The Deal with Collective Force
Observing anarchist discussions online, it seems like many folks are receptive to revived analyses such as Collective Force, but they don’t really seem to get the point of them. So, what is the deal with Collective Force?
Firstly, let’s take a step back for a minute, and revisit the most mainstream theory of exploitation in the Socialist movement, Marx’s.
The worker… works! Go figure. He makes some useful product out of stuff owned by some other guy, and in exchange, he gets some money. The Capitalist sells that stuff and gets more money than he sunk into this project. Easy enough. If the Classical Economists pointed out that the value of commodities are going to be determined by competition around labor-time, then, where do profits come from? Marx’s answer is that labor itself is a commodity whose value is determined the same way, by its cost in labor. Workers are paid the value of themselves as laborers rather than the work they actually contribute. That is Marx’s theory in a nutshell.
But, we are not Marxists. We are Anarchists. There is going to be some trouble adopting this analysis wholesale. This is because it is a specific critique of Capitalism and not an analysis of exploitation from POWER in society. The Marxist analysis is concerned with economic systems in historical succession, and Capitalism’s foundation for sociopolitical structures in societies. The Anarchist perspective is that authority is the main influence in sociopolitical and economic forms within society. Anarchists are going to emphasize the vast network of influences, where the State creates the genesis for Capitalism, and Capitalism grips its hands on State power. Marx’s theory of exploitation is not going to fit the many forms that society takes, and is extremely unlikely to be flexible enough to be tenable for understanding potential exploitation within State Socialism.
This is where the Theory of Collective Force steps in. Pierre-Joseph Proudhon had specifically formulated his criticisms against both Capitalist Property and the State. Whether the worker is exploited by Capitalists or the State it makes no categorical difference. In both cases laborer, and the laborers of society, are being directed by a will alien by their own.
To review the Theory of Collective Force for those who may not have heard of it before. “Collective Force” is a concept created by Proudhon in his critique of property which would later serve the basis of a more elaborate set of analyses about the nature of collectives, authority, and society. It formulates that in certain circumstances, the synchrony of labor creates a product greater than the sum of its parts. So, if ten laborers work for one hour in ways that create collective force, then, they will be able to accomplish more than one laborer working for ten hours. Examples of this can be the division of labor in a workshop, or groups using accumulated force to achieve a collective goal.
This tool of Collective Force can tell us a lot more things relevant to Anarchists believe it or not. If we know that production within society is essentially social since the advent of the division of labor, that there is direct synchrony with most forms of work, and indirect synchrony in all forms of work, then, we just need to identify the portion of the products that are produced from the joining of individual efforts: the collective product.
If collectives of workers within society come together organically and produce for the market, then we should expect relatively equal distribution based on labor performed. The collective product is going to be distributed relatively equal throughout society, either purposefully or through random negotiations and exchanges.
But what if we notice that the collective product is not distributed relatively equally? That tells us something important about the organization of collective labor: that it is done from TOP to BOTTOM rather than BOTTOM to TOP. Through some sort of enforced right, labor is being organized to service a certain end alien to itself. Focusing on the distribution of collective product instantly gives us a lens to see the interests of authority and their beneficiaries. Even within State Socialist societies, observing the direction of collective force will show you how labor is being directed by a top-down authority of government rather than through mutual interest. The State, therefore, is going to be the one directing the collective product as they please, and thus, are the exploiters.
In contrast to exploitative societies, the fundamental position that unites all Anarchists is the belief in a society directed from the bottom-up, where the fruits of collective force are collectively benefited from from the free federation and mutual interest of peoples.
“I found myself asking how it should begin. It could not be formed or formulized, for we had just proved that we could no more form successful society than we form the fruit upon a tree. It must be the natural growth of the interest that each one feels in it from the benefits derived or expected from it. The greater these benefits, the stronger is the ‘bond of society;’ where there is no interest felt there is no ‘bond of society,’ whatever its ‘unions,’ its organizations, its constitutions, governments or laws may be.” [Josiah Warren, The Motives for Communism]
