Beyond Money

Front matter

‘Outstanding ... a highly original and incisive analysis of the crippling role that money plays in today’s global capitalist world’

—Mike Berry, author of Justice and Democracy

‘A fascinating portal into arguments about why we need to get beyond money: —Harry Cleaver, author of 33 Lessons on Capital: Reading Marx Politically

Contents

List of Abbreviations and Symbols Glossary

Foreword by John Holloway Preface

Acknowledgements

Foreword

John Holloway

Strike at the heart of the beast! Kill money!

That is my own crude formulation of Anitra Nelson’s argument in this book, an argument that I fully share. Her presentation is far from being crude, but it is very clear. In the opening words of the first chapter, she states her purpose: ‘Money as we know it is capitalism's sine qua non, its essence. We cannot describe or define either capitalism or capitalist management and capitalist work without recourse to money. You might respond, ‘Just because capitalism relies on money, money might not always lead to capitalism; or state that the real problem is ‘capital’ and/ or ‘commodification. Indeed, these positions typify leftists, environmentalists and anti-capitalist theorists and movements today. Consequently, modified forms of money and markets are included or inferred in practically all visions of postcapitalism. So, if you're thinking money is not really that much of a problem, that we could mould money to progressive ends, consider this book my answer to you:

The book is very much an intervention in a debate or, better, in a series of debates. This is perhaps true of all political books, but in this case it is very explicit. “The desired use value of this book is to act as a key intervention in these contemporary discourses to point out that we can neither address inequalities and unsustainability nor establish postcapitalism without moving beyond money’ Anitra examines different movements for radical change, especially the environmental, feminist and indigenous movements, and argues that these movements are weakened to the extent that they do not address the central issue of money. As long as money exists, the central social problems of inequality and the unsustainability of life will continue to be generated.

I find it helpful to think of money in relation to the metaphor of the hydra of capitalism proposed by the Zapatistas. It is very difficult to defeat capitalism because every time we succeed in cutting off one of the monster’s heads, other heads sprout up to attack us. We defeat fascism, for example, and then find that it springs up in a variety of authoritarian xii + BEYOND MONEY and racist forms. We win shorter working hours through various forms of factory legislation and then find that in practice the hours become longer and longer, so that the very idea of ‘nine-to-five’ becomes a joke. We achieve recognition of the weekend and then find it invaded by pressures to work. We defeat discrimination against women and find that femicides are increasing. Sometimes it seems like an endless struggle to defend human dignity, in which any gains we make are always threatened with reversal.

If we think of the different heads of the monster as different forms of oppression - sexism, racism, exploitation of labour, destruction of other forms of life and of the environment, and so on - then it is clear that resistance takes the form of a multiplicity of struggles against these different heads. This seems to me both inevitable and desirable. Such struggles can lead to real changes that affect and often improve people's lives profoundly. The different struggles also relate to one another, often recognise a common cause and develop relations of mutual support. But there is an often unspoken question in these struggles. Are the different heads just an array of nasty oppressions or is there some unseen or only dimly seen body that not only connects them but continually generates new forms of oppression? If we really want to transform society, to create a society based on the mutual recognition of human dignities, do we not have to reach beyond the heads and defeat this generator of oppressions? The danger is that in the necessary and important battles against the heads, this question gets lost. Although she does not use the hydra metaphor, Anitra argues that it is important that this question should not get lost and that it is money that is the generator of these oppressions: money, such an essential part of our lives in capitalism that we do not even see it, such a ubiquitous force that the very idea or abolishing it seems nonsensical, beyond the bounds of rational discourse. For this reason, it is necessary to intervene in these different discussions to say ‘aren't you forgetting about the heart of the beast, money? Dont you see that to achieve our aims, we must create a society without money?’ In this I agree with her completely.

This is not a dogmatic position. There is a sense in which we will be able to understand the importance of abolishing money only after it is actually achieved, that the owl of Minerva can indeed fly only at dusk. For us now, there is an element of betting here, but we can give strong and reasoned arguments for seeing money and therefore capital and its unceasing pursuit of profit as the key generator of the destruction that is

FOREWORD :: xiii pointing us towards our possible extinction. It is urgent, therefore, that we should abolish money and create a society in which social relationships are not mediated through money.

The argument is not dogmatic in the old sense of trying to establish a hierarchy of struggle. Anitra poses her argument as an intervention in the different debates that are going on. Possibly the abolition of money can be understood only as an overflowing from the different visible struggles. Perhaps the only way of reaching the heart or body of the hydra is if the struggles against the distinct heads break through their own definitions, their own identities. It is hard to imagine ‘abolish money as a slogan that would attract support in the same way as, say, ‘Black Lives Matter’: much better to argue that the only way of creating a non-racist society of mutual recognition is through the abolition of money with its logic of identity and death. The particular struggles can be seen as possible gateways to the abolition of money, but for this to happen they must overflow their own starting-point. Precisely for this reason, it is enormously important that Anitra frames her argument as an intervention in the more particular ‘head-centred’ debates and seeks to draw out the overflowings that are already present in those debates.

Life against money: this is a central theme of the current Zapatista Voyage for Life and it is a slogan that should be taken up in all forms of radical struggle for a better world. Anitra sings out this theme in Beyond Money. I also intend to take it up myself, in a slightly different direction, in a forthcoming book.*

I hope that this book of Anitra’s will put the abolition of money where it belongs, at the centre of radical, rebellious hope.

Puebla October 2021

* Due in 2022 from Pluto Press.