Been looking for this for a while. I find it humorous
------------------
"I suppose you thought I was dead? No such thing. Don't flatter yourselves that I haven't got my eye upon you. I am wide awake, and you give plenty to look at."
Household Words, Aug. 24, 1850
From the Raven in the Happy Family
------------------
Frank's Home Page
John Linnell: "This song is called...it's called..."
Audience: "Louisiana! Montana!"
John Linnell: Don't tell me what it's called..."
------------------
"I suppose you thought I was dead? No such thing. Don't flatter yourselves that I haven't got my eye upon you. I am wide awake, and you give plenty to look at."
Household Words, Aug. 24, 1850
From the Raven in the Happy Family
------------------
Frank's Home Page
John Linnell: "This song is called...it's called..."
Audience: "Louisiana! Montana!"
John Linnell: Don't tell me what it's called..."
------------------
Somehow we're going somewhere.
------------------
"I suppose you thought I was dead? No such thing. Don't flatter yourselves that I haven't got my eye upon you. I am wide awake, and you give plenty to look at."
Household Words, Aug. 24, 1850
From the Raven in the Happy Family
According to what I have, Facism is when you have two cows and you give them milk. The Government doesn't take your cows, it just takes your milk and sells it.
Bureaucracy is the same definition of New Dealism.
Anarchism: Keep the cows. Steal another one. Shoot the Government.
Conservatism: Freeze the Milk. Embalm the cows.
Liberalism: Give away one cow. Now get the government to get you another one. Now give them both away.
------------------
I can resist anything.......
Except Temptation
------------------
Frank's Home Page
John Linnell: "This song is called...it's called..."
Audience: "Louisiana! Montana!"
John Linnell: Don't tell me what it's called..."
However, you'll notice that only in Capitalism do you end up with more than you started with...
Survivalism: Put your cow in a steel-reinforced concrete bunker, and sit outside and wait for someone to take it. Shoot them and take THEIR cow.
New Liberalism: Whine about how your ancestors were denied cows by somebody else's ancestors, until people get tired of you and give you a cow to shut you up.
------------------
Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson
[This message has been edited by First of Two (edited January 27, 2000).]
------------------
Death before Dishonor!
However Dishonor has
quite a disputed defintion.
------------------
Frank's Home Page
John Linnell: "This song is called...it's called..."
Audience: "Louisiana! Montana!"
John Linnell: Don't tell me what it's called..."
Socialism is the prelude to communism. Step One: Workers stage violent revolution. Then they implement socialism (although Marx had it wrong where socialism would be implemented -- he said already-industrialised countries, while Lenin knew Russia was building to the right formula). This socialism implementation is on the way to achieving communism.
The USSR only ever got to socialism. I'm not sure about Cuba, but I don't you could call them completely communist, by Marx's definition.
Now, I fully expect DT to correct everything I've said.
Therefore, I hereby propose that both the definitons of socialism and communism need to be tweaked a little.
quote:
Socialism is the prelude to communism. Step One: Workers stage violent revolution. Then they implement socialism (although Marx had it wrong where socialism would be implemented -- he said already-industrialised countries, while Lenin knew Russia was building to the right formula). This socialism implementation is on the way to achieving communism.The USSR only ever got to socialism. I'm not sure about Cuba, but I don't you could call them completely communist, by Marx's definition.
Now, I fully expect DT to correct everything I've said.
Righty-o chap!
Firstly, I'll correct your comment on Marx's error. Marx was not in error. There's a reason the Soviet Union failed. Socialism in one country is impossible (and an inaccuracy). Socialism in a backwards country like Russia was even more impossible, particularly since the modified capitalist forms of Lenin and Trotsky would not have worked for long in Russia. Socialist revolutions were far more likely to succeed in the long-term in industrial nations. Allow me to reference one of Vladimir Lenin's messages to Leon Trotsky during the Brest-Litovsk Negotiations.
quote:
If it were necessary for us to go under to assure the success of the German revolution, we should have to do it. The German revolution is vastly more important than ours.
Now, you were correct in regards to the stages of the dialectic. Socialism is the state between capitalism (mature capitalism) and communism.
Cuba was not a socialist government. In fact, there has never been one. There has been a worker's state, the Soviet Union. But it was the only one. No other revolution was fully carried through. The suppression of the revolutions in Poland, Germany, and Hungary during the post-WWII era by the Stalinist beauracracy are examples of this, as was the failed 1923 revolution in Germany and the failed revolution in China. The "revolutions" in China, Cuba, Yugoslavia, Vietnam, etc were all the product of protracted guerilla wars carried out mainly by the peasantry. The regimes installed in Eastern Europe after WWII were the exact opposite. Mao would later call it social-imperialism (interesting to note that when his buddy Stalin was doing it, Mao had no problem with it).
It is interesting to note that the Stalinist beuracracy, what most refer to as communism and what Marxists refer to as Stalinism, was the result of the failure of the Bolsheviks to internationalize the revolution. Of course, historically, true revolutions are opposed by the majority of the imperialist world, note the French Revolution, so this was not surprising. Primarily, the defeat of the German Revolution was responsible for this. As to whether or not the Red Army should've (and could've) intervened is a matter of debate for higher circles than this. The final death blow, of course, came at the hands of Josef Stalin, whose purges of the late 1930s eliminated the Left Opposition, but perhaps more importantly, his alliance with the Kouamintang was criminal.
So there you have it, my weekly primer on the differences between socialism and communism :-)
If anyone is interested in discussing this further, feel free to contact me via ICQ or email (not that I won't post here, but I prefer to do things one on one). A lot of the problems with Marxism is that we have had some bad press agents :-)
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
If we could achieve such universal selflessness without killing all the selfish b*stards, I'd be all for communism. In fact, if such selflessness could be achieved, we'd have it already. As things stand now, I believe that the best we can hope for is to each do what's right to the best of our knowledge. Any plan for world peace that involves killing all the people who disagree with you (even if it is "inevitable" -- a phrase that sounds like "It's not my fault!" to me) doesn't sound like "universal brotherhood" to me.
--Baloo
------------------
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
--Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Come Hither and Yawn...
Hai-keeba!
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
------------------
Col. Maybourne: "Teal'c... It's good to see you well."
Teal'c: "In my culture, I would be well within my rights to dismember you."
-Stargate SG-1: "Touchstone"
Anyways, I had a question or five. Be satisfied you've gotten me curious.
If 'socialism in one country is impossible'
Then does that mean that the whole world has to be socialist for it to suceed?
If so, wouldn't you ned a global government to run it, since each country, while being socialist for its people, is likely to be capitalist for itself (seeking out the besteconomy and advances)?
If so, wouldn't that necessarily lead to the erosion of national sovreignty (something we've agreed - I think - is important) for all the nations?
Could socialism survive expansion into space, if it encountered non-socialist civilizations and traded with them? (thus re-creating a not-entirely-socialist 'world'?)
WOULD a socialist government have the necessary funds to expand into space, thus obtaining new resources, or would it be Earthbound, subject to the eventual ravages of Malthus?
------------------
Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson
But seeing as how everyone has to share that same mindset for it to work, that's where it breaks down.
Even on a global scale it wouldn't be fruitful. Each sect or country, or whatever the divisons would be, would be trying to vie for the better hand, the better milk as it were. So, right there, you've got rudimentary capitilism.
------------------
I bet when Neanderthal kids would make a snowman, someone would
always end up saying "Don't forget the big heavy eyebrows." Then they would all get embarrassed because they remembered they had the big hunky eyebrows too, and then they would get mad and eat the snowman.
-Jack Handey
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
According to theory, yes. It's a convenient little excuse, isn't it?
------------------
You are wise, witty, and wonderful, but you spend far too much time reading this sort of trash.
------------------
Frank's Home Page
John Linnell: "This song is called...it's called..."
Audience: "Louisiana! Montana!"
John Linnell: Don't tell me what it's called..."
------------------
Col. Maybourne: "Teal'c... It's good to see you well."
Teal'c: "In my culture, I would be well within my rights to dismember you."
-Stargate SG-1: "Touchstone"
Sheesh!
------------------
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
--Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Come Hither and Yawn...
So, now to the questions.
quote:
If 'socialism in one country is impossible' Then does that mean that the whole world has to be socialist for it to suceed?
No. Allow me to quote Lenin
quote:
The complete victory of the socialist revolution in one country alone is inconceivable and demands the most active co-operation of at least several advanced countries, which do not include Russia
Russia was a backwards country, which is why we talk about how it was a failure for socialism. Especially as it was cut off from the rest of the world. Yet, socialism itself is internationalist. It is only a step between capitalism and communism, and as communism can only happen when the entire world has passed on to the state of socialism and the state slowly begins to wither away, socialism in one country is not socialism. The revolution (or more accurately, the revolutionary spirit) must be exported. That is why we say socialism in one country cannot work. So although it can get bogged down in semantics, the thought is accurate.
quote:
If so, wouldn't you ned a global government to run it, since each country, while being socialist for its people, is likely to be capitalist for itself (seeking out the besteconomy and advances)?
quote:
If so, wouldn't that necessarily lead to the erosion of national sovreignty (something we've agreed - I think - is important) for all the nations?
National sovereignty is important, now. As the old saying goes, military power is like the Mississippi River, it runs from north to south only. However, in a socialist world, it wouldn't be. For instance, nationalism itself would be dead, more or less. Most of the causes for wars would not exist between socialist states.
quote:
WOULD a socialist government have the necessary funds to expand into space, thus obtaining new sources, or would it be Earthbound, subject to the eventual ravages of Malthus?
This is a GREAT question. Firstly, if Omega is reading this, I'll simply reply to him by saying "Cosmonaut" at which time he'll run to the library at PS 21 and try to find a book with pictures of Russian spacemen in it.
But for those who accept that the USSR was not socialist, let us continue on.
There is a common misconception that socialism does not encourage economic growth. That is, however, flat wrong. To the contrary, it does to a great degree. The very nature of socialism is one that is to increase production, thus allowing for an abundance which does not raise the level of just one, but raises it of all. I will have to reference the USSR on the matter of growth, as it was the only worker's state, and it did partake in more socialist programs than any other state (keeping in mind that from 1921-23 it was ran by Lenin, and then even Stalin took a couple decades to remove the Left Opposition, and despite his reactionary nature, his economic programs were not entirely, only mostly, backwards).
In the 50 year span of 1913 (the height of pre-war production) to 1963, which included two world wars (including the epic struggle with Nazi Germany), a civil war, foreign intervention, and other calamities (some bad droughts, Stalin's collectivization and scorched earth policy) total industrial output rose more than 52 times. As compared to 6 for the US and a doubling in Britain.
From a Marxist point of view, the function of technique is to economise human labour. In the 50 year period from 1913 to 1963, the growth of productivity of labour in industry, the key index of economic development, advanced by 73 per cent in Britain and by 332 per cent in the USA. In the USSR, labour productivity rose in the same period by 1,310 per cent, although from a very low base.
Moreover, most Soviet surges occured during western slumps. For instance, the USSR was the only major industrialized country (as it was by then) not to go through the depression of the 1930s. This is part of the advantage of a planned economy (which, for all his drawbacks, Stalin had) versus an anarchaic capitalist system.
Agriculturally, the amount of cultivated land was increased in just three years, between 1953 and 1956, by a staggering 35.9 million hectares, an area equivalent to the total cultivated land of Canada. This despite the staggering blow of Stalin's forced collectivization (which Trotsky fought again) that almost crippled the USSR. Compare that to the backwardsness still suffered in countries such as India, China (which was all the fun of Stalinism without even the basic understanding of Marxism), and most parts of Africa and you have to wonder about beauracratic planning. The benefits of planning consistently tailed off in the USSR as the policy of "levelling," that of making all wages even, was diminished.
Out of a population that grew by 15 per cent, the number of technicians had grown by 55 times; the numbers in full-time education by over six times; the number of books published by 13 times; hospital beds nearly ten times; children at nurseries 1,385 times. The number of doctors per 100,000 people was 205, as compared to 170 in Italy and Austria, 150 in America, 144 in West Germany, 110 in Britain, France and Netherlands, and 101 in Sweden. Keep in mind, all this was done while the most educated social level was brutally being imprisoned and murdered through Stalin's fascism, and 20 million died at the hands of Hitler. If only Trotsky HAD won, imagine what would've happened then.
Now, are those numbers a complete vindication of socialism? Of course not. For one thing, numbers can be used to lie. But more importantly, the Soviet Union was not a socialist state. It was, however, a worker's state. And as it moved more and more away from that, it sunk more and more into the economic mire that led to the well predicted destruction of the USSR. Quite a few of those gains were gained at the expense ofe the proletariat, the peasantry, the international working class, and through concessions to capitalism (particularly during the Great Patriotic War, in which the USSR recieved a LOT of materials). Yet, Stalinism, despite being a debased form of Marxism, worked economically.
If I may quote Trotsky's brilliant work, The Revolution Betrayed...
quote:
"Even if the Soviet Union, as a result of internal difficulties, external blows and the mistakes of its leadership, were to collapse - which we firmly hope will not happen - there would remain as an earnest of the future this indestructible fact, that thanks solely to a proletarian revolution a backward country has achieved in less than ten years successes unexampled in history."
Yet, it couldn't hold out forever. Even this lowest form of sociaism would wither away as it was alone and as Stalin gave more and more power to the beuracracy and allowed the very small market economy which Lenin and Trotsky had allowed for temporary measures to grow. Only then did the economy go down the tubes.
Now, some of you may be saying "Why did this idiot stay up to 6:30 AM writing this?" Well, I can't answer that question, but I can answer another question you may be having which is "If Russia could flourish so much under Stalinism, and you claim socialism is better, why did it need the world revolution?" and that's tough for me to answer at this time of morning. But suffice it to say, what grew out of the 1920s was not socialism. And that is just it. Socialism would not have failed in Russia. It never could take hold in Russia. Russia was not yet a mature capitalist economy. And I'll save the discussion of mature capitalism for another time.
Allow me to end with a quote from Vladimir Lenin.
quote:
We are far from having completed even the transitional period from capitalism to socialism. We
have never cherished the hope that we could finish it without the aid of the international proletariat. We never had any illusions on that score. The final victory of socialism in a single country is of course impossible. Our contingent of workers and peasants which is upholding Soviet power is one of the contingents of the great world army, which at present has been split by the world war, but which is striving for unity� We can now see clearly how far the development of the Revolution will go. The Russian began it - the German, the Frenchman and the Englishman will finish it, and socialism will be victorious.
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
But why do you say that you don't see a socialist revolution occuring? Is it because you believe the masses have turned away from socialism? Or that you believe a revolution itself is not likely? On the former, I can concede that you'd have a good arguement. On the latter, I believe you're dead wrong.
Nevertheless, I do look forward to hearing your reasoning behind it my good man.
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
Actually, under socialism, you would have the cows taken away by the government, which you probably are or were a part of, and the milk is distributed evenly to all people.
Under communism, the whole community would own the cows and you'd share the milk.
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
------------------
I bet when Neanderthal kids would make a snowman, someone would
always end up saying "Don't forget the big heavy eyebrows." Then they would all get embarrassed because they remembered they had the big hunky eyebrows too, and then they would get mad and eat the snowman.
-Jack Handey
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
To quote Ferris Bueller "Isms in my opinion are not good. A person should not believe in an ism - he should believe in himself. I quote John Lennon: "I don't believe in Beatles - I just believe in me". A good point there. Of course, he was the Walrus. I could be the Walrus - I'd still have to bum rides off of people."
------------------
Ohh, so Mother Nature needs a favor? Well maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts, and plagues and poison monkeys. Nature started the fight for survival and now she wants to quit because she's losing...well I say "Hard Cheese"!
~C. Montgomery Burns
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
------------------
Ohh, so Mother Nature needs a favor? Well maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts, and plagues and poison monkeys. Nature started the fight for survival and now she wants to quit because she's losing...well I say "Hard Cheese"!
~C. Montgomery Burns
But I believe I have been EXTREMELY nice in this thread.
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
------------------
Col. Maybourne: "Teal'c... It's good to see you well."
Teal'c: "In my culture, I would be well within my rights to dismember you."
-Stargate SG-1: "Touchstone"
------------------
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
--Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Come Hither and Yawn...
------------------
Ohh, so Mother Nature needs a favor? Well maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts, and plagues and poison monkeys. Nature started the fight for survival and now she wants to quit because she's losing...well I say "Hard Cheese"!
~C. Montgomery Burns
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
------------------
Col. Maybourne: "Teal'c... It's good to see you well."
Teal'c: "In my culture, I would be well within my rights to dismember you."
-Stargate SG-1: "Touchstone"
And I would take any and all of the gifts Baloo mentioned.
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
------------------
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
--Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Come Hither and Yawn...
"and here's another clue for you allll, the Walrus is Paulll...
------------------
Fool of a Took, throw yourself in next time!!
Gandalf
Does Socialism have its basis more in social dynamics, or in economics?
I suspect it is social dynamics, but if it were economics, it might be necessary to rethink some factors of it, given that we've learned a bit more about economics since the mid 19th Century...
It seems as though the boom-bust cycle predicted has lessened or ceased, (thanks largely to lessons learned during the Great Depression) rather than continuing and getting more severe, as it was supposed to.. at least in countries with more responsible economic policies. (Hell, _I_ made $7000 on the stock market last year)
------------------
Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
--Baloo
------------------
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
--Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
Come Hither and Yawn...
Yes, economics have changed much since the writings of the Communist Manifesto. Yet, they've only become more stratified. The workers are becoming more exploited (even in America) and those who control the means of production are becoming even wealthier.
The boom and bust thing, as well, is true. Not that it is important in Marxism, as economic low points are typically measured by the bourgious. But yeah, depressions still do occur. Look at the "Asian Miracle." Typically, economic "prosperity" lasts for only about 20 years at a time. Well, when was the last recession? The early 90s, if I remember. I know we all want to block out the Reagan-Bush Years, but yeah, we did have a recession lately. Now, if we all want to think that because we now have a "great" economy in this country that it will last that way forever, that's fine. But they were the Roaring Twenties for a reason.
Simon: You're still here?
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
What I don't get is how human nature is going to change enough to end this. We're ALL users, to some extent or another. Babies cry to get more milk. Politicians say things to get your vote. People make statements of dubious veracity so that you'll support them. Exploitation is ingrained in the human psyche, if not in the human genome. This seems to me to be the reason why very few revolutions historically have not replaced the disposed elite with a new one just as bad. Subversion from within is more dangerous than subversion from without, to most ideals such as this.
------------------
Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson
DT:
Most people who know anything about the 80's would rather block out Bush-Clinton than Reagan-Bush. Regan gave us an incredible economy. Bush's dealing with the Dems gave us a recession. And let's not get started on Clinton.
------------------
You are wise, witty, and wonderful, but you spend far too much time reading this sort of trash.
In the interests of humor, this.
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.
Obviously, this precludes our litle Reagan wannabe child.
------------------
"Don't have a mind" - Kurt Cobain
Breed, Nirvana
------------------
"20th Century, go to sleep."
--
R.E.M.