[P2P-F] Fwd: [Networkedlabour] [commoning] Socialist Licences

Thu May 22 03:24:34 CEST 2014

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Jakob Rigi <rigij at ceu.hu>
Date: Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 9:55 AM
Subject: Re: [Networkedlabour] [commoning] [P2P-F] Socialist Licences
To: restakis at gmail.com, networkedlabour at lists.contrast.org,
michel at p2pfoundation.net

Hi all,

I call your attention to my critique of PPL and related  project for
cooperatives, published in tripleC.

best
 Jakob

ttripleC 12(1): 390-404, 2014
CC: Creative Commons License, 2014.
The Coming Revolution of Peer Production and Revolution- ary Cooperative. A
Response to Michel Bauwens, Vasilis Kostakis and Stefan Meretz
Jakob Rigi
Central European University; rigij at ceu.hu
Abstract: This article agrees with Meretz (2014) that the peer producing
cooperatives which are pro- posed by Bauwens & Kostakis (2014) will become
parts and parcels of the capitalist economy. Fur- ther, it argues that the
so called Peer Production Licenses (PPL), originally designed by Dmitry
Kleiner (2010), which is the basis of their proposal is a rent seeking
instrument. Contra Bauwens & Kostakis, it argues that, from the
perspectives of both reform and revolution, GPL is profoundly
anti-capitalist. The article critiques Meretz`s understanding of exchange
and reciprocity, on the one hand, and his under- estimation of GPL`s
communist aspect, on the other. On the positive side, the article,
explicating the communist nature of GPL-oriented peer production,
speculates about the general contours of a socie- ty where peer production
is the dominant mode of production. The technological basis of this
society, the article suggests, will be digital copying and automation.
Spatially, it will be based on localities that transcend the current
division between the city and country, synthesising agriculture with
industrial, affective and symbolic production. The rise of a globally
unified revolutionary social struggle which adopts peer production as its
platform is indispensible for the transformation of capitalism into such a
society.  A global network of revolutionary peer producing cooperatives
which break with market and reduce their relations to it to an absolutely
unavoidable necessary minimum can be a significant com- ponent of this
social struggle. The building of these revolutionary cooperatives requires
a massive exodus from the city to the country.
Keywords:  Peer  Production,Cooperatives,Revolutionary Struggle,Communism,
 Exodus  From  the
  City
  .

>>> Michel Bauwens <michel at p2pfoundation.net> 04/19/14 12:35 PM >>>

see inline

On Sat, Apr 19, 2014 at 4:09 AM, Christian Siefkes <christian at siefkes.net>wrote:

> Hi Michel and all,
>
> better a late reply than none at all, I guess...
>
> On 04/06/2014 02:20 AM, Michel Bauwens wrote:
> > ok, let me restate it then once again:
> >
> > you say <commercial usage is generally forbidden>
> >
> > the CBRL, would say, <commercial usage is generally encouraged, unless
> there
> > is zero reciprocity>; hope you get it this time, it's really not that
> > difficult to understand; reading ability should be sufficient. We are not
> > talking about equivalent exchange or equivalent reciprocity, requiring
> > lengthly and complicated negotations; we are simply talking of moving
> from
> > equivalent exchange to the recognition of participation in a reciprocal
> economy.
>
> Well, I'm talking about the PPL, not about your fictitious CBRL which I
> don't know. Other licenses might or might not deserve the same criticism,
> but without knowing them I cannot say. And if I understand you correctly,
> the CBRL doesn't even exist yet?
>

fair remark, indeed, I would say the PPL is just the first of a new type of
license; the PPL can be adapted, changed etc .. so the key is to focus on
the reciprocity requirements

>
> > once again, the PPL is just an instance of the CBRL; so all
> not-for-profit
> > entities (not to be confused with nonprofit) are allowed, and all the
> > players who respect reciprocity
>
> How exactly does the "reciprocity" you talk about differ from capitalist
> "exchange"?
>

essentially, capitalist exchange is based on supply and demand dynamics and
class power; reciprocity is based on ethical principles of fairness; the
community itself can determine what that means in a specific context,

see http://p2pfoundation.net/Reciprocity and the definition there:

*Balanced or Symmetrical reciprocity occurs when someone gives to someone
else, expecting a fair and tangible return at some undefined future date.
It is a very informal system of exchange. The expectation that the giver
will be repaid is based on trust and social consequences*

my FLOK colleague writes:

John Restakis (in ch. 6 of Humanizing the
Economy<http://p2pfoundation.net/Humanizing_the_Economy>
):

"Reciprocity is the social mechanism that makes associational life
possible. It is the foundation of social life. In its elements, reciprocity
is a system of voluntary exchange between individuals based on the
understanding that the giving of a favour by one will in future be
reciprocated either to the giver or to someone else. A simple example is
the loan of a lawn mower by one neighbour - call him Frank, to another –
say, Fred. Frank makes the loan on the assumption that at some later date
Fred will return the favour. If Fred does not, the basis of reciprocity
falls apart. No more loaning of the lawnmower to Fred. Moreover Fred’s
non-reciprocity, if it continues, becomes reputational. Others will stop
extending favours to Fred also. So willingness to reciprocate is a basic
signal of the sociability of an individual. Taken to an extreme, the
complete unwillingness of an individual to reciprocate is tantamount to
severing the bonds between themselves and other people. Reciprocity is thus
a social relation that contains within itself potent emotional and even
spiritual dimensions. These elements account for an entirely different set
of motivations within individuals than behaviour in the classical sense of
“maximizing one’s utility” as a consumer.

Reciprocity animates a vast range of economic activities that rest on the
sharing and reinforcement of attitudes and values that are interpersonal
and constitute essential bonds between the individual and the human
community. What is exchanged in reciprocal transactions are not merely
particular goods, services and favours, but more fundamentally the
expression of good will and the assurance that one is prepared to help
others. It is the foundation of trust. Consequently, the practice of
reciprocity has profound social ramifications and entails a clear moral
element. Reciprocity is a key for understanding how the institutions of
society work. But it is also an economic principle with wholly distinct
characteristics that embody social as opposed to merely commercial
attributes. When reciprocity finds economic expression in the exchange of
goods and services to people and communities it is the social economy that
results. Examples range from the provision of burial services through the
creation of friendly societies in the 1800s to the promotion of
neighborhood safety through organizations like Neighborhood Watch today.
Finally, reciprocity is egalitarian – it presupposes a direct relationship
of equality between the individuals involved. It is very different from
altruism where the giver may have no relation to the receiver and where
there is a clear asymmetry of power, as is the case with charity."

>
> Specifically, in the PPL I see nothing beyond "if you want to use this
> commercially and are not a coop, negotiate the terms of exchange with us,
> the license owners". That's business as usual in capitalism -- if two
> persons or entities want to trade, they negotiate terms. That doesn't
> challenge capitalism, it confirms it.
>
> Again, I understand that other not-yet-existent licenses might approach
> that
> situation in a different way and maybe I would be much happier with their
> approach. But without knowing them it's impossible to say.
>

the difference is in who is doing the negotiating

in capitalism, between two firms based on their market power

in this case, by a community with ethical enterpreneurial coalition, based
on their values and need for fairness / reciprocity

>
> > Since you fully accept the
> > subsumption of free software to capitalism, this can only be construed as
> > progress, compared to what you are advocating (i.e. no change to
> capitalism
> > at all, I am of course not talking about your unpracticed dreams for a
> pure
> > and perfect p2p society; for the record, i like dreams and utopias).
>
> Stop laying words in my mouth please, none of this is true. I agree that
> every phase of transition will be imperfect and contradictory.  Indeed I
> would claim that what you call "subsumption of free software to capitalism"
> is an expression of those contractions, i.e. the fact that the new cannot
> emerge "pure" without being touched by and involved with the old. Also, you
> might notice that the "subsumption" goes both ways, since many companies
> contribute lots of money and development time to free software projects. So
> capitalist companies benefit from peer production, but peer production
> benefits from them too.
>

i'm not laying words in your mouth, just pointing out the general passivity
of the oekonux view to the existing situation ... between the perfect
ideals and the existing situation, there is no path forward but waiting ..

>
> Your "pure", "socialist" scheme would destroy that messy but often mutually
> beneficial interaction, replacing it with the usual "lets negotiate until
> both sides feel they can do no better" model of capitalism.
>

nothing pure about what I propose, it's a pragmatic hack to improve the
present and create counter-economic accumulation for the commons, to create
livelihoods for commoners, and give power to the ethical economy; unless
you propose something different than the current situation of subsumption,
it's the only thing that can change it; the proposal combines
non-capitalist market dynamics, with commons dynamics, and with material
stigmergy on a non-capitalist and non-market basis. The PPL doesn't change
much for the capitalist, they negotiate IP and licenses everyday, but it
changes a lot for the ethical economy and the commons, since it creates
autonomous livelihoods and relatively independent cooperative coalitions

>
> > you can't just wait for the end of the market, in a accomodationist or
> > attentist way; and you can't just abolish it by fiat; you have to create
> the
> > conditions for: 1) replacing capitalist markets with post-capitalist
> markets
> > and 2) replace market and planning with peer to peer coordination.
>
> (2) is fine for me and I agree with it. But I don't really see how the PPL
> contributes to that goal -- certainly not more than the GPL and other
> licenses for knowledge and information we already have. It would be
> interesting to develop and experiment with new forms of managing physical
> commons (in addition to and beyond knowledge commons), but the PPL make no
> contributions in that regards.
>

The PPL combined with the cooperative coalition creates the condition for
material coordination, something not possible with the GPL alone, which
only creates immaterial coordination ..

>
> (1) sounds about as meaningful as saying "replacing market capitalism with
> post-market capitalism". Capitalism cannot exist without markets, of
> course.
> And while markets existed without before capitalism and might well exist
> after it, capitalism is the only economic system known where markets are
> "total", i.e. most people cannot survive without participation in market
> transactions. That was never the case before capitalism, where markets were
> used for luxury goods and exchange of surplus produce, but most people's
> lives didn't depend on them, since most production and distribution was
> organized in other ways.
>

agreed, and in fact, you seem to agree with me to say that non-total
markets are different from total-market-capitalism, that is the essential
point

>
> I don't mind the idea of post-capitalist, non-total markets, but I'm more
> interested in institutions that might eliminate the "totalitarianism" of
> markets, i.e. that ensure that people can get by, and have a good life,
> without having to buy and sell in the market. Which, for most people, means
> having to sell themselves (their own labor power), since they have nothing
> else to sell.
>

and this is essentially what my proposal addresses, pragmatically : 1) it
reinforces the commons 2) create autonomous livelihoods for commoners which
they don't have now 3) moves markets outside of capitalism 4) creates a new
sphere of material coordination outside of markets and planning ..

what the scheme does is exactly what you want, it eliminates the
totalitarianism of the current market form,

again, it's not the only thing that is necessary, it's part of integrative
approach

for a vision of how the different pieces may fit together,
http://en.wiki.floksociety.org/w/Research_Plan

> Best regards
>         Christian
>
> --
>

> |--------- Dr. Christian Siefkes --------- christian at siefkes.net ---------
> | Homepage:   http://www.siefkes.net/   |   Blog:
> http://www.keimform.de/
> | Wie Produktion zur Nebensache wurde:
> www.keimform.de/2013/freie-quellen-1/
> | Why Production No Longer Worries Us:
> www.keimform.de/2013/free-sources-1/
> |------------------------------------------- OpenPGP Key ID: 0x346452D8 --
> For most of the past two centuries, the Left has been identified with
> science and against obscurantism; we have believed that rational thought
> and the fearless analysis of objective reality (both natural and social)
> are incisive tools for combating the mystifications promoted by the
> powerful -- not to mention being desirable human ends in their own
> right. The recent turn of many "progressive" or "leftist" academic
> humanists and social scientists toward one or another form of epistemic
> relativism betrays this worthy heritage and undermines the already fragile
> prospects for progressive social critique.
>         --  Alan D. Sokal, A Physicist Experiments With Cultural Studies
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> NetworkedLabour mailing list
> NetworkedLabour at lists.contrast.org
> http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour
>
>

-- 
*Please note an intrusion wiped out my inbox on February 8; I have no
record of previous communication, proposals, etc ..*

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-- 
*Please note an intrusion wiped out my inbox on February 8; I have no
record of previous communication, proposals, etc ..*

P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

<http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates:
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