Contradictions between labor and capital. The main contradiction is between labor and capital in modern Russia. "irreconcilable antagonism between labor and capital"

Hello, dear princesses Celestia and Luna. The opinion of the classics is very important for science, but for true science there is nothing worse than falling into dogmatism, including for humanities science. True science is always a search for something new, a permanent reorganization and rethinking of accumulated experience in the light of new data. During this process, more progressive theories are replaced by less progressive ones, and the common thing here is that the less progressive model and theory becomes a special case of the more progressive one. For the new social science of the Imperium, the development of these more progressive and general theories and models is also vital, and now we have to explore a special case of which is the contradiction between labor and capital.

I don’t argue, K. Marx was a really cool dude, and in his time he did a lot for the social sciences, he made a lot of good, useful discoveries and methods, it’s hard to overestimate his contribution and damn it in general. But it would be the utmost stupidity to believe that further research can be completed here, and Karl Genrikhovich discovered everything that can be discovered, and the rest will be only a special case of his laws. Life, meanwhile, hints that with the accumulation of new experience, more general patterns are always found than those that were discovered in the light of the previous experience, and this, in general, is normal. We do not have the complete knowledge to take and immediately deduce universal fundamental laws; instead, we are forced to deduce them from actual experience, and this allows us to evaluate only certain particulars. For example, the discoveries of Copernicus, Galileo - who hasn’t heard of them? But does this mean that we should stop at their discoveries? Since then, astronomy and astrophysics have significantly increased their knowledge and developed patterns that are much more general and complex, within the framework of which “after all, it turns” looks like a kindergarten. Newton's classical mechanics organically became a special case of quantum mechanics, and now looks quite simple from the point of view of the latter. But no one studying the natural sciences would even think of attacking researchers of quantum mechanics or modern astronomy because their discoveries cast a shadow on “our everything” - Copernicus, Galileo or Newton. This will quite reasonably be perceived as utter stupidity, and at the same time no one will belittle or belittle the achievements and discoveries of earlier researchers, because they acted within the framework of the experience and system of knowledge that was available to them then, and could not make discoveries that would go beyond beyond this present experience.

But all this prudence, supported by the above-mentioned completely respectful reasons, quickly disappears when it comes to theories that are not natural, but humanitarian. And here dogmatism in human systems of the search for knowledge took and is taking on truly terrifying scope and forms. Each new generation of researchers who discover something new and want to add these discoveries to the universal treasury of invaluable knowledge has had and still has to deal with very serious resistance from the environment, in most cases completely irrational, and the application of the same logic as for the natural sciences is extremely difficult due to precisely that this very irrationality, which is deaf to the arguments of reason. For example, the conventional Socrates, Confucius, Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed, Voltaire, Marx - all of them, without a doubt, made serious breakthroughs in the humanitarian sphere, outstanding and completely unobvious for their time, but even attempts to raise the question that with these discoveries our knowledge about society and human relations, in general, should not be limited; in most cases, they are met with hostility, both from the top of society and from the bottom. The main reasons for such an anti-rational, inadequate and often aggressive reaction are obvious: humanitarian theories and teachings, unlike natural ones, in human practice are used not so much as tools of cognition and organization of experience, but as tools of control on the part of the ruling strata and as instruments of self-identification and psychological comfort on the part of layers of the controlled (there are all the answers to all the questions, just read the Bible/Marx/Rama's mantras diligently!). It is the psychological discomfort from the need to modernize the way of thinking and the threat of losing a management tool that causes such difficulties for research and breakthroughs in the social sciences both from below and from above society, which in turn is often a critical factor for timely social modernization. And this task is objectively necessary to maintain the techno-bio-humanitarian balance of society, especially in conditions of rapid scientific and technological progress, therefore, conscientious researchers are obliged not only to make discoveries and design more advanced social engineering solutions on their basis, but also to find ways to overcome social inertia when implementing these solutions.

Therefore, the social technologies of the Imperium require permanent modernization of social theories in accordance with modern knowledge and accumulated experience, which seriously exceed the level that was available at the time of Karl Marx, not to mention earlier social theorists and engineers. And the first thing that needs to be revised is the concept of capital. In the theory of K. Marx, in which materialized labor was considered capital, and its social function was permanent growth, the very important feature of this capital as a social, and not just a material entity, was ignored. Materialized labor (accumulated wealth) does not have independent social significance for the bourgeois class if everyone is rich or their wealth is not of interest to others, because In this case, the population will not experience dependence and the conditional bourgeoisie will not have the opportunity to exploit it. Accumulated wealth allows exploitation only if there is a qualitative “difference in potential” and the dependence of those around them on the distribution of this wealth between them. Those. if everyone has a lot of capital, then the social value of capital simply disappears, and no matter how much it grows, but without this “difference in potential” and dependence on the capital of other subjects, it does not have its value as a socially significant entity. From this we easily deduce that the true social goal of capital is not endless growth, but, first of all, the possibility of manipulation, i.e. controlling the behavior of other people with the help of this capital. Wealth (accumulated labor) is not the true essential characteristic of capital, but only a tool to achieve a goal. And the true social goal of capital is, first of all, domination, i.e. the ability to impose on others the behavior desired by the subject. In this light, it is obvious that material wealth (materialized labor) is only a special case of capital, because other people can be manipulated (controlled) using a very wide range of tools from brute force to soft persuasion, deception or subtle psychological intrigues. Therefore, it would be logical to determine:

Capital is a property of any phenomenon (system, its state, process), regardless of its nature, which allows a subject to one degree or another to manipulate the behavior of other subjects, at its own discretion to dispose of the resources available to society and to manage social processes.

In such situations, it becomes very difficult to evaluate capital and express it in some material indicators, because capital is not a material entity in itself, but one of its properties responsible for the possibility of social manipulation. The effectiveness of a particular material phenomenon in forcing others to carry out the decisions of the subject (performing the function of capital) is very subjective and depends on many factors that are only partly related to the material nature of the source of capital. For example, a ton of gold in a society in which no one is particularly interested in gold contains practically no qualities of capital, but exactly the same ton of gold in a society in which gold is money for which they are ready to do anything is very solid capital. The amount of capital as a social entity (the ability to manipulate others) in these cases will be completely different, although in material terms it will be the same ton of yellow metal of a certain standard. And if the source of capital (the ability to force others to carry out the decisions of the subject) is something intangible that does not have any clear units of measurement such as social authority or manipulation skills, then the problem with measuring capital is completely at sea. Therefore, it is incorrect to use metrology based on physical indicators when assessing capital. It is much more correct to use indicators that characterize the true nature of capital as a social phenomenon - behavioral, mental, and express the ability to motivate others, for which it would be very useful mana indicator - motivational power, which occupies a central place in imperial social science. At this stage, an objective rather than speculative measurement of this indicator seems very difficult, and will only be really useful with the advent of instruments capable of measuring the mental activity of people and social units, so for now it is more advisable to use the same monetary equivalent for assessing capital as more or less integrating . It must be remembered that this is a very unreliable indicator, which capital as a means of manipulation can be estimated very approximately and inaccurately, for example, in situations of emotional intensity. This is especially true for the upper echelons of the elite, where subjective social factors (authority, image, personal connections, clan affiliation) play a very significant role, but for now we are forced to use the monetary equivalent for lack of a better one. Perhaps, with the development of the social rating system, it will be possible to use it, because it is much closer to the true essence of capital than material resources.

So what does capital then strive for, being not so much a material as a mental entity?

Oddly enough, capital by itself cannot strive for anything, because it is not a subjective, but an instrumental entity. Although capital can move from one subject to another, it has no social significance without the presence of this subject, his will and desire to manipulate others, i.e. capital does not exist outside the social system. There are material objects that could act as a source of capital outside the social system, but they do not have the qualities of capital as a means of manipulation until they enter the circulation of some society.

It is worth noting that the material objects themselves, which have the property of capital, can also have their own aspirations, acting as some kind of collective subjects. For example, most sources of serious capital are social aggregates - organizations, enterprises, armies, churches, bureaucracies, intelligence networks, criminal syndicates and various types of groups, which, due to their nature and the characteristics of the functioning of these social aggregates, have their own goals, most often produced semi-consciously and due to internal social automatisms (“collective mind” according to M. Delyagin). However, these are not the aspirations of capital as such, but of the phenomena that are its source. And not because they produce capital, but because of their internal nature. Therefore, it is not capital as a social phenomenon that has aspirations, but rather the subjects who use it. And it is appropriate to differentiate these aspirations according to basic motivations.

These basic motivations are characteristic of both individuals and social aggregates, except that reproduction in the interpretation of collective subjects means expansion and growth. The first four basic motivations are characteristic of pre-rational, animal forms of signal processing, but creative motivation is closer to anthropic and rational goal setting. The more primitive the subject’s mind, the more earlier and simpler types of motivations prevail in him, the more reflexive, situational, and the less long-term and project-based his goal-setting, on which he spends the capital at his disposal. So the “desire” of capital for accumulation, growth and oppression of others is in fact the desire of subjects of capital with an underdeveloped mind for primitive pre-rational motivations like food, reproduction and dominance, accessible to any monkey. Of course, subjects can use capital for other purposes with a great depth of forecasting, for example, for rational projects, for creativity and for global optimization, but for such goal-setting, the minds of the relevant subjects must be sufficiently developed, and not only everyone can do this. If capital is at the disposal of a subject with a primitive and underdeveloped mind, who in basic goal setting is motivated in the same way as the average baboon, then there is no crime that he would not commit for the sake of 300% profit. It is not capital that is used for crimes, because it is only a tool; it is always a specific subject(s) that is used for crimes.. Who, if anything, have names, surnames, positions, property, relatives and friends, places of residence and all that.

That is why there can be no contradictions between capital and labor: capital has no aspirations of its own, it is only an instrument in the hands of the subject. Contradictions can exist between full-fledged subjects, each of whom is capable of their own goal setting. The contradiction between labor and capital is correctly understood as the contradiction between the bourgeoisie (subjects) and the proletariat (other subjects). Understanding capital as a means of control (manipulation, coercion), a special case of which is wealth (materialized labor), it turns out to be quite simple to determine a more general pattern, a special case of which is the contradiction between the bourgeoisie and the proletarians according to K. Marx. This is a fundamental contradiction between the control system of society and the controlled part of it.. Moreover, it is not so important in what specific organizational form the governing system is implemented - in the form of a caste of priests, large slave owners, feudal lords, bureaucrats or the bourgeoisie. Class differentiation into rich and poor, capitalists and workers here turns out to be secondary, incomplete and very approximate, since ownership of the means of production is only a special case of capital. The true classes should be considered managers and managed, leading and led, and the criterion for dividing into these classes is the attitude to the process of making systemically important decisions. Everything else, including material stratification or color differentiation of pants in any form, is a secondary marker of inclusion in a particular category, optional in practice.

It is important to emphasize that these conditional classes cannot be clearly separated from each other, because different people, depending on their social role, knowledge, beliefs, activity or simply mood, can act as both leaders and followers in certain situations and processes. Of course, the higher their ability to manipulate others and impose their decisions on them, i.e. the greater their capital (regardless of its nature, it can be wealth, physical strength, authority, significant cognitive superiority, etc.), the more often the subject has the opportunity to impose his will on others and the more of these others whom he can influence. Therefore, the boundaries between the classes of managers and managed in real human social systems are blurred (Fig. 1), although the trend towards the concentration of capital (means of management), and therefore participation in the decision-making process, closer to its center, where high social statuses are concentrated, is undeniable. Such clumps characterize a control system that makes a significant number of systemically significant decisions, which in turn are carried out (or not carried out) by driven subjects and units. In conditionally authoritarian control systems, the concentration of “red” (Fig. 1) is greater at the center and less at the periphery of society; in conditionally democratic systems, on the contrary, “red” (decision making) turns out to be more spread out throughout the social system. Theoretically, extreme variants of both are possible, when the control system is essentially a small red dot and all decisions are made by a single subject, and everyone else only executes the decisions (artificial intelligence and a swarm of devices, for example), or vice versa, they decisively participate in the development of decisions all elements of the system (swarm consciousness). But in practice, people won’t be able to do this (at least for now), because no one rules alone and even the most seasoned dictator needs a management apparatus, and permanently taking into account the opinions of absolutely everyone is too labor-intensive or even impossible, not to mention the competence of this collective opinion .

Of course, for convenience, one could call driven people objects, but this would not be entirely true, because de facto they have their own will and are capable of their own goal setting (at least theoretically), another thing is that they may not have the opportunity or sufficient desire for it. The distribution of influence (power) could be illustrated in the form of a classic pyramid of social status, but this would not be entirely correct, because the points of development and adoption of certain systemically significant decisions may seriously differ from the formal hierarchy. In reality, serious fluctuations occur depending on the production or other social conditions, when real power (influence on systemically significant decisions taken) is diffused very unevenly along the social pyramid (Fig. 2), and sometimes the centers of its concentration are not identical to the centers of concentration of official status. In different eras, certain structures could absorb much more real capital (the ability to influence others) than official hierarchies, for example, structures of priests, warriors, philosophers, criminals, financiers or scientists, whose opinion for one reason or another was forced or they even wanted to take into account much higher-ranking entities.

The contradiction between the controlled and controlling systems lies in their rather simple and obvious aspirations, towards which they both gravitate:

Consume as many system-wide resources and activities as possible, ideally all

Show as little outgoing activity as possible, ideally do nothing at all

Subject yourself to as few system-wide restrictions as possible, ideally not to bear any responsibility at all for anything

I believe that this was precisely the basic mistake of the Soviet Union, which determined and ultimately dragged along most of the other critical mistakes: the refusal to permanently and timely modernize social theories, and humanitarian technologies in general. A stop in the development of humanitarian technologies, ossification and dogmatism of sociotech, which preserved knowledge and theory on the teachings of Marx, no matter how cool and breakthrough it was for its time, ultimately led to a whole range of errors in social construction and goal-setting, ranging from the deliberate stopping of scientific and technological progress (thermonylation, OGAS) due to the problem of extra people to the incorrect design of the elite, errors in the organization of the economy and the incentive system, losing in the information war of meanings and ignoring the emergence of more progressive than the proletariat of significant social groups, for example, the mass technical intelligentsia. Therefore, the global project Imperium fundamentally rejects dogmatism and the affirmation of the only true decisions and postulates for all times, and insists on the need for the permanent evolution of humanitarian knowledge and social technologies in accordance with the accumulation of new experience and systems of its organization.

This scale characterizes the distribution of system resources, in the red zone of which the degradation of the control system or managed system begins due to a lack of resources, the further the further. The white zone characterizes the security gap of the system, i.e. if the resource distribution slider is in this zone, then both the control system and the managed system have enough resources for their recovery and they have objective opportunities to avoid degenerative processes.

Brown marks indicate the thresholds of a passive critical reaction, which occurs if the amount of actually distributed resources is less than this threshold. A passive critical reaction means sabotage and ignoring one’s responsibilities while outwardly maintaining loyalty and social stability. This is actually a quiet rebellion (of the elite or the masses), in which the controlling or controlled systems, for some reason, do not want to move on to active protest. The gap between these thresholds is called the system operability gap, because Upon reaching the threshold and mass sabotage and negligence, the system loses efficiency and ability to act, the further from the threshold the more, although it retains the appearance of controllability, hierarchy and stability.

Yellow marks define the thresholds of active dissatisfaction with the situation, which result in active actions, usually of a destructive nature, i.e. riots, but in mild forms such discontent can manifest itself as criticism and active grumbling. At the same time, it is interesting that a revolt of the elite from a lack of resources is just as possible, and it is much more likely even with a strong bias in the distribution of resources in favor of the control system, because The threshold for the critical reaction of the control system (the level of gluttony) on the scale is most often much higher than the threshold for the critical reaction of the controlled system, and all this results in various forms of tough intra-elite struggle or tough reaction, super-exploitation and forceful suppression of the masses.

To determine the best level of resource allocation, it is necessary to solve the problem for the optimum, which would be as far as possible from the safety thresholds and critical reaction thresholds, both above and below. It should be noted right away that this problem has a positive solution, but not always, because the macrosystem may not have a security gap due to a lack of resources at all, and one or even both subsystems will be doomed to degradation no matter how we distribute it between them resources. And here, in addition, there is a zero-sum game: the more for one, the less for others. Secondly, the thresholds of active and passive critical reaction do not necessarily have to be in the places where they are indicated in Fig. 3, but can be anywhere on the scale, including intersecting so that they simultaneously determine the critical reaction and control systems (the upper classes cannot), and a controlled system (the lower classes do not want it). So a critical reaction of either one, or the other, or both subsystems at once can occur no matter how we place the distribution slider, i.e. This problem may not have a positive solution at all, even if the macrosystem has a huge security gap.

The most interesting thing is this: the level of these thresholds is a controlled variable that depends on current stereotypes, consumer expectations, socially acceptable standards of living and everything else, which in general can be defined as how greedy the elite and the people are (to what set of benefits / liberties / they are accustomed to privilege and consider it the norm, below which they are considered losers). At the same time, the task of information attacks on a particular society in order to provoke its instability becomes extremely obvious: this task comes down to increasing the thresholds of critical reaction, both for the control system and for the managed system in order to reduce the gap in efficiency, stability and the field of resource maneuver . And when these thresholds on the scale close, it will be physically impossible to escape social instability. So it’s quite clear what exactly the conditional shakers (the Navalnys, the Solzhenitsens and others #don’t give you) and the conditional guardians (the Fritzmorgens, the remnants and others #get it first) are doing - they move the thresholds of critical reaction higher or lower. True, they can only move the thresholds of the controlled system, because the thresholds (level of gluttony) of the management system are regulated not through direct propaganda, but mainly through the system of elite education and intra-elite culture.

Since all these thresholds are also controllable, we must determine the optimal level for them too. It consists in ensuring that the appropriate threshold of an active critical reaction is slightly further than the system's safety threshold, causing the system to reflect shortly before it begins to suffer due to a lack of resources in order to ensure a timely reaction and prevent degenerative processes. At the same time, the macrosystem will be negatively affected by both a too high threshold of critical reaction (getting greedy => overexpenditure of resources => less clearance for the system’s safe resource maneuver) and too low (without social pain, damaging factors will not be detected and reflected on in time). But it is better to keep the thresholds of passive critical reaction quite low, preventing a drop in enthusiasm, activity and efficiency of the system in order to maintain controllability and the possibility of systemic transformations and maneuver even with a drop in the resource base. Unfortunately, current control systems prefer the passive critical reaction of the controlled system, because this preserves comfortable conditions for representatives of the elite and specific bureaucrats, but for the macrosystem in the long term it is much more dangerous, because it can lead to situations where it is no longer possible to do anything because the system, with external stability, simply stops responding to control signals, and does not provides at least some realistic information in feedback, i.e. shows the characteristic signs of a paralyzed or very drunk person who, although he does not feel pain, is not able to control his body normally.

Since we are not talking about a simple mechanism such as an internal combustion engine, which only needs fuel, an oxidizer and a small amount of oil for lubrication, but about a complex socio-biological system, the multitude of distributed resources should be understood not only as material resources, but also as socially and mentally significant ones. For each such class of social resources, it is appropriate to calculate its own distribution scale, with its own thresholds of critical reaction and safety, and accordingly, for each such scale, its own optimum in the level of distribution should be determined. Among these classes of socially significant resources, it is appropriate to differentiate:

= Inventory including services. To more accurately solve the problem of optimal distribution, it is also desirable to divide this class into significant groups of goods and services

= Social privileges. It would be possible, of course, to use an established meme and call this class of social resources rights and freedoms, but the semantics of this meme is noticeably different from what we need, and primarily in that it characterizes legal, legal aspects, which cannot always be used in fact, even if these rights and freedoms are written in black Russian in the constitution, as well as in fact they can be used, but not be legally spelled out or even prohibited.

Social privileges concern actual social benefits such as the right to cut down peasants to test the sword, the right of the first night, the right of high-ranking officials to clear off their offspring if they have committed crimes or to place them in a position, the right to “official feeding”, the right of workers to steal from enterprises and collective farms within reasonable limits or the right of a grandfather to send a spirit to a parasha in the army, and it would be more correct to call this category not rights and freedoms, but liberties. This, by the way, also includes the concept of freedom of speech, i.e. the opportunity to criticize established belief systems and those in power (even not always official ones) with the guarantee that no response will come from them or the social environment in one form or another. This also includes actual access to making systemically important decisions.

= Access to information and culture. Again, not legal or legal, but actual access. And first of all, this means access to high and advanced culture and science, presented and popularized quite widely. This also includes access to system education, skills in working with information and decision-making, etc. If the management system reserves very important scientific methods and discoveries and the corresponding education and culture only for itself, and for the lower classes - scraps of knowledge and ruminant culture, then this is again a very serious violation of the principle of equal exchange. By the way, the distribution scale for this class of social resources is calculated separately for the management system and the managed system, and not adjacently as for the previous classes, because characterizes a non-zero-sum game, i.e. if someone gains, this does not mean at all that someone decreases: culture and information, unlike goods and materials or privileges, are reproduced quite simply, especially in the digital era.

An important part of the optimal distribution problem is the resolution of optimal responsibilities (outgoing activities) and responsibilities (intra-system restrictions) of both the control and managed systems. To solve these problems, it is appropriate to use a similar distribution scale with a safety zone and critical reaction thresholds, but the optimum should be considered somewhat differently, placing it at the highest safe level, with a known gap to the thresholds (taking into account the amplitude of fluctuations), because The greater the safe outgoing activity and responsibility of subsystems with the same resource intensity, the greater the overall efficiency and stability of the macrosystem. As in the case of the class of information and cultural resources, here separate scales are calculated for the control system and the managed system due to the fact that this distribution is a non-zero-sum game. Here, in exactly the same way, a lack of activity and responsibility causes degradation of the macrosystem as a whole and a critical reaction on the part of the counterparty subsystem, and an excess of activity and responsibility causes degradation of the control system itself or the managed system with a critical reaction in it. As in the case of resource distribution, very dangerous situations are situations where the thresholds of critical reaction (greediness) are very high, when it is impossible to force people to work normally and be responsible for the results of this work without running into sabotage or rebellion, therefore it is necessary to adjust these thresholds through the system in a timely manner and in sufficient quantities social stereotypes and social logic. The same pattern is observed here: the control system is susceptible to excessive consumption to a much greater extent, which is why sufficient attention should be paid to working with this threshold.

We will not be able to eliminate the notorious contradiction between the control and controlled systems, and by killing one dragon we will soon get a new one, because each of the groups of subjects obeys the standard motivation of living matter to grab as many resources as possible and push as much of their entropy outward as possible, although this is usually the case with the control system it turns out much better for obvious reasons. However, we can resolve this contradiction in the most fair and rational way in accordance with the principle of equal exchange by solving the problem of optimal distribution and setting critical reaction thresholds for each type, class, group and subgroup of resources, activities and responsibilities, and the more detailed If their differentiation is made, the more accurate the desired optimal solution and the corresponding list of activities will be. Maintaining the optimum of this distribution is one of the most important conditions for achieving a harmonious state of the social macrosystem, ensuring evolution, happiness and all-round progress most effectively. That is why, dear princesses, the timely modernization of humanitarian theories and social technologies is so important: they are the ones who will help humanity construct and configure social processes most correctly, they are the ones who will help guide humanity in the best way - the path of Harmony. Always faithful, I scratch you behind the ears.

We have shown that Marx views the abolition of alienated labor, the transition from private property to “truly human” or social property as a necessary result of the development of the essential, generic powers of man. But this is only one, philosophical and historical side of his research. Another, no less important side of it, the economic one, is the analysis of the development of the contradiction between labor and capital.

Capital and labor constitute a unity of opposites, in which one side constantly reproduces the other. In this relation of opposites, “the worker has the misfortune of being living and therefore needy capital, which, the moment he does not work, loses his interest, and thereby his existence. As capital, the value of the worker increases depending on demand and supply, and physically his existence, his life were and are considered as a supply of goods, as happens with any other product.

The worker produces capital, capital produces the worker, therefore the worker produces himself, and the product of all this movement is man as a worker, as a commodity.” The conceptual form of the cited position is still unsatisfactory from the point of view of the political economy of Marxism, which is only in the process of formation. There is no distinction made here between worker, labor, labor power. The worker is characterized either as capital or as a commodity. At the same time, we are talking about the value of the worker, while we should be talking only about the value of labor power, which is a specific commodity, but not capital at all.

The opposition between labor and capital, from Marx’s point of view, is the highest stage of development of the contradiction inherent in private property. Bourgeois economists indirectly point to this contradiction when they characterize labor as the essence of private property, ignoring the obvious fact that this essence and that of which it is the essence form opposite poles of the economic life of capitalist society. Anyone who works is deprived of private property, i.e. what it produces.

He works only because he is deprived of private property, while the private owner does not work precisely because, even without working, he appropriates the products of labor. The class limitations of bourgeois political economy are clearly reflected in the fact that, having declared labor to be the essence of private property, thereby recognizing the latter as an attribute of man, it considers the existence of poor proletarians natural.

Bourgeois political economy notes the opposition between property and lack of property, ignoring the interdependence of both, the development of this contradiction, which naturally turns into antagonism between labor and capital. Meanwhile, this antagonism develops and deepens. And private property, thanks to this development, appears as “energetic, encouraging the resolution of this contradiction.”

Having shown the illusory form in which the contradiction between labor and capital is recognized by bourgeois political economy, Marx further explains how it is an objective necessity for resolution. This contradiction is reflected in the teachings of utopian socialists and communists. Marx's attention is particularly drawn to the so-called egalitarian communism, since it denies private property much more decisively than other utopian doctrines. And yet, due to an extremely limited understanding of the tasks of communist transformation, this denial is of an extremely simplified nature, completely unacceptable for Marx.

The main goal of a person is the possession of things. Therefore, the principle of egalitarian communism is “universal private property,” or the equal right of everyone to existing private property. Hence the reduction of human needs to a minimum, asceticism, ignoring individual differences, abilities, and talents. “This communism, which denies the personality of man everywhere, is only a consistent expression of private property, which is this denial.”

Marx also criticizes egalitarian communism for the denial of culture, civilization, for preaching “a return to the unnatural simplicity of the poor and needless person, who not only has not risen above the level of private property, but has not even grown to it yet.” Marx’s last remark makes it possible to understand that egalitarian communism still has no idea about the material prerequisites of socialism, which take shape during the development of capitalism, therefore, on the basis of private ownership of the means of production.

Since this communism “has not yet grasped the positive essence of private property and has not yet comprehended the human nature of need, it, too, is still captive of private property and infected by it.”

Marx contrasts egalitarian communism with the “positive abolition of private property,” which presupposes the comprehensive development of the essential forces of man, and, consequently, of material production.

Under capitalism, “along with the growth of the mass of objects, the kingdom of alien entities grows, under whose yoke man is.” Therefore, “the expansion of the range of products and needs becomes an inventive and always calculating slave of inhuman, refined, unnatural and far-fetched lusts.” Private property does not know how to transform crude need into human need; if, for example, it refines needs, then it turns them into whims, caprices, etc. Only under socialism does the wealth of human needs acquire truly human significance, for socialism transforms new types and objects of production into “a new manifestation of human essential power and a new enrichment of human creatures."

Social production is not only the creation of things that satisfy certain needs. There is also spiritual production, which, thanks to the abolition of private property, ceases to be the production of spiritual alienation and becomes the production of spiritual communication, unity, collectivism.

“Religion, family, state, law, morality, science, art, etc.,” writes Marx, “are only special types of production and are subject to its universal law. Therefore, the positive abolition of private property, as the appropriation of human life, is the positive abolition of all alienation, i.e. the return of a person from religion, family, state, etc. to your humanity, i.e. social life."

Private property, possession in general, is only one of the forms of human appropriation of objects of nature and human activity. The dominant meaning that the feeling of possession has acquired, the desire for possession, indicates the alienation of other human feelings. “Private property made us. so stupid and one-sided that an object is ours only when we possess it.” Meanwhile, “the sensual appropriation by and for a person of human essence and human life, an objective person and human works, must be understood not only in the sense of direct, unilateral use of a thing, not only in the sense of possession, possession.”

Thanks to the transition to public ownership and the development of this qualitatively new basis for people’s lives, the variety of possible forms of human appropriation of nature and human activity is fully developed. “Man appropriates to himself his comprehensive essence in a comprehensive manner, therefore, as a complete person.” These provisions of Marx contain a philosophical understanding of the essence of the humanistic reorganization of society, which Marx calls communism.

Man is a social being, explains Marx. This thesis was persistently promoted by Feuerbach, for whom the social, generic essence of the individual lies in his anthropological unity with all other individuals. Marx, unlike Feuerbach, considers social production to be a specific, generic, determining form of human activity. It forms the basis of all other forms of individual activity, which therefore also have a social character.

Even then, writes Marx, “when I am engaged in scientific work, etc. activity - activity that I can only rarely carry out in direct communication with others - even then I am engaged in social activity, because I act as a person. I am not only given, as a social product, the material for my activity - even the very language in which the thinker works - but my own being is a social activity; and therefore, what I make out of my person, I make out of myself for society, conscious of myself as a social being.” One should not, therefore, contrast “society” as an abstraction with the individual, who himself is a social being. The individual differs from the social as a special manifestation of generic life, and the latter is universal individual life.

Man has always been a social being. Does this mean that during the transition from capitalism to socialism, human social nature does not change? No, thanks to the “positive abolition of private property” and the elimination of alienation, man becomes a truly social being, i.e. its essence is manifested in an adequate way, since it is no longer alienated in the form of money, goods, private property.

It should be especially emphasized that Marx and Engels talk about the positive abolition of private ownership of the means of production. This means, firstly, that its abolition presupposes such a high level of productive forces, such a level of their capitalist socialization, i.e. concentration and centralization of capital, that private ownership of the means of production becomes economically untenable, unprofitable, unprofitable for the owner, who becomes uncompetitive in comparison with joint-stock companies accumulating the savings of millions of shareholders. Therefore, Marx in Capital characterizes such joint stock companies as the abolition of private ownership of the means of production within the framework of capitalism.

Secondly, the abolition of private property is understood by Marx and Engels not as its prohibition, abolition, confiscation, but as an objective natural-historical process, which can rather be characterized as its withering away. However, this does not mean that there will be no private owners of the means of production at all. Imagine a winemaker who has his own vineyard, his own cellar, where wine or grape spirit is aged for years. Such a special individual production, in which a special wine, cognac or brandy is produced, should, apparently, be preserved due to its special individuality.

The same applies to some other types of production, which throughout the entire period of capitalism retain their artisanal character. Social ownership of the means of production is completely compatible with private property, which, thanks to its individual character, talent, and skill of the producer, turns out to be not just competitive, but in a certain sense monopolistic, unique, such as, for example, the skill of an artist, musician, etc.

The fact that Marx and Engels did not clarify these details should not be the basis for a simplified understanding of the views of these thinkers.

A private property society limits and impoverishes a person’s sensory life, i.e. his direct relationship to nature and to other people. For a hungry man, says Marx, there is no human form of food; he absorbs it like an animal. A person depressed by worries is indifferent to beauty. This applies not only to the worker, burdened with overwork, but also to the capitalist, all of whose feelings are drowned in the thirst for profit. It is necessary, therefore, to humanize human feelings in accordance with the entire richness of human essence.

The development of public property creates the material prerequisites for the comprehensive development and spiritual enrichment of the individual. Thanks to this, “a rich man and a rich human need take the place of economic wealth and economic poverty. A rich man is at the same time a man in need of all the fullness of human manifestations of life, a man in whom his own fulfillment appears as an internal necessity, as a need.”

In a privately owned society, a person’s wealth consists mainly of things, goods, and capital that belong to him. In the society of the future, which Marx calls the “social state,” the wealth of society and each of its members is, first of all, the comprehensive development of human abilities, “essential forces.” In the world of private property, the measure of wealth is the amount of materialized labor; in the “social state,” the measure of the wealth produced will be the degree of development and application of human abilities, knowledge, and science.

The natural sciences, says Marx, have achieved outstanding success and become a powerful factor not only in the field of education, but also in the field of production. Natural science practically, through industry, “burst into human life, transformed it and prepared human emancipation, although it was directly forced to complete the dehumanization of human relations.” Human emancipation, i.e. the socialist reorganization of social life, creating a new economic basis for society, represents the comprehensive liberation of man: “the destruction of private property means the complete emancipation of all human feelings and properties; but it is this emancipation precisely because these feelings and properties have become human in both the subjective and objective sense.

The eye became a human eye just as its object became a social, human object, created by man for man. Therefore, feelings directly in their practice became theoreticians. They have a relationship to a thing for the sake of a thing, but this thing itself is an objective human relationship to itself and to a person, and vice versa. As a result, the need and use of a thing have lost their egoistic nature, and nature has lost its naked usefulness, since benefit has become human benefit.” There is a lot in this statement that needs clarification, despite the fact that Marx logically emphasizes the main point with the help of italics. How to understand that feelings as a result of communist transformation become human feelings? Weren't they human before this? In what sense do objects of human activity become human objects?

Anthropological form of presentation, the absence of a detailed historical (based on the analysis of historically specific eras in the development of mankind) analysis of social phenomena, the concept of alienation and self-alienation, according to which the relations dominant in the era preceding the “social state” are alien to man and, therefore, perverted, inhuman relationships, elements of an abstract, Feuerbachian understanding of the essence of man - all this obscures the deep meaning of the above position.

Nevertheless, his analysis makes it possible to understand that the term “human” denotes the comprehensive development of the essential powers of man as a social being.

Marx emphasizes, and, of course, not without reason (albeit with some exaggerations in the spirit of Feuerbach), that the triumph of humanism and the true development of the human personality necessarily manifest themselves as the richness of sensory life. “That is why the feelings of a social person are different feelings than the feelings of a non-social person.” Marx here calls a non-social person a member of bourgeois society. But how does this agree with Marx’s thesis that man is by nature a social being? The contradiction between sociality and asociality in man is explained by Marx by the fact that human nature is perverted by private property. Therefore, Marx defines the future society as “reintegration or the return of man to himself, as the destruction of human self-alienation.”

This means that an “unsocial person” is an alienated person. Communism is therefore characterized as the restoration of the true human essence. This understanding of man does not yet completely break with anthropology and the traditions of the Enlightenment teaching about human essence as initially given in all its certainty, but deformed by the “untrue” structure of social life. Only the refusal to universalize the category of alienation puts an end to this “essentialist” tendency and makes it possible to understand the essence of man not as something already given, preceding history, but as a set of historically changing social relations.

Marx does not yet call his teaching communism, although he sometimes uses this term (as well as the term “socialism”) to characterize the future social system. Marx calls the scientific theory of the liberation movement of the proletariat that he created complete naturalism. This does not mean that he rejects the concept of communism. Marx contrasts the egalitarian utopian communism with the concept of “social condition,” which is defined as “the real resolution of the contradiction between man and nature, man and man, the true resolution of the dispute between existence and essence, between objectification and self-affirmation, between freedom and necessity, between the individual and the race. He is the solution to the riddle of history, and he knows that he is the solution.”

Critics of Marxism, based on this and some other formulations found in Marx’s early works, formulations that are not sufficiently correct from the point of view of mature Marxism, attribute to Marx the anti-dialectical statement that communism means the final resolution of all possible social problems, the cessation of further development of society. In fact, the 1844 manuscripts convincingly prove that the positive abolition of private property is not the final goal of world history, but the basis for the subsequent progressive development of mankind.

It should, however, be borne in mind that Marx, defining his teaching not so much as communism but as real humanism, accordingly views communism (and socialism) as the path to the completion of humanism. “Socialism is a positive self-consciousness of man, no longer mediated by the denial of religion, just as real life is the positive reality of man, no longer mediated by the denial of private property, communism.

Communism is a position as the negation of the negation, therefore it is valid, for the next stage of historical development, a necessary moment of emancipation and the reconquest of man. Communism is a necessary form and energetic principle of the near future, but as such communism is not the goal of human development, the form of human society.” This position of Marx seems, at least at first glance, incomprehensible. Marx, who substantiates the historical necessity of the positive abolition of private property, does not consider communism to be the goal of social development.

This, in my opinion, should first of all be understood in the sense that Marx rejects the theological concept of human history. But this is not the only point. Marx rejects, firstly, utopian communism and negates simplified (also utopian) communism. His own communist theory is in the process of development. While highly appreciating communism as a social project, Marx does not yet call himself a communist, preferring a different name for his views: real humanism. Not only in the manuscripts under consideration, but also in the work “The Holy Family” published a year later, Marx (and Engels) call themselves not communists, but real humanists. This sheds additional light on the most important, essential content of their teaching, which later became known as communism.

Communism, Marx explains, “as the abolition of private property, means the demand for truly human life, as the inalienable property of man, means the emergence of practical humanism.” The formation of practical humanism presupposes a practical revolutionary act. “To destroy the idea of ​​private property, the idea of ​​communism is quite sufficient. In order to destroy private property in reality, actual communist action is required. History will bring with it this communist action, and that movement, which we have already recognized in our thoughts as self-defeating, will in reality undergo a very difficult and lengthy process.”

Therefore, it is not enough just to realize alienation: this does not eliminate it, but becomes even more tangible. Alienation must be practically abolished; This is the task of the liberation struggle of the working class, during which the proletarians rise above the limitations of bourgeois society, which divides people and pits them against each other. Human brotherhood in the mouths of the proletarians “is not a phrase, but the truth, and from their faces, hardened by labor, human nobility shines upon us.”

Some critics of Marxism, limiting themselves to only considering the “Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844,” come to the conclusion that the main philosophical concept of Marxism is the concept of alienation. Thus, P. Bartsch, for example, states: “Already a superficial examination of Marxism shows that it breaks down into political and philosophical teachings. If the central concept of political Marxism is the concept of exploitation of man by man, then the central concept of philosophical Marxism is the concept of alienation.”

G. Bartsch, as he himself admits, is limited to a superficial consideration of Marxism, since he does not go further than the Parisian manuscripts of 1844. Meanwhile, it is enough to consider even such early works of Marx and Engels as “The Holy Family” and “The German Ideology” for it to become obvious the inconsistency of the conclusion made by Barch.

The “Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844” are theoretically summarized by the conclusion: the liberation struggle of the proletariat is objectively determined by the economic structure of capitalism: “the entire revolutionary movement finds both an empirical and theoretical basis in the movement of private property, in the economy.”

Thus, overcoming the limitations of utopian communism and socialism and the materialist justification of the communist ideal constitute for Marx essentially a single task.

• The formation of the radical democratic views of K. Marx and F. Engels and their philosophical justification

  • On some features of the first stage of the formation of Marxism: idealism and radical democracy
  • Gymnasium works by K. Marx. Traditional views, which Marx soon breaks with. Reflections on calling
  • Letter from K. Marx to his father. Rapprochement with the Young Hegelians. The problem of what should be and what is and the idealistic Hegelian dialectic
  • Doctoral dissertation of K. Marx “The difference between the natural philosophy of Democritus and the natural philosophy of Epicurus.” Epicureanism as the Enlightenment of the Ancient Era
  • Doctoral dissertation. K. Marx and the Hegelian concept of ancient atomism. Philosophy as the negation of religion
  • Doctoral dissertation. Self-awareness and empirical reality, theory and practice, philosophy and revolution. Dialectics and questions of the history of philosophy
    • Doctoral dissertation. Self-awareness and empirical reality, theory and practice, philosophy and revolution. Dialectics and questions of the history of philosophy - page 2
  • Radical democratic criticism of the Prussian order. Dialectics as a tool for revolutionary criticism of feudal-romantic illusions
  • F. Engels's transition to the position of atheism. The formation of his radical democratic views
  • The transition of F. Engels to the position of Young Hegelianism. Radical democratic interpretation of Hegelian philosophy
  • Engels' criticism of Schelling's irrationalism. Relation to Hegel, the Young Hegelians and Feuerbach
    • Engels' criticism of Schelling's irrationalism. Attitude to Hegel, the Young Hegelians and Feuerbach - page 2
  • Some preliminary results. K. Marx and F. Engels and the Young Hegelian movement of the late 30s - early 40s.

• K. Marx and the Rheinische Zeitung. Correspondence of F. Engels from London. The attitude of Marx and Engels to materialism and communism

  • The work of K. Marx in the Rheinische Gazeta. Speeches in defense of the oppressed and exploited, attitude towards utopian socialism and communism
    • The work of K. Marx in the Rheinische Gazeta. Speeches in defense of the oppressed and exploited, attitude towards utopian socialism and communism - page 2
  • Revolutionary-democratic understanding of the role of philosophy in public life. Philosophy and religion. Relation to Feuerbach. Criticism of reactionary romanticism

1. K. Marx: the contradiction between Labor and Capital.

Labor - hired workers.

Capital - employers.

2. Capital:

a) National capital: industrial, state capital, the growth of which, as a rule, is associated with an increase in state revenues and the growth of the well-being of citizens, increases the commodity supply, and prevents inflation;

a) Proletarian: worker “without a fatherland”, “without a fixed place of residence”, working under a contract, “shift worker”, “strikebreaker”, potential emigrant;

b) Worker: a worker with a permanent job, usually interested in the result of his work, with extensive experience and high qualifications, the labor foundation of the nation.

A). Class contradictions are resolved not by the destruction of one of the classes (Bolshevism), which should imply class war, but by the state regulating the contradictions between labor and capital (corporatism).

c) The primacy of the public over the personal.

a) Task: formation of a state with class peace.

6. Marxism and liberalism: Karl Marx and Adam Smith. Worldview systems based on the priority of economics.

a) Marxism: Refutation of A. Smith, Ricardo.

b) Liberalism: philosophers Locke, de Mondeville. A. Smith. Vienna School: Bam-Bawerk, Menger, von Mises, von Heisk. Lausanne School: Valras, Walfredo Pareto. Neoliberalism: The St. Louis and Chicago School: Milton Friedman, Jeffrey Sachs.

7. “The Third Way” in economics, which asserts the secondary nature of economic relations.

a) German idealistic philosophy: Fichte.

b) German cameralism: von Justi, Sonnerfeeds. and the theory of “authority of large spaces.”

9. “Dependent Economy”: F. List and the theory of “authority of large spaces”, and Sismondi.

10. German Historical School: Gustav Schmoller, Wilhelm Roscher, Bruno Hilderbrandt, Karl Knies.

11. Sociological theory of economics: Max Weber, Werner Sombart.

12. The theory of “economic insulation” by Keynes.

13. Joseph Schumpeter, Francois Perroux.

14. Institutionalist economic school: Thorstein, Veblen, Mitchell, Berle, Burnham, John Kenneth Galbraith.

Friedrich List (1789-1846)

Jean Charles Simond de Sismondi (1773-1842)

Gustav Schmoller (1838-1917)

Max Weber (1864-1920)

Werner Sombart (1863-1941)

Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865)

Silvio Gesell (1862-1930)

J. Keynes (1883-1946)

Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950)

Francois Perroux

Serge Christophe Colm

Nicholas Georgescu-Regen (1906-1994)

Michelle Aglietta

Clifford Douglas

16. Basic theoretical principles of the “Third Way” economy - unorthodox socialism:

a) contextualization;

b) culture-centric pluralism of economic forms;

c) synthesis of conflictological and balance approaches;

d) sociologism, humanism and qualityism of the economic system;

e) mesoeconomics, collective concretization;

f) autocentricity, broadly understood regionalism;

g) environmentalism, ambientism;

h) integrationism, a customs union on a continental scale;

i) differentialism.

17. Economic aspects of neo-Eurasianism:

a) change in the quality of Eurasianism;

b) Eurasianism as economic pragmatism;

c) contextualist approach to economics;

d) Eurasian solidarity;

e) negative assessment by Eurasians of liberal reforms in Russia;

f) the revival of the national economy will not come from the military-industrial complex, nor from socialism, nor from the expropriation of the oligarchs;

g) liberal Eurasians (Eurasian capital);

h) the social role of “Eurasia”.

Methodological support:

Bibliography:

Dugin A.G. Fundamentals of Eurasianism. - M: 2002.

Dugin A.G. Fundamentals of geopolitics. - M: 1999.

Dugin A.G. Russian thing. T.1.- M: 2001.

Labor and capital, their unity and contradictions, opposition and struggle are the core, source and driving force of not only socio-economic, but also all social, human development, the socio-economic content of world history. In the unity and connection of labor-property, labor-capital, the primacy and the most active role belongs to labor. Although objectively labor activity is based on property, on the means of production and the means of labor, it is labor that acts as a creative, driving, innovative force in economic, production, and all social development. Labor creates property itself, capital itself, multiplies them, increases them qualitatively and quantitatively, although it itself becomes dependent on capital. In human history, unity and contradictions, the opposition and struggle of labor and capital acquire the character of social inequality and social antagonism, expressed in oppression, in exploitation by property owners, capital owners of working people, workers, workers.

At the early historical stages of the presence of public property and social labor, their unity expressed the socially equivalent and fair nature of the relationship. The turning point began with the emergence of private ownership of the means of production and labor. Since then, this social antagonism between labor and capital has determined both the substantive nature of private property eras, including the era of the 20th century, and the subjective desire of working people and peoples to resolve this antagonistic contradiction in favor of labor. And in the 21st century, in the third millennium, humanity, workers, peoples will never give up the need to decisively overcome the social antagonism of labor and capital on the paths of social justice, true socialism and true communism. Labor not only creates the person himself, but also opens up for a person the broadest opportunity to realize his richest human potentials and abilities, both in labor and in all other spheres and types of his multilateral activities. Labor creates the opportunity for human creativity in labor and production activities to create high-quality, original new material and spiritual objects, products, benefits, and values. Capitalism's primordial and essential rejection of real socialization, not to mention the admission of socialism, is demonstrated by the present time. Having managed to break the leader of the socialist system of the USSR and turn eight socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe onto the path of capitalism, imperialism in the United States and throughout the West in recent years has openly and brazenly abandoned its “game” of sociality and turned sharply to the right. Namely, towards reaction, an attack on the social rights of workers, and a growing reduction in these rights. The conclusion is that in the 20th century, capitalism and imperialism, with all the changes in it, including those of a progressive nature in scientific and technological terms, showed and proved their exhaustion and futility. It is still based on the exploitation and oppression of both the workers of their own countries, and especially the workers and peoples of the former colonial, now developing countries of Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

Labor and capital are historically opposed to each other. This is evidenced by a retrospective analysis of the development of economic science. The founder of the scientific concept of political economy, A. Smith, showed the changing nature of the formation of well-being, which in different periods of countries and peoples gave rise to two unequal systems of political economy:
1) commercial;
2) agricultural.
Defining the essence of the commercial system, A. Smith noted that in society there has traditionally been an identical concept between wealth and money. In this case, gold and silver are important as money capital. On this wave, the economic doctrine that arose in the 15th century received a name - mercantilism, which argued that the main source of wealth is trade, which redistributes the amount of gold and silver in the state. In turn, the improvement of trade contributed to the development of the export industry and thereby the accumulation of capital. The resulting monetary capital of the state contributed to the development of property capital, which subsequently led to the creation of the necessary basis for the emergence of capitalism as a new formation of economic relations. At the same time, in the mercantilistic doctrine, a division of wealth into two types arose: natural and artificial. The first is what the country has due to climatic and geographical conditions; artificial wealth is the ability of a nation to develop its own industry. So, mercantilism contributed to the emergence of a class of owners of physical capital - capitalists. Mercantilist concept of accumulation of monetary capital in the 16th–18th centuries. came into conflict with the agricultural physiocratic economic system, where the main wealth is labor on the land. The physiocrats argued that only agricultural labor could be productive. Land, from their point of view, is the only source of national wealth. But in this way, the economic teaching of the physiocrats for the first time created the prerequisites for the formation of the ideology of labor as a source of wealth. This idea was then developed by A. Smith, showing that the wealth of a nation is created by labor.
In addition, it should be noted the opinion of A. Turgot, who adhered to the physiocratic teaching at the late stage of its development - in the second half of the 18th century. According to K. Marx, A. Turgot led the physiocratic doctrine to its most developed form, which was closely adjacent to capitalism. Thus, in contrast to F. Quesnay, the founder of the economic theory of physiocracy, A. Turgot believed that any expenditure of capital, not only in agricultural production, but also in industry, as well as in trade, is capable of producing savings and generating profit. A. Turgot penetrated much deeper into the essence of emerging capitalist relations than his contemporaries, the physiocrats. He made adjustments to the class division of society that existed among the physiocrats, defined capital as a set of means of production, and gave a detailed theory of profit. Thus, A. Turgot showed the emerging elements of contradictions in the economic theory of the physiocrats. Thus, already by the time the theoretical and methodological foundations of classical political economy of A. Smith appeared in 1776, the existence of a contradiction between labor and capital was established in the works of the later physiocrats.
The confrontation between capital and labor in economic activity, which received theoretical formulation, then became a traditional contradiction in the development of societies. It subsequently led to global problems in relations not only within states, but also between different countries. Labor and capital turned into an antagonistic opposition, which acquired political characteristics (a tough confrontation arose between the owners of the means of production and hired workers), which allowed C. Saint-Simon, and then C. Marx and F. Engels in the Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848) , in the first half of the 19th century, to substantiate the negative nature of the capitalist form of economic relations and establish the prerequisites for the emergence of socialism, designed to overcome the contradictions between labor and capital. According to their behests, V.I. Ulyanov-Lenin, relying on the party he created (RSDLP), carried out a revolution in Russia in 1917 and began to build socialism, where it was supposed to eliminate this antagonistic confrontation. Before the start of the Great Patriotic War, the former USSR actually managed to weaken the confrontation between labor and capital. The people at least formally became the owners of the main means of production (factories, factories, natural resources, etc.), which meant a decrease in the predominance of capital over labor. But, as you know, with the end of the Great Patriotic War, the industrial period of human development ended. The former USSR also went through its path of industrialization by this time. However, already in the 1950-1970s. In the Soviet Union, there was a significant lag in economic growth from the most developed countries of the world. It is obvious that the collective ownership of the means of production in the country has exhausted its existential potential. In addition, a comparative analysis of the opinions of former soldiers of the Red Army, citizens of the USSR, who observed the system of organizing economic relations in Europe while advancing towards Berlin during hostilities in 1944–1945, showed that private ownership of the means of production, even in private households , small and medium-sized businesses, generates better human well-being. In this case, it is advisable to recall K. Marx, who noted: “The worker is free only when he is the owner of his means of production.” Of course, it is difficult to deny economic insight to the founder of Marxist political economy. But under the property of workers, K. Marx assumed their proletarian essence - ownership of “living labor,” i.e. physical labor. Although joint-stock companies began to be created in the world even before 1848 (for example, in 1836, Russian Emperor Nicholas I approved the “Regulations on Companies with Shares,” which was destined to become the first general law on joint-stock companies in Europe), but a little later, on At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the owners of many capitalist enterprises in the world, according to the behests of K. Marx, began to create joint-stock companies to involve workers in owning the means of production through shares. Thus, attempts were made to weaken the contradiction between labor and capital. Owning shares motivates employees and makes their interests and the interests of the companies interdependent.
At the same time, human nature is selfish and satisfying its private desires is a rather difficult problem. The gradual increase in the information armament of society, with a simultaneous increase in needs, led to the 1950s. to increasing the role and significance of the knowledge that an individual has, i.e. humanity gradually began to join the post-industrial era, where knowledge and awareness began to strengthen the intellectual power of individual people, which contributed to their dominance in the economic organization of society. Intellectual labor began to intensify and dominate capital. The most intellectually organized nations began to invest their knowledge in the weapons system and thereby managed to create powerful nuclear weapons. D. Bell identified the main features of post-industrial society:
-the central role of theoretical knowledge;
-creation of new intellectual technology;
-growth of the class of knowledge carriers;
-transition from the production of goods to the production of services;
-changes in the nature of work;
-growing role of women;
-increasing role of science in society as a social need;
- dominance of situses as political units (situs - position, position);
-growth of meritocracy (education and qualifications determine a person’s capabilities);
- the emergence of opportunities for a person to manage his free time;
-economic theory of information.
At the same time, a revolutionary breakthrough in solving the problem of confrontation between labor and capital, in the initial period of the post-industrial movement in the world, were the results of research by American economists T. Schultz and G. Becker in the early 1960s. on a problem called “human capital”. An analysis of expert assessments, based on materials from various studies, showed that the justification of the new economic category “human capital” made it possible to significantly reduce the tension between labor and capital in the developed countries of the world. If T. Schultz is the pioneer and author of the term “human capital,” then this economic category received significant development in the works of G. Becker. Although it should be noted that the idea of ​​​​measuring human capabilities arose in the 17th century with the English economist W. Petty, who attempted to measure these capabilities monetaryly. Then other attempts at such measurements were made in the 18th–20th centuries, but they were not convincing enough. For example, G. Becker notes: “The most important characteristic that distinguishes human capital from physical capital is that it is embodied or materialized in the personality of the investor himself. This embodiment is the main reason why the marginal benefits of human capital decrease as it accumulates.”
The fact is that at the turn of the 1950s–1960s, as we have already noted, the post-industrial period of global social development began, characterized by the emergence of a tendency towards increased intellectualization of labor in social production, the intensive emergence of new knowledge, economic ideas, equipment and technologies. According to a number of researchers, the term “post-industrialism” was first introduced in 1914 by A. Coomaraswamy, and after the Second World War, the ideology of post-industrial development was summarized in the famous work of D. Bell, which was already mentioned above: “The coming post-industrial society. Experience of social forecasting". Post-industrialism (postmodernism) is a level of functioning of society where knowledge begins to dominate ignorance. This raises the question: what is considered knowledge? For example, D. Bell believes that “... I define knowledge as a set of subordinated facts or judgments that represent a reasoned statement or an experimental result that can be transmitted to other people using means of communication in a certain systematic form... thus, I I distinguish knowledge from news." Over the more than 200-year industrial period of its development, humanity has created a certain system of knowledge about natural, social and economic phenomena that occur in the world. At this time, the basic physical, chemical, biological, economic and social laws and patterns of life of the human community in their relationships with the surrounding world were substantiated.
Knowledge in these conditions has received the status of capitalized capabilities of people, which allow them to build the necessary economic relations and satisfy the necessary needs of each person. But knowledge can be legal (published, known and accessible to everyone) and illegal (known only to one person or a narrow circle of people). F. Hayek back in the 1940s. gave a definition of tacit knowledge as “scattered” knowledge in society, which is possessed by each individual. In his opinion, only market relations in society are capable of maximally involving all the knowledge available to people for the benefit of economic development. So, in modern society, knowledge takes the form of capital, the bearer of which becomes an individual.
All this allowed the individual to create his own individual intellectual capital, which began to combine two antagonistic principles in economic relations - labor and capital, and thereby weaken this traditional confrontation. Human capital is the personal capital of an individual and cannot be transferred to others. This capital must be created by the personal labor of each person, which predetermined its ability to overcome the traditional conflict of labor and physical capital. In this regard, modern Russia needs to intensively increase national human capital and strengthen research on this problem.
The fact is that the established modern system of scientific knowledge leads to the understanding that only the socio-psychological state of a nation determines the forms and nature of economic relations in society, and not the economy as a deterministic system. Only the totality of human abilities allows the bearer of these abilities (together - the entire society) to receive income. In this context, a person can be compared with physical capital, and his capabilities can be considered as human capital. By introducing the concept of human capital, a person (employee) is involved in the distribution of labor results. As V. Mau notes, only in the mid-2000s. the attention of the domestic elite shifted to the problems of human capital.
According to the Center for Labor Research at the Higher School of Economics (HSE), the total value of Russia’s human capital is more than 600 trillion rubles. (which if we divide these data by the entire economically active population of the country, it turns out that for each worker in Russia there are more than 6 million rubles), which is almost 13.5 times more than the country’s GDP and 5.5 times more than the value of physical capital . These data show that the ratio of capital and labor has changed: rising wages have led to an increase in labor over capital. To eliminate the likely imbalance between labor and capital in the country, additional jobs are needed to attract human capital to economic activity. Obviously, guided by these considerations, back in 2012, Russian President V. Putin set the task for society to create at least 25 million new jobs in the coming years. In addition, some domestic experts note the emerging trend in Russia towards the suppression of human capital by social capital, which shows that part of society is changing its value system and expects to receive not knowledge, but an education diploma. Only high-quality domestic human capital can resist the deterioration of the relationship between labor and capital.
Thus, the traditional opposition between labor and capital can only be weakened through the dominance of human capital in economic relations. This capital collectively combines elements of capital and labor, which in modern postmodern economic reality, where knowledge predominates, helps reduce social tension in society. An employee of an enterprise must have the right to participate in the distribution of the final results of activities, and this gives grounds to define the employee as the owner of part of the functioning human capital, in fact, as a capitalist. And this process will contribute to the transition from the economic exploitation of human capital to economic mutualism, notes A. Buzhin.