Marx, socialism and liberty

Résumé En

If Marx did not give any specific representation of what a post-capitalist society would look like, he was convinced that a planned and conscious organization of the economy does not entail a centralization of the means of production through a State but implies a cooperation and free association of producers within self-managed collective units. Therefore, our claim in this contribution is that socialism/communism, as advocated by its original followers, is antagonistic to the control of the state over economy. Our point here is to advocate a mode of organization articulated both around collective ownership and mutual planning, in which individuals cooperate for a common interest, implement standards of community and equality, and preclude market exchange and private ownership of the means of production, with a view to promoting social harmony. We advocate that, in theory, such a claim depends on the possibility to associate equality and liberty. This implies that an opposition between the two terms, which refers to the opposition between the State and the market, but also between holism and individualism, is conservative. Our purpose here is to overcome this opposition, in an attempt to promote individual freedom as precisely a condition for equality and, following several authors in recent years, to regenerate the notion of communism. After giving some preliminary insights on how socialism is not statism, we discuss how capitalism entails a lack of freedom, as a transcendental standard of justice. We then show how socialism can be dealt with as a movement towards liberation, with use value overcoming exchange value, and finally discuss the conditions in which liberty is consistent with equality.