The Division of Labour, Revisited
Scott Johnson
sjohn at cp.duluth.mn.us
Mon, 04 Aug 1997 16:18:00 -0500
SCOTT:
<<It comes down to this, Ken: you
either think the material for a better world is here now or you don't.
That is, either you are utopian or not. I have asked you before "What
are you holding out for?".>>
MICHAEL: what dialecticians, including adorno and marx, reject for good
reasons is the implicit metaphysics contained in either/or dualism, and
the
pseudo-"choices" that these only pretend to offer whilst covering over
the
truth that lies in their mutual presuppositions.
SCOIT: Let me rephrase. "You either think there is NO material for a
better world in the present or not." That is, you discount the
possibility of a basis for a critical consciousness and for the
construction of a better world and pin your hopes on an other of some
sort that can never realize itself BY DEFINTION. The "dialectical"
opposite of this (thinking oneself entirely out of the world) would be
thinking that there is nothing left to do, that the critical
counsciousness is perfectly developed in the present and is perfectly
realized (that is, being unable to think anything BUT this world). Yes,
I accuse Ken of the former; no, I do not hold to the latter.
---
SCOTT:
<<Abolish the division of labor? And in the
blink of an eye the world is transformed? Puh-leeze. Can this
transformation be so radical that the whole current situation, with its
necessary division of labor, disappears? Where is this transformation
supposed to come from, if not from the present? If a truly critical
consciousness is impossible (or has no epistemological basis, as you
seem wont to argue) how is this supposed to happen? The mysterious
appearance of THE OTHER (the breakthorough of auratic art, a release of
inarticulate libido...)?>>
MICHAEL: another example of either/rismsfrom Scott?
SCOTT: What I am criticizing here is the empty negativity, the "Not
this!" which can never be anything. This is popular among those thinkers
who dispair of any basis for a critical consciousness which can do any
positive work, and are driven to waiting for a deus ex machina of some
kind. The application of a "dialectical method", I would argue, is just
such a pursuit of an empty negativity. What can be revealed by a
dialectical argument that would not, because it has been articulated,
now not in turn become subject to another dialectical turn? Remember,
this is BY DEFINITION. Why isn't this a "bad infinity"?
SCOTT: <<You, like Horkheimer, Adorno, Heidegger, and
Derrida, will be sitting by the roadside waiting for Godot forever until
you find that not only has the time to realize philosophy passed, but so
also has your time to wait.>>
---
SCOTT:
<<The appeal of all this to Ken doesn't seem hard to find. Marx wrote:
"For as soon as labor is distributed, each man has a particular,
exclusive sphere of activity which is forced upon him and from which he
cannot escape." Ken, we know, holds with Adorno that ALL categorizations
are inadequate, a "positive" imposition from without. Ken, the romantic
individual, must always be something more than what he seems; nay, he is
_essentially_ other than what he is -- he is infinitely free. The world
must become friendly to such beings, must reform its institutions to
accomodate these (noumenal) libidinal strivings which escape concrete
expressions. D'oh! -- but those institutions would be confining too!
What we really need is a world without institutions!>>
MICHAEL: a number people on this list including myself have complained
of
personally abusive and dismissive responses to the postings of others.
>From
earlier postings Ken's relation to Adorno is far from uncritical, same
regarding Derrida et al. To borrow one of Ralph's better complaints, we
all
need to attend carefully to what others say, assume and imply, and not
set
them in such a way that become vulnerable to a ready-made put down.
SCOTT: Ken has already obligingly absolved me of part of this
accusation:
"So far I am unconvinced
that any instutionional structure is without oppression - Habermas's
arguments included. I refuse to stand by and say "well, this is the
best there is..." or "it must be this way." and this is romance? i
prefer the term disenchanted."
Hmm...including, Ken, the "institutional structure" which your own
criticisms represent?
Yes, I am harsh with Ken. Okay, so a little too harsh. But I am not
*gratuitously* abusive and dismissive. Think of it as "tough love".
---
MICHAEL: The kind
of immanent criticisms practised by Adorno, Ken and others (including
myself
regarding Adorno, Ken and others (excluding myself) is being caricatured
by
the very mode of external critique that Marx dismissed as "mere
criticism",
or am I missing something?
SCOTT: Yes, in fact I think you are missing something, and I've already
mentioned it. I assert that any "dialectical method" will result in a
bad infinity which BY DEFINITION excludes reconciliation, and can thus
produce nothing but a perpetual "negative dialectic". Immanent criticism
proceeds on the basis of real convictions and commitments. In immanent
criticism we criticize OUR OWN convictions and commitments on the basis
of experience which shows them to be self-contradictory. Those
convictions and commitments are expressed in action, but they must be
articulated and made adequate to reflection when the current
articulation proves inadequate upon experience. Theory and practice come
together when we can give a coherent account of those commitments
expressed in practice, but one that can withstand reflection upon
themselves. Later we may find that there is an inadequacy, but we can
recognize it as an inadequacy because we have a basis for judgement --
just one we have not properly understood and articulated.
The present task is to recover those convictions and commitments in
an age which forgets it has them and cooks up theories which cannot
account for the practice of such theorizing. No one has better
formulated this problem than Habermas. He acknowledges that our moral
commitments are not in our theories but are present in the practice of
moral discourse. One needn't swallow discourse ethics whole (I don't) to
appreciate this. (Much of the criticism of Habermas seems to me to miss
the point, and attacks Habermas where I wouldn't wish to defend him.)
---------------------------------------------------------
Scott Johnson
105 W. 1st St. #214 sjohn@cp.duluth.mn.us
Duluth, MN 55802 voice/fax (218) 722-1351
http://www.cp.duluth.mn.us/~sjohn/sjohn_on.html
--
A memo signed by Major Okuntimo of the Rivers State Internal
Security Task Force, dated May 12th 1994, states:
"Shell operations still impossible unless ruthless military
operations are undertaken for smooth economic activities to
commence."
-- From a web page (http://www.gem.co.za/ELA/ken.html)
dedicated to executed Nigerian activist Ken Saro-Wiwa,
who led a group resisting Shell Oil's activities in his
homeland. The memo referred to was sent 10 days before
Saro-Wiwa's arrest.