The Division of Labour, Revisited

[Ralph Dumain]

I don't know if I created a monster or what.  On the one hand, I'm glad I'm
no longer the focus of this debate.  On the other, I'm puzzled as to what is
being fought over, and what inspired Scott Johnson's vehemence, and why it
was directed against Ken and not me.  Is it merely because I did not
advocate the elimination of the division of labor, though some might infer
that I was driving at this, or is it because Scott has me pegged as a
rah-rah-revolutionary pragmatist and thus immune from the ivory tower syndrome?

I left this discussion on a sour note, though I reiterate that most of the
sourness is a reaction to the inability of people to pay attention rather
than reading their prefabricated assumptions into every discussion.  Ther is
room for intellectual histories that recapitulate what a particular
intellectual cohort was fighting over, and that is always a matter at least
of anthropological significance, but one cannot foist a particular set of
issues on everyone without giving good reason, and this is the fundamental
shortcoming of all internecine dialog.  Why should _I_ care about _your_
issues?  If you can keep in mind this question, you will find it much easier
to explain yourself and to listen to others outside your own reference group.

I have nothing to offer in the way of practical proposals for eliminating
the division of labor or overcoming it.  I could try to recall the two or
three articles and lectures I have encountered that tries to take Marx's
vision of the socialist society seriously and what that means for labor.
But, assuming that specialization must continue to exist in a high-tech
world such as ours, what can be done to counteract its effects?  What
effects?  Well, the effects I was dealing with were the inevitable
mystifications that result when people are locked into a particular social
network, fetishizing that one and mystified by what lies outside.  

How could these effects be overcome?  Not many thoughts here, though I did
mention that I came across an article on Gramsci recently that takes this
concern very seriously, and gives me new-found respect for Gramsci in spite
of his current vogue.  Also, I am reminded of other discussions on CLR James
in which I stated that the idea of workers councils and direct democracy as
a formula for a democratic socialist society is far too simplistic.  So
don't count on me to defend simplistic solutions.

Could we perhaps gets some clues by examining, in real life or in popular
culture, how people have attempted to overcome the limitations of being
locked in a fixed place in society, within the confines of actually existing
society itself?  Part of the answer must lie in the experiences people have
actually had in real life, those who have been fortunate to have experienced
a wide variety of occupations, social groups, travels, exposure to different
lifestyles, etc.  We can learn an awful lot from popular culture, too, esp.
a particular TV genre I grew up with and which obsesses me to this very day,
a genre exemplified by shows such as THE FUGITIVE and ROUTE 66.  To
understand the powerful appeal of this genre and the real social need it
addresses is to unlock the secret of the problem.

At 02:33 PM 8/3/97 -0500, Scott Johnson wrote:
>SCOTT:
>  Yes, criticize it forever and ever and ever and ever, because this
>utopian bullshit can never be realized. 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?". 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...)? 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. But at least you were "critical" (or at
>least whiny)...
>   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!
>   To borrow an expression from Ralph:
>
>...PIFFLE!