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Originally Posted by Die Neue Zeit
I'm literally scratching my head on this. I don't want to come across as some sort of political hypocrite ("labour rights" under bourgeois rule, none afterwards).
Maybe I can incorporate unionization with the abolition of prison labour for the benefit of private parties, while retaining conscription (vs. "voluntary") and group-by-group regard or disregard for contemporary labour laws (incl. compensation)... as a compromise?
That disregard would definitely kick in for the worst criminals. The small-time offenders fit for "community service" could perhaps be subject to the labour laws (so much for actual slavery), but I'd still retain conscription. Again, consider that one-million pool out of the millions more incarcerated throughout the world today, and you'd still have a sufficient pool for infrastructure projects.
And since comrade MarxSchmarx brought up the word "corvee" in describing the labour used to build the pyramids, perhaps the corrective labour system as a whole could incorporate conscripted corvee labour (no compensation, but other labour laws in effect) as an alternative to paying hefty fines and such. So now we have Pool C in addition to Pool A (real Gulag labour for these worst of scum) and Pool B (the small-timers).
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I really think the problem here is not in the technicalities, but in the fundamentals. It's about how prisons and prison labor are organized and used, which is a reflection of society as a whole.
In a workers' republic, a prison is a reform school for recalcitrant elements of society -- those who refuse to break with the old bourgeois order. It's meant to teach those elements how to be productive members of the contemporary transitional society and, ultimately, the communist society.
I cannot agree with the concept of corvée labor (generally called indentured servitude) any more than forms of slave labor. Part of the role of prisons-as-a-school is that they are meant to instill the understanding and importance of voluntary participation in collective labor, so that the repatriated prisoner is able to function as a part of the new society. The use of corvée labor would be counterproductive to that end. The fact is that some of those recalcitrant elements will eventually be released from prison and enter the association of producers. Having such elements inevitably agitating among other producers around this issue -- "
You say this is a 'free association', but that's only true if you agree with the majority; if not, it's off to prison and forced labor!" -- would do more damage to the forward development of society toward communism than abstaining from the use of such labor practices. Keep in mind that, even today, there are broad elements of the exploiting and oppressing classes that use the historical tactics and methods of the workers' movement to advance their own programs. That's not going to disappear.
It would be naive to think no level of coercion would exist with genuinely recalcitrant and militant counterrevolutionary elements in prison. And while it is possible that these elements will make up a large percentage of the prison population in the early years of the workers' republic, we need to make clear than any coercion that is applied to them is merely a concentrated complement to the coercion that all bourgeois and petty-bourgeois elements will receive under proletarian rule.
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Originally Posted by Die Neue Zeit
Why such clemency? "If they don't, it's back to prison"?
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Call it my charitable streak, but these are the only two options I propose for such elements: laboring in prison or laboring in the worst jobs outside of prison. They receive no quarter apart from this, including on the question of citizenship rights. But instead of having a new homeless and lumpen problem develop in the workers' republic, I think it's better to repeatedly try to rehabilitate and educate through the structure of the reform prison.
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Originally Posted by Die Neue Zeit
What about that one-million global scenario I suggested? Each of Pool A, Pool B, and Pool C have high turnover, for different reasons. Pool A: slow and painful death (real Gulag stuff). Pool B: short sentences ("community service"). Pool C: anywhere from seasonal corvee labour turnover to monthly corvee labour turnover. I don't think even those paying hefty fines would be expected to work exclusively for the corrective labour system until the fine is paid.
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The "job" of the recalcitrant bourgeois or petty-bourgeois (be they "standard" or lumpen) is not simply to die slowly. Or, to put it another way, our job is not to hasten and/or facilitate the killing of these elements, which is what you're proposing. If that happens, it needs to be clear that it was a conscious decision of those elements themselves -- i.e., they could have chosen another path but refused. Privilege in a prison setting is based on "good behavior", and if prisoners refuse to adhere to standards of "good behavior" then they will be stripped of all manner of privileges. You set a base minimum that all prisoners are entitled to; you then add on to that based on different variables (severity of their crime, time to serve, level of "good behavior" and cooperation, etc.). The minimum is survival/subsistence level, whereas most prisoners will receive much higher because of the variable factors. In other words, cooperate and you'll do fine; act as a saboteur or counterrevolutionary agitator and you'll receive the most spartan prison experience.
Again, though, this is all pertaining to those most recalcitrant elements, and not those who are involved in lesser crimes. To reference your materials, the group above is your Pool A, but with a key difference: if they suffer a slow and painful death, it will be entirely their decision, not done by administrative fiat or bureaucratic number-crunching, which is more the method that was used in the GULAG system. The principle that those who do not work shall not eat will apply most glaringly in the prisons, because there is little room there for more shades of grey.
