudhon, he may have been in favour of commodity exchange but was against wage-labour and in favour of workers self-management of production (association) and socio-economic federalism -- see my Mutualism, yes and no or the introduction to my Proudhon Anthology Property is Theft!.

Working my way through that Proudhon anthology at the minute. Would recommend the introduction too, Sleeper.

I'm not sure I like mutualism any more than I did before but I certainly have a much better understanding of it and where it came from.

Anarcho

Mutualism aims to create a system of self-employed workers and co-operatives honestly exchanging goods and services in a market without interest, rent, profit, landlords or capitalists. Rejecting social revolution, it aims to destroy capitalism and the state by means of reform – a combination of more just and more efficient economic institutions (mutual banks and co-operatives) and pressurising the state from outside to enact appropriate reforms.

Precisely what I was getting at there slick - I'll call it 'artisanal capitalism' if that would cool your jets?

boozemonarchy

Precisely what I was getting at there slick - I'll call it 'artisanal capitalism' if that would cool your jets?

Capitalism is marked by wage-labour, the selling of labour rather than its product. Artisanal capitalism is a contradiction in terms.

Anarcho

boozemonarchy

Precisely what I was getting at there slick - I'll call it 'artisanal capitalism' if that would cool your jets?

Capitalism is marked by wage-labour, the selling of labour rather than its product. Artisanal capitalism is a contradiction in terms.

I don't know if it's a good idea to limit our understanding of capitalism to one specific commodity as we then don't get to analyse the functionings outside of the sale and purchase of that commodity.

There is more than the purchase and sale of labour power. I think there's a reason Marx starts his analysis at the commodity form itself.

Well I hope so because you should consider mutualism as much an essential part of anarchism as socialism / communism is.

Tarquin

Working my way through that Proudhon anthology at the minute. Would recommend the introduction too, Sleeper.

I'm not sure I like mutualism any more than I did before but I certainly have a much better understanding of it and where it came from.

Hehe, l suppose forms of exploitation which rely EXCLUSlVELY on the use of capital - such as being a landlord - doesn't fit into anarcho's definition of capitalism... but it fits into mine. And some very capitalist activity - such as property speculation, currency speculation, etc. also doesn't exactly fit that definition. So maybe capitalism needs to be defined as a use of capital to make profit off other people's work, wealth or need to exist and also maybe capital needs to be defined as access to material wealth in a broader sense.

Don't like mutualism, but also don't like the cobbler's tool joke. lt sounds too much like some creepy primitivist stereotypes about anarchosyndicailsts and coal mines.

Pyrrha

I don't know if it's a good idea to limit our understanding of capitalism to one specific commodity as we then don't get to analyse the functionings outside of the sale and purchase of that commodity.

Well, labour is not really a commodity -- although capitalism tries to turn it (treat it) as such -- and that brings us to why it is so unique. It is labour's ability to create more value when used that allows capital to exploit labour. This means that markets -- which predate capitalism -- need not the exploitative (e.g., self-employed workers exchanging the products of their labour). But, of course, markets have problems of their own even if we get rid of bosses and landlords -- which is why I'm not a mutualist.

Pyrrha

There is more than the purchase and sale of labour power. I think there's a reason Marx starts his analysis at the commodity form itself.

Marx's analysis is just confused -- sometimes he defined capital was wage-labour, sometimes as self-expanding value. As for starting at the commodity form itself, well, later in the work he actually states that capitalism only comes about once the worker is separated from the means of production. The first few chapters are an attempt to show that commodity exchange needs money and so labour-notes cannot replace it -- but, of course, Proudhon (regardless of Marx's many assertions) never advocated labour-notes...

So I would say that we need to be clear between capitalism and markets -- it is just one form of market economy. We also need to be clear that there are problems with markets as such and that we can go beyond market socialism notions (see "I.1.3 What is wrong with markets anyway?")

akai

Hehe, l suppose forms of exploitation which rely EXCLUSlVELY on the use of capital - such as being a landlord - doesn't fit into anarcho's definition of capitalism... but it fits into mine

Landlordism fits precisely into my definition -- as I thought would be obvious. Hiring others to work your property (whether land or a workplace) is my definition of capitalism ("property is theft" and all that...)

akai

And some very capitalist activity - such as property speculation, currency speculation, etc. also doesn't exactly fit that definition. So maybe capitalism needs to be defined as a use of capital to make profit off other people's work, wealth or need to exist and also maybe capital needs to be defined as access to material wealth in a broader sense.

I think Proudhhon's definition of property is basically the as Marx's "capital" -- property worked by those who do not own it which allows the owner to keep a slice of the value the immediate producers create. This applies to individual owners plus collective (state) owners. In terms of access, yes a group of workers could easily stop others from using their resources and force them to be wage-workers -- that is why Proudhon, like other anarchists, argued for socialisation of the means of production (see "Proudhon, Property and Possession")

akai

Don't like mutualism, but also don't like the cobbler's tool joke. lt sounds too much like some creepy primitivist stereotypes about anarchosyndicailsts and coal mines.

You don't need to like something to understand it correctly and reject the stereotypes.