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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:10   #1
dda
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Yo, Communists (part one)

I have noticed that when the subject of communism comes up our resident communists chirp blissfully about the wonders of communism. However, others inevitably bring up Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, North Korea, Cuba and various other topics.

I have additionally noted that the communists tend to reply heatedly that those are/were not truely communist and communism can't be blamed for these problems.

Okay. Good enough.

I would llike to delve a little deeper in what the communists among us feel that triue communism is. If a communist country were to exist along with the proper set of communist values, or whatever, for OUR communists to feel comfortable saying, "Yes, indeed. That is a communist country."

However, I think it would be usefull to take these things one at a time.

So, first topic.

Would a truly communist state have a democracy? Would it be totalitarian? What would be the ruling mechanism?

Let us assume that we are talking about a state larger than the average turnip field.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:25   #2
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

I always felt a communist country couldnt exist in a capitalist world. But that's nothing other that what I thought after doing no research or anything.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:27   #3
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

im not speaking for anyone else but myself (and i consider myself a 'socialist to the ends of liberalism') but i think you are going to struggle with people wanting to use the term 'communism'

Dante, if i remember, describes himself as an anarcho-marxist or something similar.

Given that the whole debate is about semantics and interpretations unless you try and clarify further this thread could be dead in the water before it begins
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:27   #4
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by dda
Would a truly communist state have a democracy? Would it be totalitarian? What would be the ruling mechanism?
Communism in the longer term wouldn't necessarily have what we would term a "state".

But for the purposes of your question, yes there would be a democracy and no it wouldn't be totalitarian. As to it's ruling mechanism, who knows? That depends on the history, culture and conditions of wherever this place is. Liberal democracy in the United Kingdom is different to liberal democracy in Japan because the two are very different countries. Socialist / communist Britain would be different to socialist / communist Japan for precisely the same reasons.

This is not evading the question but merely that to try and have some scientific plan / prescription for what society will look like is totalitarian in approach and utterly ahistorical.

In terms of what structure I'd like to see than I would say a variety of power organs would exist where people might interact with political power in more or less democratic ways. So at work they might operate through some workers council type format, at home they might be members of the Sunnydale Residents Association, in their part time they might be members of other organisations. How each of these functioned would partially depend on their members desire, the needs of the time, etc. I'm very hostile on the most past to centralisation so there would be less need for general elections, etc but I think a rule of thumb is that any group / organisation which wields political power should be democratically accountable on some level.

(It's not clear whether such formations could realistically exist as nation-states, but that's another discussion. Any time there has been a state which has called itself communist it has been attacked from outside by states/interests wishing to reverse this change, usually in collusion with the old order. The evils of Stalin are totally inexcusable in any form ever but they are slightly more understandable when one considers the western post-revolutionary intervention, war communism, the German threat, etc.)
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:35   #5
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Deffeh
Dante, if i remember, describes himself as an anarcho-marxist or something similar.
Basically, yeah. Labels in politics are almost as bad as genres in music. I sometimes say "Communist" because it's the most convenient shorthand of what I'm talking about, but yeah it does mean you end up having a lot of stupid conversations about Stalin.

Without wishing to sound like a pomo wanker, I'm not really fond of these sort of "big" questions, they're needlessly abstract and totally divorced from real-world action / behaviour. People seem to think politics is some kind of emulator saved-state which you can load to show exactly what society should / will look like, rather than being about action in a given situation based on certain moral precepts. Or something.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 00:58   #6
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

First, thank you for your response. I am genuinely intersted in getting some basic idea of what you think on the subject.

Do you see communism (or whatever you would prefer to call it) as more of an economic or social order? Democracy is more of a governmental/social order sort of thing. Capitalism is more of an economic order sort of thing. There are inevitable overlaps but where do you place Dante-Marxist doctrine.?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 02:04   #7
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

dda: I like that phrase you use "Democracy is more of a governmental/social order sort of thing".
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 02:31   #8
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by dda
First, thank you for your response. I am genuinely intersted in getting some basic idea of what you think on the subject.

Do you see communism (or whatever you would prefer to call it) as more of an economic or social order? Democracy is more of a governmental/social order sort of thing. Capitalism is more of an economic order sort of thing. There are inevitable overlaps but where do you place Dante-Marxist doctrine.?
I don't know if im completely wrong or not (I don't think so)...

But most people I know who call themselves communists are reasonably (edit: entirely) libertarian in their views of social issues.

But then most intelligent people I know are.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 03:44   #9
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
This is not evading the question but merely that to try and have some scientific plan / prescription for what society will look like is totalitarian in approach and utterly ahistorical.
It would be historical in that it takes into account the horrendous failures that previous attempts to create communist regimes without proper planning have been. I realise that Marxists tend to be intrinsically hostile to theorising as detached from action, but I think there is a point where it makes sense to acknowlege the terrible mistakes that have been made in the past and at least make an honest attempt to learn from them.

Quote:
(It's not clear whether such formations could realistically exist as nation-states, but that's another discussion. Any time there has been a state which has called itself communist it has been attacked from outside by states/interests wishing to reverse this change, usually in collusion with the old order. The evils of Stalin are totally inexcusable in any form ever but they are slightly more understandable when one considers the western post-revolutionary intervention, war communism, the German threat, etc.)
This is disingenous to the extent that it implies any particular communist state was content to be communist in isolation. The driving force behind communist ideology in the 20th century, and the soviet Party in particular, was generally that communism should be actively spread over the world to the greatest extent possible.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Deepflow
But most people I know who call themselves communists are reasonably (edit: entirely) libertarian in their views of social issues.
Everyone on the internet is a libertarian, you dont have an unbiased sample. I see no reason why communism should be libertarian in social outlook, either based on the theory behind the doctrine, or on empirical evidence of previous communism attempts. Radical democracy/anarchism tends to be fundamentally incompatible with individual liberty in the classical sense - if one of Dante's workers collectives decided that drugs should be outlawed because they were a leftover vestige of bourgeois consciousness with the sole aim of distracting alienated workers from their predicament, then I guess that would just be tough luck for anyone who wanted to take them.

You also have to take into account that the removal of a market economy would presumably make it easier for distribution of certain goods to be suppressed. If you had fixed levels of (state controlled) production and a strict control of currency and other mediums of exchange, then it would be harder for a black market to survive in goods that central bodies did not want to be widespread.

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 04:06   #10
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

I was thinking of subscribing to your ideology nod, do you have a brochure or pamphlet I could peruse for more information?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 05:08   #11
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nodrog
Everyone on the internet is a libertarian, you dont have an unbiased sample.
Everyone I know is from the internet.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nodrog
I see no reason why communism should be libertarian in social outlook, either based on the theory behind the doctrine, or on empirical evidence of previous communism attempts. Radical democracy/anarchism tends to be fundamentally incompatible with individual liberty in the classical sense - if one of Dante's workers collectives decided that drugs should be outlawed because they were a leftover vestige of bourgeois consciousness with the sole aim of distracting alienated workers from their predicament, then I guess that would just be tough luck for anyone who wanted to take them.
That's a silly argument. Why would they do such a thing?

If they did, then of course, anyone under their jurisdiction would be in tough luck. I certainly don't think this would be the prevailing attitude though. Why would it be? The attitudes of today are fairly anti-drugs amongst certain sections of society, granted, but I see no reason why they would be if people were able to begin the current legislation "from scratch" and were given access to all the info beforehand.

You might as well say "what if one of Dante's workers collectives decided to outlaw abortion/homosexuality/black people?"

The basic idea is... that if people have access to and familiarity with the correct information, then they will come to the same conclusions as me. This may be untrue... but it's yet to be tested!
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 05:30   #12
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

In a society striving for equality, all it takes if for one person to hold back to lose that. Until the people refuse to fail the system, the system will fail the people.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 05:39   #13
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Huracan
In a society striving for equality, all it takes if for one person to hold back to lose that. Until the people refuse to fail the system, the system will fail the people.
What use is the system then?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 05:46   #14
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Deepflow
That's a silly argument. Why would they do such a thing?
Because theres probably never been a society in the history of humanity that hasnt tried to censor the activities of which it disapproves? One of the most fundamental aspects of Western-style governments is the existence of checks on governmental/democratic power, whether this takes the form of constitutions, seperation of powers, etc. When you remove this, you remove any reason to believe that the majority of people wont just inflict their whims on others unchecked.

Quote:
You might as well say "what if one of Dante's workers collectives decided to outlaw abortion/homosexuality/black people?"
Yes, I could equally have used those examples. Youre proposing the removal of all checks on executive power (where executive here just means the ability of communes to enforce their decisions).
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 06:31   #15
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Nodrog
It would be historical in that it takes into account the horrendous failures that previous attempts to create communist regimes without proper planning have been.
I think the main useful thing Marxists (or indeed anyone advocating a new social order) can do is outline general principles. Specifics (e.g. how often people should vote for their local representative, how many people each ward will contain) is speculation at best and would seem to be a waste of time as discussion topics go (especially as you then get bogged down in side issues, or defending irrelevant details).

A problem which has affected some revolutions* in the past is the perception that they (i.e. the revolutionaries) would replace a social order over night. This leads to it's logical (utterly absurd/grotesque) end point with the Khmer Rogue. An attempt is made to completely remake society in one gigantic act of sheer will (with obvious accompanying slaughter). One of the things that encourages such an approach is dwelling excessively on utopian fantasies (almost inevitably top-down, by their very nature). If you inherit system x and then want to completely change it to system y then you start seeing centralisation as the obvious path. It's the sort of Civilisation (or Populus/Sim City) approach to politics; "You have total control over the world, how do you want it to be?"

The question "How should society be?" isn't really one we should ask any more than "How should a human being be?". There isn't some end point / ideal type as such we're aiming at, but more an approach that an awesome human being (/society) would take, given certain conditions. Having said that, I would "blame" Marx for not being explicit in some of his works - if he had spent a few chapters saying "ffs, in a new society there will be no imprisonment without trial, there will be no suppressing of free speech or free assembly...etc" then I don't dare to think how many lives could have been saved.

I would say that these sorts of questions are probably best handled in novels, and if I wasn't a useless gobshite, I'd try to do such a thing. Given we are in a situation where revolutionary left parties struggle to maintain memberships in double figures it's difficult to embark on such a project seriously though. Where there are developments in this area I suspect they will at least partially come out of struggles or experience. Orwell's 'Homage to Catalonia' is more interesting than 90% of academic left utopias combined because although tragic it is a real product of history.
Quote:
I realise that Marxists tend to be intrinsically hostile to theorising as detached from action, but I think there is a point where it makes sense to acknowlege the terrible mistakes that have been made in the past and at least make an honest attempt to learn from them.
Despite my comments in the above, I agree with this and would concede one that it represents one of the main weaknesses in Marxist (or whatever) theory today. There are people who have written things on this subject, but they're not well publicised and they generally fall into masturbatory utopian fantasising before too long. For those interested, there used to be a journal called 'Democracy & Nature' (now not published) which tackled these sorts of questions. The late Murray Bookchin I think did a couple of articles on his proposed utopia : libertarian municipalism.
Quote:
This is disingenous to the extent that it implies any particular communist state was content to be communist in isolation. The driving force behind communist ideology in the 20th century, and the soviet Party in particular, was generally that communism should be actively spread over the world to the greatest extent possible.
This is true, but doesn't change anything. Let's imagine that, at some point in the future, a global Islamic movement manages to defeat liberal democracy globally and replace existing governments with Islamic theocracies. A few years after this, one country tries to have a liberal revolution, and this is violently put down after intervention from it's neighbours. The Islamic apologist could easily say "Well, liberal democracy is a totalitarian ideology. They are not content until every single person in the world has their precious 'freedoms'". And they'd be correct (upto a point).

But then any analysis of the nascent liberal state would have to take into account they were almost immediately attacked by the dominant world power(s). You couldn't look at the experiences of this hypothetical state and try to generalise from its experiences. Even if the first intervention failed, and they survived then the economy and politics of the country would (most probably) be warped. Even a relatively small risk (e.g. like the United States faces now, in comparative terms) can lead to a sort of national paranoia, curtailing of individual freedoms and abuses of power. What would the United States look like if more than a dozen countries had recently landed troops to attack them and an industrially strong Mexico was talking about needing more living space in the North. It's possible to imagine that we might get things siginificantly worse than the Patriot Act.

But this is kind of what we find if we look at post-revolutionary Russia. Between 1918 and 1920, when Soviet Russia was in such a mess to not be a direct threat to the Imperial powers, over 100,000 foriegn troops intervened (not including the German/Austro-Hungarians who were already fighting the Russians), often directly against Bolshevik forces. I am not complaining about such an action, it makes sense from a power perspective, I am merely saying that we should take it into account in any analysis of the resulting politics.

I would say that one general principle of any socialist state would be a total rejection of conscription (and perhaps even a rejection of having a military at all). However, if on Day #1 of the new order the nation was attacked by someone then what? Chomsky raises this question and seems to suggest that it would be better to not resist at all, thereby being a heroic example to future struggles. I'm not sure if I was the elected representative for the Campberwell Worker's Council I could seriously suggest people martyr themselves on the guns of the oncoming troops. However, I do get his point that any sort of military struggle will result in the usual war-like-conditions. In a similar vein, did the American revolutionaries always respect due process when dealing with British sympathisers in the colonies during the fight for independence? Again, this is not to defend the horrors that resulted from the Russian revolution and it's long and bloody aftermath.

But I'd say that it's a general rule that in wars for national survival that even nations with checks on executive power can run into problems. One of the reasons Britain has not fallen into dictatorship is not the checks and balances which exist in Britain but a general culture which does not favour totalitarianism or arbritrary violation of the rule of law. It's also probably the reason which Britain has lower levels of corruption than even economically comparable parts of Europe. The point is, what we'd need in any crisis situation is a population which appreciated freedom and held the right kind of cultural values. (Based on current trends, we're screwed. )

Anyway, all we can do is prepare ideologically and practically - both domestically and internationally. If there was a sufficiently strong anti-military movement in Britain then that would probably be able to constrain the British state from intervening in a hypothetical French revolution in the first place. One of the (many) problems with the Russian revolution was it took place in such isolation that not only did Europeans workers not join them but the left was unable to stop attacks against the new regime. Even today while America does not necessarily invade Cuba (at least partially due to international opinion I would say), there is still a blockade in place which unnecessarily immiserates the Cuban people mainly, or so it seems, out of spite.

Perhaps in the future, given technological and economic developments (and mass migration) we could expect a more trans-national outlook to arise. Not necessarily totally internationalist (because these links between nations are not evenly spread) - but a strong cultural affinity between citizens across national boundaries (due to the 'net and such). If such a thing happened then we'd be less likely to see massive military interventions as has happened in the past (maybe).

Previously people relied on a global media (controlled/influenced to a greater or lesser extent by state power or capital) for global news, but now there is much more scope for hearing directly from the people involed. As I've said before, 9/11 was interesting to me because it was the first global event where I learnt just as much from people I knew on the ground (e.g. New Yorkers on mailing lists I was on) than I did the TV news. If we develop to a state where everyones phone is basically a super powerful camcodrder and there are methods of sharing such video in an uncensored fashion then I suspect the scope for "Bolsheviks Eat Babies" type propaganda will be greatly reduced. As such, it might get to the stage where if political consciousness was high enough then it wouldn't matter if it was only socialism (or whatever) in one country since the power to blockade, attack and destabalise such a country would be constrained by internal forces. This already happens of course, and certainly in Europe the ability for states to participate in the Iraq war has been reduced dramatically (especially given the response of large, restless Muslim populations throughout most of Western Europe).

* = "Revolution" is a word which also carries with a lot of baggage which implies baracades, slaughtering aristocrats and replacing society overnight. It has now got to the point where some believe that an action can only be revolutionary if it involves murder. This is obviously not the case and to an extent, revolution is a word which needs reclaiming.

Last edited by Dante Hicks; 30 Dec 2006 at 10:19.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 09:45   #16
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by dda
Do you see communism (or whatever you would prefer to call it) as more of an economic or social order?
The terms used all mean different things in different contexts, which is why discussion is so difficult. As briefly as possible (which isn't very briefly at all since those post has ended up at 3.5k words), here are some definitions (oy vey, all this before I even answer your question!). This might help, or it might simply confuse the issue. **** you either way.

Dante's Guide to Political Definitions of the 'Left' - you can skip down to half-way through the post where I actually try to answer the question if you want to avoid all this nonsense.

the left :
In the French assembly of the 1780's the division was between the people who supported the old regime (on the right) versus the people who were for change (on the left). As such, left became a sort of synonym for radical and right for reactionary. Such terms still apply, but are less useful - partly because it's impossible to define most modern questions in those terms and partly because every user of the terms left/right means something else. This forum has about 4-5 working definition.

When I say left (or more commonly, "far-left") I am talking about people who want social change towards less inequality, more freedom, less nationalism, less religion, less racism, respect scientific reason, etc. However, not all self-proclaimed "Marxists" follow this - many have been openly hostile to the power of human reason in recent years. As with many of these terms, it's imperfect and has the added difficulty of multiple definitions. Before debating someone, ask what they mean - it probably isn't what you thought.

Marxism :
the set of ideas espoused in the collected works of Karl Marx and Frederich Engels. Mainly centring on a historical analysis which looked at the way human beings produce (i.e. make food to live) and reproduce (i.e. procreate). This analysis continues on to how economic classes (which emerge from increased specialisation and the move to agriculture) interact with each other and how much of history was determined by these (class) struggles. Marxism presupposes many things; atheism, materialism, rationalism, etc and is very much a product of the European enlightenment and arguably various Judeo-Christian traditions. Marx described his theories as a combination of English economics, German philosophy and French politics.

analytical marxism
There are two sides to Marxism -the first is a value free, morality-free analytical approach to social and political quesitions. As such, it is possible to find speeches from business leaders or arch-reactionaries talking about class struggle. They are adopting Marxist language (and possibly analysis) but are not necessarily adopting the implied political-moral side. They are Marxists, but for the other side, as some say. This is understandable because ideas about economic history, class struggle and so on were always present in Western philosophy (they can be found in Plato) and Marx is perhaps just the most famous (and able) theorist to have developed them. Many of the ideas Marx outlined have (in some cases) leaked into the wider consciousness and even presently (if not as confidently as in years gone by) it could be said that in an analytical sense 'we are all Marxists now'.

political marxism
The second side of Marxism is the political more value-laden side. Arguably this is the "ethical" position Marx implies, but it's difficult because Marx had no truck with what he thought of as bourgeois moralising and so tried to stay clear of rhetorical condemning. From one point of view, Marx merely said certain things would happen, they were historical inevitabilities and did not even really say this was good or bad. That's a bad argument though and breaks down when one consider Marx's political actions or read some of his more moving condemnations of factory conditions in industrial England. Marx may have tried to make his work scientific, but this does not mean he was conducting science in the sense a disinterested biologist examines a bacterial culture. Overall this political Marxism is called various things : revolutionary socialism, communism or it's subsets : Maoism, Trotskyism, Leninism, etc.

Basically the political premise is : We should undertake a revolution to overthrow the current ruling class and private property relations, replacing it with something we might call 'socialism'. In the longer term after an undefined length of time you'd move towards communism, a theoretical state much more in line with anarchist ideas (e.g. a withering of the state, perhaps abolition of the division of labour as we know it, etc). What socialism will look like before communism is a notoriously underdeveloped aspect of Marxist theory and has become associated (by default) with the monstrous state socialist failures. Marx has precious little to say on the subject (for various reasons).

marxist
The problem with the term "Marxist" is it is too personal. It is easy to be accused of following a secular religion when a set of beliefs is named after a man. Marx and Engels wrote a great deal, a lot of which is quite interesting, some of which is brilliant, some which is frankly rubbish. Consider the following insight, surely at home in #forums :
Quote:
Originally Posted by Letter from Marx to Engels, 1862
It is now quite plain to me — as the shape of his head and the way his hair grows also testify — that he is descended from the negroes who accompanied Moses’ flight from Egypt (unless his mother or paternal grandmother interbred with a nigg**). Now, this blend of Jewishness and Germanness, on the one hand, and basic negroid stock, on the other, must inevitably give rise to a peculiar product. The fellow’s importunity is also nigg**-like.
So we obviously don't follow all of it. We cherry pick the good bits, as you would with any philosophy. But why bother calling yourself a Marxist? To be honest, the only reason I do is convenience. My political ideas are from a dozen sources but calling myself a "Russellian-Chomskyan-Orwellian-Marxist-Luxemburgian-Gramscian-Smithian-Jeffersonian-etc" is unwieldy and Dante-ist won't mean anything beyond those that already know me.

troskyism/maoism/leninism
by and large, these are add-ons to Marx's initial theories. If someone says they're a Maoist then this should mean they broadly follow Marx's ideas on history, class, etc (this isn't always true).

A lot of what Marx's intellectual descendents wrote about (particularly these three) were revolutionary strategies. Mao developed theories on guerilla war and working with the peasantry, Lenin on the vanguard party and attitudes to other parties while Trotsky wrote about the permanent revolution. While these might be important in some contexts, it seems strange to define yourselves in these terms. But this is exactly what the far-left does on the whole (or at least did) which is one of the many reasons it remains an utter irrelevance in most of the world.

Generalising horribly; I would avoid anyone who describes themselves primarily as a Leninist, Trotskyist or Maoist today (that might include Zhukov, I'm not sure ). If nothing else, these thinkers didn't necessarily support the "universalising" of their ideas (well, before they went nuts like Mao) and applying them to radically different countries. Perhaps it's appropriate the Maoist guerillas in rural Nepal use Mao's strategies, but it's bizarre that urban political groups in the United States into the 1970's would call themselves Maoists. (Although I would concede that are transferable ideas in Mao).

Some of Marx's descendents did write interesting political things outside of revolutionary theory - Antonio Gramsci's prison notebooks are worth a read (although some of it is very specific to the Italian left circa 1920) - Rosa Luxemburg offers a slightly more anarchist-approach to Marxism and even people like Stalin wrote the odd article (on the national question) before they gave up writing and become a professional mass murderer.

communism :
either means the post-socialist social structure mentioned in Marx & Engels works
or the desire for such a society,
or some pre-Marxist idea of socialism which relied on the abscence of private property - e.g. the theories of some Christian sects.
or the government type of the smattering of nation states which existed after the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, from Cuba to North Korea.

These states were usually called 'actually existing socialism' and originally not even the leaders called their system "communism". They saw that as post-capitalist (well, sort of) countries they could only be socialist by Marx's reckoning. However, for propaganda purposes in time some of nations promoted themselves after some imagined milestone had been reached and they felt they were perfect. They also similarly dubbed themselves people's democracies but that was taken slightly less seriously. I'm not sure about Cuba, they seem to use the term socialist most of the time, and as for China, clearly anything they have to say on the subject of the abolition of private property should be greeted with amusement.

So anyway communism came to mean 'Stalinist states'. Giant centralised economies, no political freedoms, no dissent, poor standards of living, politically engineered famines.

socialism
At the same time 'socialism' in Western Europe increasingly meant non-revolutionary socialism - usually socialism via the ballot box ('parliamentary socialism') where the working class (owing to it's vast numbers and universal franchise) would simply vote in socialism. That is why now people use 'socialist' as the less radical cousin of 'communist' which is fair enough.

The main problem with "actually existing socialism" and "parliamentary socialism" is both became utterly intwined with ideas of state power (and to an extent, repression). Originally, "the left" was not only anti-state but also was (at times) the champion of liberty in parts of Europe. Even up to WW2 it was not always surprising that the Communists were the backbone of some of the anti-fascist resistance (especially in parts of Italy and Albania). They were fighting fascism not just because that was the Moscow line but often because the left was the natural ally to rebellion and (incredible as it might seem now) to freedom too.

Of course, now we are at a point where (in America at least) the term socialism is synonomous with freedom-hating and where "socialist" parties across Europe routinely vote in authoritarian directions, lacking any imagination as to how else social justice might be achieved.

In most of the industrialised worlds the right are much more comfortable talking "liberty" than the left, who are much more about state control of your lives. In fact, the right often appear more radical - of the PM's of the last 35 years Thatcher was probably the most "radical" in terms of change undertaken and the scale of confrontation against the status quo. The left on the other hand is conservative, timid with no real ideas of where to go.

This transformation is partly down to some cleverness by the right (who in Hayek and the Chicago School economists had intellectual idols for the first time in a while), but it's mainly attributable to the utter stupidity and intellectual bankruptcy of pretty much the whole left (or at least the bits calling itself communist). The only high profile left-wing intellectuals active in the post-war period to emerge with any credit (and stay radical - some like Orwell moved a little more to the centre) are to my mind Noam Chomsky, Bertrand Russell, Michael Focault and Jean-Paul Sartre. Even here I am not sure whether Foucault or Sartre have much of a reputation in the English speaking world (outside academia). I am not even sure of their radicalism either - certainly Sartre seemed to indulge in a sophisticated form of trolling for much of his career.

Of the four, none were political Communists in the sense Trotsky or Lenin and it is telling that the two from the English speaking world have almost zero association with communism at all.

My Attempt At Explaining Myself (or, why you shouldn't do drugs, kids)
Quote:
Democracy is more of a governmental/social order sort of thing. Capitalism is more of an economic order sort of thing. There are inevitable overlaps but where do you place Dante-Marxist doctrine.?
Although I do not agree with Marx 100% (or even 90%), I'll quote his words to give the simplest answer I can :
Quote:
Originally Posted by Karl Marx in the Communist Manifesto
In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property.
Note Marx doesn't say anything about equal wages, or that everyone will have the same size house, or that the government will ensure everyone has the same rate of income irrespective of whether they work. It does not say that individuals can be rewarded for extra work, or for showing special ingenuity or whatever else. All it says is private property.

A little later in the same work Marx says :
Quote:
Communism deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society; all that it does is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labor of others by means of such appropriations.
Now, you could read this however you wish - some say it means it would be illegal to hire someone, or to pay someone to give you a massage, or something like that. I don't really care which is the most accurate but my reading / viewpoint would be that : individual enterprise is not being opposed. Individual enterprise which pays others as part of a collective venture, where their return is guaranteed (i.e. wages) and yours is surplus (i.e. profits) is also not being opposed.

What is being opposed is the accumulation of private property. Now, arguably everything we own down to our clothes is "property" so clearly we don't mean that - and what I am talking about can basically be restricted to land (or real-estate which sits on such land). Land cannot be bought or sold for the simple reason it is not owned. You might be considered the guardian of such land for a given period, much like you are the guardians of your children. As such, you have you certain power but these are not unrestricted and you do not have the right to sell your land (or your children).

Now, who occupies what piece of land and does what with it is a terribly complex issue, one which cannot (for ethical and practical reasons) ignore existing conditions or historical claims, etc - one only has to look at the horrors of forced collectivisations to see some previous mistakes where people thought society could be reset in a single stroke of a bureaucrats pen. So I won't say who is going to have what, that's silly but these questions will be dealt with in a timespan measured in decades or maybe even centuries, not days. In some countries where things are more pressing (e.g. land claims in Southern Africa) then there are other issues, but as seen, simply throwing people off lands they've farmed for years is often counter-productive to say the least. The process dealing with such issues would be both political and legal (I would imagine) and vary from country to country.

Speaking philosophically the principle is : the world belongs to all human beings both present and unborn, and must be managed as such. We must therefore, in the longer term come to agreements locally among all who live in a given area as to what happens with what land. This does not mean all questions become purely democratic - things like security of tenure would mean you wouldn't randomly fear you lost your home - but that our most important asset (i.e. the world) must be managed by the above principle and in conjunction with human need. That's the key thing for me (I think Marx is partly with me here, but he would probably disagree on my emphasis - it doesn't matter however). Issues such as what happens with factories, or homes, or resources are all subsets of that (i.e. land) question. On the whole, contemporary debates ignore the land issue horribly (in the developed world at least, in the developing it's a lot more obvious and you get stuff like this).

Anyway, so the property issue (our one line definition of communism) would primarily seem to be an economic issue, but of course land has special value/meaning beyond it's economic. Who lives where and what they're allowed to do covers a whole swathe of subissues. A small example - the UK government is going to ban smoking in pubs and clubs (i.e. privately owned buildings). Should they have the power? Can we reasonably talk of private property if they can do this? Similarly; in any discussion of social development (either present or future) we need to think how social space is distributed and managed. So if people want to conduct unusual, but consensual sexual activities they must have space to do this, and protection from intervention from those who oppose their behaviour. Security must exist (both from attack or state intervention) to protect personal liberties, and this will often involve property of one form or another. These sorts of nuts and bolts issues are the key political issues to be worked out before we can move forward. I am proposing no magic bullet, there will always be arguments and most probably there will also be intolerant ****s.

Many economics issues depend on the land issue, but what about other types of economics questions. What would the state do in a economy moving towards communism?

All economic activity is primarily a transaction between two or more individuals. Whether one of these individuals involved in the transaction is an employee of the state (and conducting "state business") is not really important unless we are implying that their position brings with it a special benefit (i.e. the state has a monopoly on this activity, or they can use coercion to get what they want or perhaps conversely that as the state they pay much higer rates than anyone else)

Now, without wishing to get into specifics, what is our desired end result? I would say that one might be an end to this special status in economic transactions. If I work for the housing department and I go to buy a door (either personally or as part of my work) then why should I have special treatment (unless we have a bulk agreement in place or something).

Once we start to view things like that, are these bodies (e.g. the Camberwell Shop Co-Op) really "the state" at all? They are not monopolies (anyone can compete with their services for the most part), they cannot use coercion against suppliers or consumers and they are regulated in the same fashion as everyone else (if at all).

Of course they might be democratically accountable, but I am presuming that many enterprises would be democratically run - especially where there is some dependence on the utilisation of non-trivial amounts of land. And so this public/private schism disappears - everything is private and everything is public. Of course, there are exceptions (at least in the mid-term) - there might be restrictions on how many people can run their own army say (there might not be, I don't really care tbh). These are more long term issues though, and not something we have to worry about for at least ten years (even if everyone awoke tomorrow believing Dante-ism).

Other political/economic questions like whether people earn the same amount of money is of secondary interest here. I don't even think equal wages would be desirable (even if achievable) and people who focus on those sorts of (end results) are mainly people interested in parliamentary socialism (i.e. what should a socialist government do). Now, this is not to say I do not have a view on income inequality (or the host of issues which go with it) and I would certainly say that a society which did not address this in the longer term would not deserve to be called a functioning communist system. But this does not mean that retarded proclamations about forcing people to be equal are part of our doctrine.

One problem is that political positions now are not the same as hypothetical political position in the future. I'd like to think that in a better future you wouldn't have a minimum wage - not becuase I want lower wages but because such a concept wouldn't make sense in such a soceity - either from the point of view of people choosing to work for a pittance or people interfering with someone elses private transactions. But I am in favour of a minimum wage now, because that's not the society we live in. Again, politics is a lot more dynamic than simplistic questions like : "Are you in favour of policy x?" allow. The answer to almost every question like that is "yes and no - it depends on the circumstances".

There's lots more than just land, but I've already written eight million words and that's perhaps the core point which sets what I'm talking apart from something like anarcho-capitalism. There are other key principles to my philosophy like the denial of the concept of intellectual property, or the absolute importance of liberty, and the origin of rights generally. But they can wait for now.

In conclusion : Communism is lots of things. Primarily, to me, it's about the practical realisation of the aims of the original French revolutionary slogan : liberty, equality and fraternity.

Moreover, it's about realising that we have a shared destiny that arises from our co-habitation of this world along with our specific species character (consciousness). We must build a world we can all live in and first build a system which allows us to build such a world. But to even begin any of this, we must recognise that politics should not come from abstract designs or fantasies but through continual two-way interactions with existing realities (e.g. our environment & cultural histories). We must have a philosophy which deals with the real world, not which is frightened by it.

Thus to adapt a cliche, communism is not the place we're going nor even how we're getting there. It's about an attitude (or set of attitudes) which define how we perceive the world : our land, not my land - human beings not citizen or subject of nation x or y - inherent universal freedoms, not easily revoked government privileges, our brothers and sisters, not merely people who share the same space as us.

I hope that answers part of your question.

p.s. Yes, I am on meth.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 10:37   #17
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

While your land-based communism is slightly different from other flavours, I think it shares the same basic flaw - namely a pathological fixation on the part played by material forces in determining the value of goods rather than the concretised ideas and visions which have allowed their production. The labour theory of value is the most explicit example of this fallacy, but it seems to be always present in the background whenever communism is discussed.

I was reading the German Idelology last month and the part that really stands out is just how dated it all sounds - the account of production and general wealth-creation given by Marx probably made a lot of sense in 1850 whem the average worker was involved in either agriculture or factory-based production with no real social or employment mobility, but it has very little relevant to modern Western countries where most work is technological and/or service based with many opportunities for specialist training, career changing, and general ladder climbing.

The most obvious example of this involves the nebulous 'means of production'. Someone who uses this term is probably thinking about factory conveyer belts and tractors, but in the modern world a few computers can be all you need to generate a fortune. Some of the world's most profitable companies are investment banks, and the only 'means of production' they own are offices filled with computers and telephones. Law firms can make huge profits without really producing or consuming anything, and IT companies can require even less - there are many websites with gigantic turnovers which started out as bedroom projects.

Your focus on land shares this problem - placing such a large value on land makes sense in an environment where most wealth is created by factories and farms, but that just isnt the world we live in any more. Noone has large amounts of land in London, Tokyo or New York, yet these are the richest cities in the world by quite some margin. The Citigroup skyscraper at Canary Wharf takes up a tiny area of land, yet the offices in it are generating profits in the millions. Land isnt that valuable in its own right - it's what you do with it that counts, and modern technlogy makes it possible for larger and larger profits to be generated by smaller and smaller areas of land. Yeah, you could bring in some system where all land is communally owned and noone gets to occupy more of it than anyone else, but I doubt that this would reduce income inequality in the longterm, because some people are always going to be able to use their land in a far more productive way than others.

Regardless of the system you bring in, there will be people who - whether by luck, hardwork or genius - can use what theyre allocated to become far far richer than those around them, and this will necessarily lead to significant longterm inequality unless you have something in place explicitly banning people from owning more than others even when they are producing greater amounts.

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 11:30   #18
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Also its worth pointing out that even when it comes to large corporations, talking about 'ownership' can be a bit nebulous anyway - a public company is owned by its shareholders, and in practice these can just be average people (the 'workers' if you will, and in the case of companies which give stock options this is literally true). Even when you have larger shareholders like saving banks and (eg) pension funds invested by trustees, this will be money which in some way represents the savings of average people. Yeah in a lot of cases individual shareholders wont have a great say in company policy but the same applies to any system where youre just one owner among many (including communally owned factories and democratic governments). And the people who run companies day to day arent some shadowly clique of capitalists either - its largely just going to be average people who started out at some company and worked their way up through the ranks until they reached director/partner status. With some companies you do have elements of hereditary ownership (Donald Trump being a representative example), but with others the owners are just normal workers who created the whole thing from scratch (Microsoft being a paradigm case).

Basically, now that we've moved beyond the model of factories and farmland which have their ownership determined by hereditary, there is no coherent way to draw a sharp distinction between owners of capital/land/'means of production', and workers - that isnt really how advanced capitalism works.

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 11:39   #19
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
Its obvious really, there isn't much debate, the capitalists have had centuries to make life better for everyone and yet in many cases it has gotten worse. Some people are back to living in almost stone-age conditions because of the system. Its understood that the institutions which rest on that system can't change it to any great extent because they are part of it as well. Its no one's fault but that is the way things are.
Are things really worse for a poor English person today compared to a poor English person in 1706?

Free education
Free healthcare
Unemployment benefit
Housing benefit
Various other benefits (child benefit, incapacity benefit)
Various guaranteed human rights
Minimum wage

Surely this is preferable to what came before? It might not be utopia, but in the real world it beats any attempt at utopia that has yet been attempted.

Quote:
So in this new society people might quite reasonably be expected to ask: "What do we do now? How can we create a system which uses people's abilities to provide the things they need? Whilst letting them make choices about their own lives, giving them equal share in decision making, distribute resources according to those needs and giving equal access to them. How do we settle disputes in such a society and how do we work together to make sure that one group of people does not enjoy dominion over another?"
The simple answer is surely strong protection of individual rights combined with generous redistribution?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 11:48   #20
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by ComradeRob
Are things really worse for a poor English person today compared to a poor English person in 1706?

Free education
Free healthcare
Unemployment benefit
Housing benefit
Various other benefits (child benefit, incapacity benefit)
Various guaranteed human rights
Minimum wage

Surely this is preferable to what came before? It might not be utopia, but in the real world it beats any attempt at utopia that has yet been attempted.
Presumably T&F is talking globally. Not that I think the fact certain people live in dire poverty is because capitalism is evil, more so that globalisation works in ****ed up ways.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 11:51   #21
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by JonnyBGood
Presumably T&F is talking globally. Not that I think the fact certain people live in dire poverty is because capitalism is evil, more so that globalisation works in ****ed up ways.
Globally speaking the countries T&F is talking about are most likely in fairly similar positions to where Britain was in 1800, and talking about their plight as if its some intractable problem of capitalism rather than a transitional phase as they move from being poor countries into first world nations would be making an identical mistake to the one Marx made 100 years ago, or which someone in India would have been making if he had said the same thing 50 years ago, or which someone in S Korea/Hong Kong would have been making had they etc etc.

We can keep outsourcing work to poorer countries and then leaving when theyve developed a bit and it becomes too expensive for another 100 years, and by that time we should have robots to do all the dull jobs anyway. The real problem is ensuring that poor countries have the correct political and economic conditions to develop, which historically means Western values and systems rather than dictatorships and failed attempts at communism.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 12:10   #22
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Capitalism and Free Enterprise FTW!!

Communism has always been a futile cry of the lazy for equality and has been used as an alibi for dictatorships who implement Communism to satisfy their greed.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 12:22   #23
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

I'm not a communist (despite the name), but for what it's worth, here's my shot at a perfect system of utopian government:

Firstly, the state is a giant insurance system. It protects and enforces individual rights which all citizens are endowed with. The citizens pay the state to protect those rights. One can (as per anarcho-capitalism) imagine the possibility of competing 'states' which protect their citizens' rights, but I personally think it makes sense to have one state per one geographical area. For historical reasons, traditional nation states are the easiest model to use for an example.

So, the state is insurance against anarchy (the bad kind of anarchy where all rights are dissolved and people steal anything not nailed down). For the sake of the example, anarchy can be considered to be the point at which any rights you have no longer mean anything; you can be murdered with impunity, the largest armed gang steal the most valuable stuff, and almost all productive activity ceases. Since as citizens we have an interest in avoiding this, we pay our taxes. However, some people have a lot more to lose than others. This is why taxes should be based on wealth rather than income; using some form of land value tax would make sense. Think of it as an insurance premium; the premium on a mansion, a Jag, Rolls Royce and a yacht is higher than the premium on a two-bedroom terraced house in Newcastle. Those with the most to lose from anarchy contribute the most to its prevention. LVT looks like it has some nice side-effects too, such as incentivising people/businesses to move away from ridiculously expensive areas like London and towards a more even distribution of land use. LVT also prevents free-riding on publicly-provided goods (if the land your house is on increases 50% in value because a good school was built around the corner at no cost to you, you will pay for it in land taxes).

A cynical Marxist may note (as Marx himself did) that this all accepts the basic premise of capitalism. Well, yes, it does. But in the context of the present system, that is not a useful argument. Our present solution is capitalism mixed with various solutions which have either not been fully implemented, or have been stretched beyond their original purpose (income tax was, famously, introduced to fund the war against Napoleon). Since capitalism is the only show in town, we might as well have a tax structure designed to take advantage of it, rather than set up to fight it (a battle which can never be won).

I'd also abolish the present benefits system, and replace it with a basic income. Something in the vicinity of £5k per year perhaps (roughly equivalent to the higher rate of student loan, except it doesn't have to be paid back). Everyone would receive this, though obviously some people would pay more back in taxation (so for them it might work like an extension to the personal allowance). The basic income also neatly solves the problem of regional transfer payments. If set at the same level across the country, it would have an equalising effect on incomes across the country.

Privatise the schools and hospitals. Yes, the 'P' word will probably scare a lot of people off, but centralised education and healthcare (but most particularly education) seems like a means of keeping people locked into a system not of their choosing. I am highly dubious about the way we do education in Britain, and the government's habit of top-down changes every couple of years is destructive to teachers and pupils alike. Independent schools would be free to teach as they think best, and would live or die on the success of their methods rather than their OFSTED ratings. Diversity should breed innovation and improvement.

Perhaps this is somewhat fanciful, but I'd like to imagine that we could create a more participatory society along this model. The monolithic state destroys interpersonal relationships by turning them into a relationship between citizen and state. The pre-welfare state institutions of friendly societies, clubs, community schools and hospitals, religious groups, trades unions and others have been systematically eroded in their importance (some disappearing almost entirely) by the existence of the welfare state which has sought to replace these social networks with 'entitlements' from the state. My hope would be that getting the state out of people's lives would lead to a renaissance in social cooperation (well, I did say it was a utopian vision). The poverty of the pre-welfare state period is avoided by the use of the basic income. I recognise that this is somewhat contradictory; removing all benefits would pretty much guarantee an increase in social cooperation as it would be necessary to cooperate in order to survive. My excuse is simply that, if there is a trade-off, I'm on the side that doesn't risk people starving to death. Yes, some people will probably continue to drop out of society, but some people probably always will. My hope is that by removing the state provision of services, people will come up with their own local solutions, whilst we maintain the funding of such institutions via the basic income.

So, an end to means-testing, benefits offices, government health initiatives, schools being used for social engineering experiments. The state should probably be limited to the core functions of defence and law and order. Anything else that people want can be purchased via the basic income. The basic income would rise in proportion to GDP (which means that we all have an interest in a productive economy). I should also add that the constitution would set out a wide range of basic rights, essentially comprising of the classical liberal rights (free speech, free assembly and so forth). Mostly 'negative rights' with the exception of the right to the basic income.

In all honesty, this system probably displays some class/background bias on my part; it is designed to favour the hard-working/intelligent from poor/lower-middle-class backgrounds. Relative to the present system, it's probably bad for people who are already very wealthy. It should (depending on the precise levels of tax) be neutral for the 'average person', and profoundly beneficial for the poor. It would also be greatly beneficial for those who are on a high-ish income but from a poor background - they don't yet have much property as they haven't had time to acquire it, but they would lose a lot less of their income due to the abolition of income tax (so social mobility should increase).

If I had to describe this system, I'd probably call it 'left libertarian'. Not my phrase, but it fits well enough (though I expect it already has another meaning ).
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 12:32   #24
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

A wealth tax is probably the worst idea for a taxation scheme possible because people with a medium-large amount of assets will generally have the bulk of them in non-liquid form which makes paying the tax impossible unless they have a high sustainable (and increasing) level of income.

I mean lets say someone buys (or inherits!) a house valued at £1million. If you want to set wealth tax at 10% or so then hes going to be paying £100,000 a year for the rest of his life, which makes further earning, retirement or even taking a short term paycut, impossible.

Or what about the average person saving for retirement? If he makes £30000 a year or so, then when his savings exceed £100000 or so then hes going to be paying so much in tax relative to his income that he wont be able to live.

There is no fundamental connection between wealth (what youre being taxed on) and income (what youre using to pay the tax), so a wealth tax is completely unworkable. It would also mean theres no incentive whatsoever in having savings if you were to set the rate at more than 1-2% above inflation since you'd actually be losing money.



Also your basic income idea is surely just a method of inflating the currency, you could do it more directly and avoid the distribution costs of actualy giving out £5000 to everyone. It would be amusing watching the economy crash as soon as you announced you were implementing it though as all foreign investors dumped their currency holdings overnight.


edit: Regarding free-riding on publically created goods, we already have capital gains tax so youre attacking a problem which doesnt really exist anyway (except that your idea is far worse than CGT since if my house increased in value by £50000 over maybe 3 years and my salary didnt increase, I would presumably have to find £5000 a year out of nowhere in order to pay the increased wealth tax or sell the house, whereas CGT would only tax the liquid profit when/if I sold it).

Quote:
it is designed to favour the intelligent from poor/lower-middle-class backgrounds
Actually no, it favours people who are going to remain poor their whole life. Someone who is intelligent/hardworking from a lower-middle-class background and has reasonable educational opportunities can most likely find a job where they are earning enough to be worse off under your system (or under any heavily progressive system really). Yeah, they might be better off for the first 5-10 years out of uni while they have very little assets, but as soon as they buy a house and have some savings theyll end up getting hammered. Plus if theyre unlucky enough to inherit anything non-liquid before they have the income required to pay the maintenance tax youre imposing, theyre probably screwed.

You cant have it both ways - if you have social mobility then those intelligent-but-lower-class people are eventually going to be earning enough to be hampered by a progressive system.

edit: Its also going to be easier for the really rich to tax dodge, since I would imagine that its simpler and less risky to hide overseas assets than it is to hide income.

Last edited by Nodrog; 30 Dec 2006 at 13:03.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 12:34   #25
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by demiGOD
Capitalism and Free Enterprise FTW!!

Communism has always been a futile cry of the lazy for equality and has been used as an alibi for dictatorships who implement Communism to satisfy their greed.
in the entirety of your life have you ever sustained a complex thought?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 12:45   #26
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nodrog
Globally speaking the countries T&F is talking about are most likely in fairly similar positions to where Britain was in 1800, and talking about their plight as if its some intractable problem of capitalism rather than a transitional phase as they move from being poor countries into first world nations would be making an identical mistake to the one Marx made 100 years ago, or which someone in India would have been making if he had said the same thing 50 years ago, or which someone in S Korea/Hong Kong would have been making had they etc etc.
Some of them, due to population pressures, are probably further behind. I don't view it as a problem which arose due to capitalism as I said, more a side-affect of imperialism.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 13:08   #27
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

I wouldnt even necessarily blame imperialism, its as much to do with the fact that different countries developed at different rates. While you can blame Europeans in certain cases, Africa (for instance) would probably be a shithole with or without colonialism.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 14:50   #28
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Nodrog
While your land-based communism is slightly different from other flavours, I think it shares the same basic flaw - namely a pathological fixation on the part played by material forces in determining the value of goods rather than the concretised ideas and visions which have allowed their production.
1. The value of goods is presently heavily determined by the purchasing power of those demanding them. We have absurd situations where water is used to keep the lawns in Jo'burgs suburbs green while a few miles away there are many thousands of Africans without reliable access to clean water. How much is water valued? Well, not much obviously if we can afford to pour it over lawns.

2. You talk about divergence in wealth being inevitable under any system. I would say probably, yes. So? You're assuming two things :
i) That wealth would be as important as it is today. I would say (speaking internally of developed countries only) wealth is probably less important than it was a few hundred years ago (or is in some parts of the world) - the top ten richest men in the world in theory own more than most nations but this doesn't translate to real world effect. Bill Gates may have a ten million times more money than I have but is his dinner ten million times as good? I'm sure his computer is pretty sweet, but is it ten million times better than mine? Are his shoes? If he get's a cold does he buy the special ten million strength Lemsip?

This sounds ridiculous, but it hides a real point. For a variety of reasons if we ignore the silly numbers game I can be said to be far more the equal of Bill Gates than my great-grandfather was the equal of a random millionaire in his day. Social advancement means (for instance) no matter how wealthy you are you cannot buy and sell slaves, or openly murder people, or beat your employees and so on. It's quite possible government enforced monopolies (patents/copyrights) will not be available to buy either. According to my system, people would not be able to buy land. So what exactly are people going to do with their wealth? Buy diamond rings? Solid gold hat? Maybe, but those are the inequalities I can live with.

ii) That you could always transfer notional wealth (i.e. the figure you have for your bank account in a database somewhere) to real-world physical wealth. This is not a given, one can amass a huge wealth in a third world currency only to find it is not exchangable for anything. A certain proportion of food might be produced in an alternative currency or something like that. The point is that the free flow and exchange of capital is not a universal (indeed, it's not even that usual, historically speaking).

3. You say I am over-estimating the value of land. But this is because you are equating value with revenue (or profit) which I am not. The value I am talking is the ability to provide shelter or space for a family or similar. In the third world this is not just a theoretical question - people's lives are at stake and they do not need to be told that the land is valueless - they know it has value!

Indeed, I would note that even in our advanced society there are many people who would be greatful for land suitable for building on (without legal restriction which is the key thing). It is possible to build houses without the involvement of central authority or capital - indeed this is the practice in many part of the world. Given information sharing and collective efforts to buy equipment and so on, it's silly to talk about land not having value when there are many tens of thousands of people in substandard housing.

Of course, the potential profit (or revenue) of a particular plot will depend on what is done with it. But profit to whom? A piece of land in South Africa may produce far more money as a hotel than as a series of homes for former squatter camp inhabitants - but is this more value? As things stand by that schema something which produces something which exclusively benefits dollar-poor people is de facto almost valueless. That seems an unsatisfactory assesssment.

Also, if we are to talk in dollar terms about profits, then can we be clear as to who this benefits. Even if we allow for trickle down economics or tax receipts benefiting from increased profits, let's be clear : "nations" don't suffer or benefit, its citizens do. Since the burden (and benefit) does not fall equally on all citizens it's best we understand this in the language we use.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 14:54   #29
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Nodrog
I mean lets say someone buys (or inherits!) a house valued at £1million. If you want to set wealth tax at 10% or so then hes going to be paying £100,000 a year for the rest of his life, which makes further earning, retirement or even taking a short term paycut, impossible.
Depending on the size both of the house and the man's family it wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing if it increased the incentive to move to a smaller dwelling. Under-occupation is a criminal waste of resources which persists for little good reason. Additionally encouraging shitty institutions like the Church who own land but produce nothing of value to go bankrupt would only be a good thing.

Obviously the specifics would need to be set as to not put anyone in difficulties, 10% sounds way too high for a residential property for instance although I realise you were speaking generally.
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Originally Posted by Nodrog
Yeah, they might be better off for the first 5-10 years out of uni while they have very little assets, but as soon as they buy a house and have some savings theyll end up getting hammered.
You're assuming owner occupation here (which is not a universal and less likely to be the norm in such a scenario). Some kind of pension would generally be excluded too. I presume (without giving it any thought admittedly) that interest rates and investment yields would be fundamentally different anyway (presumably higher) to make investing worthwhile in the first place.
Quote:
Plus if theyre unlucky enough to inherit anything non-liquid before they have the income required to pay the maintenance tax youre imposing, theyre probably screwed.
You're not forced to accept something given to you afaik, but even if you were and it was somehow non-liquid (I'm not sure what would be classified as being high value but non-liquid) I'm sure any tax agency could simply allow you to delay payment until the asset was sold.

There are already situations we deal with at work where old people with fixed low incomes (who bought their flats under right-to-buy for less than £10,000) receive bills for £15,000 for maintenance. In such a situation one option is (assuming a property market value is £100,000) then they sell 15% of the property to us, which we get when they move / die. Of course, in this situation the cost is the actual real-world cost of keeping their property together, not a notional cost imposted by the government, but it's a similar principle.

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 15:21   #30
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
First post
I dont disagree with anything you say, but thats largely because I'm having trouble seeing how youre really any different from a libertarian who doesnt like land-ownership. What it is that makes Danteism significantly different from laissez-faire capitalism with slightly different land leasing? (and you seem to agree that land isnt _that_ much of an issue in Western countries anyway). If capitalism has got us to the stage where the difference between you and the richest man in the world in buying terms is nowhere near as great as it was in the past, and if this gap should close further in the future as technology advances, then what exactly is the problem that requires revolution to solve (other than excessive statism and legislation, which could presumably be changed via a gradual process provided you had support of the majority of the population)?

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 17:25   #31
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Pardon me, but despite all this theorising I still cannot understand how intelligent people believe all this can happen and be sustained. Does anyone really believe that it can, or has communism become some kind of moral imperative?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 17:59   #32
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Boogster
Pardon me, but despite all this theorising I still cannot understand how intelligent people believe all this can happen and be sustained.
To be fair, it is in response to someone asking a question. Whether a maximal position (i.e. the full extent of what I've described) is possible is certainly debatable. However, there are literally billions of steps in that direction. Are we saying that none of them are possible? That we can't ease any of the suffering or injustice or whatever that exists in the world?

(Obviously that's a rhetorical question, of course we can ease these things and indeed that is what we should do collectively speaking.)
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 18:16   #33
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

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Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
To be fair, it is in response to someone asking a question. Whether a maximal position (i.e. the full extent of what I've described) is possible is certainly debatable. However, there are literally billions of steps in that direction. Are we saying that none of them are possible? That we can't ease any of the suffering or injustice or whatever that exists in the world?

(Obviously that's a rhetorical question, of course we can ease these things and indeed that is what we should do collectively speaking.)
I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to be patronising. I'm just a bit of a cynic, I suppose. I don't accept that humans will ever collectively acknowledge that communism (or anything else, for that matter) is indisputably the best thing for everyone. Indeed, this seems such an unrealisable objective, without significant acts of despotism, that I cannot understand why anyone bothers thinking about it at all.
Of course, I assume you've heard all this before, and you must have thought about it. You must have thought about the process of revolution and the consolidation of a communist community. How do you suppose it could practically work? Essentially, I'm wondering whether you (or anyone else) view communism as a moral or ideological principle or a realisable policital and socio-economic aim.
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 19:13   #34
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Phang
in the entirety of your life have you ever sustained a complex thought?
I'm a recruitment officer in the Navy. Yes. All the time. What does that have to do with my opinion about communism?
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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 22:03   #35
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boogster
I'm just a bit of a cynic, I suppose. I don't accept that humans will ever collectively acknowledge that communism (or anything else, for that matter) is indisputably the best thing for everyone. Indeed, this seems such an unrealisable objective, without significant acts of despotism, that I cannot understand why anyone bothers thinking about it at all.
I'm not really interested in people collectively acknowledging anything to be honest. It depends on the context but I'm usually more interested in people's co-operation and support in the face of certain practical problems. That seems to be what politics is all about. As KM's grave says : "Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it."
Quote:
You must have thought about the process of revolution and the consolidation of a communist community. How do you suppose it could practically work? Essentially, I'm wondering whether you (or anyone else) view communism as a moral or ideological principle or a realisable policital and socio-economic aim.
Both. I'd certainly see it as realisable, although I wouldn't really consider it in that sort of binary sense. Put another way : Europe did not turn overnight from absolute monarchies to liberal democracies with universal suffrage. It was a series of changes, some dramatic, some more administrative. In general, we would view most of these changes (I would imagine) as improvements. Now, is our current society, it's laws, policy and economic system one of total perfection? If there is room for improvement then let us continue with this work. If we're fortunate to live in the most perfect of all possible worlds then let us praise the lord.

In terms of revolution, as I said earlier, this can throw up ideas of violence and bloodshed, and indeed I have talked about the military interventions that previous revolutions have faced. But revolutionary action could take a number of courses. For instance, I'd say the Black Panther's breakfast program for kids was more revolutionary than the nonsense that the Weathermen engaged in.

The revolution is a long term process of transforming society which begins right now.

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Unread 30 Dec 2006, 22:18   #36
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nodrog
What it is that makes Danteism significantly different from laissez-faire capitalism with slightly different land leasing?
I may overestimate, but I think you underestimate the importance of the land and the resources it contains.
Quote:
(and you seem to agree that land isnt _that_ much of an issue in Western countries anyway).
Woah, easy there tiger. I'd certainly agree it's much less of an issue in the developed world than in parts of the developing world but that's because in the latter it's a matter of life and death. It's still tremendously important as a global question for all sorts of reasons.
Quote:
If capitalism has got us to the stage where the difference between you and the richest man in the world in buying terms is nowhere near as great as it was in the past, and if this gap should close further in the future as technology advances
Yes and no. Not all technological advancements will be as egalitarian and as I've argued elsewhere, you could imagine certain things greatly exaggerating inequality for a period. Perhaps in the long term (for a given value of 'long') this would even out, but it is not clear whether this would be enough.

But yeah, in general that's the trend which Marx was at great pains to point out. Capitalism creates the conditions which eliminates capitalism was one of Marx's key points.
Quote:
then what exactly is the problem that requires revolution to solve (other than excessive statism and legislation, which could presumably be changed via a gradual process provided you had support of the majority of the population)?
Again, I think you're probably assuming a revolution implies gunning people down or something like that. I'd argue we're in a revolutionary position right now - a revolutionary change in technology, science, demographics, etc. The shift away from private property will be one of many revolutionary changes which occur (possibly in our lifetimes) I would say. The "problem" it will address is one we have already touched on - the fact the world's fate currently sits with disproportionately few human beings at least partially because of the way "value" has been assigned to the world. We have absurd scenarios where Manhattan is somehow "worth" more than large sections of Africa.

Given the potential resource and environmental crisis we may face this sort of absurd imbalance cannot continue indefinitely. Even in the absence of this, a key driver would be the absolute poverty faced by many. As I often bore about, there are literally hundreds of millions of people without sufficient food. You may be content with waiting for this to be solved in some unspecified future time but many are not. There are other reasons of course, but those are two of the more pressing ones.

Again, these are global questions though, which is (on the whole) not how politics is performed. I want revolutionary change for reasons which relate to my life primarily, while I recognise my moral obligations to those overseas it would be disengenuous to suggest that my day-to-day politics is based on the attitudes and conditions of people many miles from here.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 00:17   #37
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
Well you have offered nothing to support your claim. In your job when faced with a similarly boring general assertion such as "lol everyone in the navy is gay, everyone knows you're not as good as the airforce!" do you just say "well fair play then" or would attempt to challenge that opinion?
I wouldn't say challenge, but I would start a sales pitch, which if would be put in writing, can be as long (or longer) as your posts, and same with nod's and Dante's, so therefore:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
Dante and myself have taken the time to put forward a program where Communism might be appropriate summarising hundreds of years worth of philosophy and social theory for your reading pleasure and your response "Capitalism FTW blah blah blah everyone knows Communism is for lazy people" translates directly into my mind as "I'm either too ignorant or too stupid to read what has been written here, I should not really be in this thread but I might as well post my two cents. without taking a second to consider what is actually being discussed."
Your posts, and nod's and Dante's are very entertaining and informative. A lot of aspects and ideas which will definitely, if implemented correctly, would possibly make communism work in a perfect world.

In a world where money is the driving force and motivation for success, anywhere where you would mandate an extreme like communism - abolishing all privacy rights, ownership, competition, and even religion, extreme taxation evenly and achieving a class-less society (on the contrary to the purpose of communism, a class-less society will only cause the upper class who actually worked hard for their money to be poor, and will probably never save the working class and the poor from poverty), all these things coming from an absolute power of one individual - Also the ideas of a more stable and improved economy might very well so, but the temptations for corruption is very likely because of humans' simple nature of greed - these things will only cause a series of horrific events like proven in history.

You can knit-pick these nations who were failed by communism because of some actions, political and economical decisions, that probably didn't 100% adhere to the ideas of Marx and Engels. You can really, study and review hard, the possibilities that it could work if done correctly. The fact of the matter is, it will only work in a perfect world scenario.

My Capitalism and Free Enterprise FTW statement is my quick-fix remark towards capitalism and against communism. Capitalism and free enterprise is the best motivation for hard work and success and competition is the best reason for innovation and improvement. Capitalism caters to the hard-workers and the educated, but at the same time, middle and lower working class citizens will have available programs in place for compensations and welfare based on measured inequalities of distribution of wealth in a state and/or nation.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 00:37   #38
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

In principle in a perfect world, commumism would be great, but we dont live in a perfect world with perfect people, so sadly it doesnt, because it as i see it, has not enough *give* in its principles to allow for that.
Capitalism and free enterprise flourish because its a device built for impurity, give communism that building block and most of us would be jumping into line to get our red card.

(note i say sadly, because the basics of communism are a blue print for a peacefull utopia)

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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 01:07   #39
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mistwraith
In principle in a perfect world, commumism would be great, but we dont live in a perfect world with perfect people, so sadly it doesnt, because it as i see it, has not enough *give* in its principles to allow for that.
I have heard this argument about twenty eight billion times in my lifetime, and I've yet to have anyone satisfactorily explain what they mean.

What wouldn't work? Don't just say communism, please describe which policy or system wouldn't work and which aspect of human nature would prevent it from working. What do you mean by "work" anyway? Does the current system work given it provides to fulfill the basic needs of many millions of people?

I'm not trying to be an arsehole here, but some of these arguments are like trying to nail down fog, and if we don't get down to specifics it's difficult to get anywhere.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 01:17   #40
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Wow, a brilliant thread, I really need to start paying more attention here. I bet Marx is rolling in his grave for all the times his name has been connected to politics on this thread. Over all, Marx wasn't a politician as much as a philosopher (or modernly said, societal scientist). After all, the famous communist manifest was a work paid for Marx and Engels to do by certain European political parties. In the 21st century, it'd be called PR or campaigning.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nodrog
If capitalism has got us to the stage where the difference between you and the richest man in the world in buying terms is nowhere near as great as it was in the past, and if this gap should close further in the future as technology advances, then what exactly is the problem that requires revolution to solve (other than excessive statism and legislation, which could presumably be changed via a gradual process provided you had support of the majority of the population)?
Really? The difference between the poorest and the richest has done nothing but polarisized lately. The difference between Bill Gates and an African poor is definately multiple times to what the difference between a medieval Pope and a serf was. Ceteris paribus, capitalism has actually brought us to a state where we can say that there are by absolute rich countries and poor countries, and the rich countries (with the help of transnational firms) have the ability to dictate what the poor countries are allowed and whatnot. Technological advancement and the spillover and such phenomena seem to work occasionally (in world history, the "major cases" are, in the past, for example Finland, and today, perhaps India or China), but it's difficult to say why certain areas manage to catch up and certain never do (Africa, South-America here). Some claim it is because the liberal capitalist countries are so hugely capitalistic and liberal (more like mercantilistic and medieval) with their import policies. To give some figures, the World Bank made a calculation according to which, if the rich countries abolished subsidies and tariffs on agricultural products starting 2007, the poor countries would be

500,000,000,000 USD

richer in twenty years time. This would mean ability to advance infrastructure and, by the ideology of free trade the prosperous capitalistic countries so uphold, the poor countries to take trade in the products they have comparative advantage in. Instead, the nice "Western" capitalists are pinning them down with subsidies and tariffs. Yeah, a 150 million people less on the poverty traps in twenty years.

Yeah, capitalism definately isn't they key into solving global income differences. On some local levels, it has worked, but requires extensive state interference. Good examples here are Finland (broad public sector, high social transfers; the income differences are fairly narrow, yet the country is among the top competitive countries of the world), and Saudi Arabia (inexisting public sector, "capitalism", a plethora of rich people who, as the capitalists, own the property, and then a proletariate with uhm, little money). By gross domestic product, Saudi Arabia probably beats Finland. By educational levels, child deaths, income differences (assuming smaller is better), or "competitiveness" they're behind.

Quote:
Originally Posted by demiGOD
would possibly make communism work in a perfect world
I doubt communism would ever make a perfect world, to be honest. Socialism might, but I don't want to start a debate on the definitions any more than has already been done so I'll leave it.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 01:20   #41
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by demiGOD
Also the ideas of a more stable and improved economy might very well so, but the temptations for corruption is very likely because of humans' simple nature of greed - these things will only cause a series of horrific events like proven in history.
I'm not sure who you're suggesting would be corrupt but I'd say two of the strongest weapons against corruption (outside of economic development, stronger audits and respect for the rule of law) are minimising / eliminating bureaucracy wherever possible and making all processes entirely transparent - much more possible with newer technologies.

That's not really anything to do with communism or capitalism though - as I've mentioned before, there are capitalist states with higher rates of corruption than in the existing state-socialist systems. A lot of it is cultural acceptance of certain practices ("greasing the wheel") and in other cases state employees are criminally underpaid. Putting underpaid people in position of authority (e.g. in awarding contracts of very high value) is asking for trouble, especially if you don't have proper audit processes in place.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 01:45   #42
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
I'm not sure who you're suggesting would be corrupt but I'd say two of the strongest weapons against corruption (outside of economic development, stronger audits and respect for the rule of law) are minimising / eliminating bureaucracy wherever possible and making all processes entirely transparent - much more possible with newer technologies.
I don't understand how you think you can make the use of public money more transparent without having a large bureaucracy to ... oh i don't know ... audit the expenditure, compile reports on efficiency, review the cost of the alternatives, report comprehensively to the public ... etc. etc.

But then so little of your drug fueled posts have made any sense in this thread.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 01:55   #43
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yahwe
I don't understand how you think you can make the use of public money more transparent without having a large bureaucracy
Technology which already exists would make a huge difference here for comparatively little cost if introduced into new systems (and wouldn't necessarily imply any additional costs in terms of audit time).

The specifics will vary wildly but as an example in my own work I am working on things which would allow (in the longer term) our customers to see every single invoice we receive on a maintenance jobs, every quotation we receive, that sort of thing - all in real-time. There is a slightly increased IT cost envisioned (better network security, predicted higher demand of existing servers, etc) but the actual difference in day-to-day operations is nil - we already have system for electronic processing of invoices and who can see the eventual scanned file makes very little difference. This sort of thing isn't always appropriate / possible, but that's one very simple example.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 02:11   #44
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
Technology which already exists would make a huge difference here for comparatively little cost if introduced into new systems (and wouldn't necessarily imply any additional costs in terms of audit time).
This statement makes you sound like a naive optimist.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
The specifics will vary wildly but as an example in my own work I am working on things which would allow (in the longer term) our customers to see every single invoice we receive on a maintenance jobs, every quotation we receive, that sort of thing - all in real-time. There is a slightly increased IT cost envisioned (better network security, predicted higher demand of existing servers, etc) but the actual difference in day-to-day operations is nil - we already have system for electronic processing of invoices and who can see the eventual scanned file makes very little difference. This sort of thing isn't always appropriate / possible, but that's one very simple example.
Your example confirms it.

Once your glorious technology is in place who authorises payment of the invoices?

(i can't believe you need me to point this out to you. what bizare cocktail are you on?)
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 02:39   #45
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yahwe
Once your glorious technology is in place who authorises payment of the invoices?
It depends on a range of things but basically it would usually be more than one person. The document would go along a defined work-flow until all requirements are satisfied for payment, each step giving their authorisation. It depends obviously on the type of invoice. All of this happens anyway of course, I am merely talking about allowing a wider range of people to view the data in a different way.

The point is not that this system eliminates the possibility of people stealing, or inflating invoices in collusion with contractors but it does mean the process is slightly more transparent (my original point). Anyone can see a clear record of what's taken place at each step, who took these steps and when. It's fairly trivial to require certain evidence (e.g. photograph of completed work) before something could be authorised if you wanted (this already happens with certain categories of work for non financial reasons).

One of the frustrations for some of our customers (who are eventually billed for a portion of the work) is they report a repair, hear nothing about it and then get a bill a year later (where it's difficult to realistically challenge whether a communal light-fitting was really replaced or not). Some of our customers therefore believe they are being billed for work which never took place. This might improve their odds of spotting something like that, if it ever did.

Again, this is a very small example and pretty minor. It's pretty easy to see though that you could engineer certain types of process to be more open without too much (if any) additional hard work or more bureaucracy.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 03:08   #46
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dante Hicks
It depends on a range of things but basically it would usually be more than one person.

The point is not that this system eliminates the possibility of people stealing, or inflating invoices in collusion with contractors but it does mean the process is slightly more transparent (my original point).
Yep.

When you come down you'll see that you just confirmed my original point

Another point you might like to consider (not now but after you are legally fit to drive) is that seeing a computer screen which says that work has occured and being able to physically see that no work has actually occured may well be two co-existing truths.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 03:10   #47
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
Communism doesn't require a perfect world, that's the point. Capitalism and free enterprise don't flourish, they simply dominate, that's not the same thing.
Lovely lovely rhetoric.

CAN YOU EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT IT MEANS? BECAUSE MY DICTIONARY APPEARS CAN NOT
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 03:26   #48
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue

In terms of flourishing, it implies that Capitalism is a natural, sweet smelling bloom growing out of the decaying soil bringing beauty and order wherever they take root. However what they really do is centralise the control over resources and the means of exploiting those resources. They act as a system which binds people to Capital. Thus it is a system of domination. These two descriptions are different, thus not the same.

Its not that difficult really.
It is if you understand the word flourish.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 03:37   #49
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
You don't have an original point.

Are you legally fit to drive?

At the moment global capitalist markets are monitored through an electronic system, but that's presumably infallible in your eyes because its capitalism and so nothing goes wrong, ever it just always works, that's the magic of Capitalism.

I can't drive and am ergo never fit to drive.

By global capitalist markets you mean the stock exchange which is not infallibly monitored by computers (my original point btw). Indeed it is monitored by humans because those humans can make profit where computers can not do so.

The nature of growth is innovation. This absurd 'computers can rule us' argument is flawed (as I have said - see my original point) and utterly absurd because maintaining the status quo is not inovation it is stagnation and in stagnation nothing good ever happens.

You adore calling me a capitalist because it is easier than explaining what a communist is. You define by difference and thus because i contradict you i am the enemy.

The FACT that you call me a capitalist and you call people who ideologically disagree with me a capitalist as well is of no concern of yours. You have your club and we are all defined solely by not being in it.

When you sober up (and i use that expression in it's loosest sense) you ought to feel at least a pang of shame.
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Unread 31 Dec 2006, 03:39   #50
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Re: Yo, Communists (part one)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
I was interpreting the word flourish and its usage.

However checking the dictionary provides these exciting interpretations:

flour·ish (flūr'ĭsh, flŭr'-) pronunciation

v., -ished, -ish·ing, -ish·es.

v.intr.

1. To grow well or luxuriantly; thrive: The crops flourished in the rich soil.
2. To do or fare well; prosper: “No village on the railroad failed to flourish” (John Kenneth Galbraith).
3. To be in a period of highest productivity, excellence, or influence: a poet who flourished in the tenth century.

Well they all seem to fit the context I was using the word. It even has Galbraith there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Toccata & Fugue
Communism doesn't require a perfect world, that's the point. Capitalism and free enterprise don't flourish,

Time for bed said Zebedee
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