Business Colleges

So I missed Marxism Monday. So sorry, folks! It was a combination of work kicking my ass and not having completed my research on the socialist value equation. It's coming. I swear. Anyway, I wanted to discuss something that every comrade should be aware of, and why it is a pernicious evil that propagates bourgeois sensibility among those that should be our allies but walk away with degrees declaring their status as enemies.

That, dear friends, is the Fisher College of Business, a recent addition to the Ohio State University which served as my alma mater (fucking Buckeyes....). Now, when I say it's recent, I mean it is one of the most recent additions to the University's curricula, not that it was added in the past ten years. Fisher has been in the business of doing business for some time, and paired with the football team, makes quite a bit of money for a University that no longer has education or academics as its core focus.

The presence of a Business College is a pernicious stain on any University campus. The terminology used by people who attend it are especially telling. Engineering, physics, linguistics, statistics, biology, anthropology, gender-studies, etc. are all academic disciplines. They are not something one can commoditize. With my degree in Russian, with a strong emphasis on culture (I like to think of myself as a linguist and anthropologist, but I digress), I cannot simply set up shop and sell my services in these areas to the general population. This is not a practical degree, nor was it ever intended to be. No University has ever concerned itself with practical application of its curricula. You go to a University to learn how to think critically in a particular field to further the sum total of human knowledge and understanding. This is not practical. This is all speculative and theoretical. Are there some degrees (Engineering, biochemistry, etc.) that have practical applications? Absolutely. But one is also providing a service to their academic field and future students in the same field.

The Business College is absolutely exempt from this reality. For centuries, one became a businessman by engaging in business and learning it as one would a trade--hands on. Today, the principles of business management remain very much the same as they always have. Ensure your supply is equal to your demand, pay a fair wage, ensure decent human resources access, and adapt your business model to changes in business climate to ensure you stay in business. This is a trade, not a speculative field of research. "Research" projects in Business Colleges amount to "how I would set up my business" and ensure one has read the material. They do not, however, offer valuable insights into the way one might do business in the future. And why is this the case if they are part of the family of highly speculative and forward-thinking curricula that make up the rest of the University syllabus? Because Business Colleges do not exist to promote freedom of thought, nor do they exist to contribute to the larger body of human knowledge. They exist to indoctrinate and propagandize those that walk their hallowed halls. They exist to shame the rest of the speculative fields being heavily invested in, and showing the University that THEY bring in business. THEY capitalize themselves. THEY are superior to all other fields of knowledge.

Remember what I said about how Business College attendees have a particular vocabulary? This is their vocabulary. They frame themselves in the context of the social construct that is the perceived prestige of attending an academic institution, but they themselves are not engaged in any way with academia outside academic requisites set by the University as terms of one's graduation.

But, here, also is a major issue with the decades-long legacy of the Business College. You do not attend a University and look at its job-placement rate. To engage in academia is the quiet acceptance that, while a practical job outside academia might exist for you, your ultimate career path is to remain in academia. Academics are people who never leave school. Business College graduates, however, have no choice. For them, the job-placement rate is tantamount to the academic's search for accreditation. So an already-large University like Ohio State can attract more money through more students by investing heavily in a Business College...and then watching as the social construct is reformed to glorify it and measure the rest of the University in the same terms.

The Business College is not an academic institution, so framing the debate on the humanities, arts and sciences, etc. in the terms of the Business College is disingenuous. A Business College has no place at an academic institution because it helps engender and indoctrinate people who do not even attend it. Academics ARE the vanguard of the revolution. Academics ARE the professional revolutionaries, because they have the time and energy to study and pursue further study. But the Business College prevents academics from joining the revolution because they become adherents to the propaganda of the Koch Brothers and McGraw Hill. Everyone, even in the Humanities, starts chasing that dollar sign and the entire premise of academia is undermined.

But when everyone is a business man and the economic collapses out from underneath them, where will their practical degree get them? Money can't really feed you, but I'm sure the embossing on your "university" degree will add some texture to that delicious business salad.

Fresh Friday #3

I was reviewing some of my recent posts and realized I haven't really addressed any strategies for a United Left outside of a call for Evangelistic Marxism. So I wanted a return to this concern since that is, after all, the modus operandi of the blog. So I will be talking about sectarianism within the American Left (and the Left in general), and how we can address these problems.

On Uniting the Left: Socialism Without Adjectives
-E.M. Diderot

My Comrade, Jack, posted on Facebook yesterday "Socialism without adjectives". It sparked a few tongue-in-cheek responses including my personal favorite: "Sentences without adjectives or verbs." But the sentiment is very real. Another Comrade, Chris, has been posting lately on the Anarchists, with whom the radical left on Facebook recently spontaneously and (nearly) unanimously declared solidarity over the Anarchist Memes fiasco, and their absolute refusal to accept our solidarity. I have to say the level of despair he is proclaiming is not unique to him. There is a reason I have stopped actively engaging the AnCaps on the usurper AM page. There is a reason many of my Comrades have dropped the offensive. But then, in a Facebook group whose aim is the discussion of radical Communist theory in general, on the same day as all this, a post was made asking which Leftists would we be unwilling to work with in a revolutionary group.

Three independent individuals, posting at different times in different places with different intentions, all in one day, underlining the ever-present snake that is Leftist sectarianism. And it really made me think about what "Socialism without adjectives" and the concept of a "United Left" really mean.

For starters, "Socialism without adjectives" is simply that. It is sort of a declaration similar to non-denominational Christianity. You are declaring your adherence to a particular ideology and its particular set of principles without any further qualifiers or modifications. So adjectiveless Socialism would necessarily argue for (in general) the following:

• The abolition of capital;
• The emancipation of labor;
• The full democratization of political power; and
• The full equity of social relations.

Sounds nice, right? Well, the definitions of each bullet point, how they relate to class struggle, and how they are best to be accomplished are what causes sectarianism among the Left. So it's really a lot harder than it looks to nail down what the basic tenets of a United Left or "Socialism without adjectives" should look like. But it's a place to start. That being said, using those (highly simplified) bullet points, we can very quickly throw out a few groups as NOT being amenable to a United Left or belonging to an adjectiveless Socialism. These even came up in the post about who you wouldn't work with:

• Liberals; they support operation within the current system which is opposed to the abolition of capital and the full democratization of political power--we cannot consider them as being on the Left.
• Stalinists; my understanding of Stalinism and its modern adherents is that the full equity of social relations and the full democratization of political power are questioned if not outright denied--no matter how "Left" they are, we cannot consider them Socialists

I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones who most readily come to mind. This is the first restriction on the definition of a United Left in this country, that not all who lay claim to the Left can be considered allies in the sense of pursuing class struggle to its inevitably revolutionary end. Hal Draper discusses this trend in his 1948 critique of Neo-Stalinists, and he is far less forgiving than I am in his treatment of whether or not they can claim to be "socialist". 

As far as the Anarchists who refused our solidarity and openly mocked it, challenging us on the merits of Marxism rather than the merits of unity and solidarity, it is the question of the third bullet that truly divides us from them: what, in a post-revolutionary society, would the full democratization of political power look like? They advocate for the complete abolition of a state apparatus upon the success of the revolution, while we (generally) advocate for a new kind of people's or worker's state. This is the rub of it. Ergo, because Anarchists do not represent a wide spectrum of the Left, a United Left can only be considered as such insofar as it unites and brings together various groups of a Marxist, Socialist, Communist variety. Anarchists can and should be admitted so long as the question of unity and solidarity trumps sectarian division on the question of the existence of the state, and we should openly support Anarchist groups and declare our solidarity with them, but in the actual formation of a United Left it is unfathomable to recommend full agency to Anarchism precisely because the definition of the state would be enough for schism.

It is an unfortunate reality that a United Left must necessarily recognize that certain groups that are historically on the Left or historically claim membership among the Left would be detrimental to a wider united front. But if we do not address these questions now, it would become harder later on to address them and address them effectively. Council Communism, Party Vanguardism, Democratic Centralism, etc. can all vie for prominence among the membership of a United Left because they all agree on the basic idea that a state apparatus in some form would exist post-revolution. But because Anarchists do not agree, these other strains would not even be able to vie for influence because the question of "state? yes or no?" would dominate everything else.

The DNA of a United Left is to be decided upon what we on the Left can agree upon in general without relying on specific definitions. This rather exoteric approach to Marxism, a self-described scientific dialectical theory, has its issues, and problems most definitely would arise from it. But far from attempting a dogmatic orthodoxy of Marxism, it is a framework in which vibrant heterodoxies can flourish and challenge each other, urging a dialectical synthesis of Marxist formulations. Without insisting on a rigid, disciplined orthodoxy, a United Left could potentially be a formidable force. It is simply a matter of finding the platforms upon which we all in general agree, which is, of course, no simple matter at all.

Fresh Friday #1

So anyone who read the Inaugural Address post will know that I missed one of the features I promised (Theory Thursday). That was quite unintentional. You see, I'm recently recovered from a broken foot and will be returning to a full time schedule this upcoming week and I was trying to cram as much social time in as possible during my last long mid-week-off. For those interested, I wanted to discuss Hal Draper and his feminism. Since I did not do this, it gives me another week to go over it again and hit any points I might have missed and it will give you guys a chance to familiarize yourselves with the text as well. But, Fridays are not for theorists who are well and published and properly established. Fridays are for fresh ideas, or ideas that I at least think are new. So, without further ado, onto my first installment of Fresh Fridays.

An Evangelical Marxism: How to Approach Marxist Social Education in the Twenty-First Century

-E.M. Diderot

Under the (now) Blessed Pope John Paul II, the Catholic Church embarked on something called the "New Evangelization", the idea that the way the Church interacts with the world is out of sync with how the world has developed in the last century. Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI also talked about the New Evangelization, and entered into a broader ecumenical dialogue with other Christian denominations and interfaith groups. So far I haven't seen Pope Francis say anything about the New Evangelization, but his platform centered on Social Justice and (tentative) Liberation Theology seems to be on par for the course. What does this have to do with Marxism?

First, the point of this blog is discussion on the creation of a United Left. There is no point to creating a united left unless this unification can attract new blood. In the Twenty-First Century, Marxism is suffering a crisis of relevance in the same way as the Catholic Church. Both Marxists and Catholics see themselves as fundamentally relevant to the creation of solutions for the world's endemic problems, but both are finding a hard place to gain a foothold to inspire mass cultural and social change. A lot of this is rooted in the fact that the Catholic Church still approaches its interaction with society in general and its congregants specifically from the standpoint that it did in the Nineteenth Century. Marxism is very much the same. The development of high degrees of economic specialization, technological advancement, and the birth of the internet and social networking have fundamentally changed the relationship of labor to capital in the modern economy. But much of our language and educational strategy is still firmly rooted in the romanticized notion of the flatcap Irish immigrant in a steel mill twelve hours a day. Capital is still firmly represented with top hats, and that is something WE need to appropriate. Ngyes! (Nigel Thornberry accent required)

Secondly, the language and posturings of religious institutions for (largely) religious populations has been a very effective and prolific strategy in Marxist enterprises around the world. For an in-depth look at how the Bolshevik Party appropriated religious language, attitude, and mentality for its own message in Russia, please reference Nikolai Berdayev's The Religious Foundations of Bolshevism. So, in the United States, the land of Sara Palin, Michele Bachmann, and others, a country where the fastest growing demographic are underpaid, overworked Central American Latino Catholics, why would it not be beneficial to adopt the same language and strategies as a revitalized Catholic Evanglization? Approaching Marxism in an evangelical fashion would not be limited to Catholics, either. The United States is the birthplace of Evangelical Christianity, with its roots in Southern Baptism. Adopting the same sort of apocalyptic language and charismatic posturing would do wonders to draw parallels between the theological hell being prophesied by their fire-and-brimstone preachers and the very real material hell in which they live, now.

If it is the considered opinion of a United Left that the Evangelical Strategy be promoted, it would become necessary for all Marxists to familiarize themselves with the writings of Liberation Theologians and Evangelical and Charismatic Christian authors. Principally, this is due to two factors:
1. It would allow the easy generation of arguments that clearly explain Marxist positions in language that is immediately recognizable and accessible to the masses; and
2. It would eliminate the highly academic air that much Marxist discourse has in the Twenty-First Century today.

This second point I feel is the most important thing we need to combat in approaching cross-ideological Marxist education, today. Much of our language has become increasingly technical and highly sect-specific. To an outsider, this vocabulary is not easy to understand, and it is not their responsibility to educate themselves before encountering it. How many coffee-house conversations have ended due to mutual frustration when the other person "just doesn't get it"? How many times have you had to sidetrack your main argument just to explain a term or concept that is self-evident to you? By adopting the language of the most virulently anti-Marxist populations in the country, we can make these terms and concepts self-evident, as well, and we can get the point across much, much sooner.

Problems and contradictions:

Marxists are materialists, first and foremost. Religion is not a materialist philosophy, and it must be combated. However, I hold that religion in and of itself as a concept is not harmful. Therefore, the focus should not be an offensive war against religion as a social institution, but, instead, an offensive war against the problems that force a need for religion. The religious can very easily be our allies. It was the revolutionary anti-religious attitude of the First International that received the condemnation of Marxism by the Holy See in the first place. It is why the evolution of Liberation Theology has been so troublesome. It is why concepts like "Christian Socialism" and "Christian Communism" have built-in contradictions. The generational impact of a social norm that says "Communism is Anti-Religion" implies that nothing good can come out of Marxism, therefore, its arguments, no matter their validity, must be vigorously combated even when it is against one's own self-interest to do so. Is it any wonder that the Republican Party has so effectively undermined the self-interests of the poorest and most vulnerable in our society, yet continue to garner their support?

Marxists must understand that their anti-religious position must as a matter of pure necessity and pragmatism carry with it the caveat that religion will exist so long as it is necessary. Legislating it out of existence (even in a post-revolutionary hypothetical America) will not be possible. It cannot be done in the United States. The First Amendment is more inviolable than the rest of the Constitution in its entirety. What must be sought, instead, is alliance with the religious community, especially the Catholics who already make up a plurality of self-identified religious Americans, so that the reasons religion is sought out can be addressed and corrected. When all religions fade away, the First Amendment will still be there, just in case a new religion springs up.

Second issue: how to overcome anti-Communist bias and stigma among the religious right. It can be done, but it must be done in the same way one church poaches the membership of another. Marxists MUST represent themselves in a moral and an ethically positive way. This should be a matter of fact and self-evident to all Marxists whether they embrace a Marxist Evangelization or not. We seek a humanitarian end, yet we do not always behave as humanitarians. The revolutionary period of American history has not yet come, so we do not need to concern ourselves with violently ridding ourselves of the Capitalist system. To engage the world in the way that St. Paul demanded of the early Church, but with a Marxist ethic rather than a Christian one, would do more to inspire people to overcome their anti-Communist bias than anything else. And if we are already armed with the language and vocabulary of the religious right, it is simply a matter of having coffee with them, and an entirely new demographic will be added to the cause and movement of the United Left.