Concerning the General Points of Departure in the Economic Theory of Socialism

The first part of this paper deals with using the logical and historical method of explanation in the economic theory of socialism. The mutual linkage of the logical and historical method is the outcome of the development of Relation into Process, of the mutual transition between affinity laws and causal laws. Affinity and causal laws are the laws of development of society, viewed in the first case from the point of view of structure and in the other case from the point of view of the genesis of production relations. The genesis as such is reflected in the basic economic law in its individual historical forms, which are gradually developing into a hierarchically ordered system of economic laws. The structure of production relations is reflected in the basic production relation.

The basis of the logical method is the highest achieved form of economic processes, its fundamental relation are the contradictions in the socio-economic form of the product of human object-activity. In this form all contradictions in their seminal stage, in a concentrated manner are present. Products are the material agents of social relations among working people themselves, while during their creation these relations are only being formed. The social properties of products are disclosed by their comparisons; behind the relations between them are hidden relations between the social form of various labour processes and relations among working people as such. Here we are moving along a spiral which leads us from the form of a product lo the social structure. Contradictions of this movement are analysed on a constantly higher level, from the point of view of all stages of the reproduction process in the sequence; consumption ~ distribution — production and back. To begin with the product of labour — this point of departure is in fact already the conclusion of our study and at the same time its verification; at this stage of scientific study we must already know, at least in a rough outline, the laws of development of socialism. Only use-value fulfills all the demands made upon a initial category, the movement of use-values implements the basic economic law of socialism.

The historical method explains the internal logic of historical processes from the point of view of the genesis and development of specific phenomena; individual historical phenomena are explained in the sequence in which they make their appearance and begin to function. It is thus possible to use as a point of departure that which begins the development of socialist production relations.

In the second part of the paper the author formulates, after analysing the genesis of socialist economic relations, the following: 1) the basic economic law as the law of social appropriation of the conditions and results of production which provide complete welfare and a comprehensively developed personality, i. e. as the law of leisure time; 2) the basic productive relationship as the relation between the collective owner and the summary worker, i. e. as the relation between total disposable social time and a section of this time (labour time) which must be devoted to the functioning of social production; 3) the basic contradiction as the contradiction between the participation of the social individual in the functioning of social production and his participation in its improvement, i. e. the contradiction between labour and leisure time; 4) the basic law of movement as the law of the increasing race of efficiency of social production, i. e. as the law of the increasing ratio of leisure time to disposable social time.

Full Czech Version see Politická ekonomie, 33, 1984, s.841-854