The Offtopicgrad Soviet: A Place to Discuss All Things Red

[Tahuti]

And why would anyone start a new company if the boss of said company will be elected by the workers, and not by the guy who started it?

Apple was started by Steve Wozniak too, and not just Steve Jobs. Now, imagine Apple to be a fellowship of people like Wozniak and Jobs and no angel investors. Just how it was in the 1970s.

Apple in it's earliest incarnation was effectively such a company. And that's why the modern Apple Corporation is such a sad creation.

 

[Tani Coyote]

And why would anyone start a new company if the boss of said company will be elected by the workers, and not by the guy who started it?

Small business partnerships form all the time under capitalism. Under a market socialist system, even the rank and file would have decent amounts of disposable income to form new enterprises.

As for those with more wealth, they are not necessarily excluded from the boss position. They just have to sell themselves to their workers the same way a politician sells himself to voters. Indeed, further along the system, those with wealth most likely will have been successful bosses (as otherwise their workers would have voted them out), making it that much easier to convince workers to choose them.

There is the issue of initial investment, but I think the digital age has made appealing to possible worker-owners viable so that a wealthier person need not invest the lion's share of the funds and come up with only a fraction of the ownership. Never mind the fact that under capitalism, most people don't invest in a company to run it. They invest in it to make a profit. Even under the current system, there is no shortage of non-voting shares.

Many cooperatives allow former workers to have (generally non-voting) shares in the company. In much the same way, during the transition from capitalism to market socialism, a wealthy person might have a large amount invested in the company, but not have control of it. If he is discontent with the way the company is going, he sells his shares and goes elsewhere, as is done now.

 

[luiz]

Not very convincing. All sorts of enterprise require massive initial investment and involve massive risk, and people will only do it if they can get massive reward and if they can control the company. The state can do it as well, as it did in the USSR, but you still lose on innovation. But the notion that workers' cooperatives will be able to invest in and create stuff that requires billions in initial investment is just not realistic.

Note that in the present system we're free to create cooperatives where we can elect our own bosses. It's just that we're also free to be the bosses of the stuff we own as well.

 

[Daw]

And why would anyone start a new company if the boss of said company will be elected by the workers, and not by the guy who started it?

A group of professionals in the area might, I suppose.

Edit: too late an answer... I better read.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

No, if you note I say the market fundamentalists are utopians as well.
But if your idea of "something better than this" where this is Western capitalism is the Soviet Union, then yes, I think it's fair to say you're a utopian who doesn't care what crimes are committed in the pursuit of your utopia.

Then you're just ignoring what words mean for the convenience of avoiding meaningful criticism of your ideology.

Is it actually true that time "flows in a linear direction"?

If this is going to be the quality of "discussion" here then don't bother trying to respond.

Yes, I'm somewhat familiar with Hegelian and Marxist dialectics. The fact that contradictions create new contradictions means contradictions can never be done away with, though I think it's correct that a more socialist society will have to deal with slightly different contradictions to a capitalist one.

I didn't say we could do away with contradictions as a thing, now did I? I said that the contradictions of capitalism would force it to change. Try to focus on things I say.

Of course capitalism didn't 'absolutely destroy' what came before. As we all know perfectly well plenty of pre-capitalist stuff has survived into the capitalist age, like religion, racism, patriarchy, etc.
Also, hey, I remember arguing capitalism only existed for a couple of hundred years (came about in 19th century England) and being told by a certain someone that this meant I had no idea what capitalism even was

You're extremely tiring.

"A couple hundred years" can mean 200 or it can mean 800. In that argument you said 200, I said closer to a thousand.

Ugh. See, Marx didn't "prove" anything, he just came up with a new way of looking at things, imo some of which is pretty cool and useful and some of which is so much 19th-century nonsense. That applies to your dialectics, too: it's a tool, stop acting as though it's something that's been 'proven' and that the rest of us are stupid because we just don't get it!

Marxism isn't just another perspective, it is a science. Just like physics isn't just another perspective, it is a science.

Correct. But it's inaccurate to say that capitalism is 'solving' the problem. Capitalism has given us the means to solve the problem, with socialism - something, finally, Cheezy the Wiz and I agree on.

Don't try to close ranks with me if this sophistry is the best you can do.

Ok but back to reality we are feeding more people than ever, both in absolute numbers and as a proportion of total people, with no end to that trend in sight. It's not being solved by making more people starve because that's a mathematical contradiction.

Translation of "perpetuating": solving slower than immediately.

There has been, to date, only this reality: humans always knew starvation and "capitalism" has been the only system to progressively end the threat of starvation for many, now most, and trend-lining to all.

Capitalism destroyed self-sustaining societies the world over through imperialism in order to create raw material supplies and markets for the imperial center. While famine has always been a part of pre-mechanized agriculture (something critics of the USSR and China always conveniently forget), the degree to which famine was perpetuated by capitalism for the sake of profit is colossal and criminal almost beyond comprehension.

Please read Late Victorian Holocausts by Mike Davis and 1493 by Charles C. Mann to get at least some perspective on what we're talking about here.

And as I said, hunger continues to be allowed to exist, even in this country, because it is unprofitable to feed hungry mouths without recompense. That is never going to change under capitalism. We aren't trending toward some golden future where capitalism will make us all rich and provide for everyone and will be run by responsible and ethical people who make the best decisions for everyone. This kind technocratic pipe-dream is what's going to kill us all.

If I had a choice to live as Bob the Peasant in Bohemia 1640 or Bob the Minimum Wage Worker in Alabama 2016, I know which one I'm choosing.
Heck, I would be down with being Bob the Copper Miner in Zambia 2016 over Bob the Peasant.

That's nice. You know that labor is what makes that difference, not capitalism, right? The -ism just decides who keeps and controls the flow of wealth.

How can we know for sure that market socialism will slide back into capitalism, though, when there has been no market socialist economy?

Short answer? Dialectics.

Slightly longer answer? Because Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and the USSR tried market socialism and got their socialist governments overthrown for it.

As I explained just a page ago or so, market socialism is not socialism. It's capitalism. Even if a proletarian dictatorship is in charge, even if the old bourgeoisie is destroyed completely, the conditions that create a bourgeois class still exist, and sooner or later, that bourgeoisie will have enough strength to assert its interest and contest state power, and if it's victorious then your "socialism" is gone. That's exactly what happened in most of Central and Eastern Europe in the late 80s and early 90s.

And plus, we don't need market socialism. Economic planning works better.

Not very convincing. All sorts of enterprise require massive initial investment and involve massive risk, and people will only do it if they can get massive reward and if they can control the company. The state can do it as well, as it did in the USSR, but you still lose on innovation. But the notion that workers' cooperatives will be able to invest in and create stuff that requires billions in initial investment is just not realistic.

Note that in the present system we're free to create cooperatives where we can elect our own bosses. It's just that we're also free to be the bosses of the stuff we own as well.

Strangely, we find ourselves in agreement, except on the point of "innovation loss." The state just does it better, because it can plan far ahead and has access to huge amounts of capital. Who's going to start up a "mom & pop steel mill?"

Right now China is making socioeconomic plans for 50 years from now. The US government doesn't know what it's gonna do next quarter.

 

[Ajidica]

That's nice. You know that labor is what makes that difference, not capitalism, right? The -ism just decides who keeps and controls the flow of wealth.

I may have left my college Marxist phase behind me, but I would like to think I retained enough literacy in communist and anarchist thought to parse what you are saying, but you lost me here.

Right now China is making socioeconomic plans for 50 years from now. The US government doesn't know what it's gonna do next quarter.

Let's check back in 50 years and see how relevant that plan was. The Soviets couldn't even get a 5 year plan to work during arguably the height of bureaucratic control over the economy. I feel a Chinese 50 year plan in an evolving free market economy when they are facing pretty serious economic and demographic problems in the next decade or two will be even less useful than the British plan in 1955 to grant independence to their colonies over the next 20 years.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I may have left my college Marxist phase behind me, but I would like to think I retained enough literacy in communist and anarchist thought to parse what you are saying, but you lost me here.

Labor by people is the origin of all wealth.

The economic system doesn't "make" things, labor inside that system does. The system just decides where that wealth goes and how its products get distributed through society.

Capitalism is one way of allocating that wealth and distributing social goods. Tributary relations (so-called "feudalism") is another. Socialism is another. It's all labor, labor creating wealth, and a society that gets that wealth distributed throughout it somehow.

It's absurd to point to capitalism and say "see, things are better now than they were 400 years ago, therefore capitalism is good!"

Let's check back in 50 years and see how relevant that plan was. The Soviets couldn't even get a 5 year plan to work during arguably the height of bureaucratic control over the economy.

That's utter nonsense but whatever.

I feel a Chinese 50 year plan in an evolving free market economy when they are facing pretty serious economic and demographic problems in the next decade or two will be even less useful than the British plan in 1955 to grant independence to their colonies over the next 20 years.

The Chinese economy isn't free market. There's a large state sector, and a pretty heavily-regulated capitalist sector, both of which remain under the control of the socialist state.

Also the idea that Chinese economic planning and British decolonization are remotely comparable is downright offensive.

 

[Ajidica]

Labor by people is the origin of all wealth.

The economic system doesn't "make" things, labor inside that system does. The system just decides where that wealth goes and how its products get distributed through society.

Capitalism is one way of allocating that wealth and distributing social goods. Tributary relations (so-called "feudalism") is another. Socialism is another. It's all labor, labor creating wealth, and a society that gets that wealth distributed throughout it somehow.

It's absurd to point to capitalism and say "see, things are better now than they were 400 years ago, therefore capitalism is good!"

Well, something happened in the intervening 400 years that saw me rather be a Zambian Copper Miner than a Bavarian peasant.
Although given that I've openly admired the British Welfare State, French dirigisme, the Great Society, and Scandinavian Social Democracy it is funny you see me as the "Capitalism = Good" group.
Economic planning a state intervention is a valuable tool; especially for developing economies.

That's utter nonsense but whatever.

How is it nonsense?

The Chinese economy isn't free market. There's a large state sector, and a pretty heavily-regulated capitalist sector, both of which remain under the control of the socialist state.

Evolving free market. I don't see any indications for a return to the days of Great Chairman Mao but plenty of indications the Chinese political and economic elite are eager to adopt Singaporean or South Korean economic policies.

Also the idea that Chinese economic planning and British decolonization are remotely comparable is downright offensive.

I was thinking more along the lines of how silly it is to try and plan a society 50 years out; unless we feel like pressing a giant pause button on societal changes Warhammer 40K style.

 

[Lexicus]

If this is going to be the quality of "discussion" here then don't bother trying to respond.

Well, the topic isn't really pertinent but it was an honest question. Linear time is a perspective, not a 'fact' in the sense you seem to think it is.

I didn't say we could do away with contradictions as a thing, now did I? I said that the contradictions of capitalism would force it to change. Try to focus on things I say.

I am focusing on the things you say. Surely you agree that the establishment of the classless society ("Communism") will end the conflicts of interest over how resources are distributed that you claim are inherent to capitalism? Isn't, for example, 'class conflict' going to be ended by the establishment of socialism?

"A couple hundred years" can mean 200 or it can mean 800. In that argument you said 200, I said closer to a thousand.

Uh, a couple means two, actually. Eight is like, several hundred at least.
In any case this is peripheral to the real issue which is that capitalism hasn't fully succeeded in destroying social arrangements that came before it, though it has come close. But even so it is an outgrowth of what came before it. The roots of it lie far back in time.

Marxism isn't just another perspective, it is a science. Just like physics isn't just another perspective, it is a science.

Science is a perspective, though I agree it isn't "just another" perspective. But when you say "Marxism is a science", you are obviously wrong.
Science is certainly not the only perspective with value.

Don't try to close ranks with me if this sophistry is the best you can do.

I like you Cheezy. Don't be mad! I always learn something when I talk to Leninists. How is it sophistry?

That's nice. You know that labor is what makes that difference, not capitalism, right? The -ism just decides who keeps and controls the flow of wealth.

Ahh, but Cheezy, surely you must understand that the organization and direction of labor is itself a type of labor?
It's not silly to say that capitalism has led to huge humanitarian improvements on previous forms of social organization. Marx himself recognized this. He was pretty explicit that capitalism is what made socialism and communism possible. Capitalism enables forms of labor organization that never existed before in history. It enables the kind of technological dynamism that has created such a glut of material wealth in the world. The reason is that capitalists are constantly striving to produce more and pay less for it. So if they can come up with a machine that will let 10 workers do the work of 100, they will use it and add tremendously to society's ability to create a surplus.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Lexicus I have little patience for sophistry and pedantry. I'm not here because I'm bored, or just for the sake of arguing. If you have real questions then ask them, otherwise I'm not going to respond.

Well, something happened in the intervening 400 years that saw me rather be a Zambian Copper Miner than a Bavarian peasant.
Although given that I've openly admired the British Welfare State, French dirigisme, the Great Society, and Scandinavian Social Democracy it is funny you see me as the "Capitalism = Good" group.

All of those are capitalism, that's why I see you in the "capitalism = good" group.

Plus you seize every opportunity to crap on Actually Existing Socialism. That doesn't bode well for anti-capitalist credentials.

Economic planning a state intervention is a valuable tool; especially for developing economies.

Sure, but it's not socialism by itself.

How is it nonsense?

Because none of it is true?

Evolving free market. I don't see any indications for a return to the days of Great Chairman Mao but plenty of indications the Chinese political and economic elite are eager to adopt Singaporean or South Korean economic policies.

I don't see any indication that China is "on the capitalist road," especially since Xi has made re-emphasizing Marxism and cracking down on corruption centerpoints of his presidency.

However, a lot remains to be done to correct decades of rightist errors.

I was thinking more along the lines of how silly it is to try and plan a society 50 years out; unless we feel like pressing a giant pause button on societal changes Warhammer 40K style.

Anything is silly, if you imagine it in a silly way.

If you don't assume that people are stupid and senseless, then a lot of things that seemed silly suddenly become a whole lot more sensible.

 

[Lexicus]

Lexicus I have little patience for sophistry and pedantry. I'm not here because I'm bored, or just for the sake of arguing. If you have real questions then ask them, otherwise I'm not going to respond.

I'll take that as a ragequit. A small part of what I wrote was pedantry, but none was sophistry and I'm kind of confused by your dismissal.

To recap, I said Marxism is not science. Based on my understanding of the philosophy of science, Marxism, to the extent that it makes falsifiable claims, is something that ought to be subject to scientific inquiry. What makes you claim that Marxism is a science like physics?
Capitalism is clearly responsible for much of the change that's happened in the world in the last two centuries; what would lead you to claim otherwise?
Those are "real questions" as far as I can tell. For the life of me I can't see how they're pedantic or how asking them constitutes sophistry.

 

[Ajidica]

All of those are capitalism, that's why I see you in the "capitalism = good" group.

Plus you seize every opportunity to crap on Actually Existing Socialism. That doesn't bode well for anti-capitalist credentials.

What do you define as "Actually Existing Socialism"?
>Lenin-era RSFSR? Last I checked Emma Goldman and Rosa Luxemburg didn't consider it "Actually Existing Socialism".
>Stalin-era Soviet Union? I seem to remember someone getting purged and killed with an icepick because he didn't believe it was "Actually Existing Socialism".

Because none of it is true?

I'm confused. Are you suggesting that Stalin-era Soviet Union didn't have extensive levels of bureaucratic control over industry and directed the industry to meet the 5 Year Plans?

I don't see any indication that China is "on the capitalist road," especially since Xi has made re-emphasizing Marxism and cracking down on corruption centerpoints of his presidency.

Would you believe David Cameron that Britain is becoming freer and richer if they continue voting for inbred aristocrats Tory?
I see no fundamental reason to believe Xi is any more truthful that David Cameron. Cracking down on corruption is not inherently Marxist and from the articles I've read on the BBC - unless they have completely degenerated into toadies for decadent bourgeois imperialists- indicates that Xi is focused more on stamping out potential challenges to the CCP long-term than any sort of "mass mobilization of the noble peasantry" or Maoist slogans (Let 100 Flowers Bloom, Let 100 Schools of Thought Contend).
However, a lot remains to be done to correct decades of rightist errors.
it in a silly way.

If you don't assume that people are stupid and senseless, then a lot of things that seemed silly suddenly become a whole lot more sensible.

I don't assume people are stupid and senseless, but they are products of their time with their own biases and ideas about how the world should be. When Britain was drawing up its 20 year decolonization plans, they were working with a worldview that saw nothing wrong with minority rule and they were a civilizing force for the world.
To assume that CCP functionaries are not products of their time and have transcended to be pure, rational minds free of bias and ideas about how the world should be seems a bit strange.

 

[red_elk]

What do you define as "Actually Existing Socialism"?
>Lenin-era RSFSR? Last I checked Emma Goldman and Rosa Luxemburg didn't consider it "Actually Existing Socialism".
>Stalin-era Soviet Union? I seem to remember someone getting purged and killed with an icepick because he didn't believe it was "Actually Existing Socialism".

Allende's Chile, Cuba, USSR in 60-80s ?

 

[W|M]

Those three use(d) markets

>Stalin-era Soviet Union? I seem to remember someone getting purged and killed with an icepick because he didn't believe it was "Actually Existing Socialism".

His vision was to put himself in power, not implement socialism. Although Stalin-era USSR was so not-socialist it had a personality cult of the leader at the top

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

What do you define as "Actually Existing Socialism"?

Socialism that Actually Existed, i.e. where a Dictatorship of the Proletariat took state power and survived for at least a period of time.

There are five presently-existing socialist states: China, DPRK, Vietnam, Laos, and Cuba. Add to that probably another dozen historically: The USSR, Poland, DDR, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Albania, Mongolia, and perhaps some of the African attempts like Burkina Faso, Tanzania, and The Gambia.

>Lenin-era RSFSR? Last I checked Emma Goldman and Rosa Luxemburg didn't consider it "Actually Existing Socialism".

Emma Goldman was an anarchist, and Rosa Luxemburg did approve of the Russian Revolution, she just had some criticisms and concerns about it.

Their objection is meaningless though.

>Stalin-era Soviet Union? I seem to remember someone getting purged and killed with an icepick because he didn't believe it was "Actually Existing Socialism".

Trotsky also never denied the socialist content of the USSR. He believed it was a deformed workers' state (which is an absurd notion) but he never denied that it was, in fact, socialism.

Also, Trotsky was purged because he repeatedly broke party rules that he himself had helped create, not because "zomg Stalin was evil and got rid of all dissent."

Also also, I don't care about Trotsky's objections either. Socialism's existence isn't dependent on universal approval from the community of people who call themselves communists.

I'm confused. Are you suggesting that Stalin-era Soviet Union didn't have extensive levels of bureaucratic control over industry and directed the industry to meet the 5 Year Plans?

Don't be coy. I'm clearly saying that this is false:

"The Soviets couldn't even get a 5 year plan to work during arguably the height of bureaucratic control over the economy."

The Five Year Plans worked stupendously, and Soviet economic planning worked just fine afterwards too.

I'm beginning to see why this "College Marxist" phase was only a phase...

Would you believe David Cameron that Britain is becoming freer and richer if they continue voting for inbred aristocrats Tory?
I see no fundamental reason to believe Xi is any more truthful that David Cameron. Cracking down on corruption is not inherently Marxist and from the articles I've read on the BBC - unless they have completely degenerated into toadies for decadent bourgeois imperialists- indicates that Xi is focused more on stamping out potential challenges to the CCP long-term than any sort of "mass mobilization of the noble peasantry" or Maoist slogans (Let 100 Flowers Bloom, Let 100 Schools of Thought Contend).

So your argument boils down to "people have lied before, therefore I don't believe these people when they say things."

Also, laughing at the idea that the BBC is supposed to be some irrefutable bastion of truth, most of all about China.

I don't assume people are stupid and senseless, but they are products of their time with their own biases and ideas about how the world should be. When Britain was drawing up its 20 year decolonization plans, they were working with a worldview that saw nothing wrong with minority rule and they were a civilizing force for the world.
To assume that CCP functionaries are not products of their time and have transcended to be pure, rational minds free of bias and ideas about how the world should be seems a bit strange.

Britain didn't honestly want decolonization, it was forced to engage in it because it could no longer defend its Empire. It has nothing to do with being "products of their time" and the idea that the Chinese are pursuing socioeconomic development like the British pursued decolonization is ridiculous.

His vision was to put himself in power, not implement socialism. Although Stalin-era USSR was so not-socialist it had a personality cult of the leader at the top

I, too, am familiar with Western propaganda.

Do you have anything substantial and real to offer us?

 

[Namor]

The Five Year Plans worked stupendously, and Soviet economic planning worked just fine afterwards too.

So not even lip service paid to the catastrophic famine that resulted or the regular use of slave labor? Is that all just considered the cost of doing business?

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

So not even lip service paid to the catastrophic famine that resulted or the regular use of slave labor? Is that all just considered the cost of doing business?

There was no slave labor, and the famine had nothing to do with the Pyatletka.

 

[Namor]

There was no slave labor, and the famine had nothing to do with the Pyatletka.

Your argument is that all those prisoners of the state wanted to meet those quotas? When slave prison labor is used in capitalist countries, I don't think that is looked upon too favorably.

 

[Lexicus]

Your argument is that all those prisoners of the state wanted to meet those quotas? When slave prison labor is used in capitalist countries, I don't think that is looked upon too favorably.

Then there is that whole pesky Holodomor thing.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Your argument is that all those prisoners of the state wanted to meet those quotas? When slave prison labor is used in capitalist countries, I don't think that is looked upon too favorably.

I don't really care what the prisoners wanted. Prison labor was ubiquitous in that period, and it is still quite prevalent in the US today.

Meanwhile there was very real slave labor in the European colonies. Not a word of outrage about that from you, I see. No, only socialism must be held responsible for its crimes.

Then there is that whole pesky Holodomor thing.

Only in the minds of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists and Nazis was there such a thing as "Holodomor."

If you're referring to the 1932-3 famine that happened all across the southern grain-growing region of the USSR, again, it had nothing to do with the Five-Year Plans except that component collectivization ended famines in the USSR. There's this thing called "weather," you see, and non-mechanized agricultural societies are quite susceptible to its whims. Mechanization came with the Five Year Plans, and after 1933 there were no more famines there.

Again, not a word about the tens of millions who starved in famines in India because the British forcibly destroyed the Indians' ability to feed themselves. Not a word about Roosevelt destroying food during a time of hunger in the US because it wasn't profitable to sell it at such a low price. Don't waste my time with your pathetic crocodile tears about the "human cost" when you clearly don't care about the human cost of capitalism.

Moderator Action: Let's turn the temperature down on this debate. Please remain civil and assume good faith. In particular, calling another poster's motives insincere or 'pathetic' is not allowed. This is an RD thread and will be moderated as such
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889