Question for socialists

[KimberleyChris]

If labour want to get back into power they need to talk to me

Well, my old chum, I really can't see you voting for them in a million years, so it's actually MY cross they will need on the ballot form

[DodgyAgent]

Well, my old chum, I really can't see you voting for them in a million years, so it's actually MY cross they will need on the ballot form

I think if they see my cross on their ballot paper they will pack up and go home

[EternalOptimist]

Shall I go on?

You do. you do

[d000hg]

The challenge of socialism is how to sustain wealth creation and provide a genuine good quality of life for lower earners.

No? Or is that straying into communism?

It all works if people genuinely care about their fellow man and have a work ethic for its own sake rather than the accumulation of wealth. None of that even requires the government to help out... someone has little so neighbours give what they have.

Easy

[xoggoth]

I know you lot are pig ignorant when it comes to Socialism

You have a point if you mean theoretical Socialism, I doubt anyone here has bothered to read Karl Marx or any other major treatises. However, having read rather more about general history, we do know about the reality of socialism - dictatorship, corruption, low productivity and unhappiness.

Human nature being what it is, those in power will always serve themselves, it may be plain greed, it may be empire building egotism or the well meaning pursuit of unworkable idealism, it doesn't matter. The honourable idealist Julius Nyrere ruined Tanzania's economy with his pursuit of Marxist policies almost as much as Amin ruined Uganda's.

Unfettered capitalism hands too much power to large corporations, socialism hands too much to the state. There must be strong independent checks on both. More importantly, you cannot ignore natural human wishes. That is not to say that some distribution of wealth is not a great thing (Sweden etc) as men are not just greedy, they are social animals and willing to share with those they relate to. But when too much of the fruits of a man's efforts are handed to those he does not identify with, according to rules over which he has no control, the incentive to try diminishes. This destruction of incentive is already advanced in our own nation and nobody would call the UK a socialist state.

Cue usual fine distinctions between socialism, communism etc. I recall arguments years ago with some hippy communists back in USSR era. When challenged on the awful reality, "That isn't real communism man!" When anyone cites examples of a socialist state they are never true socialist states. The true socialist state, like the perfect society of the devout that the religious bleat about, has never existed. Like heaven, the socialist state that actually works is an unattainable myth.

[KimberleyChris]

True.

Socialism (or Communism for that matter) can only really work if it is accepted by the vast majority because it is better than what was in place before.

This applies to the USSR (where it replaced feudalism/serfdom) and maybe in the Kibbutz system in Israel (in the shadow of the Holocaust).

What, I wonder, would we replace capitalism with, if that too were to totally fail us?? No system is sacred, it just needs something big enough to push the first domino over.

[DodgyAgent]

True.

Socialism (or Communism for that matter) can only really work if it is accepted by the vast majority because it is better than what was in place before.

This applies to the USSR (where it replaced feudalism/serfdom) and maybe in the Kibbutz system in Israel (in the shadow of the Holocaust).

What, I wonder, would we replace capitalism with, if that too were to totally fail us?? No system is sacred, it just needs something big enough to push the first domino over.

Socialism flies in the face of human nature as XOG argues so eloquently - better than I do Socialism can only work if it is forced upon us and it is an entirely negative ideology that permeates down through the institutions that it controls. Capitalism is at least honest and positive in its nature and reflects natural human behaviour (brutally so). For society to work it needs to harness the individual's wants and needs (capitalism) to the positive benefit of everyone. The Torys are beginning to understand this but they are too busy struggling with legacy of the rape and pillage of failed socialist activities to do anything about it in the short term.

If Labour were to grasp this and move away from their class war agendas then they might get somewhere (I still would'nt vote for them)

[KimberleyChris]

Time out....

Something here for everybody.

BBC News - 'Booth babes' stir controversy at 2012 CES

[Old Greg]

There is no single answer to what socialists think as there is no single answer to what capitalists (by which I mean people who believe in capitalism, rather than people who hold capital) think about the provision of housing. Capitalist political philosophies are broad in their spectrum from moderate liberals / one nation Tories through free marketers and right libertarian right to fascists and Nazis. They will all have different positions on housing and so it is with socialists, who range from moderate social democrats through to hard-line Trotskyites and no doubt beyond.

The essence of socialism (although someone else will say it’s something else) is democratic ownership and control of the means of production and therefore of distribution of goods and services. It means the removal of the power of capital to control labour, production and to speculate. You can infer from this that in general, socialists will not view housing as a commodity, to be speculated with or privately profited from by landlords, and indeed this is the view held by socialists I have known. Therefore, in a society where there is enough decent housing to go round, everyone will have decent housing. Similarly (in terms of responsibilities) where there is enough meaningful work to go round everyone who is capable of work will work according to their abilities (with obvious exceptions such as students and retired people).

How housing is organised is another matter. I guess there are socialists who would like to see a society in which the state provides housing. There will be others who see that just as people will collectively manage their offices / factories / shops etc., they will, in similar units, mange housing. There will be socialists who support private ownership of houses in which people live, and who are unconcerned about inequalities that this leads to as long as those inequalities are not excessive. For example, Orwell’s view of socialism was that a maximum to minimum income of 10:1 was acceptable in a socialist society in which the power of money was reduced due to its inability to profit from labour or speculate – i.e. money has just become a token to exchange for goods or services.

[vetran]

Xoggy nailed it as usual

As always a compromise. I prefer "compassionate capitalism" because you separate the people that make the money from those that spend it and from those that make the rules on how its spent or made.

That way if business or the populace doesn't like the way the government takes money or spends it then they can push back. Conversely the government can control corporations and make sure they provide socially acceptable jobs, products and behaviour.

The fact our government is not that good at doing the controlling or our corporations aren't that good at behaving is a pity. But its far better than most societies that have one organisation deciding both, I cite the Trabant and Siberian work camps as evidence.

Whilst we are now forcing our unemployed to suffer in Poundland I doubt there will be a new best seller called 'Thrift Store Archipelago'.

Animal Farm pointed out the basic issue and the concept was put well in 1887

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority, still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.

Online Library of Liberty - Acton on Moral Judgements in History

The Romans & the Greeks recognised it yet still suffered from it when the Emperors resurfaced.

Only by setting up a system where the decision makers are kept in check by an equally powerful force will you see long term stability and a society you want to live in.