Socialism 101: Q&A

[white_wolf]

I'm still doing research and organizing my information so my next in-depth post will be sometime next week more than likely, however I am reading a lot on this topic so I just thought I'd post this thread and see if anyone had any general questions I could answer on the topic. If I can't answer your question I'll do more research and get back to you. Oh and for anyone who has not read this I highly recommend Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism by Lenin: http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/

[northoftheborder]

1. This will be a useful post. Thanks for doing this.

[white_wolf]

2. Happy to help out. n/t

[unkachuck]

3. thanks, white-wolf....

....since Socialism has the same access to science and technology as capitalism, why is it argued that Socialism can never be made as creative and productive as capitalism?

....capitalism offers limited individuals unlimited opportunity for wealth (at great societal expense); Socialism offers the opportunity to live in a peaceful well-maintained society; yet most people reject Socialism knowing full well they'll never attain capitalist wealth....why is the concept of personal power and gain more powerful than the concept of living a pleasant life in a pleasant society?

[white_wolf]

4. Good question.

I'm really glad you asked this because it touches on one of the biggest arguments against socialism. The human nature argument. First of all, I'd argue that capitalism doesn't offer unlimited opportunity, because if you look at our society there are people with college degrees who are waiting tables at restaurants. There were PhD in Egypt waiting tables and other service level jobs and Egypt wasn't socialist.
Second of all, to address the human nature argument. What is human nature? The Marxist/Socialist response would be that human nature is a product of our environment and society, under capitalism the goal is to gain as much wealth as possible so, of course, greed is the norm. People have been raised to think that way their whole lives, they don't know anything else. In a socialist society the greatest goal would be service to society, you would still be rewarded for your contributions to society but not only would you gain some material compensation you would gain the respect of your fellow man, which in my mind is far better a reward than a BMW. Does that address your question?

[unkachuck]

11. "Does that address your question?"

....pretty much....I can see it's partly or maybe even mostly, education, but still, at a more profound level I think there's a survival/preservation thing happening within the individual which needs to be addressed more effectively by Socialism....for maximum acceptance and participation, a person needs to feel confident and secure that he/she is living in the best society possible and that that society has stability, fairness and a secure future....

....and I don't understand why Socialism can't be structured to be as innovative and creative as capitalism....a capitalist country doesn't spend as much on society; does that account for more resources available for innovation? Is Socialism always going to be at a disadvantage?

[white_wolf]

15. I don't think it will be at a disadvantage.

In a capitalist society so many resources are concentrated into so few hands,that it really hampers innovation. In a socialist society there would be much more money/resources available for research and innovation. For example, you hear rumors about how they have already developed a cure for cancer, but won't release because corporations can make more money if cancer exists. Under a socialist society that problem would be gone.

[socialist_n_TN]

18. RE: your second paragraph.......

The resources that are not spent in a capitalist country on society do NOT go into innovation. The innovation, in most cases, comes from the bottom up and is expropriated (by purchase or force) BY the capitalists and THEN either distributed or quashed BY the capitalists once they've obtained the innovation. The money the capitalists DON'T spend on society goes into their pockets. Because most innovation comes from the bottom up, socialism should be even more ameneable to innovation than capitalism.

[DonCoquixote]

23. Because

one persons "peaceful well maintained" society is another's empire, meaning that there have been many times where the offer of peace was coupled with imprisonment, much like Religion offered. Socialism will be sold when you allow for people to have inalienable rights, and no, I do not mean to make lots of money, but that the state allows for grievances, as well as cultural differences., Granted, most european states do achieve this pretty well, but that is not sold, especially because some on both the extreme left and right hate that idea equally.

[BOG PERSON]

5. in a post-capitalist society, who will clean the streets?

[white_wolf]

6. Well Idealy

we would be able to automate that in time. In the mean time however, The specifics would be left up to the local community to decide in meetings via democratic vote, however in general jobs such as that, which are necessary but undesirable would be done via a rotation system so no one in the community is stuck doing it everyday. I hope that helps.

[socialist_n_TN]

7. As the Zen master responded........

to a student question as to why an enlightened person should be washing dishes, "The dishes still need to be washed." :rofl:

[bvar22]

9. Pay a decent salary with health care & pension,

and I'll do it.

[white_wolf]

13. Well those are a given in a socialist society.

You would get those regardless, but in a socialist society the community wouldn't want to force someone into a job they would hate day after day.

[leftstreet]

12. LOL how come no one ever worries about who will perform our surgeries?

"...in a post capitalist society"

:shrug:

[white_wolf]

14. You will still need doctors.

However unlike in our current society where a lot of people become doctors simply to get rich, you would have people becoming doctors who truly care about helping people. Oh and yes, they would still get reward slightly better than a person who sweeps the streets, but the greatest reward would be the respect they would gain from their society.

[cigsandcoffee]

16. They'd probably rather have Ferraris.

n/t

[leftstreet]

20. No, what I meant was how bizarre that question always sounds

Without capitalism, who will clean our streets?

could also be stated....

If we don't pay street cleaners shit wages, who will do it?

:crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

It makes NO sense!

[white_wolf]

22. Oh, haha sorry. My bad.

[Starry Messenger]

8. k&r

[BOG PERSON]

10. would there be military parades?

the one thing i love about communist countries is their military parades.

[Xicano]

17. I would just like to add these two short video clips.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6cN-1dLoPY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzqW0YaN2ho

[Alcibiades]

19. To what extent has the history of the last 30 years

been a vindication of Marx? I have in mind Volume III of Capital, which is something of a hodge podge, cobbled together by Engels out of scraps, but also one of my favorite works by Max, in part because of Engels' heavy editing (he's more readable) and in part because it represents Marx's most advanced ideas on the subject of advanced capitalist development.

Here are a few passages that seem remarkably prescient: contrary to the common opinion that Marx has somehow been falsified by history, they make it clear that Marx has himself falsified this common opinion of his work. I've been thinking about these particular passages for the past decade or so, and they have provided a pretty accurate roadmap of the development of our economy since, say, 1979.

_________

The capital itself, which a man really owns or is supposed to own in the opinion of the public, becomes purely a basis for the superstructure of credit. This is particularly true of wholesale commerce, through which the greatest portion of the social product passes. All standards of measurement, all excuses more or less still justified under capitalist production, disappear here. What the speculating wholesale merchant risks is social property, not his own. Equally sordid becomes the phrase relating the origin of capital to savings, for what he demands is that others should save for him. The other phrase concerning abstention is squarely refuted by his luxury, which is now itself a means of credit. Conceptions which have some meaning on a less developed stage of capitalist production, become quite meaningless here. Success and failure both lead here to a centralisation of capital, and thus to expropriation on the most enormous scale. Expropriation extends here from the direct producers to the smaller and the medium-sized capitalists themselves. It is the point of departure for the capitalist mode of production; its accomplishment is the goal of this production. In the last instance, it aims at the expropriation of the means of production from all individuals.

_________
Think about that for a moment: advanced capitalism tends toward the expropriation of the means of production from all individuals. Isn't this exactly the political and economic program of Wall Street and their allies in government?

_________

The two characteristics immanent in the credit system are, on the one hand, to develop the incentive of capitalist production, enrichment through exploitation of the labour of others, to the purest and most colossal form of gambling and swindling, and to reduce more and more the number of the few who exploit the social wealth; on the other hand, to constitute the form of transition to a new mode of production. It is this ambiguous nature, which endows the principal spokesmen of credit from Law to Isaac Péreire with the pleasant character mixture of swindler and prophet.

_________

In these bits taken from Chapter 27, and throughout Part V of Volume II of Capital, it is not the emiseration of the proletariat that ultimately leads to socialism, but the tendency of capitalism to, in the end, create one powerful bank that controls all production and credit. The process that leads to this is one of lurching from one credit-fueled crisis to another. Isn't that exactly what we have been going through since at least the S&L crisis of the 1980's?

[white_wolf]

21. Honestly I think you answered your own question :)

I do think the last 30 years have proven Marx right. He perfectly predicted the mess we find ourselves in today.