What is to be Read? - Episode 1: Fully Automated Luxury Communism

In the first episode of "What is to be Read?" we look at Aaron Bastani's "Fully Automated Luxury Communism." We talk about the book's central themes and offer some of our thoughts on the arguments presented by Bastani.
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Patreon:
Twitter:
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Discussion by C and M.
Animated intro by Jack, co-host of the Auxiliary Statements podcast @AuxStatements on Twitter.
Intro music by Charles Tristan:
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00:00 - 01:05 Introduction
01:06 - 15:30 Summary
15:31 - 21:32 Communism
21:33 - 33:54 Capitalism, Automation, and the Third Disruption
33:55 - 39:49 Post-Scarcity in Energy
39:50 - 44:38 Post-Scarcity in Resources
44:39 - 50:50 Post-Scarcity in Health
50:51 - 59:30 Some Limitations (and Other Reflections)
59:31 - 01:16:10 Political Directions
1:16:11 - 1:20:48 Markets vs. Planning
1:20:49 - 1:25:35 Final Thoughts
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Video mentioned in the discussion:

[BalkanOdyssey_]

Amazing stuff guys, keep up the good work.

[PC]

Wtf? Second Thought, Hakim, 1Dime, Marxist Paul and now The Marxist Project throws a banger over similar topics. What a weekend!

[SvalbardSleeperDistrict]

Unlike his wonderful videos on history, I've always found Bastani's ideas on global communism (as articulated in Novara Media content, etc) to be lacking in the political department, as noted by the reviewers too. He speaks of achieving communism like our societies are comprised of just workers and technology interacting with one another and having a smooth sailing towards an inevitable outcome, and there's no private capital that is successfully preventing that outcome. I can't see how it's likely that communism will be achieved without a struggle that wins that future from the capital - especially in the context of the impending climate crisis.

[erosharcos]

In the political directions section, starting around 59:40 there is discussion on Bastani's claim that "socialism could not have built communism in the past" and the underlying premise of this assertion by Bastani is that, only through capitalism is the efficiency and cost-reduction of commodities in production brought to near-zero.

From what I understand from when I attempted to understand what I read in Capital that Marxian thought is that Capitalism is a post-feudal, economic reformation, and not the end-all-be-all of increases in efficiency. This doesn't make sense to me because I could have sworn that Marx criticized capitalism at least several times on how it has deficiencies in production as a form of political-economy. Even if Bastani isn't making an orthodox Marxian argument here, it doesn't seem correct that Capitalism is the only phase of economic organization that would yield gains in efficiency of production. Obviously progression of efficiency of production occurred prior to Capitalism, and I don't see any solid argument as to how Capitalism is a necessary condition for raising the efficiency of production.

One could argue that post-capitalist nations of the 20th and 21st centuries achieved heightened production of certain commodities over capitalist nations, but I don't see this as a necessary point, plus the semantics of whether or not a post-capitalist country has ever existed would be a whole tangential argument by itself. A dictatorship of the proletariat would have so many reasons to pursue gains in the efficiency of production and the benefits of this efficiency is so obvious as a net-positive goal to pursue that it couldn't possibly be an isolated occurrence under Capitalism. Gains in efficiency certainly have occurred under capitalist modes of production, but capitalism itself isn't the only organization of the economy where gains can occur.

Anyways, if I'm wrong or missing the mark I do hope that someone will correct me. Thanks to the channel for all the work y'all put into these videos!

I stopped the video at 1:00:04 to write this comment while the question was fresh on my mind and if this question is answered in the video I'll delete this comment.

[non-standardproletarian]

Looking forward to listening to this, but I would check out Max Ajl's "A People's Green New Deal" and its critiques of Bastani's work for its creeping imperialist trajectory.

[weakboson]

Enjoyed this commentary a lot. I think the point that has to be emphasized about the "political direction" section is that the book was written in the heady days when Corbyn was still leader of the UK Labour party, and pretty many of the workable, incremental solutions he describes was the policy of a would-be Corbyn lead government, or at least alive ideas in those circles. So I think he was trying to connect his ideas with some then-current political action that a reader could get involved in immediately. Shortly after the book was released, of course, that Corbyn-lead government failed to win the necessary electoral battle and the right of the party has since purged itself of any of these progressive ideas. The section reads very differently in a "post-2019 world" where these things aren't on the cards electorally. To be honest I think this makes some of the questions he doesn't address or glosses over (mainly the conflict with capital and finance) all the more urgent.

[meltyninjers]

5:27 not sure if the rest of the video or the book touches on this, but moore's law is actually very close to being dead. we'll be able to continue making better, faster computers with new technologies (quantum computing being a well-known one that's in the works), but sometime in the next decade we're expected to reach a point where we'll hit the limit of how many transistors we can fit on a chip

[Alexalexalexalex]

You guys should read towards a new socialism next

[WastedContender]

amazing book! very optimistic. i recommend it!

[Eddie]

Very good video! Very good video.1:00:04 I don't agree with that argument. 1:00:40 And Marx never said that the revolution would necessarily have to begin in a developed country. He said that the revolution could start in any country, but it would not succeed if it did not reach the centrality of capital.

[preston]

i believe his argument about technology was more concerned with the data required to efficiently allocate resources at a large scale

[megathai]

Wow. That's a very pleasant voice. Would yall ever do an episode on unequal exchange and unequal development? I heard there isn't a
unified theory yet and I think that's a very interesting topic.

[karabelaclubberlang]

Hi from istanbul turkey comrade. İ love your video projects. Thank you. ✊

[RexAndAllen]

Have you checked out Mike Duncan's Revolutions podcast? Thought you might find it interesting

[jacobclark]

16:25 we do have a laid out definition of communism from an ML and MLM reading of theory. It's not just a word utopians throw around. There is entire theory of scientific socialism.

[wlxlhmk]

Can you guys please research & advocate for full intellectual property (IP) abolition? This is the most important activist aim for working class people! A just economy (& most leftist projects) has very little chance without first abolishing IP. IP is the most severe & oppressive tool of the rich & powerful.

Please see the work of Stephan Kinsella, Michele Boldrin, & David K. Levine. These are the best experts on intellectual property in the world. Everyone who cares about seriously improving things for humanity needs to know what IP abolition is about.

[Altronauts]

You both don't understand anything about artificial superintelligence. We will reach longevity escape velocity by 2029, which basically means immortality. So, post-scarcity healthcare is very much real.

[AnthonyChinaski]

69th comment. I have achieved synthesis

[MrTaxiRob]

I don't believe automation is a great threat to jobs outside of manufacturing. Autonomous vehicles only work in controlled conditions, and the kind of machine learning necessary to enable them to replace human operators would be SkyNet level AI. Look for Alphabet, Tesla et al to push for new wireless guidance infrastructure projects as a shortcut; creating even more tightly controlled conditions would be the only way that current autonomous vehicle technology could succeed. And vote them down when they show up on your states' ballot initiatives, because they're not bringing us any alternate employment opportunities.

[floxy]

The fact that the organizers of the Moscow piano competition in 1956 had to ask the premier of the country for permission to award top prize to an American tells you all you need to know about the hierarchical stultification of the Soviet Union.