11/3/2021 The World-Historic Shift Labor Undergoes in Hegel's Philosophy. By: Carlos L. GarridoRead NowFor most of civilization physical labor, that labor which creates a tangible object, has been seen as an unfortunate task done merely for the sake of acquiring the necessaries of life. The Greeks and Romans in large part relegated this sort of work to slaves. The Middle Ages tell stories of kings, philosophers, theologians, and priests, but not of workers. And the capitalist era, from early mercantilism to modern imperialism, thrives insofar as it has labor to exploit, labor it can reduce to a commodity, labor whose activity and product can be stripped from the laborer. Today most people’s relation to their work is dull at best, a source of life drainage at worst. As a reaction, even many ‘left-wing’ theoretical spaces continue in the tradition of viewing work as an unfortunate necessity – one whose conditions might be improvable, but which is itself not fruitful. It only exists because people need the products it can create. Although painted with a broad stroke, the history of the greatest minds in Europe has been one which sniffs at the activities for which their abstract mind games depended on. However, can labor be thought of as something done for purposes not limited to those of consumption? Can labor be fruitful and meaningful in itself? In G.W.F. Hegel, for the first time in a prominent western theorist, the response is YES! In Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit and Philosophy of Right one can see what I have elsewhere called a “world-historic shift” in how labor is conceived: from labor as an unfortunate necessity, towards labor as a valuable expression of creative activity which constitutes a moment of liberation.[i] In the famed lord and bondsman section of his 1907 Phenomenology of Spirit Hegel describes the encounter of two self-consciousnesses with each other, an event plagued with a mutual desire for recognition. After a series of ambiguous supersessions between the two consciousnesses, this encounter leads to a life and death struggle, for “only through staking one’s life is freedom won.”[ii] Realizing that “death is the natural negation of consciousness,”[iii] for he who is dead cannot think and he who requires recognition for self-consciousness that is in and for itself cannot get it from a dead man, this infantile skirmish ends with one submitting to the other. This submission gives rise to the lord and bondsman, the former who posits himself as “pure self-conscious” and the latter as “merely immediate consciousness, or consciousness in the form of thinghood.”[iv] Although the lord is described as the “pure, essential action in this relation”, because what the “lord does to the other he also does to himself,” the recognition he receives from the bondsman is “one-sided and unequal,” i.e., in the relationship’s reduction of the bondsman to thinghood, his status as independent consciousness is negated and thus unable to afford the recognition necessary for the lord to be certain of his being for-self.[v] Simply put, in sex that you pay for you cannot affirm yourself as a good lover. Hegel concludes that “just as lordship showed that its essential nature is the reverse of what it wants to be, so too servitude in its consummation will really turn into the opposite of what it immediately is… it will withdraw into itself and be transformed into a truly independent consciousness.”[vi] How can Hegel affirm the slave as the one with the potential for ‘truly independent consciousness’? Hegel states that “through work, however, the bondsman becomes conscious of what he truly is.”[vii] He continues, Work forms and shapes the thing. The negative relation to the object becomes its form and something permanent, because it is precisely for the worker that the object has independence. This negative middle term or the formative activity is at the same time the individuality or pure being-for-self of consciousness which now, in the work outside of it, acquires an element of permanence. It is in this way, therefore, that consciousness, qua worker, comes to see in the independent being [of the object] its own independence. Hence, although his immediate condition is as a slave, his externalization (or objectification for Marxists), although at first appearing as an alien force independent of the bondsman, eventually shows itself as his creation. Through observing the independence of his self-otherization into the object he can, to play with the language of Hegel's Science of Logic, absolutely recoil back into himself and reinstate his initial condition but in a higher form – as true self-consciousness. Approximately thirteen years after the publication of the Phenomenology, Hegel’s Philosophy of Right reintroduces the liberatory role of labor, albeit without the imaginative and captivating language used in the lord and bondsman moment of spirit’s unfolding. When addressing certain philosophers’ romanticized theories of a ‘state of nature’ where man’s needs were such that the “accidents of nature directly assured to him” enough to subsist, Hegel condemns this view’s inability to see that there is a “moment of liberation intrinsic to work.”[viii] For Hegel, this utopianism fails to see that work is meaningful in itself. Yes, its object satisfies needs, cravings, etc., but this satisfactory power of the object is what the French call jouissance, a sort of surplus enjoyment. The objects of labor are valuable[ix]; they can fill empty stomachs, warm bodies, provide aesthetic enjoyment, and so on, but the laboring activity which the object presupposes can be valuable as well. Unlike the traditional views of labor before him, for Hegel the first moment of value in labor is not the object, but the work itself. Work itself is meaningful and valuable because it consists of a dedication of “my time…, my being, my universal activity and actuality, [and] my personality,”[x] into creating, with the “raw materials directly supplied by nature,”[xi] that upon which the human community sustains itself. For Hegel, the object labor creates is not simply an independent alien entity, instead, Hegel sees that the object “derives its destiny and soul from [the worker’s] will,”[xii] the worker ensouls his object. Hence, for Hegel the result of labor is 1) the liberating sense of growth, meaning, and flourishing it can provide the laborer and 2) the consumptive growth it brings the consumer (who could, naturally, be the same person). Although this historical-shift is praiseworthy, there are, of course, certain contradictions which ensue from Hegel’s attempt to both: 1) sustain a critique of chattel slavery grounded in his view of labor’s totalizing inalienability, while also sustaining 2) a defense for wage-slavery, grounded in his acceptance of labor’s alienation “for a specific period.”[xiii] In my essay, “A World-Historic Shift: Hegel, Marx, and Labour”[xiv] I further explore how these contradictions arise and how Marx and Engels, by immanently taking Hegel to his logical and practical conclusions, sublate the contradictions Hegel encounters. For now, I simply urge the reader to recognize that this anarchistic disdain of work is not a part of the Marxist tradition. Starting from Hegel, but better formulated in Marx and Engels, labor is humanity’s unique life-activity – it allows one to transform nature consciously and collaboratively in accordance with human needs and aesthetic sensibilities. We must not universalize and fixate the wretchedness of alienated work under capitalism with work in general; for work, when done in a non-exploitative setting, can be the most fruitful and meaningful thing a human can do. In fact, I would argue the few but meaningful moments we do encounter under capitalism are those in which labor takes place in a setting which overflows (albeit never fully) the exploitative logic of capital – e.g., home craft projects, sports, revolutionary militancy, parenting, etc. References [i] The article I am referring to is “A World-Historic Shift: Hegel, Marx, and Labor,” which is set to appear in the fifth issue of Peace, Land, and Bread. [ii] Hegel, Georg. Phenomenology of Spirit. (Oxford, 1997), p. 114. [iii] Ibid. [iv] Ibid., 115. [v] Ibid. [vi] Ibid., 117. [vii] Ibid., 118. [viii] Hegel, Georg. Philosophy of Right. (Oxford, 1978), p. 128. [ix] To be clear, I am referring to Value as Use-Value here. [x] Ibid., 54. [xi] Ibid., 129. [xii] Ibid., 41. [xiii] Ibid., 54. [xiv] See note [i] AuthorCarlos L. Garrido is a Cuban American graduate student and instructor in philosophy at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. His research focuses include Marxism, Hegel, and early 19th century American socialism. His academic work has appeared in Critical Sociology, The Journal of American Socialist Studies, and Peace, Land, and Bread. Along with various editors from The Journal of American Socialist Studies, Carlos is currently working on a serial anthology of American socialism. His popular theoretical and political work has appeared in Monthly Review Online, CovertAction Magazine, The International Magazine, The Marx-Engels Institute of Peru, Countercurrents, Janata Weekly, Hampton Institute, Orinoco Tribune, Workers Today, Delinking, and in Midwestern Marx, which he co-founded and where he serves as an editorial board member. As a political analyst with a focus on Latin America (esp. Cuba) he has been interviewed by Russia Today and has appeared in dozens of radio interviews in the US and around the world. Archives November 2021
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China Daily The following speech was given by Xi Jinping at the 28th group study session of the Political Bureau of the 18th CPC Central Committee on November 23, 2015. Today, we are holding the 28th group study session of the Political Bureau, and our focus is on the basic principles and methodology of Marxist political economy. The aim of this study session is to strengthen our understanding of the basic principles of Marxism. We have previously held sessions on subjects related to historical materialism and dialectical materialism. On this occasion, we will deepen our understanding and grasp of the laws underlying economic development by reviewing Marxist political economy so that we can become more competent and proficient at leading the nation’s economic development. I would now like to discuss some of my thoughts. Marxist political economy is an important component of Marxism and required learning for our efforts to uphold and develop Marxism. Marx and Engels carried forward historic achievements made in the field of economics, especially British classical political economy, through a process of critical examination based on the worldview and methodology of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. After intensive study of human economic activities, they founded Marxist political economy, which drew back the curtain on the laws underlying the economic workings of human society and capitalist society in particular. Engels said that the whole theory of a proletarian party was derived from the study of political economy, while Lenin regarded political economy as the most profound, most comprehensive, and most detailed proof and application of Marxist theory. Though there is now a rich diversity of economic theories, our study of political economy must be based on Marxist political economy and not any other economic theory. There are people who believe Marxist political economy and Das Kapital are obsolete, but this is an arbitrary and erroneous judgment. Setting aside more distant events and looking at just the period since the global financial crisis, we can see that many capitalist countries have remained in an economic slump, with serious unemployment problems, intensifying polarization, and deepening social divides. The facts tell us that the contradictions between the socialization of production and the private possession of the means of production still exist, but they are manifested in ways and show characteristics that are somewhat different. After the global financial crisis, many Western scholars began studying Marxist political economy and Das Kapital again for the purpose of reflecting on the deficiencies of capitalism. Last year, the book Capital in the Twenty-First Century by French scholar Thomas Piketty aroused broad discussion in international academic circles. Using accurate and abundant data, Piketty shows that levels of inequality are as high or higher than they have ever been in the U.S. and other Western countries. He argues that unconstrained capitalism has aggravated phenomena such as wealth inequality, and that the situation will continue to get worse. His analysis is mainly conducted from the perspective of distribution and does not touch significantly upon more fundamental questions of ownership, but the conclusions he reaches are nonetheless well worth our consideration. Xi Jinping at a rural ecotourism park in Helan County, Yinchuan, June 9, 2020, photo by Xinhua reporter Ju Peng Our Party has always attached great importance to the study, analysis, and application of Marxist political economy. Mao Zedong arranged special reviews of Das Kapital on four occasions and led multiple discussions on the Soviet textbook Political Economy, stressing that the analysis of questions on political economy was of great theoretical and practical significance. During the period of New Democracy (1911–1949), Mao Zedong created the new democratic economic program, and introduced a number of original ideas on developing China’s economy in the process of exploring the path to socialism. For example, he introduced the theory of basic contradictions in socialist societies and put forward important concepts such as pursuing comprehensive planning and overall balance, regarding agriculture as the foundation and industry as the leading force, and coordinating the development of agriculture, light industry, and heavy industry. These are all examples of how our Party has driven forward evolution of Marxist political economy. China’s contributions to Marxist political economy Since the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee in 1978, our Party has integrated the basic principles of Marxist political economy with the practice of reform and opening up, and made constant efforts to enrich and develop Marxist political economy. After the “Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Reform of the Economic Structure” was passed in October 1984, Deng Xiaoping commented that this represented a “first draft” of political economy that fused the basic principles of Marxism with the practice of socialism with Chinese characteristics. As reform and opening up has constantly pushed deeper in the more than three decades that have passed since then, we have brought about many important theoretical achievements in the Marxist political economy of contemporary China. Some examples are the theory on the essence of socialism; the theory on the basic economic system for the primary stage of socialism; the theory on establishing and implementing the philosophy of innovative, coordinated, green, open, and shared development; the theory on developing the socialist market economy and making the market play the decisive role in resource allocation while ensuring that the government better plays its role; the theory on China’s entrance into a new normal of economic development; the theory on coordinating the processes of new industrialization, digitalization, urbanization, and agricultural modernization; the theory on the nature of ownership rights, contract rights, and usage rights for contracted farmland; the theory on making effective use of domestic and international markets and resources; and the theory on promoting social equity and justice and bringing about common prosperity for everyone. These theoretical achievements were never discussed by the authors of the Marxist classics, and before reform and opening up we had no experience or understanding of the issues with which they are concerned. Instead, they form a body of knowledge about political economy that has been molded by the conditions of contemporary China and the nature of the times. This has not only provided firm guidance for China’s endeavors in economic development, but also opened up new frontiers for Marxist political economy. In the volatile and unpredictable tide of the world economy today, a major test of our Party is whether or not we can effectively steer the great ship of China’s economy. With an extremely complex economic landscape both at home and abroad and an overwhelming profusion of economic phenomena to contend with, studying the basic principles and methodology of Marxist political economy can help us master sound means of economic analysis, understand the processes through which the economy runs, build a grasp of the laws underlying social and economic development, and become more competent at keeping the socialist market economy on course. This will enable us to address theoretical and practical challenges in our nation’s economic development more effectively. The purpose of studying Marxist political economy is to better lead China’s economic development. While we must ensure that we uphold its basic principles and methodology, it is even more important that we integrate Marxist political economy with the realities of our nation’s economic development, and constantly strive toward new theoretical achievements in the process. First, we must uphold a people-centered approach to development. Development is for the people; this is the fundamental position of Marxist political economy. Marx and Engels stated that “the proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interests of the immense majority,” and that in future societies, production would be “calculated for the wealth of all.” Deng Xiaoping said that emancipating and developing productive forces and eliminating exploitation and polarization in order to ultimately bring about common prosperity represents the essence of socialism. The Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee in October 2015 clearly emphasized the need to uphold a people-centered approach to development, and to make improving the people’s well-being, promoting their all-around development, and pursuing steady progress toward common prosperity the immutable aims of economic development. This is something that we must never lose sight of. When planning economic work, formulating economic policies, and promoting economic development, we must always adhere firmly to this fundamental position.
They represent a concentrated reflection of our Party’s new understanding of the underlying laws governing China’s development and correspond with many of the perspectives of Marxist political economy. For example, Marx and Engels imagined future societies in which there would be “participation by all in enjoyments produced by all,” in which “man is directly a natural being,” and in which “the history of nature and the history of men are dependent on each other.” Meanwhile, the five components of the new development philosophy also represent a distillation of the perceptual knowledge we have acquired in the process of driving forward economic development and a theoretical summary of our experience in this regard. We must persist in using the new development philosophy to guide and advance our nation’s economic development, and to consistently resolve challenges and break new ground in the process. Third, we must uphold and improve our basic socialist economic system. According to Marxist political economy, ownership of the means of production is the core of the relations of production, and this determines a society’s fundamental nature and the orientation of its development. Since reform and opening up, our Party has reflected on both positive and negative experiences and established a basic economic system for the primary stage of socialism. Under this system, we have stressed the importance of continuing to make public ownership the mainstay while allowing ownership of other forms to develop side by side and made it clear that both the public and non-public sectors are important components of the socialist market economy as well as crucial foundations for our nation’s economic and social development. We must consolidate and develop the public sector with firm commitment, and devote equal commitment to encouraging, supporting, and guiding the development of the non-public sector, ensuring that ownership of all forms can reinforce each other and develop together. At the same time, we must be extremely clear that our nation’s basic economic system is an important pillar of the Chinese socialist system and the basis of the socialist market economy, and therefore the dominant role of public ownership and the leading role of the state sector must not change. This represents an institutional guarantee for ensuring that people of all ethnic groups across China are able to share in the fruits of development, as well as an important means of consolidating the CPC’s governing position and upholding our nation’s socialist system. Fourth, we must uphold and improve our basic socialist distribution system. Marxist political economy posits that distribution is both determined by and reactive to production, and that “production is most encouraged by a mode of distribution which allows all members of society to develop, maintain, and exert their capacities with maximum universality.” Through consideration of our actual conditions, we established a system of distribution centered on labor-based distribution while allowing other forms of distribution to coexist. This institutional arrangement has been proven through practice to be conducive to mobilizing the initiative of all sectors and achieving an organic balance between efficiency and equity. Due to a multitude of factors, however, a number of prominent problems still exist in China’s income distribution. The main problems are that the income gap has grown wider, the proportion of primary distribution accounted for by wages is relatively low, and the share of personal income in the distribution of national income is also on the low side. We have taken these problems very seriously, working hard to ensure that personal income grows in step with the economy, and that wages increase in step with labor productivity. We will adjust the national income distribution structure, bring about consistent increases in the incomes of urban and rural residents, and continue to shrink the income gap, through constant improvement of systems and mechanisms as well as specific measures. Fifth, we must uphold reforms to develop the socialist market economy. Developing a market economy under conditions of socialism represents a great pioneering effort undertaken by our Party. One of the key factors behind China’s tremendous success in economic development is that we have simultaneously leveraged the strengths of both the market economy and the socialist system. Our market economy has developed under the essential conditions of the socialist system and the leadership of the CPC. The term “socialist” is the key descriptor, and this is something that we must never lose sight of. We call our economy a socialist market economy because we are committed to maintaining the strengths of our system while effectively avoiding the deficiencies of a capitalist market economy. Recognizing the two-sided nature of things under a dialectical approach, we must keep working to integrate the basic socialist system with the market economy, ensuring that the strengths of each are brought to bear, and devote practical efforts to solving the universal economic challenge of how to have both an efficient market and an effective government. Beijing, Trey Ratcliff (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) Sixth, we must uphold the fundamental national policy of opening up. According to Marxist political economy, human society will ultimately witness the transcendence of history from the level of individual nations to the global scale. Today, the degree of our country’s connection with the world is unprecedented, as is our economy’s impact on the world economy and vice versa. With globalization advancing deeper, we could not possibly pursue development by closing ourselves off. Instead, we must be adept at keeping an eye on the landscape both at home and abroad and making good use of domestic and international markets and resources. Conforming to the trend of our economy’s deep integration into the world economy, we must develop a more open economy, actively participate in global economic governance, and push the global economic order in a more just, equitable, cooperative, and mutually beneficial direction. At the same time, we must firmly safeguard our nation’s development interests, forestall risks of all kinds, and ensure our economic security. In carrying out these tasks, there are many theoretical and practical questions that we must explore further. To conclude, our commitment to upholding the basic principles and methodology of Marxist political economy does not imply rejection of the rational components of the economic theories of other countries. Western economic knowledge on topics such as finance, prices, currency, markets, competition, trade, exchange rates, industries, enterprises, growth, and management do reflect one side of the general laws underpinning socialized production and market economics and should therefore be used as reference. At the same time, however, we must cast a discerning eye on the economic theories of other countries, particularly those of the West, making sure that we separate the wheat from the chaff. Putting our own interests first while using the strengths of others to our advantage, we must ensure that we do not mechanically copy the aspects of these theories that reflect the nature and values of the capitalist system or that are colored by Western ideology. Although the discipline of economics is devoted to the study of economic issues, it does not exist in a vacuum, and therefore cannot be separated from social and political issues. Therefore, when our educators teach economics, they must not advocate the indiscriminate absorption of foreign concepts. They must discuss Marxist political economy and the socialist political economy of contemporary China thoroughly and at length so to prevent their marginalization. For Marxist political economy to remain vital, it must evolve with the times. Practice is the source of theory. In the space of mere decades, we have completed a process of development that took centuries for developed countries. Behind all our incredible progress and achievements in economic development have been the tremendous momentum, vigor, and potential of theoretical innovation. Today, our economy and the world economy are facing many major new challenges, and these need to be addressed by sound theories. Grounded in China’s national conditions and our experiences in development, we must thoroughly look into new issues and circumstances faced by the domestic and global economies, bringing new patterns and characteristics to light. We must review and refine the achievements we have made in recognizing underlying laws through the process of economic development and elevate our practical experience to the level of systematized economic theories. By doing so, we will constantly open up new frontiers for Marxist political economy in contemporary China and contribute Chinese wisdom to the discipline’s innovation and development. Originally appeared in Qiushi Journal, Chinese edition, No. 16, 2020. AuthorXi Jinping This article was produced by CPUSA. Archives November 2021 “I still call myself a Communist, because Communism is no more what Russia made of it than Christianity is what the churches make of it.” — Pete Seeger, The New York Times Magazine, 1995 Many artists have called themselves communist or have been members of communist parties around the world. One would think that with artists like Pablo Picasso, Dashiell Hammett, and Jean-Luc Godard, communism would receive some kind of recognition for its artistic contributions. These three alone are giants in their respective fields. So, where is the praise for Communist artists? I imagine it remains locked up in a vault somewhere alongside the Islamic Golden Age — that fertile period in world history when artists and thinkers in Baghdad and Muslim Spain made monumental contributions to the arts and sciences, contributions that, for political reasons, remain unknown to many Westerners. Those who adhere to right-wing politics are not inclined to give due respect to the contributors of the Islamic Golden Age (mostly Brown and Black people) for their groundbreaking work in astronomy and mathematics. I’m sure they feel the same way when it comes to giving Communist artists their proper due. Revolutionary artists Many communist artists are household names. Spanish master Pablo Picasso is one of the movement’s greatest artists, having cofounded the Cubist movement, co-invented the collage, and created some of the most influential works of art in modern art history. His 1907 painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon resulted in Picasso eclipsing Henri Matisse to become the leading figure in modern art. Art critic Peter Plagens, in a 2007 Newsweek article, called it “the most important work of art of the last 100 years.” Picasso’s Guernica (1937), which is one of the artist’s best-known works, is regarded by many art critics as the most powerful anti-war painting in history. In the words of Chicago Sun-Times columnist Alejandro Escalona, “Guernica is to painting what Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is to music.” Picasso, who had joined the French Communist Party in 1944 and remained a loyal member of the Party until his death, was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize in 1962. Picasso dominated Western art in the 20th century, but he wasn’t the only Communist painter from that century who had an immense impact on the art world. In Mexico, two giants emerged and carved out their own place in art history. Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo are not only two of Mexico’s most revered artists, but they’re also two of the most important artists to ever come out of Latin America. Assuming for a moment that Diego Velázquez, Francisco Goya, Pablo Picasso, and Salvador Dalí are “Hispanic” and not white Europeans (Spaniards), as I consider them to be, Rivera and Kahlo would rank alongside those masters as the greatest Latino/a artists the world has ever known. In the 1920s, both Rivera and Kahlo had joined the Mexican Communist Party, through which they met and later married. (Rivera was later expelled from the Party for being a “Trotsky sympathizer,” and though he was indeed a Trotskyist, he remained a devoted Communist throughout his life.) Along with David Alfaro Siqueiros, also a Communist, Rivera is among the most celebrated Mexican muralists of the 20th century. He was an idealist who, through his art, created a mythology around the Mexican Revolution and promoted Mexico’s indigenous past, while simultaneously advocating Marxist beliefs. Rivera could turn his hand to any style, from Cubism to Post-Impressionism, and he was responsible for the revival of fresco painting in Latin America. Since his death, the Mexican government has declared Rivera’s works as “monumentos historicos,” and in 2018, his painting The Rivals became the highest-priced Latin American artwork ever sold at an auction.
Initially overlooked as simply the wife of Diego Rivera, Kahlo is now widely regarded as one of the most renowned painters. In her native country, Kahlo’s work has been declared part of the national cultural heritage, prohibiting their export from Mexico. In the United States in 2001, Kahlo became the first Latina to be honored with a U.S. postage stamp. Communists in film Picasso, Rivera, and Kahlo could be considered “the big three” Communist artists, but the Mount Rushmore of Communist artists wouldn’t be complete without a fourth figure, and there is none more befitting than French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard, who, according to Filmmaker magazine, boasts “the most influential body of work in the history of cinema.” Put simply, without Godard, there would be no Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, or Wes Anderson. A pioneer of the French New Wave, Godard invented what so many artists and even social media “creators” on YouTube and TikTok today take for granted. The retro, self-conscious, postmodern aesthetic that permeates the modern world (whether in movies, music, television, or the internet) comes directly from Godard and the French New Wave.
“Modern movies begin here,” Roger Ebert said of Breathless, in a retrospective review. “No debut film since Citizen Kane in [1941] has been as influential,” he added. At the time, the movie’s unconventional use of jump cuts — an editing technique in which a single continuous shot is broken into two parts — was nothing short of revolutionary, and can now be seen in nearly every video on YouTube and TikTok, and of course, in many movies. It could be said in earnest that Godard walked so the rest of us could run. In 2010, Godard was awarded an Academy Honorary Award. Another giant of the film industry was Sergei Eisenstein, aka “the father of montage,” who was a pioneer of early cinema. Think D. W. Griffith, but whereas Griffith’s shameful The Birth of a Nation (1915) inspired the rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan, Eisenstein’s work lifted workers’ and peasants’ voices while revolutionizing cinema. (When Google celebrated Eisenstein’s 120th birthday in 2018 with a “Doodle,” right-wing Americans let their displeasure be known by praising the racist Griffith.) Ten years after the release of The Birth of a Nation, Eisenstein released what Roger Ebert called “one of the fundamental landmarks of cinema,” Battleship Potemkin (1925). It was named the greatest film of all time at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair and has since consistently been ranked among the greatest and most influential movies ever made.1 (When I took a film course in college, Battleship Potemkin was the first movie our professor showed us — not The Birth of a Nation or Citizen Kane.) Battleship Potemkin depicts a real-life mutiny that occurred in 1905 and is now viewed as a precursor to the Russian Revolution. Fearing that anyone who saw the film would be turned into a Communist, various federal and municipal U.S., French, German, and British governments banned it. The film was banned for a longer time than any other film in British history, from 1926 to 1954. Eisenstein, who had been invited to Hollywood in 1930 to make a movie for Paramount Pictures, became the target of anti-Communists, and his projects were rejected by the studio. Those on the Right would have you believe that Hollywood is (and always has been) a bastion of the Left — the same Hollywood that was once dominated by old, white, anti-Semitic Protestant men who produced propaganda movies like I Was a Communist for the FBI (1951) and Red Dawn (1984), and who fawned over Ronald Reagan in his early years as an actor. Vladimir Lenin once remarked that film was “the most important of the arts,” so it should come as no surprise that, in 1920, the Soviet Union established one of the largest and oldest movie studios in Europe, Mosfilm. Aside from Sergei Eisenstein’s work, other acclaimed movies to come out of the Soviet Union include Mother (1926), Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Earth (1930), Cranes Are Flying (1957, winner of the Palme d’Or at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival), Ballad of a Soldier (1959), I Am Cuba (1964), War and Peace (1966–67; Academy Award and Golden Globe winner), Come and See (1985, generally considered one of the finest war movies ever made), and the many masterpieces of one of world cinema’s greatest directors, Andrei Tarkovsky, whose most notable films include Andrei Rublev (1966), Solaris (1972), Mirror, (1975), and Stalker (1979). Not all the directors of these masterworks were Communists. How much this matters is up for debate. Whether or not the great scientists and mathematicians of the Islamic Golden Age were Muslim is irrelevant (most were Muslim, others Jewish, and some Christian). What matters is that Islamic states in Baghdad and Muslim Spain nurtured intellectual thought — and for a while, the same thing happened in the Soviet Union, albeit on a smaller scale. The U.S. film industry also had its share of Communists. Hollywood actors include comedian Lucille Ball, a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award, and the Kennedy Center Honors; and Sterling Hayden, best-known for his work in The Asphalt Jungle, Dr. Strangelove, and The Godfather. And there were the “Hollywood 10,” the movie producers, directors, and screenwriters who were brought before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947, refused to answer questions about their political affiliations, and were mostly blacklisted afterward. The most outspoken film actor during the McCarthy period was more of a Renaissance man than a creature of Hollywood, the multi-talented Paul Robeson — athlete, singer, and stage and film actor. In 1951 he and William Patterson, Secretary of the Civil Rights Congress (CRC), presented to the United Nations a petition on behalf of the CRC titled “We Charge Genocide: The Crime of Government against the Negro People,” which documented lynchings and other forms of violence against African Americans. Literary leftists Dashiell Hammett, dubbed “the dean of the . . . ‘hard-boiled’ school of detective fiction” by the New York Times, is widely regarded as one of the greatest mystery writers of all time, best-known for having penned Red Harvest (1929), which was included in Time magazine’s list of the 100 best novels published in the English language between 1923 and 2005, The Maltese Falcon (1930), and The Glass Key (1931). His work also appeared in the highly popular pulp magazine Black Mask.
He was found guilty of contempt and served time in a West Virginia federal penitentiary, where he was reportedly assigned to clean toilets. Hammett’s popularity waned thereafter, and he soon found himself blacklisted when, in 1953, he testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee about his own Communist activities, but refused to cooperate with the committee. Impoverished, Hammett sank deeper into alcoholism, which had plagued him for years, and he died in 1961. A veteran of both world wars, Hammett was buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Other great Communist authors worthy of mention include Theodore Dreiser, who authored the 1925 classic An American Tragedy; Portuguese Nobel laureate José Saramago; Jorge Amado, who remains the best-known of the modern Brazilian writers; Meridel Le Sueur, who joined the CP in 1925, wrote for the New Masses, and was blacklisted in the 1950s; Richard Wright (he left the Communist Party, though he remained a Marxist); Maxim Gorky, a five-time nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature; and Tillie Olsen, who in 1961 won the O’Henry Award for her short story “Tell Me a Riddle.” Well-known Communist poets include Mahmoud Darwish, who is regarded as the Palestinian national poet; Greek poet Yiannis Ritsos; Rafael Alberti, who is heralded as one of the greatest literary figures of the so-called Silver Age of Spanish literature; Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz, who was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature and awarded the Lenin Peace Prize; Pablo Neruda, often considered the national poet of Chile (he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature and was called “the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language” by noted Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez; Louis Aragon, a leading voice of the Surrealist movement in France; and Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén. Musical communists In the music world there are American rappers Dead Prez and Noname and singer-songwriters Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, both Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees and Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award honorees; and Mikis Theodorakis, a beloved Greek composer of modern classical music and recipient of the Lenin Peace Prize. Theodorakis, who died in September 2021, scored the music for the films Zorba the Greek and Serpico. Another big name is the influential hip-hop artist Tupac Shakur. He was not a card-carrying member of the Communist Party, but he did join the Baltimore Young Communist League while in his teens. One only has to listen to Shakur’s music, which often addresses social issues, to see that the Communist ideals he inherited in his youth carried over into his adulthood. Listening to Shakur’s interviews, in which he talks about inequality and other social issues, will give you an idea of his politics. Shakur’s most acclaimed albums, Me against the World (1995) and All Eyez on Me (1996), are regarded as classics of the hip-hop genre, and his song “Dear Mama” was added to the National Recording Registry in the Library of Congress in 2009. Eight years later, Tupac Shakur was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. It’s hard not to be impressed by communism’s astounding contributions to the arts, especially since the communist movement is relatively young. Yet there are untold numbers of communist artists — some famous, others less so, some who are Communists with a capital “C,” others who think like communists — who have brought their unique visions to the world. The arts are all the richer for it. Note 1. The 1958 Brussels World’s Fair was no small matter. At the event, 117 film critics and historians from 26 nations selected the 12 greatest films of all time in what is now considered the first universal film poll in history, with Battleship Potemkin being named the greatest film of all time, ahead of the works of Charlie Chaplin and Orson Welles. Images: River’s Detroit Industry Murals (Wikipedia, public domain); (Picasso’s Guernica (Wikipedia, fair use); Frida Kahlo (Wikipedia, public domain); Movie poster for Godard’s Breathless (Wikipedia, fair use); Shots from Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin (Wikipedia, public domain); Dashiell Hammett (Wikipedia, public domain). AuthorNino Hoti This article was produced by CPUSA. Archives November 2021 11/2/2021 Why American Workers Want Congress to Deliver an Infrastructure Bill. By: Tom ConwayRead NowWith business already strong and a national infrastructure program likely to further increase demand for its products, DuPont realized it needed a strategy to find more workers. So it did what any sensible employer would do—turned to the union for help. DuPont approached United Steelworkers (USW) Local 12075 about the possibility of a worker recruitment campaign highlighting the availability of union jobs, which provide the benefits, security and dignity more and more Americans seek in the wake of COVID-19. Major investments in America’s infrastructure will modernize the nation and revitalize its industrial base. But an infrastructure program is about more than rebuilding roads and bridges. It’s about creating more of those family-sustaining union jobs and rebuilding the middle class. It’s about creating an economy that’s not only more powerful but more just. In August, the Senate took the critical first step by passing a $1 trillion infrastructure bill that would pave the way for long-overdue improvements in roads, water systems, school buildings, airports, communications networks, energy systems and manufacturing facilities. Now, the House needs to pass its own version of the legislation and set the nation on a path to shared prosperity. “We are waiting for them to finish up, so we can move on,” said Local 12075 President Kent Holsing, noting he represents hundreds of workers at DuPont, Dow and other chemical companies in the Midland, Michigan, area who are ready to handle the added business that an infrastructure program would generate. “We make lots of products that are used in building construction,” Holsing explained. “We make products that go into water-treatment plants. We make a number of products that go into cars. Investment in infrastructure is an investment in products, and investment in products is an investment in jobs.” But DuPont needs more workers to take on those jobs. Holsing said that when company representatives asked which USW benefits it ought to highlight in recruitment efforts, he and his colleagues told them “everything from worker representation to the college scholarship program.” The pandemic underscored the withered state of America’s manufacturing base and marked a turning point for Americans fed up with the low-wage, nonunion jobs that proliferated amid industrial decline. No longer willing to endure the exploitation that COVID-19 threw into sharp relief, millions of workers left employers that not only exposed them to the virus but also denied them the affordable health care, paid sick leave and other basics they needed to help their families through the crisis. “A lot of them don’t have anything to lose,” Lorri Walker, president of USW Local 444L, said of Americans who ditched exploitative employers. “They can’t afford to buy a house. They can’t afford to buy a car.” “People have to have a pathway for a future so they can retire,” explained Walker, who represents hundreds of workers at Henniges Automotive in Keokuk, Iowa. “They have to have decent wages, and they have to have a voice in the workplace. It’s not going to happen without a union.” During the pandemic, unions fought for COVID-19 protections. They succeeded in preserving members’ jobs, even as nonunion employers cut many more workers loose during the crisis. And because of contracts negotiated before COVID-19, union workers had greater access to health insurance and paid sick leave to help care for their families when the virus struck. Now, a growing number of Americans want union jobs. “I think they understand the value of labor,” said Walker, noting how eagerly new hires at Henniges Automotive, a manufacturer of weatherstripping products, join the USW. A national infrastructure program is essential for creating more of the opportunities Americans now demand. Infrastructure investments have the potential to generate quality jobs for the workers at mines, steel mills and aluminum plants who furnish the raw materials for infrastructure projects. These projects also would create work for heavy equipment manufacturers, glassmakers and producers of tires, optical fiber and numerous other products all along supply chains. At Holophane in Newark, Ohio, for example, workers anticipate increased demand for their lighting products, which government agencies and other customers purchase for interstate highways, city streets, parks, ports, power plants and other settings. And USW Local 525T President Steve Bishoff said the union and Holophane recently wrapped up a contract that will help recruit and retain the workers the company knows it needs to capitalize on coming opportunities. The new agreement included improvements in the wage scale and preserved affordable health care, among other enhancements. The company, Bishoff added, “didn’t try to take anything away.” “These are good jobs,” he said, noting workers at other local employers vie for openings at Holophane because of the higher wages and other benefits. America has a historic opportunity not just to emerge from the pandemic stronger than before but also to galvanize a tide of prosperity that will benefit generations to come. It all starts with the infrastructure bill. Millions of Americans eager for better lives expect Congress to push it over the finish line. “In my 22 years working for the union, I have not seen a labor marketplace like this ever,” Holsing said, referring to the large number of workers fighting back against unfair treatment and demanding more from employers. “This is something we’re going to really need to capitalize on.” AuthorTom Conway is the international president of the United Steelworkers Union (USW). This article was produced by the Independent Media Institute. Archives November 2021 11/1/2021 The Democrats in D.C. Promised Consequential Racial Justice Reform—Where Is It? By: Ebony Slaughter-JohnsonRead NowThe message to Black Americans expecting more progress has largely been to wait—for a better political opportunity, for the racial wealth gap to widen, for another Black American to die at the hands of the police. The lesson of the 2020 U.S. election cycle was clear: Do not underestimate the influence of Black voters. At a time when the electoral process was characterized by voter suppression, Black voters in crucial swing states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin gave this country renewed hope by securing the presidency for President Joe Biden. Thanks to the Black voters who pushed Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff over the electoral edge in Georgia’s runoff elections on January 5, Democrats took control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. With Democrats in control of the executive and legislative branches, the promise of much-needed progressive change with respect to racial justice seemed to be on the brink of becoming reality. Instead, in the more than nine months since Democrats have helmed the federal government, all that has occurred in the name of racial justice is the recognition of Juneteenth as a federal holiday that marks the day slavery ended in the United States (June 19, 1865—two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued). I do not mean to diminish the historical significance of “Juneteenth National Independence Day” as it is officially known or to disrespect the work of Black activists who have advocated for commemorating this important historical milestone for years. And as Republicans in state legislatures battle to keep discussions of racial inequality out of public schools, I applaud efforts to recognize Black history and culture. I also understand that Democrats are in a complicated position. Republicans have long shown hostility to racial justice issues, preferring instead to court white supremacists. The pressure to legislate for the benefit of Black voters has unfairly fallen exclusively on the shoulders of the Democratic Party, but that is the burden the party agreed to bear when it competed for support from the Black community. Black voters supported national Democratic candidates in reliance on their promises. These candidates committed themselves to enacting consequential racial justice legislation. Where is it? The tragic murder of George Floyd in 2020 inspired the largest mass protest in American history and brought police reform to the forefront of the national consciousness. Democrats had the opportunity to follow up the historic conviction of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of Floyd with the introduction of aggressive police reform, but, instead, the Democratic Party squandered the moment by wasting time negotiating with Republicans who are more interested in creating a cultural boogeyman out of critical race theory than actually legislating. Although the House passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, any hope of police reform currently lies dormant in the Senate. Republican-led state legislatures have passed a number of bills designed to limit the franchise in 2021 alone, an inevitability after the Supreme Court announced its decision in Shelby County v. Holder in 2013. The decision essentially castrated the Voting Rights Act, determining that the preclearance formula used to determine which jurisdictions must have their voting regimes approved by the federal government was unconstitutional. Texas has become synonymous with voter suppression recently. The state enacted a law on September 7 that, among other changes, eliminates 24-hour voting and drive-through voting, measures that are likely to most heavily burden voters of color. The law also provides poll watchers with new freedoms to monitor voters’ activity, presenting ripe opportunities for racial profiling. State voter suppression, particularly in states with high populations of people of color, ahead of the 2022 midterms intensifies the urgency of enacting federal voting rights protections. Yet, efforts to legislate have stalled. The House passed the For the People Act and the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2021 earlier this year, but the Senate appears to be more invested in protecting the filibuster than in protecting the right to vote. Senate Democrats rallied support for alternative voting rights legislation, but progress on that legislation has since been thwarted by Senate Republicans. After months of exhortations from constituents, activists, and state officials, including Texas state Democrats who risked arrest and a pandemic to lobby senators, no progress has been made to push reforms to protect voting rights. Support for reparations has increased in recent years. The 2020 Democratic presidential frontrunners suggested that they supported the idea of at least exploring how the country might go about distributing reparations to the descendants of enslaved Black Americans. Reparations programs have assumed various forms. Several Virginia colleges and universities will atone for slavery through economic and educational advancement opportunities. Evanston, Illinois, broke new ground in the implementation of reparations, inaugurating a $10 million fund for housing grants in March. The state of California and Los Angeles County have returned land to the descendants of a Black couple who were dispossessed of their property during the Jim Crow era. Against the backdrop of progress at the state and local level, precious little has occurred at the federal level. More than 30 years after it was first introduced, a bill to simply study reparations finally made its way out of the House Judiciary Committee only to languish in legislative limbo somewhere within the House. But at least Democrats, and Republicans, in both houses of Congress could unite to make Juneteenth a federal holiday. Even this victory is hollow. Black Americans tend to be concentrated in the types of jobs in the food service and retail industries that are not required to observe federal holidays. Ironically, the day of rest, and hopefully reflection, afforded by Juneteenth could be largely enjoyed by the white Americans who work in government offices and professional offices. Although they expected deliverables, Black Americans have mostly experienced delays. The message to Black Americans is to wait. Wait for Congress to pass the infrastructure bill. Wait for Congress to negotiate to keep the federal government operative. Wait for the legislative chaos to die down. Wait for the Democrats to expand their majorities in Congress after the midterm elections. Wait for another state to introduce more egregiously restrictive voting rights laws. Wait for the racial wealth gap to widen. Wait for another Black American to die at the hands of the police. Wait for another global protest movement to develop that galvanizes public opinion in favor of police accountability. Black activists have vocally demanded enhanced voter protections for years. Nearly 90 percent of Black Americans who participated in a 2020 Gallup panel voiced support for police reform. Meanwhile, 74 percent of Black Americans polled by AP-NORC in 2019 supported the implementation of a federal reparations program. These initiatives are not pet projects for Black Americans. They are vital public policy imperatives that Democrats were elected to achieve. As 2021 comes to a close, congressional lawmakers will transition from governing mode to campaigning mode. Though President Biden and congressional Democrats deserve credit for guiding the country through the coronavirus pandemic, rejoining the Paris Agreement, and expanding child tax credits, all of which have racial justice components, their only specific legislative accomplishment on the racial justice front is the Juneteenth federal holiday. As symbolic as that holiday is, it is no substitute for safeguarding constitutional rights, protecting Black lives, and potentially minimizing the racial wealth gap. When congressional Democratic candidates appeal to Black voters for support during the 2022 election, they may find that the holiday similarly fails to motivate Black voters to head to the polls. AuthorEbony Slaughter-Johnson is a freelance writer and a writing fellow for Local Peace Economy, a project of the Independent Media Institute. Her work has appeared on AlterNet, U.S. News & World Report, Equal Voice News and Common Dreams. This article was produced by Local Peace Economy, a project of the Independent Media Institute. Archives October 2021 I named this blog "Labor Power” because its theme will be the working class, the 99%. One form of labor which is not always clearly thought of as labor or work is Caring and Re-productive Labor. By convention, history, prejudice, etc., it is done predominantly by women. Even wage-labor jobs of the Caring Labor type are done more by women. For background on Caring Labourers, see my previous article. The Familial and anti-War, not Commercial or Male Supremacist, Origins of Mother's Day "Care work is a sub-category of work that includes all tasks that directly involve care processes done in service of others. Often, it is differentiated from other forms of work because it is intrinsically motivated, meaning that people are motivated to pursue care work for internal reasons, not related to money.[1] Another factor that is often used to differentiate caring labor from other types of work is the motivating factor. This perspective defines care labor as labor undertaken out of affection or a sense of responsibility for other people, with no expectation of immediate pecuniary reward.[2]Despite the importance of this intrinsic motivation factor, care work includes care activities done for pay as well as those done without remuneration. Specifically, care work refers to those occupations that provide services that help people develop their capabilities, or their ability to pursue the aspects of their life that they value. Examples of these occupations include child care, all levels of teaching (from preschoolthrough university professors), and health care of all types (nurses, doctors, physical therapists and psychologists).[3] Care work also includes the array of domestic unpaid work that is often disproportionately done by women.[4] Often, care work focuses on the responsibilities to provide for dependents- children, the sick, and the elderly.[5] However, care work also refers to any work done in the immediate service others, regardless of the recipient’s dependent or nondependent status. Care work is becoming a popular topic for academic study and discussion. This study is closely linked with the field of feminist economics and is associated with scholars including Nancy Folbre, Paula England, Maria Floro, Diane Elson, Caren Grown and Virginia Held" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Care_work) Of course, women do much of what is regularly called labor, work, toil, too: AuthorCharles Brown is a political activist in Detroit, Michigan. He has degrees in anthropology and is a member of the bar. He teaches anthropology at Community College. His favorite slogan is "What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.” This article was produced by Charles Brown Blog - *small adjustments have been made for contextual relevance. Archives November 2021 |
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