It is a shame Marxsim/communism/socialism is so much associated with tyranny and dictatorships.
Appropriation of capital basically means that the government decides to eradicate right to private ownership, thus reducing the will for economic creative destruction.
The lack of this creative destruction leads to stagnation.
To my view, one should not harken to a communist system. Marx was a great observer and analyst, but the medicine offered under the brands of socialism and communism generally create only worse situations.
19th century workers movement was needed to create pressure to give every citizen more or less equal right regardless of the property they possessed. After this was achieved, the result was a much fairer capitalist system which was far less harsh than the soul and body destroying early factory/labour conditions Marx described.
Marx's analysis was critical in specifically pointing out what was wrong. The western societies fixed themselves without violent revolution.
The places which were touched by revolution into socialist/communist systems basically became de-facto oligarchy led autocracit governments who need to cling to power using authoritarian bullying.
I think anything that needs to be written as a summary of socialist reality was written by Orwell in Animal Farm. He was a fervent socialist - but became a quite strong critic of it's implementations as they stand.
Orwells fondness for socialism was driven by his experiences as part of the civil service of the british empire - a machine of opression to him, which he came to abhor.
He thought socialism would offer a better, fairer world - only to find out it only enabled a new band of crooks to take over.
The foundations of humane societies are not in communism or socialism.
This is mighty reminiscent of basically every other system of large (super-Dunbar-scale) society control, from the ancient priest-kings, through the Roman "republic" and imperial systems, medieval feudalism, and late-stage capitalism.
When control of the political system (how society allocates resources) can be used in a self-dealing manner, and resources can be used to control the political system, the steady state will tend towards the pattern you noted above (especially when those resources tend toward power-law distributions).
Notably, the argument can be made that the situations where political power has reverted to a wider base (including the establishment of modern democracies) has come about when social or technological changes destabilized the economic distribution structure. Examples include the workers' movement you cited, the growing late medieval era's growing merchant class (whose willingness to be taxed to fund mutually-beneficial programs and corresponding demands for control over those programs helped trigger the creation of European democracy), and the western Roman Empire's decaying ability to use the funds of expansion to exert social control in its occupied territories.
Lastly, it should be noted that, as brutal, illiberal, and inegalitarian as the USSR ended up being, the society they replaced (the Tsarist Russian Empire), being an industrialized dictatorship built around an enormous serf class was probably worse on all three counts.
I disagree. The czarist state was far more lenient creature than the industrial scale slaughtermachine that was the stalinist USSR. A poignant example is the treatment of dissenters when Stalin himself was condemned for insurecctions against the czarist Russian state pre 1917. He was sent to 'exile' meaning he had to spend time in specific village, while being more or less free, being cordially observed by the guardsmen. Compare this to the well documented purges he laid upon those regarded as enemies of the state. (Ref. "Young Stalin" by Simon Sebag).
Of course USSR was more a continuation of the Russia of preceding centuries than a new political entity - hence alone cannot be used to empirically judge the quality of communism as a philosophy for state building.
"Luckily" we have many more examples around the world, especially from the eastern block countries which were prosperous modern states before they fell under the communist yoke - which in my opinion form sufficient evidence that communism does not really work as intended as a form of government that would be an obvious improvement to human condition.
With capitalism, the coercion to work is decentralized in the form of people promising to give you somebody else's work (money) if you do some work for them. Being decentralized makes a dictatorship unnecessary to sustain it.
People like to say that America is the home of the free, but we have the world’s largest prison population. This happened under a democratic capitalist system.
> With capitalism, the coercion to work is decentralized in the form of people promising to give you somebody else's work (money)
You say the system is decentralized but 3 individuals in the US hold more wealth than 50% of the population. If money is the method of decentralized enticement, yet a handful of people control most of the money and assets, is that really decentralized control? “A handful of elites owning the nation’s wealth” sounds like most people’s perception of communism, and yet it describes reality in capitalist America.
> Being decentralized makes a dictatorship unnecessary to sustain it.
Last January a defeated President and his followers attempted to overthrow democracy and install himself as the first American dictator. This happened under a capitalist republic. If capitalism makes dictatorships unnecessary, why is an authoritarian movement growing in capitalist America?
Marx said "I am not a Marxist" and "I do not write recipes for cookshops of the future", so there is no Marxist society other than the one he envisioned in the far future (certainly not a nearer term socialist future) which had the banner "From each according to ability, to each according to need".
> From each according to ability
This is the dystopian part, if they judge you to have high ability they will work you to the bone and punish you if they think they could grind more work out of you. There is no freedom to quit and do something else, there is just the judgement of the state and if they get something wrong you are screwed.
Reward people for work instead of punish people for not working, that is the capitalist way. Punishing people to get them to work is a bad idea, I thought most people on the left agreed with this? So why do you still think communism makes sense, when it is a system based on punishment rather than rewards?
Secondly, tribal human society roved in bands of approx 100+ people which, by virtue that it usually had leadership, was not entirely classless, despite the fact that the groups were small enough not to require political representation or monarchs. You're dreaming if you think individuals were always free to act against a tribe leader's wishes.
What makes me say that? Because the concept of complex systems (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_system) gave me a new approach to think about different economic and social organizations.
Economy (and society) is a complex system and it is impossible to model perfectly (at least for now). So any approach that attempts to have everything under control will (eventually) fail. Or you may need to use force to mold the reality to your hypothetical system.
Capitalism may not be the best system there is, but it certainly aligns with a complex systems point of view.
Russel, of course, was aligned with the left his entire life.
Since then socialism (per Marx defined as the nationalization of all but private effects) has been independently tried to the same ruinous effect. Every socialist regime is unique, because they all try to explain and fix why the others failed; uniquely brutal reaching it's zenith with Pol Pot.
Is Cuba a “tyrannical dictatorship”?
How did Pinochet fall?
To say all of the above, by the way, is in no way to defend the also barbaric practices of the Pinochet regime. Pinochet however at least left power after a forceful referendum and peaceful transition to democracy. The ruling elite of Cuba never did and in no way ever even let things reach the point of an honest referendum.
Cuba is a tyranny. They've soften up to get European investment and tourists, but they're brutal in their indoctrination, imprisonment of dissidents, etc. They're also an important (and beloved) backstop preventing American domination in L. America.
Pinochet didn't fall, he basically handed over power peacefully. His (surprisingly liberal) constitution of 1980 established him as head of the armed forces (which he was until he died) and promised free elections. He allowed for a fair and free elections in '88 that he lost and whose result he respected paving the way for the 1990 presidential elections. Again he lost and respected the result.
He's also a murderer who slaughtered thousands of innocents, but that's peanuts compared what the commies have wrought.
Everything I wrote is a gross oversimplification. Volumes have been written for each of the three topics you glibly referenced.
And you have to be absolutely brainwashed to believe Cuba is a “tyrannical dictatorship.”
If you read my comment carefully I clearly state:
- Pinochet slaughtered (tens) thousands of innocents
- Cuba is a backstop to American imperialism in the region which I clearly eluded as a good thing for those L. Americans outside of Cuba (at least until Americans drop their Monroe BS).
My parents are from Argentina and lost many friends, students and professors (luckily no family) to capitalist dictators. The battles of L. America literally run through my blood. I think I am very well aware who the Chilean equivalent of Videla is. Pinochet, however, must be recognized for having relinquished power unlike his Argentine capitalist counter parts and Cuban socialist counterparts.
Anyway, I think I have demonstrated a little more nuance in this very complicated topic than trite single line slogans. I am not a "capitalist", whatever that means. I reject the destructive "socialism" vs "capitalism" false dichotomy.
Nothing could expose your class position as much as your suggestion that Cuba’s leaders are Pinochet’s “counterparts.”
Pinochet was lifted into power by the American capitalist empire. Castro was lifted into power by the Cuban working class. It takes a lot of nerve to equate the two in any way, and even more to suggest that the latter should step down in spite of overwhelming support from the Cuban people.
You'd be surprised, however, how popular Pinochet is particularly among working class Chileans, just as you'd obviously be surprised how much support Cuba needed from the USSR to keep the regime together. Material support and training manuals on how to buttstock resistive people.
Battista fell over 60 years ago, Cubans want something else.
Reality is complicated, it cannot be reduced to pretty slogans.
Yes, looks like it works just like any other communist state. Communism needs to be maintained through tyranny, people wouldn't vote for it if they could which is why communist states must constantly supress dissent and never allow people to vote for other parties. When people can vote they quickly vote out communism in favor of more liberal parties, communism is very short lived in free societies as when people try it they quickly learn to hate it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/13/world/americas/cuba-judge...
Democracy is very sensitive and the liberal democracies in Western capitalist countries are brutally anti-democratic. Most Americans realize this but will be so quick to presume any other country a dictatorship.
Cuba has never been a “dictatorship”. Castro and his successors were and still are deeply loved by the Cuban working class that put them into power. US leaders understand this and it’s why none of their attacks have penetrated. See: Bay of Pigs
"Cuba is a one-party state, with the Communist Party of Cuba being described as the "superior driving force of the society and the state" in the Constitution of Cuba, and all other political parties are illegal. Elections in Cuba are not democratic because the government does not allow free and fair voting." ~https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_Cuba
So how would that work?
How does that jibe with democracy and free elections?
Cuba was just a Soviet Union's project to burn enough money to show that socialism works. But it didn't. And I very unhappy that we were living so poor in soviet era while paying those "democracies" which were modeled just like our country - with literally no choice on any elections.
And being rich is not a sin, btw.
People aren't dying on makeshift rafts trying to get there, they're dying on makeshift rafts trying to escape.
(I wouldn't lump "socialism" in there because it's more vague; social-democracy can and does work).
"Unanimous" agreement on the collective good/collective interests only works, at all, in small groups (primitive societies) and dictatorships. That was really my point.
"power" is distributed in democracies; The centralized nature of communism is its weakest spot, and it is by design.
Also, a lot of USSR space advancements were made thanks thanks to captured Nazi scientists. If they had to rely purely on homegrown science, they'd have had much harder time.
In soviet central planning system, few people make decisions that affect many and there's was redundancy. No free press. No political opposition. No economic rivalries to challenge. Same in civic/industrial evolution. If a committee decides to pursue idea X and drop idea Y.... So be it.
There was no democratic feedback mechanism either. Public is not happy that state money is used to prop up revolutions all around the world while one's citizen are living in poor condition? Tough luck, party line is never wrong.
NN Taleb stated it well on Twitter, I think: "At Fed level, libertarian; state, Republican; local, Democrat; family/friends, socialist."
I don't know, it seems like a lot of European countries with a pluralistic party system are heavily "Christian Socialist" (pro free market, pro property ownership, pro capitalist, pro safety net) and they don't seem to be any more prone to slide into dictatorship?
I've actually have never read a compiled lists of stats of what types of government make a country impervious to dictatorial rule.
Nazi (national-socialist) Germany was totally socialist.
P.S. Your description of „socialism“ is a veeeery weird one. Apparently everything is socialist.
There are no Marxist regimes; all “Communist” regimes are (or are derived from) Leninism which introduces vanguardism and other changes to avoid the prerequisite of developing proletarian class consciousness through mature capitalism in Marxism, and feature a (theoretically) transitional initial phase to replace development through private capitalism, which none have ever escaped from to anything that was supposed to be beyond it (though China rewrote the plan to include authoritarian quasi-private capitalism.)
There's a wide array of arguably socialist non-“Communist” regimes, but all of them are democratic/market socialism that explicitly accepts plural democracy and regulated (not “free”) markets as important elements.
> Nazi (national-socialist) Germany was totally socialist.
This is true to about the same extent as “the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is totally a democratic republic” is true.