MÉSZÁROS, István. the Communal System and the Principle of SelfCritique

8/10/2019 MSZROS, Istvn. the Communal System and the Principle of SelfCritique

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monthlyreview.org https://monthlyreview.org/2008/03/01/the-communal-system-and-the-principle-of-self-critique

Istvn Mszros mo re on Marxism & Socialism

The Communal System and the Principle of Self-Critique

Itsvn Mszros is autho r of Socialism or Barbarism: From the American Century to the Crossroads

(Monthly Review Press, 2001), Beyond Capital: Toward a Theory of Transition (Monthly Review Press ,

1995), and The Challenge and Burden of Historical Time: Socialism in the Twenty- First Century

(f orthcoming, Monthly Review Press, 2008).

The collapse by centurys end of most of the post -revolutionary social experiments o f the twentieth

century put socialist s nearly everywhere on the defensive. Todays call f or a socialism for t he twenty-f irst

century is an attempt to t ranscend this def ensive posture and to engage f ully with the mos t urgent

problem of our t ime: the creation o f a sustainable socialist o rder. In this respect, Istvn Mszros, in the

words o f President Hugo Chvez of Venezuela, is someone who lights up the road. He points to the core

of the argument we must make in order to go beyond the defensive att itude in which the worlds peoples

and revolutionary movements f ind themselves, and to take the of f ensive, throughout the world, in moving

to ward socialism (quoted f rom back cover of Mszros, O desafio e o fardo do tempo histrico[So Paulo:Boitempo Editorial, 2007]; English edition, The Challenge and Burden of Historical Time[forthcoming from

Monthly Review Press, 2008]).

The f ollowing article, The Communal System and the Principle of Self -Critique, by Mszros is much more

dif f icult to read than what we normally publish in MR. It is included here because we believe that the issue it

addresses is vitally important to the f uture of socialism and hence to the future of the world. The very

demanding nature of this article is mainly due to the inherent challenges o f the problem it addresses. This

has led Mszros to reach out to unfamiliar concepts , building on hitherto neglected aspects o f Marxs

thought. A brief introduction t o his conceptual f ramework and vocabulary is therefo re necessary.

For those inf luenced by the Hegelian and Marxist critical traditions, the term critique has a specif ic

meaning and should not be conf used with mere criticism. To engage in critique is to uncover the essence

underlying appearance, the historical conditions t hat make a particular set of social ideas and

arrangements seem necessary and rational. Critique is most commonly exercised in relation to the hist orical

past. For example, bourgeois society as a result o f its own development is able to see the historical

underpinnings and limitations o f the f eudal society that preceded it. It is normal fo r any given class society

to suspend critique with respect to its own social f ormation. Instead it seeks to eternalize its own social

relations. Hence, it is only to a limited extent (and only in its ascending phase) that a dominant class

f ormation will engage in selfcritique.

This is particularly the case with capital as a so cial order, which operates on apost festumbasis, wheredecisions on the reproduction of society are determined by the blind workings of the so -called market

mechanism (capitals logic of commodity exchange) and all social decisions t hus take place af ter t he f act o f

f or- prof it economic determinations. This leaves no room for rat ional social decisions or planning, and no

space f or self -critique.

For Mszros, as f or Marx, the regime of capital is an organic system in the sense that all of its

components are reciprocal and reinforcing, tending to reproduce the dominant social relations as a whole.

Capitalism thus operates by what Mszros calls a kind of unconscious consciousness working behind

the backs o f individualsAdam Smiths f amous invisible hand. It is reinforced at every point by a

hierarchal division of labor. Under these circumstances, equality, democracy, and self -critique are at best

mere mockeries o f what they might be. As a particular social metabolic order the o rganic syst em of

capitalism creates all sorts of vicious circles by which it reproduces its exploitative relations.

To make a communal system of production based on substant ive equality possible, and not t o f all into t he

twin errors o f command socialism and market socialismboth o f which mean the ef f ective restorat ion
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of the capital- labor relations characteristic of the regime of capital (if not capitalism per se)it is

necessary that socialism itself be const ituted as an organic system or social metabolic order, whereby its

productive relations and decision- making relations reinfo rce each other. A more collective organizat ion o f

production makes possible, but also necessaryif a truly organic communal mode is to developthe

activation of the principle of self -critique, directed at the present, as a const itutive element in society.

Genuine planning under conditions of substantive democracy cannot occur without the continual, active

engagement o f individuals in self -critique that involves non-s to p learning fro m changing historical

experience. As Marx wrote, proletarian revolutions criticize themselves constantly, interrupt themselves

continually in their course, come back to the apparently accomplished in order to begin it af resh, deride with

unmercif ul thoroughness t he inadequacies, weaknesses and paltriness o f their f irst at tempts. Hence for

Mszros t he activation of the principle of self -critique, just as much as the collective organizat ion of

production, is what distinguishes genuine socialism (the communal order of production) as an organic

system.

The Editors

The Necessity o f Self -Critique

The conscious adoptionand successf ul maintenance of the orienting principle of self-critiqueis an

absolutely f undamental requirement o f the hist orically sustainable hegemonic alternative to capitals social

metabolic order as an organic system.

Since it cannot be allowed to conf lict in any way with the necessarily open-endedhistorical determinations

of labor s alternative reproductive orderon the contrary, it must be a vital guarantee against all

temptations t o relapse into a self -complacent closure, and thereby into the reproduction of vitiating vested

interests , corresponding to the traditional pattern of the pastthe envisaged and knowingly pursued

f aithf ulness to the theoretical as well as practical operative methodo logical principle of self -critique needs

to be embraced as apermanentf eature of the new, positively enduring, social fo rmation. For precisely

through the genuine and continuing exercise of that orienting principle it becomes poss ible to correct in

good time the tendencies that might otherwise not only appear but, worse than that, also conso lidatethemselves in favor o f the ossif ication of a given stage of the present, undermining thereby the prospects

of a sustainable future.

This is so because the f lexible coordination and consensual integrationof the necessarily varied but at f irst

only locally/partially adoptedmeasures and, as a result, po tentially conf licting decisions, into a coherent

wholeis inconceivable without real self -critique. The kind of potential conf lict we are here concerned with,

due to the circumstance that so me important measures and decisions are taken at f irst only locally/partially

before t hey can be assessed on a comprehensive basis, must be in fact more unavoidable in the socialist

modality of the societal reproduction process t han ever before. This is because of its substantively

democraticcharacter based on the supersession of the vertical/hierarchical division of labor. For that

reason a proper way of guardingthrough consciously embraced self -critique by the people concerned

against the dangers that might result f rom such would-be conf licts is a matter of great importance.

The qualitat ively diff erent organic systemof labor s necessary hegemonic alternativeto the established

mode of social metabolic reproduction is unthinkable without the conscious espousal of self-critiqueas its

vital orienting principle. At the same time, it is impossible to envisage the conscious adoption and operation

of self -critique as an enduring orienting principle without a certain typeof societal reproduction which must

successf ully maintain itself as a veritable organic system without the danger of being derailed f rom its

consist ently open-ended historical course of development. For we are talking about a dialectical correlation

between the qualitativelydiff erent type of organic system needed in the future and the necessary orienting

principle of self -critique in conjunction with which that new type becomes f easible at all.

Neither the qualitatively diff erent new type of organic system, nor the orienting and operative principle of

genuine self -critique can fully unfold and pos itively f unction without the o ther. However, this dialectical

reciprocity cannot be allowed to const itute a convenient circle, let alone a ready-made excuse f or justif ying


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the absence of both, by apologet ically asserting on each side that without the full-scale availability of the

otherno progress can be made in the realizat ion of the onein question, or vice versa. For, as we know, that

is how an assumed convenient circle becomes an utterly vicious circle.In truth the dialectical correlation

between the new organic system and the organ of self -critique defines itself precisely as the mutuality of

helping each othereven at a very early stageof their historical development, once the need f or inst ituting

labors hegemonic alternative arises f rom the prof ound st ructural crisis o f capitals increasingly destructive

societal reproductive o rder.

In view of the f act that the necessary alternative to capitalsin our timeubiquitous ly dest ructive organicsystem must be a qualitat ively dif f erent but nonetheless organic system, only the communalmode o f

societal reproduction can truly qualif y in this respect. In other words, only the communally organized system

is capable of providing the overall framework f or t he continuing development of the multif aceted and

substantively equitable constitutive parts of the so cialist mode of integration of all creative individual and

collective fo rces into a coherent wholeas a historically viable organic system of social metabolic

reproduction.And the success of this enterprise is f easible only if the envisaged integration into the new

type of organic system is accomplished in such a way that the parts reciprocally support and enhance each

other on apositively open-endedbasis, in the spirit of conscious self-determination, providing thereby to t he

f reely associated producers the scope needed fo r their self- realizat ion as rich social individuals (in Marxs

words) t hrough their fully sustainable fo rm of social metabolic interaction among themselves and withnature.

This is a seminal requirement o f the new historic f orm as labor s necessary hegemonic alternative to

capitals social metabolic order. Evidently, the principle of self -critique is integral to the necessary spirit of

conscious self -determination of the f reely associated producers. But just as evidently, the self -

determination of the social individuals deserves its name only if their application of the vital orienting

principle of self -critique is the result o f a consciously chosen voluntary act. Any arbitrary attempt at

imposing the ritual of self -critique on the people f rom above, as we know it f rom the Stalinist past, can

amount t o no more than the painful mockery of it, with f ar-reaching counter-productive consequences and

reversals in actual historical development.

Limited Self -Critique and the Capital System

Since the communal systemin to tal cont rast to capitals unalterable, even if destructively blind, self -

expansionary logiccannot count on economic determinations which work behind the back of the

individuals,its only f easible way of ordering its af f airs, in accordance with the voluntary determinations of

the f reely asso ciated individuals, is by f ully activating the orienting and operative principle of self -critique at

all levels. This means positively activating it in accordance with the particular individual concerns all the way

to the highest and mos t complex decision- making processes of comprehensive societal interaction, with its

unavoidable impact on nature. And the inevitability o f that impact deeply implicates no t s imply the obvious

time-determinations o f the present but also the longest t erm histo rical dimension of the qualitatively newcommunal organic systems consciously designed mode of overall social metabolic contro l.

We have to return later to the discussion of some of the contrasting determinations o f the radically

dif f erent communal system as the only sustainable histo rical alternative to capitals increasingly dest ructive

organic system. But f irst it is necessary to consider the possibilities and limitations of self -critique in

general terms, and not in relation to its considerably modif ied potentialities f or contributing to the

operation of the communal system.

It goes without saying that selfcritique is (or at least ought-to-be) an integral part of the particular

intellectuals activity. When we think of so me great intellectual achievements, irrespective of the social

set ting with which they are asso ciatedlike the Hegelian philosophical synthesis, f or instancethecreative contribution of self -critique is clear enough, at t imes even explicitly stated.

However, the limitat ions are also clearly in evidence when we cons ider the negative impact o f problematical

social determinationseven in the case of such monumental philosophical undertaking as the Hegelian


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synthesis. But t his should be by no means surprising. For there are some histo rical situations and

associated so cial const raints when even a great thinker f inds it impossible to jump over Rhodes, in

Hegels own words. The French Revolution and the ascending phase of the capital systems historical

development o f f ered a pos itive scope f or the Hegelian achievement. However, the insuperable exploitative

dimension of the capital systems innermost determinations became increasingly more dominant as time

went by, assert ing itself with grave implications f or t he future in the bourgeois orders descending phase of

development Hence, the uncritical acceptanceof the systems contradictions and the defense of its

ultimately explosive structural antagonisms became more evident, bringing with it in the Hegelian philosophy

a speculatively-articulated conservative reconciliation.

Accordingly, Marx right ly characterized the social limitat ion intervening against the self -crit icaland in its

own way also criticalintent o f this great philosopher by underlining that Hegels standpoint is that of

modern political economy.1 The acceptance of such a standpoint brings with it, of course, f ar-reaching

consequences. For in its spirit the unavoidable reconciliatory presuppositions and complicated practical

imperatives of capitals po litical economy enter the picture, even if they are transubstant iated by Hegel with

great cons istency. This deeply af f ects in a speculative way the general character o f an earlier quite

inconceivable synthesis of philosophy based on the French Revoluto n. We can f ind many instances o f this

reconciliatory approach presented by Hegel in the name of the World Spirit f rom the vantage point o f

capitals political economy. But, inevitably, such limitations corresponding to capitals vantage point enterthe picture and undermine the critical intentnot only of the Hegelian system but also of the work of the

other major thinkers who conceptualize the world f rom the standpoint of capitals political economy,

including a giant o f the Scot tish Enlightenment movement, Adam Smith. The result of such limitations is to

more or less consciously internalizethe systems most problematical practical presupposit ions and

objective imperatives, art iculating in that way the pos ition which embodies the f undamental socioeconomic

interests , as well as t he central values, of a societal reproductive order with which they identif y themselves.

This is what sets t he ultimate limits even to t heir best intent ioned self -critique.

This failure of self -critque is not s imply f atalistically determined by the class pos itions o f the thinkers

concerned. There are many intellectual and political f igures, including some out standing ones, who have

successf ully broken their ties with their class and have produced their radical st rategic systems, with

powerf ul revolut ionary practical implications and corresponding social movements , in irreconcilable

contradiction to t he fundamental interest s o f the class into which they have been born and in relation to

which they had to def ine their position in the course o f their upbringing. It is enough to recall the names o f

Marx and Engels in this respect.

Of course it is t rue that in periods o f major social turmoil and great upheavals the personal mot ivation of

many individuals f or reexamining in a radical way their own class belongingtogether with the ro le which

their privileged class happens to play under the given historical circumstancesand doing so to the po int

of committing themselves to a struggle f or the rest of their lif e against the repressive f unctions o f the

class in which they have been brought up, is considerably greater than under normal circumstances. Theopposite is also true, in the sense that periods of conservative political and economic success in society at

largewith a small c, sustaining even the so -called neoliberalphase o f deeply reactionary developments in

the last three decades of twentieth-century history, f or instancetend to co incide with wholesale

intellectual reversals and with the acceptance of rather absurd pseudo- theoretical fashions. And the latter

f ollow at humiliatingly short intervals o ne another in a vain search of the people concerned f or ephemerally

self -serving irrational evasion.

The truth of the matter is, though, that such conjunctural events and correlations cannot set tle the

f undamental historical issues. Not even when we have in mind some of the outstanding representat ives o f

polit ical economy and philosophy who in their time identif ied themselves with capitals vantage point , like

Adam Smith and Hegel. For t he limits of a thinker s ability t o assume a real criticalst ance, on the basis of

his or her readiness to exercise the required self-critiquein the process, is ultimately decided by the overall

histo rical conf iguration o f the interacting social fo rces. They necessarily involve all dimensions o f

development, including the elementary conditions of humanitys survival on t his planet in the midst of the

established order s deepening structural crisis and the concomitant destruction of nature.


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With regard to this correlation it was by no means accidental that capitals ascending phase o f development

to some extent f avoring the adoption o f a critical stance, even if a limited and selective oneresulted in

the great achievements o f classical political economy.By contrast the same capital systems descending

phase had brought with it the painful theoretical impoverishment and the crass social apologet ics of vulgar

economy, which conf ined itself to systematizing in a pedantic way, and proclaiming for everlast ing truths,

the t rite ideas held by the self- complacent bourgeoisie with regard to their own world, to t hem the best of all

possible worlds, as sharply criticized by Marx.2 Thus, disconcerting and potentially tragic as it happens to

be, in the course of the capital systems histo rical unf olding even the limited scope f or self -critiquecharacteristic of the earlier phase had to leave its space f or the ideology of the systems eternalizat ion

and for t he authoritarian practical imposition of the most retrograde policies over all actively dissenting

f orces, no matter how dangerous f or humankind the consequences.

From Limited Self -Critique to Apologet ics

The original scope for self -critique at the ascending phase of the capital systems histo rical unf olding was

quite important, despite its o bvious class limitat ions. The relevance of this connection is f ar f rom negligible

because in terms o f the requirements of scientif ic advancement in generalwithout which the

achievements of classical polit ical economy would be unthinkablean element of self-critiqueis a

necessary condition f or a critical understandingof the overall subject of enquiry.

This is why Marx puts into relief the analogy between the critical element in the historical development o f

Christ ianity and a somewhat better understanding by the bourgeoisie of its reproductive order when it

assumed a less mythologizing att itude towards its own mode of production. We can see this connection

st ressed in an important passage of Marxs Grundrissein which he links the general theoretical point

concerning the principal economic categories o f a more advanced historical stage of societal reproduction

and the necessary but usually neglected qualif ications of that general theoretical point f or t he proper

conceptualization of capitals socioeconomic order itself , as the mos t advanced form. This is how he puts

it:

The bourgeois economy supplies the key to the ancient, etc. But no t at all in the manner of those

economists who smudge over all historical dif f erences and see bourgeois relations in all forms of society.

One can understand tribute, tithe, etc., if one is acquainted with ground rent. But o ne must not identif y

them. Further, since bourgeois society is itself only a contradictory f orm of development, relations derived

f rom earlier forms will of ten be found within it o nly in an entirely stunted f orm, or even travest ied. For

example, communal property. Although it is t rue, therefo re, that the categories o f bourgeois economics

possess a t ruth f or all other f orms of society, this is to be taken only with a grain of salt. They can contain

them in a developed, or s tunted, or caricatured f orm, etc., but always with an essent ial dif f erence. The so-

called histo rical presentat ion of development is f ounded, as a rule, on the fact that t he latest f orm regards

the previous ones as steps leading up to itself , and, since it is only rarely and only under quite specif ic

conditions able to criticize itselfleaving aside, of course, the historical periods which appear to

themselves as t imes of decadenceit always conceives them one-sidedly. The Christ ian religion was able

to be of assistance in reaching an objective understanding of earlier mythologies o nly when its own self-

criticismhad been accomplished to a certain degree, so to speak dynamei [potentially]. Likewise, bourgeois

economics arrived at an understanding of f eudal, ancient, o riental economics only af ter the self-criticismof

bourgeois society had begun. In so f ar as the bourgeois economy did not mythologicallyidentif y itself

altogether with the past, its critiqueof the previous economies, notably of f eudalism, with which it was still

engaged in direct struggle, resembled the critique which Christianity levelled against paganism, or also that

of Protestantism against Catho licism.3

The anatomy of civil society was produced by class ical political economy on t his basis, once the earliermythologizing vision of the emerging bourgeois order became pointless in the af termath of the victo ry over

f eudalism. This was a histo rical phase of boundless opt imism in the new conceptions, incorporat ing the

hopef ul anticipations as well as the illusions of the Enlightenment movement in Europe. As one of Adam

Smiths Scottish Enlightenment comrades, Henry Home wrote with great optimism and enthusiasm:


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Reason, resuming her sovereign authority, will banish [persecution] altogether.Within the next century it

will be thought strange, that persecution should have prevailed among social beings. It will perhaps even be

doubted, whether it ever was seriously put into practice.4 And he was equally enthusiast ic about the

potentialities o f the new work ethos , in contrast t o the idleness of the f ormer ruling personnel, insist ing

that Activity is essential to a social being: to a self ish being it is o f no use, af ter procuring the means of

living. A self ish man, who by his opulence has all the luxuries of life at command, and dependents without

number, has no occasion f or activity.5

The self -conf idence of the new approach, which produced real scientif ic achievements in understandingthe production of wealth, fully corresponded to capitals f rom that histo ric phase onwards irresist ible

vantage point.6 There seemed to be no need fo r f urther self -critique in other than secondary or marginal

detail. The power of capital successf ully asserted itself in all domainsto the point that additional

exercises in self -critique were suspended. Not even the once t roublesome political dimension could

exercise any signif icant res istance to its advancement. On the cont rary, the state itself had progressively

become an integral part of the capital systems overall determinations, under the primacy of the material

reproduction process. In this way everything had been subsumed and conso lidated under the rule of capital

as the most powerful self-expansionary organic system, notwithstanding its inherent but unacknowledged

antagonisms. And given its unchallenged systemic dominance in actuality, it seemed obvious to all those

who conceptualized the world f rom capitals vantage point that their organic system const ituted the oneand only natural system.This is why Adam Smith could sum it all up by saying that capital embodied the

natural system of perfect liberty and justice.7

Self-Critique and the Two Opposing Organic Systems

The communal organic system, as the only histo rically feasible hegemonic alternative to capitals social

metabolic order, cannot af f ord the luxury of the once boundless self -conf idence and self -complacency of

its predecessor. For it cannot even begin to assert and sustain itself, f rom the moment of its at tempted

self -const itution, without the conscious adoption of self -critique appropriate to the ongoing (and

necessarily changing) conditions of development.

The self -const ituting communal system cannot count on economic determinations which work behind the

back of the individuals:the obvious mode o f operation of capitals so cial metabolic order throughout its

histo ry. This kind of economic determination is well in tune with t he unconsciouscharacter o f the specif ic

parts o f capitals reproduction processinherent in theplurality of relatively autonomous and self-assertively

expansionary capitalsand f ulf ils a paradoxical correctivef unction in the system. For the individual

capitalists can pursue up to a pointtheir own design, in expectation of successf ully achieving their particular

interests , but they cannot do that againstthe f undamental systemic determinations of their shared mode

of production. The fundamental systemic determinations and objective practical imperativeswhich must

work behind the back of the individual capitalistsforcef ully impose themselves over againstthe particular

excessively self -seeking decisions. For beyond a certain point t he self -seeking decisions would tend toundermine the overall viability of the system itself as the histo rically dominant o rganic system, in view of

the insuperably centrifugaltendency of unconscious(unalterably self -oriented) individual capitalist

consciousness.

Moreover, the unconscious consciousnessin question is simultaneously also the manifestation of incurably

adversarial/conflictualinterest s and corresponding st rategies. The pursuit of such interests necessarily

intensif ies the unconscious character of the whole process. For they render to the particular capitalist s the

possibility of anticipating the adversarys design and his o r her responses to ones own movesby each

reciprocally attempting to outwit the o ther as competito rs t hrough f irmly established (and even legally

sanctif ied) concealmentmaking the whole societal process that much more opaque.This is one of the

signif icant reasons why the adversariality itself is structurally insuperable. Still, thanks t o t he earliermentioned paradoxical corrective function of the f undamental systemic imperatives which assert

themselves behind the back of the individual, the centrifugal tendency of particularistic pursuits is not

allowed to get completely out o f hand, since that would endanger the survival of the system as a whole.


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Naturally, the insuperable adversariality inherent in the capital system is not conf ined to the conf rontation

and potential collision of particular capitalist interests. If it was only for that, some signif icant

improvements would be f easible, as they are indeed of ten pos tulated in the form of ideological

rationalizations of imaginary remedies: f rom the constantly propagandized f iction of peoples capitalism

to the pro jection o f all-embracing capitalist planning and to John Kenneth Galbraiths universally

reconciliatory techno-structure.

However, underneath the adversariality o f particular capitalist interestsindeed directly af f ecting also the

unfolding of the individual capitalist conf rontationswe f ind the structurally ineliminable fundamentalantagonism between capital and laboras the rival bearers of the hegemonic alternative modes of contro lling

the overall social metabolic process. Capital can carry on its hegemonic mode o f contro l only on condition

and only so long asit is capable of preserving and enforcing the deep-seated structural antagonism

which const itutes the necessary material and ideological presupposition of its social reproductive order.

And labor, on the contrary, can advance its genuine alternat ive only if it succeeds in institut ing a

qualitatively dif f erent mode of societal reproductionthe communal organic systemthrough historically

overcoming antagonistic adversariality altogether, and thereby consigning on a permanent basis t o t he past

the structurally secured hierarchical dominationof the overwhelming majority of human beings by a t iny

minority, as inherited f rom the capital system.

The inst itution and successf ul operation of such a hegemonic alternative is, of course, inconceivable

without the consciouscontro l of their lif e-activity by the f reely asso ciated social individuals. In this regard

the individualand the socialdimensions of our problem are inextricably intertwined.

It is self -evident that there can be no question o f a conscious societal control of the necessary decision-

making processes unless the particular individuals themselveswho are expected to introduce, and in a

respons ible way to carry out, t he decisions involvedf ully identif y themselves with the pursued objectives.

But that circumstance does not make the issue itself a purely, or even a predominantly, personal matt er.

The individual and the social const ituents o f genuine socialist consciousness would be altogether f ailing in

their much needed role unless they couldpositively enhanceone another. For the real personal involvement

of the particular individuals in the realization o f the chosen objectives and st rategies is conceivable only ifthe general social conditions t hemselves actively favorthe process, instead of tending in the opposite

direction, which would allow some form of adversarialityto creep in and undermine the articulation of

comprehensively cohesivesocial consciousness.

This is why onlya certain typeof so cial metabolic orderemphatically: the communal organic system

could qualif y as t ruly compatible with the production and the cont inuing positive enhancement o f the

required individual and social consciousness . For the institution and self -determined conso lidation o f that

type of reproductive system is the only feasible way to o vercome adversariality altogether, providing

thereby full scope fo r the cooperative realizationo f their f reely adopted conscious decisions by the

individuals.

The meaning of cooperative,in the full sense of the termwhich is absolutely essential for sustainable

socialist actionimplies the ability as well as the determination of the social individuals not only to dedicate

themselves to the implementation o f determinate tasks but also auto nomously to modifytheir actions in

the light o f the jointly evaluated consequences. This mode of self-correctiveaction could not be more

dif f erent f rom the known varieties o f being overruled by a separate hierarchical authority, imposed upon

them f rom above, or by the blind impact and unwanted consequences of their unconscious consciousness

i.e. the invisible hand of the capital system. Such unwanted consequences inevitably arise in the social

metabolic order in which economic laws and determinations work behind the back of the individuals, in the

interest of the capital systems survival, even if they directly imperil the survival of humanity.

Thus consciousnessand self-critiqueare inseparable f rom one another as the orienting and operative

principles o f decision making and action in the communal organic system. This is eas ily understandable. For

proper self -consciousness, individuals must incorporate theirpositively disposedawareness o f the real and

potential impacts o f their decisions and actions o n their f ellow human beings, which is inconceivable


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without f reely undertaken selfcritique. At the same time, the conscious guard in the communal type of

societal interaction process as a whole againstthe establishment and conso lidation of self -perpetuating

vested interests , which would inevitably reproduce adversariality of one kind or another, and thepositive

wayof preventing the fo rmation of such vested interests t hrough the cooperative promot ion and

maintenance of substantive equality, constitute the necessary condition for the conscious and positively

inclined self -critical awareness of the social individuals in their interactions among t hemselves.

Moreover, there is also a dimension o f this problem which transcendsthe direct experience of the particular

individuals both in time and in space. For, obviously, they have a limited lif e-span, compared to humanityshisto rically unfolding overall development. And while the individuals are, of course, const itutive parts of the

actually given stage of humanitys advancement, they are at the same time active members o f a particular

community, with its o wn specif ic history and diverse problems f rom which signif icantly diff erent tasks may

arise for them to f ulf ill. The problem of the contradiction between the time-spans of individuals and of the

community is especially acute at a relatively early st age in the development o f the communal system in

question, when the need for overcoming the major inequalities inherited f rom the past represents a much

more dif f icult problem. Also with regard to the general time scale of development, there are some

consequences o f earlier determined fo rms o f action which can beand have to bemodif ied on a longer

time-scale, well beyond the lif e-span of the generation which was responsible for consciously adopting

under the once prevailing circumstances the original decisions.

However, these considerations do not undermine the vital importance of the orienting and operative

principles o f conscious decision makingand the appropriate self -critique closely associated with itby

the individuals in their social metabolic interchange with nature and among themselves. They only underline

the need f or real solidarityextending over the mos t diverse communities and across the succeeding

generations. Besides, learning f rom the lessons of the past cannot cease to be relevant because of the

adoption of the principles of conscious self -critical action. On the cont rary, it can really come into its o wn

only under circumstances when the perversely derailing adversariality of vested interests is no longer

dominating societal interchange itself . It is notorious how of ten t ragic histo rical events and circumstances

reappear and cause f urther devastation, due to the refusal of the interested parties to f ace up to the

challenge of critically reassess ing them, including their own ro le in allowing such developments to prevail in

the f irst place. The implosion of the Soviet- type system was one of the mos t t ragic historical experiences

of the twentieth century for t he socialist movement. It would be even more t ragic if we could not draw the

appropriate lessons f rom it.

Self -Critique and Socialist Transition

The constitution o f the communal system, through the conscious adoption and continued enhancement of

self -critique, is undoubtedly a mos t dif f icult learning process. Marx anticipated the importance of such self -

critique in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparteby saying that proletarian revolutions

criticize themselves constantly, interrupt t hemselves cont inually in their own course, come back to the

apparently accomplished in order to begin it af resh, deride with unmercif ul thoroughness the inadequacies,

weaknesses and paltrinesses of their f irst at tempts, seem to throw down their adversary only in order that

he may draw new strength f rom the earth and rise again, more gigantic, bef ore them, and they recoil again

and again f rom the indef inite prodigiousness o f their own aims, until a situat ion has been created which

makes all turning back impossible, and the conditions themselves cry out:

Hic Rhodus, hic salta!

Here is Rhodes, leap here!8

In this sense, learning f rom historical experience is an important part of the process of self -critique.Especially when we are concerned with actual historical developments associated with socialist claims, as

made by the Soviet system. Understandably, Marx was no contemporary to them and therefore could in no

way take into account the historical specif icities under which the bewildering pos trevolutionary

developments unf olded under Stalin in the name of socialism in one country, and in the end have brought


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about the implosion of the Soviet- type postcapitalist capital system. Nevertheless the way in which Marx

characterized capitals f ully developed o rder as an organic system, because its const ituents reciprocally

sustain one anotherand thus calling for change f ar exceeding itsjuridical relationswhile maintaining in

many respects more or less intact the capital relation, including its new fo rm of self -assertive

personif icationshelps to throw light on what went wrong and of f ers important indications of necessary

self -critique f or the f uture. Likewise Gorbachevs gro tesquely uncritical conception of market so cialism

could of f er only fantasy remedy to the system and was right f rom the beginning doomed to f ailure, paving

the road to capitalist restoration.

The issue resembling the uncritical projection o f market socialism surf aced much earlier and,

understandably, it is visible again in China.9 In f act, the fantasy of market socialism appeared already in

Marxs lif etime, even if then it was no t called by that name. Marx made it abso lutely clear what he thought of

it when he stressed in the Grundrissethat the idea held by some socialists that we need capital but not the

capitalistsis altogether wrong. It is posited within the concept of capital that the objective conditions of

laborand these are its own producttake on a perso nality toward it.10 And he added in another passage

in the same work that capital in its being-f or- itself is the capitalist. Of course, socialists sometimes say,

we need capital, but no t the capitalist . Then capital appears as a pure thing, not as a relation o f production

which, ref lected in itself , is precisely the capitalist. I may well separate capital f rom a given individual

capitalist, and it can be transf erred to another. But, in los ing capital, he loses the quality o f being acapitalist. Thus capital is indeed separable f rom an individual capitalist , but not f rom the capitalistwho, as

such, contro ls the worker.11

It is a s imilarly myst ifying and self -disarming conception when the relationship of capital and labor is

described, in the most superf icial way, as one between buyers and sellers, hypostat izing thereby a f ictitious

equalityin place of the actually existing structurally secured and safeguarded domination and subordination.

The total absence of criticaland self-criticalassessment of this relationship had a great deal to do with

Gorbachev and others adopting the absurd strategy of market so cialism, bringing with it necessary f ailure.

For in reality the relationship we are talking about is not at all a genuine market relation, like that between

particular capitalist enterprises exchanging their products, but o nly its deceptive semblance, the imposition

of a deceptive invisible hand.For the innermost substantivedetermination o f the f undamental interchange

between capital and labor is an actual relationship of power under the supremacy of capital.The real

substanceas the f irmly established actualpresuppositionof the relationship in question in the sphere of

productionis deeply hidden beneath the deceptive semblance of the pseudo- equitat ive transactions in the

sphere of circulation. As Marx had made it amply clear: It is not a mere buyer and a mere seller who f ace

each other, it is a capitalistand a worker; it is a capitalist and a worker, who f ace each other in the sphere of

circulation, on the market, as buyerand seller.The relation as capitalistand workeris the presupposition f or

their relation as buyer and seller.12

Thus, f rom the st rategically derailing and self -disarming conceptions of this kind the overall f ramework of

sustainable social transf ormationthe socialist vision of a necessary histo rical alternative to capitalsorganic systemis tot ally miss ing. Its place is taken by an eclectic mixture o f voluntaristic tacticalpo litical

projections (misconceived as proper strategicmeasures) and so me elements of capitals established

material order. Like the wishf ul adoption o f the so- called market mechanism, which is no simple mechanism

at all but an integral const itutent o f capitals organic system, its very nature is quite incompatible with the

envisaged change. And since the necessary st rategic orienting f ramework of the communal organic system

is nowhere even hinted at in such conceptions, there can be no room at all in them f or conscious self-

critique: the elementary condition of success o f the so cialist enterprise. No one should be surprised,

therefo re, by the restoration o f capitalism.

Contradictions of the Post FestumSystem of Control

One of the overwhelmingly important reaso ns why only the communal organic system can meet the

challenge of adopting as its normal and indef initely sustainable mode o f operation the orienting principle of

conscious self -critique concerns the insuperablepost festumcharacter of capitals organic system of social

metabolic contro l.


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This is so even if only someof the def ining characteristics of the old system are retained among the

guiding principles o f postrevolutionary developments, for whatever reason. It is, o f course, well

understandable that some tempting const raints and responses are bound to arise on the basis of

capitalist enmity, due to the well-known encirclementof a country which attempts to break its f ormer links

with the global capital system. However, they cannot provide an excuse, as it was done in Stalins Russia,

f or incorporating disruptive and alienating characterist ics o f the o nce prevailing mode o f managementlike

the contro l of the productive enterprises st rictly from above, as inherited f rom the capitalist

authoritarianism of the workshopinto t he new system. For in capitals o rganic system that characteristicitself is an integral partof some overall systemic determinations, and therefore cannot beand indeed they

are notsustained in iso lation. In the case of its capitalist version, the authoritarianism of the workshopis

inseparable f rom, and is also greatly strengthened and enfo rced by, the tyranny of the market.

If , therefore, the management of the so cialist enterprise f rom above (a veritable contradiction in terms)

f ails to produce the voluntaristically projected pos itive results , as it is bound to do , ever repeated calls f or

legitimating its twin brother are bound to surf ace. That is, calls f or the establishment o f the socialist

market economy (another incorrigible contradiction in terms), with its own kind of uncontro llable tyranny on

to p of those now happily embraced through the post revolutionary societys renewed links with the global

capitalist market. As indeed they actually did.

It is a rather uncomf ortable truth in this respect that the tendency to capitalist resto ration in the Soviet

Union did not s tart with Gorbachev. He only consummated it in its f inal variety. And it did not even start with

Khrushchev, several decades earlier. Khrushchev only gave it a more pro nounced f orm of practice, with its

corresponding ideological legitimation. In f act the long drawn out tendency f or capitalist restorat ion was

started by none other than Stalinhimself , as I have discussed and documented in cons iderable detail in

Beyond Capital.13 That f atef ul road, with its ultimately uncont rollable implications, was embarked upon

more than half a century ago, when the earlier state of emergency, linked to t he Second World War and to

the most urgent tasks of postwar reconstruction, outlived its usefulness and had to be abandoned.

With regard to the issue of the necessary conscious self -critique for sustainable socialist development, asdiscussed above in relation t o t he individuals and their social st rategies, the f act is that even partially

retaining the inherited determinations o f the past carries with it great dif f iculties f or the future. This can be

highlighted with the problem that the incorrigiblypost festumcharacter of such determinations represent a

f undamental challenge for socialist t ransf ormation. This is a challenge that cannot be avoided,

sidestepped, or postponed, but must be directly conf ronted right f rom the beginning.

For Marx the social character of production is posited onlypost festumin the form of exchange values

under the capital system. Hence, the more universal, social characteristics of production appear as mere

indirect byproducts , alienated manifestat ions of capitals own self -expansion. Out of this arises the

pervasive irrationality of the system, which is f orced by its to tal incapacity to plan for social ends and the

endless contradictions that this generates to restort to innumerable make-shif t arrangements after the fact

of the production of commodif ied values. Under capitals f ully developed organic system thispost festum

character o f societal interchange and the cont radictions it generates are therefore increasingly in evidence.

This has four principal aspects.

First , thepost festumsocial character of productive activity itself cannot even be imagined apart f rom

capitals historically established exchange relations asserted within the f ramework of generalized

commodity production, st rictly subordinating use-valueto the absolute requirement of profitable exchange-

value.Only through such, highly problematical, and ultimately quite unsustainable, mediation can the

production process of the capital system qualify as the mos t developed f orm of social production in

history.

Second, there is the inalterablypost festumcharacter of the potent ial corrective functionf easible in such a

post festumsocial productive system, with regard to the incurably adversarial/irrationalisticinterchanges o f

capitals productive enterprises through the market.Although the latter is idealized as the universally

benevolent invisible hand, even this idealization misses a vital dimension of the roblem. For in its ost


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festumdeterminations the market itself , as a set of attempted corrective socioeconomic and political power

relations (characterist ically misrepresented as a straightf orward mechanism), can onlypartiallycover the

relevant terrain in need of remedy, even when it is hypostatized as the rat ionally operat ive global market. It

could never turn t hepost festum socialityof the productive practices themselves into the cont rollably

(rationally) so cial.

The third principal aspect is the necessarilypost festumcharacter of planningeven in the most gigantic

quasi-monopolistic enterprises. This is partly due to the overall market f ramework of generalized

commodity production, underlined in the previous point. But no t only to that . An even more important f actoris the fundamental st ructural antago nism between capital and labor, which is ineliminable f rom the capital

system no matter how many and how varied might be the at tempted remedies. They range f rom technical

and technological as well as organizat ional devices, including the practices o f Toyotism and the strategy

of securing lean supply lines in the transnat ional industrial enterprises, all the way to the most

authoritarian f orms of anti-labor legislation even in the so-called democratic countries.14

And f ourth, thepost festumnature of the f easible adjustments becomes evident when some major conf licts

and complications erupt in the sociopo litical arena, whether in a given national sett ing or across

international boundaries. Activating the openly repressive functions o f the capitalist state was always t he

normal way of dealing with this kind of problem. In the most acute international cases this involvedembarking even on major wars, including the catastrophically destructive two world wars in the twentieth

century. For it always belonged to the normality of capital to operate on the basis of war if the ot her ways

of subduing the adversary f ail. While obvious ly this devastating general principle has not been abandoned,

as witnessed by the countless postwar military adventures in which the dominant imperialist power, the

United States o f America, of ten with its allies, has been engaged in the last f ew decades, including the

Vietnam War and the ongoing Middle East genocide, the prospects f oreshadowed by a potential third world

war f or the annihilation o f humankind represent here a rat ionally insuperable const raint, underlining also in

that way the total untenability o f this kind of post festumremedy in the capital system.

To be sure, Soviet- type postrevolutionary f ormations did not retain all four of thesepost festum

characteristics in their mode o f contro lling the societal reproduction process. Tragically, however, so me of

them remained operative throughout t heir seven-decades-long histo ry, including the f ailure to make the

production process itself directly social. In the same way, the authoritarian retroactive character of their

highly bureaucratized mode o f planning and its arbitrary modif ication and reimposition af ter t heir regular

f ailure put into relief the cont radicto ry character of theirpost festummode of operation. Moreover, as we all

know, the eventual acceptance of the tyranny of the marketmind-bogglingly even proclaimed by

Gorbachevs o f f icially named ideology chief as nothing less than the guarantee of the renewal of

socialismsealed their fate on the road to unreserved capitalist restorat ion.15

The grave problem in this context is that t hepost festumdetermination of the so cial metabolic processes

makes it impossible to adopt the orienting and operative principle of conscious self -critique. And sooner orlater the absence of that vital principle fro m the societies that make the f irst s teps t hrough their anti-

capitalist po litical revolution in the direction of a socialist t ransf ormation is bound to derail them.

It is relatively easy to be criticalvis--vis the justifiably negatedaspects of thepast, or even of a

determinate phase of the unfoldingpresent.However, the real test f or the viability of the attempted

socialist course of action is to be able to put into critical historical perspective the presently affirmedand

accepted circumstances o f social development. Not gratuitous ly, for the sake of f ulf illing some formal

requirement peremptorily prescribed to the individuals, as of ten happened in the past , but in order to

cooperatively overcome the real challenges as they are bound to arise f rom the given conditions of

societal interchange. And, of course, that kind of critiqueis conceivable only through the consistent

exercise of genuine self-criticism, on the basis o f soberly assess ing the specific time-bound determinations

and the corresponding relatively limitedvalidity of the already accomplishedpartin thenecessarily

changingdynamic whole, with its real and potential contradictions as well as with its all too f requent

temptations to f ollow the line of least resistance.


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Self-Critical Planning and the Communal System of Production

We may limit o urselves here to the consideration of only one, but one abso lutely crucial issue: the genuine

planning process. For among its inherent characterist ics we can clearly perceive the inseparability of the

criticaland the equally important self-criticalmode of evaluating the tasks and the asso ciated dif f iculties,

to gether with the feasible f orms of remedial action whenever there may be a need for it .

It goes without saying, the socialist type of sustainable decision making and the corresponding practical

management of so cial metabo lic interchanges are inconceivable without all-embracing planning.This is atype o f planning which can consensually bring together, and in a lasting way integratein a coherent whole,

the particular concerns and the consciously taken decisions o f the f reely asso ciated individuals.

Inevitably this means that the crutcho f the inherited hierarchical social division o f laborwhich admittedly

simplifies f or the commanding personnel many thingscarries with it a heavy price f or the rest. It

simplifies matters f or the contro llers of the decision-making process t hrough the systems preestablished

economic determinism which, however, deprives at the same time the working individuals of their power of

decision making in the related f ield. Naturally, that crutch must be discarded and replaced by the exercise of

the f aculty o f voluntarily/consciously assumed self- critical action by the so cial individuals, involving at the

same time the acceptance of full responsibilityf or their action. This way of redef ining the decision-making

process must be the case because the helpful crutch is not simply a convenient crutch but also

inseparable f rom a heavy chain that f irmly shackles t he arms o f the individuals to itself .

Accordingly, labors necessary hegemonic alternat ive implies a radical shif t f rom the social/hierarchical

division of labor, with its preestablished practical imperatives, t o an appropriate combination and

organization of labor, to be accomplished within the f ramework of a qualitatively dif f erent communal organic

system. In such a system, thanks to its ability to overcome the vitiatingpost festumdeterminations of

reproductive interchange, in Marxs words:

the product does not f irst have to be transposed into a particular f orm in order to attain a general

character f or the individual. Instead of a division of labour, such as is necessarily created with the exchange

of exchange values, there would take place an organization of labourwhose consequences would be the

participation o f the individual in communal consumption.In the f irst case the social character of production

is posited onlypost festumwith the elevation of products to exchange values and the exchange of these

exchange values. In the second case the social character of production is presupposed, and participation in

the world of products, in consumption, is no t mediated by the exchange of mutually independent labours o r

products of labour. It is mediated, rather, by the social conditions of productionwithin which the individual is

active.16

Thus we are concerned here with a matt er of f undamental importance. For in the only historically

sustainable hegemonic alternative to capitals social metabolic order it is necessary to secure the

conditions f or the irreversible supersess ion of adversariality, which would otherwise be bound to resurf aceand assert its power in the direction of capitalist resto rationf rom the more or less blindpost festum

determinations o f societal reproduction. And that vital condition of superseding adversariality, on which so

much else depends, can be secured only through the proper maintenance of the conscious and self-critical

that is, on a cont inuing basis rat ionally readjusted, rather than in a voluntarist ic way on the recalcitrant

individuals f rom above superimposedall-embracing planning process.

In this sense consciousness, self-critique, the supersession of adversariality, and the genuine planningof

societal reproduction in harmony with the autonomous determination o f their meaningful life-activityby the

social individuals themselves, are inextricably combined in making possiblebeyond the anachronisticpost

festummode o f operating humanitys social metabo lic interchange with nature and among the individualsthe positive inst itution of the communal organic systemas t he necessary historical alternative to capitals

increasingly dest ructive organic system.

None of the conditions mentioned here can be disregarded or even partially neglected. Without t he

permanently maintained conscious self -critique of their forms of interchange by the f reely associated


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individuals the communal system is inconceivable. At the same time, without the positively sustained reality

of the communal system itself , which cannot be allowed to be in any way burdened with s tructurally

sustained adversariality, the orienting principle of conscious self -critique can amount to nothing more t han

an empty postulate. For t he qualitatively dif f erent new organic system cannot f unction at all without the

f reely adopted conscious planningo f its vital reproductive practiceson the basis of the evaluation of the

legitimately enduring elements o f the past and the present, f ree f rom the dead weight of vested interests

by the social individuals. And, of course, such planning is f easible only through the pos itively determined

self-critiqueof allindividuals who in that way can f ully identif y themselves with the overall objectives o f their

social developmentthat is t he necessary precondition f or real foresighttowards an open-ended future, in

sharp contrast to the closure forced upon the working individuals by the incorrigible retroactive post festum

determinationso f their fo rmer societal reproduction.

Understandably, the move f rom the exist ing fo rms o f society to t he communal mode of social metabolic

contro l is the most dif f icult one to make, with great obstacles and resistances on the way. Transition, by its

very nature, is always dif f icult, since deeply embedded ways of so cietal interaction and individual behavior

must be signif icantly modif ied or altogether abandoned in its course o f realizat ion. In the case of a radically

dif f erent way of ordering the lif e of the people by themselves, appropriate to t he communal system, the

dif f erence is incommensurable with anything accomplished in the past .

But all that can provide no excuse f or abandoning the perspective, or t o water down the objective and

subjective requirements of a transit ion to t he communal system. Its f ull development is, no doubt, bound to

take a long time. However, even at the earliest stage of its realization it is necessary to adopt t he overall

vision of the system, with its clearly def inable criteria and characteristics some of which have been

indicated above, as the real targeto f social transf ormation and the necessary compassof the journey. The

orienting principles o f critique and self -critique are directly relevant in this respect.

Notes

1. Karl Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing

House, 1959), 152. Marxs emphases.2. Karl Marx, Capital, vol. 1 (Moscow: Foreign Languages Press , 1958), 81.

3. Marx, Grundrisse (Hammondsworth: Penguin Books Ltd., 1973), 10506.

4. Henry Home (Lord Kames), Loose Hints upon Education, chiefly concerning the Culture of the Heart

(Edinburgh & London, 1781), 284.

5. Home, Loose Hints upon Education, 257.

6. Marx stressed in this regard that It was an immense step forward for Adam Smith to throw out every

limiting specif ication o f wealth-creating activitynot only manufacturing, or commercial or agricultural

labour, but o ne as well as the o ther, labour in general.As a rule, the most general abstractions arise o nly

in the midst o f the richest poss ible concrete development, where one thing appears as common to many, to

all. Then it ceases to be thinkable in a particular form alone.Indif f erence to wards specif ic labourscorresponds to a form of society in which individuals can with ease transf er f rom one to another, and

where the specif ic kind is a matter of chance for t hem, hence of indif f erence. Not only the category, labour,

but labour in reality has here become the means o f creating wealth in general, and has ceased to be

organically linked with part icular individuals in any specif ic form. Marx, Grundrisse, 104.

7. Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations(Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1863), 273.

8. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Collected Works (MECW), vol. 11 (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1994),

10607.

9. As an art icle on a conf erence in Beijing reported recently in Monthly Review, some Chinese participants

argued that When a State Owned Enterprise is t urned into a joint s tock corporation with many

shareholders, it represents socializat ion of ownership as Marx and Engels described it, since ownership

goes f rom a single owner to a large number of owners [among others, this was stated by someone from

the Central Party Schoo l]. If State Owned Enterprises are turned into joint s tock corporations and the

employees are given some shares o f the sto ck, then this would achieve Marxs o bjective of private

property. In dealing with the State Owned Enterprises, we must f ollow international norms and establish a

modern ro ert ri hts s stem. As in the Soviet Union and Eastern Euro e at the end of the 1980s, the


14/14

terms in quotes were euphemisms f or capitalist norms and capitalist property rights .] Enterprises can be

ef f icient in our socialist market economy only if they are privately owned. [This s tatement, voiced by several

people, comes directly f rom Western neoclassical economic theory.] David Kot z, T he State o f Of f icial

Marxism in China Today, Monthly Review59, no. 4, (September 2007): 6061.

10. Marx, Grundrisse, 512,

11. Marx, Grundrisse, 303, Marxs emphases. The so cialist writings ref erred to by Marx are John Gray, The

Social System(36), and J. F. Bray, Labours Wrongs(15776).

12. Marx, Economic Works: 186164, MECW, vol. 34, 422, Marxs emphases .

13. See in particular Sections 17.2 (Socialism in One Country), 17.3 (The Failure of De-Stalinizat ion and

the Collapse of Really Exist ing Socialism), and 17.4 (The Attempted Switch f rom Political to Economic

Extraction of Surplus-Labour: Glasnost and Perestro ika without the People) of Beyond Capital, pages

62272 in English.

14. See, f or instance, the writings of Ricardo AntunesincludingAdeus ao trabalho?(So Paulo: Cortez,

1995) and Os sentidos do trabalho(So Paulo: Boitempo, 1999)in this respect.

15. Vadim Medvedev, The Ideology of Perestroika, in Perestroika Annual, vol. 2, edited by Abel Aganbegyan

(London: Futura/Macdonald, 1989), 32.

16. Marx, Grundrisse, 172.

Documents

MÉSZÁROS, István. the Communal System and the Principle of SelfCritique