i on thomas paine reviews: origins of crisis in ussr - Common Sense

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Page 34 Common Sense - Issue 15 a state of coexistence and cohesion. Particularly important is his elaboration of abstract space, the form and function of the "building" and the processes of urbanisation, and the ways in which space and violence constitutes the essence and modus operandi of the state. In this respect Lefebvre captures well one aspect of the nature of yace which marks our time, abstract space. However, it is argued here, that such insights can be developed in a more theoretically and politically fruitful way by not separating contradictions of space from contradictions in space and elevating the former over the latter. This is important because some of the tendencies in Lefebvre's approach reproduce the society-spae dualism which means that his account of the spatiality of capitalism is essentially static and becomes an object to be struggled for. While capital may attempt to continually achieve the "annihilation of space by time" (Marx 1973 p 539), this is the process of forming abstract space, capitalist space. It is none other than the continual struggle to commodify labour power and transform the spatiality of social concrete labour to the abstract, meaningless and quantitative expansion of alien wealth through the production and realisation of surplus value. Merely to attempt to invert (mentally) this tendency and displace time by space merely obscures the dynamic and contradictory nature of the capital relation and the ways in which this expresses itself in a spatially uneven way through, what Smith refers to as, "the production of space in its own image" (1990 p xv). The crucial commodity is labour power and the spatially and temporally changing ability of capital to "contain the uncontainable" (Holloway 1991 p 75) and to transform that power into surplus value. The basis of differential space as a mode of existence, not as goal but as instrument, is this "uncontrollable chaos at the heart of capital"(ibid.), one which continually undermines abstract space and forces capital to keep moving around the globe in search for an impossible "spatial fix". The importance of the debate on the spatiality of capitalism is that it raises to the consciousness the fact that "space can be made to hide consequences from us, how relations of power and discipline are inscribed into the apparently innocent spatiality of social life ...." (Soja 1989 p 6) Space is a means by which to bind as well as separate, to include as well as exclude, and precisely by bringing to life a critical conception of space Lefebvre (and the subsequent debate) has "provided some of the tools for decoding the spatial metaphors that 'script' our efforts to integrate, negotiate, and theorise different 'positions'." (Smith 1990 p 171) This is the critical and revolutionary potential inherent in Lefebvre's concept, the production of space. More importantly, however, is the fact that the concept of production brings to the fore the question of form and directly relates spatiality to the specific form of labour. Furthermore, to "change life!", to return to the quotation of Lefebvre's given at the start of this article, space will be an "instrument" in the struggle for change, but will certainly not be the "goal" of that struggle, as Lefebvre suggests. The goal of struggle is the FORM taken by labour and its abolition as imposed "work. Only by changing the form of labour will life and the spatiality of that life change, but the latter will change as result, as outcome, not as goal. An understanding of the spatiality of life will provide a powerful means of organising struggle. But to struggle against the spatiality of life without changing the form of labour will simply reproduce the abstract space that asphyxiates all of life. Acknowledgements: Thanks go to Wemer Bonefeld and Bob Goupillot for their helpful comments. This article arises out of a research project on the construction/ property development industry which is funded by The Leverhulme Trust.
Trial by Space: Reflections on Lefebvre Page 35 REFERENCES Bonefeld. W. (1993) The Recomposition of the British State During the 1980s. Dartmouth Press, Aldershot. Foucault, M. (1986) "Of other spaces" Diacritics Vol. 16 pp 22-7. Gregory, D. (1994) Geographicallrnaginatiorrs Blackwell, Oxford. Harvey, D. (1989) The Urban Experience Blackwell, Oxford. Holloway. J. (1991) "In the Beginning was the Scream" Common Sense, (11) pp 69-77, Edinburgh Jameson, F. (1984) "Postmodernism, or the cultural logic of late capitalism" New Lefi Review, (146) pp 53-92 London. Katznelson, I. (1992) Marxism and the City Clarendon Press Lefebvre, H. (1976) The Survival of Capitalism Allison & Busby Lefebvre, H. (1979) "Space: social product and use value" in Frieberg, J.W. (d.) Critical Sociology Irvington Publications Lefebvre, H. (1991) The Production of Space Blackwell Mm, K (1973) Grundrisse Pelican Pieke, F.N. (1993) "Images of protest and the use of urban space in the 1989 Chinese Peoples Movement" in Nas, P.J.M.(ed.) Urban Symbolism E.J. Brill Reed,F. (1991) On Common Ground Working Press Smith, N. (1990) Uneven Development Blackwell Soja, E. (1989) Postmodern Geogrqphies Verso Szczelkun, S. (1993) The Conspiracy of Good Taste Working Press
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