1848-1948
1848-98
If 1825 represents the start of a new crisis phase, whilst 1843 represents the end of a stagnation phase/start of a prosperity phase, it's reasonable to assume that in this period, the overall length of the cycle is closer to 40 years than 50 years. We know from Marx and Engels' account that the new uptrend begins in 1843. By 1865, there are clear signs that the uptrend is already faltering, and by 1870, it's clear that a new period of crisis has begun. We might place the US Civil War itself within that context, along with the Crimean War, Franco-Prussian War, and the Paris Commune. We can place the crisis phase, therefore, from around 1865-75, with the stagnation phase of the Long Depression running from around 1875-1890.
Paul gives us again the standard Trotskyist version of Engels' assessment of the British working-class, at the end of the 19th century. That is that it is characterised by an “aristocracy of labour”, and has been bought off as a consequence of the fruits of British colonialism. According to Paul, the working-class, elsewhere, were still subject to the conditions which provoke them into rebelliousness, and the privileges of the British workers were only temporary. But, this interpretation is false. It is only sustainable on the basis of the old Lassallean/Stalinist immiseration interpretation of Marxism, and of the catastrophist theories of crisis.
Marx always made clear that Britain, as the more developed economy, presented a glimpse of their future to less developed economies. Moreover, although Marx makes clear the importance of having cheap raw materials, he is quite insistent on explaining the wealth of nations on the basis of their accumulation of capital, and consequent production of relative surplus value, as opposed to the old mercantilist notions that preceded Adam Smith. Engels' explanation of Britain's wealth is that accumulation of capital and consequent production of relative surplus value. It is that which leads to its desire to avoid strikes, in order to keep the vast amounts of machinery running continuously. And, as he says, the middle class managers, who now have the social function of achieving that condition, and pulling all the levers of this complex social machine, can only do that if they have political power, a political power they can only exercise with the support of a working-class now (for its male component) that has been enfranchised.
1898 - 1948
Paul begins this section by looking at the work of F.W. Taylor, and the development of scientific management. Paul dates this phase from 1898, though the new upswing begins around 1890. We might expect, therefore, that one of the incentives for Taylorism itself, was that, eight years into a new powerful upswing, that now encompasses a far wider range of economies than was the case in 1843, is the need to utilise labour more efficiently, as the demand for labour-power rose sharply.
Following the introduction of Taylor's methods at Bethlehem Steel, productivity quadrupled, whilst wages rose by 70% from $1.15 to $1.85 a day. This illustrates the basis upon which Fordism operated, in the following century. In other words, real wages could increase substantially, provided they rose by less than the rise in productivity, and hence the rate of surplus value.
Paul argues that Taylorism and Fordism reshaped the working-class. It created increased stratification. A new white collar elite was established, as mental skills were removed further from manual skills; a skilled manual layer remained amongst groups such as toolmakers, but an increased semi-skilled group of workers able to flexibly adapt their skills to a variety of machines shifted the centre of gravity away from the unskilled labour.
What can be seen here is the maturation of some of the developments that Marx and Engels had discussed. The white collar elite that was responsible for managing and supervising production, as well as taking on all of the technical and administrative functions, is that group of functioning capitalists discussed by Marx in Capital III.
Paul is right to point out that if this was intended to undermine the conditions for socialism it failed, and it failed for the very reasons that Marx sets out, in describing the process whereby capital accumulation, the concentration and centralisation of capital results in the creation of socialised capital. The functioning capitalists that comprise this white collar, working-class elite, are drawn from and remain tied to the rest of the working-class, even though as the immediate personification of that socialised capital, their function is to maximise the production and accumulation of surplus value. The growing objective division, in society, becomes, as Marx sets out in Capital III, the division between this socialised productive-capital and money-lending capital, i.e. between real capital and fictitious capital, between the productive-capital that is the basis of wealth creation, and the fictitious capital which is the basis of wealth distribution.
In fact, its Paul's failure to understand that this is the real basis of the contradictions of modern capitalism, and the material basis of the specific characteristics of the fifth wave that leads him into the search for alternative causes.
The huge expansion that took place after 1890, resulted not just in a growth of trades unions, but also of workers parties, as I've also previously described, in relation to the long wave. Paul also cites some of the details of that development, such as the sudden rise in support for the German SPD that saw its electoral vote rise to 31%, in 1903.
Paul rightly notes that a major component of The Great Unrest that spread across the globe, from Russia to the US, and from France to Wales, was not just a demand for better wages and conditions, but was for industrial democracy, and control over the labour process. In the US, the unions saw Taylorism as an ally, because it was often used to attack the inefficient and unscientific nature of existing management, as the basis of poor performance. The more the actual professional managers are themselves drawn from the ranks of an educated working-class, and the methods and policies of that management can be examined and tested against established principles, rather than being purely arbitrary, the more a basis for a common interest of these associated producers can be established as against the interest of the money-lending capitalists, and their representatives, i.e. against the shareholders and their appointed directors.
Paul quotes from the strategy of the Welsh Miners Union,
“Every industry thoroughly organised, in the first place, to fight, to gain control of, and then to administer, that industry … leaving to the men themselves to determine under what conditions and how the work shall be done.” (p 190)
That strategy is consistent with the ideas set out by Marx and Engels, but it was not the strategy that was adopted by the Second International, and inherited by the Third International. And, as I've discussed elsewhere, in Britain, when the 1945 Labour government nationalised the coal mines, it also nationalised the cooperatively owned mines, thereby putting an end to the workers ownership and control that did exist in that industry.
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