Marx and Hobbes would have gotten in a bar fight

Marx – for all his gloom and doom about loss of identity through forced labor – was something of a disgusting optimist. In Marx’s view, people are caught in a system of “forced labor. It is therefore not the satisfaction of a need; it is merely a means to satisfy needs external to it” (655). Thus people are currently producing not because they need the product, but because they need the financial value associated with that product. In this system, Marx argues that the identity and the worth of the worker is lost as “the worker puts his life into the object…now his life no longer belongs to him by to the object” (652). So far, Marx seems to have a pretty pessimistic outlook on the way the world works. But then we get t his solution to the problem: A “community of free individuals” (669). And that’s where Marx goes off on an overly optimistic jaunt through Never Never Land.

First off, let’s start with the notion of a “community free individuals.” “Community” implies at the very least a relationship in which people are functioning together, which it itself limits total independence. A community requires some sort of compromise in order for it to function as a unit, thus an entirely free individual wouldn’t actually be a functioning member of the community (they would just be functioning as themselves while surrounded by a community, but they would not be part of said community). Thus both the “free” and the “individual” get diminished, and Marx got off to a rather bad start by creating an oxymoron right off the bat.

Moving deeper into Marx’s theory on this community, Marx proves to have overly optimistic view of human nature. In this community, he sees people as recreating the lifestyle of Robinson Crusoe, and the “characteristics of Robinson’s labour are here repeated, but with this difference, that they are social, instead of individual’ (669). Applying Robinson Crusoe’s model – which is the extreme example of the individual producing only for himself – to an entire community simply cannot work. Production for self is never the same as production for everyone, particularly when a system of allotment of goods is put in place, as Marx does. Robinson Crusoe yielded exactly what he built/grew/created/etc, but someone in Marx’s society would still be receiving an abstract value in response to his or her labor. Marx talks about how the community will labor together to supply itself with its needs, and Marx throws in the idea that each man will receive according to his needs in proportion to the amount of work done. Where on earth does Marx get the idea that people will be indefinitely content under this system, or even that any sort of agreement could be reached? The notion of “the share of each individual producer in the means of subsistence is determined by his labour-time” could only work if all labor was the same, but obviously it’s not (669). Eight hours of laboring at a computer as an accountant is entirely different from eight hours of laboring with a sledgehammer as a construction worker. Marx seems to think people could actually agree on what the value of the eight hours of the accountant vs. the eight hours as a construction worker would be worth, and that people would be willing to be distributed to accordingly. Doubtful. And what about those who cannot labor effectively? In Marx’s world, cripples, the disabled, or the simply inept would have to be promptly drummed out of the society in order for this system to continuing functioning.

Then there comes the issue of “the total product of [the] community is a social product” (669). And the issue with that is simply that people aren’t always too keen on sharing. Call it survival instinct, call it selfish, call it just plain normal, after laboring for eight hours a day on a product, the thought of sacrificing it to a common social good isn’t always be a pleasant thought. And what happens if those eight hours are valued at less of a “labour-time” ratio than someone else, and all the efforts of that product yield a small portion value when it comes time for distribution? In some cases, it would then make more sense to keep the product. And in that case, the individual would either remain a dissatisfied member of the community or leave it, and either way, the society has proven to be dysfunctional and failed.

And speaking of products, that brings me to my biggest issue with Marx’s theory, and that is that it is still reductive. Even under this model, people are still only worth what they can produce. Because the “distribution of portion” is based on labour-time, the value is still placed on production (669). How is a person working for “distribution” any different from them working for monetary gain in the capitalist system? The capacity for production is still the dominating factor, shared or not.

Thus while Marx does a good job focusing on the problems in his society, he does a pretty poor job when it comes to his solution. He shifts from his condemnation of the current human condition to an excessively optimistic vision of human nature, and his vision is not conducive to creating a real solution with real individuals. Similar to Percy Bysshe Shelley’s frantic calls for revolution and change, Marx loves pointing out what’s wrong but forgets to suggest how it can be (realistically) fixed.