Pathways to socialism.

[regent]

He hadn't read our federal Constitution?

If you are referring to Marx, there is a good chance he read our Constitution, and even took time to congratulate Lincoln on his election.

 

[CultureCitizen]

Ok. So it sounds like the distinction you're making between capitalism and socialism isn't with who owns the means of production, but what they try to do with it. State capitalism would be the state directing funds and resources toward profitable endeavors, and state socialism toward something else - presumably the good of the people.

If that's so, then it would seem the difference worth discussing is that between profit and the good of the people. How would you propose to measure the good of the people?

Well first yes, that is exactly the point.
Let's assume a socialist state has some SOE with the initial intent of improving people's lives, but after a while the government becomes increasingly corrupt and starts using the utility to beneffit the incumbents ( a simple way would be through a company that sold services to the SOE).
This is a situation which must be avoided. The question is exactly how to ensure that the company effectively serves its original intent.
One way I can think of is give shares to the citizens which allow them to take decisions regarding the company's direction. Of course this can complicate matters ,a LOT. Imagine a union tries to reduce the retirement age to 40. The workers might think it's great, but the rest of the shareholders will surely think this is an abusive policy .
... agh , the devil is in the details.

Regarding how to measure the "good" of the people , the human development index could be used... but I am guessing you probably mean a more difficult question: how do we decide who gets the benefit.

 

[CultureCitizen]

Wrong. China is communist and doesn't pretend otherwise. It allows businesses to operate at their discretion and right now they put the environment on the back burner to rake in as much money as they can.

That depends on your definition of "communism" and "capitalism".
But taking a fragment form wiki :
"In political and social sciences, communism (from Latincommunis – common, universal)[1][2] is a social, political, and economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of the communist society, which is a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production, absence of social classes,money,[3][4] and the state."

Common ownership of the means of production - granted, quite communist given the size an reach of their SOE.
Absence of social class - quite far from reallity (see link).
Money - ja ( nothing further from reallity).
State - Nope. Not even close.

So, the Chinese may claim whatever they want, but according to the definition of "communism", they are very , very far from becomming a communist society.

China gets richer but more unequal World news The Guardian

 

[CultureCitizen]

I've started this thread to explore the different paths and obstacles that might appear while switching to socialism. But before engaging into any discussion it is necesary to establish a working definition.

"Socialism is a social and economic system characterised by social ownership of the means of production and co-operative management of the economy."

Here it is important to distinguish "social ownership" and "state ownership". While it can be argued that when the state owns a company it does so having in mind the best interest of the society, it is often the case that the company is used to advance the agenda of a group of people holding office. Certain mechanisms must be in place in order to ensure true social ownership is ensured , like transparency and democracy. In any case, when the state has the control of several companies, we might be facing a scenario of state capitalism and not of socialism.

From my viewpoint cooperatives are the closest form of social ownership to date.
Can you think of any other ways to achieve social ownership?
What would be the drawbacks of having a large number of companies organized in such a fashion?
Do you think such arrangement is compatible with the free market ?
Share your thoughts.

Social ownership and state ownership are synonymous in an economy that is diverse and large. Such concepts can exist within a small community but cannot scale over a large one. there is simply no way of communally owning such resources that are so spread out over millions of 'owners.' There MUST be an entity to dole out those resources and hence the only working model comes into play - communism. Unfortunately, such a system is doomed to abject poverty and failure.

What makes you think that such a move would be beneficial?

I don't think it is ( having an entity to dole out the resources). It just shifts power from the corporations into the state.

While it is not possible to have a "nation wide" healthcare system, I do think it should be possible to have a set of local hospitals working as local cooperatives. Your thoughts on this option ?

I don't think it is realistic.

You can have somewhat local control over a single business entity but the reality is that the economy has become complex enough that resources that are commonplace are no longer local. For instance - there really are very few places that vehicles are actually produced. How then do you figure out how an individual in California, where no vehicles are produced, gets one? 80 percent of the worlds electronic goods are produced in a single facility in China. How and who decides how we bring those to market in a socialistic society?

That is the core problem with 'local' ownership by the people of the means of production. Everyone owns the car factory in your neighborhood but everyone in the nation needs a car. Are you going to sell those cars then as you would in a capitalist society? How are you going to deal with those in a local district in Tennessee that do not produce anything anyone really wants then? How have you solved any of the problems that capitalism has in that scenario? All you have done is move the problem around a bit.

In the end, a socialistic nation requires an entity that decides where the goods are needed and sends them there. In essence, there is no such thing as the 'people' owning the means of production. It goes right to the government.


You might like a similar thread I started that focuses on the fact that there are not going to be any jobs left after enough automation and robotics kick in. I don't really think that socialism has the answers here though.
The future of capitalism US Message Board - Political Discussion Forum

First , thanks for an interesting answer and engaging into actual discussion.

" How then do you figure out how an individual in California, where no vehicles are produced, gets one? "
Same way as today , supply and demand. The market is a usefull tool .
The difference is that the company is owned by the workers ( and maybe) also by the locals. This changes the behavior of both, the "unions" and the company. Unions killing a company by unreasonable wage rises would be stopped on their tracks, moving a factory to another country would probably be a last resource.

"Everyone owns the car factory in your neighborhood but everyone in the nation needs a car. Are you going to sell those cars then as you would in a capitalist society? "

Indeed. If the product is bad the company still goes out of business. I do notice that collective ownership requires a set of people who is more financially educated.

"In essence, there is no such thing as the 'people' owning the means of production. It goes right to the government."
Well , the government has to run some services ( some people have a hard time admiting that ) . But collective ownership seems like an interesting alternative. It both empowers people and gives them more responsibility.
There are several levels of collective ownership:
1) It can be owned by the employees only , as Kantega
2) It can be owned by the "customers" as is the case with the Grameen Bank.
3) It can be owned both by the workers and the locals.
4) It can be owned by all the members of a country ( this would be the extreme case, but a mechanism should be enabled as to halt the actual ownership by the state).

What I am thinking is that by having collective means of production and markets the end result should be more stable allthough some efficiency is lost in the process.

Kantega - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
Grameen Bank - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

See above.
You want communal ownership but to maintain a capitalist system outside of each individual company. How does that address anything?

In many ways. A cooperative will more likely distribute income more evenly among its members. Some action's like creating a highly polluting plant might be either stopped by the same employees or shareholders.
Third, an institution like the Grameen bank is unlikely to gain anything from predatory lending ... because the gains will be split among the borrowers ( and shareholders).

 

[Iceweasel]

Wrong. China is communist and doesn't pretend otherwise. It allows businesses to operate at their discretion and right now they put the environment on the back burner to rake in as much money as they can.

That depends on your definition of "communism" and "capitalism".
But taking a fragment form wiki :

Nobody with a brain uses wikipedia for anything definitive. Play your stupid games with somebody else.

 

[FA_Q2]

Social ownership and state ownership are synonymous in an economy that is diverse and large. Such concepts can exist within a small community but cannot scale over a large one. there is simply no way of communally owning such resources that are so spread out over millions of 'owners.' There MUST be an entity to dole out those resources and hence the only working model comes into play - communism. Unfortunately, such a system is doomed to abject poverty and failure.

What makes you think that such a move would be beneficial?

I don't think it is ( having an entity to dole out the resources). It just shifts power from the corporations into the state.

While it is not possible to have a "nation wide" healthcare system, I do think it should be possible to have a set of local hospitals working as local cooperatives. Your thoughts on this option ?

I don't think it is realistic.

You can have somewhat local control over a single business entity but the reality is that the economy has become complex enough that resources that are commonplace are no longer local. For instance - there really are very few places that vehicles are actually produced. How then do you figure out how an individual in California, where no vehicles are produced, gets one? 80 percent of the worlds electronic goods are produced in a single facility in China. How and who decides how we bring those to market in a socialistic society?

That is the core problem with 'local' ownership by the people of the means of production. Everyone owns the car factory in your neighborhood but everyone in the nation needs a car. Are you going to sell those cars then as you would in a capitalist society? How are you going to deal with those in a local district in Tennessee that do not produce anything anyone really wants then? How have you solved any of the problems that capitalism has in that scenario? All you have done is move the problem around a bit.

In the end, a socialistic nation requires an entity that decides where the goods are needed and sends them there. In essence, there is no such thing as the 'people' owning the means of production. It goes right to the government.


You might like a similar thread I started that focuses on the fact that there are not going to be any jobs left after enough automation and robotics kick in. I don't really think that socialism has the answers here though.
The future of capitalism US Message Board - Political Discussion Forum

First , thanks for an interesting answer and engaging into actual discussion.

" How then do you figure out how an individual in California, where no vehicles are produced, gets one? "
Same way as today , supply and demand. The market is a usefull tool .
The difference is that the company is owned by the workers ( and maybe) also by the locals. This changes the behavior of both, the "unions" and the company. Unions killing a company by unreasonable wage rises would be stopped on their tracks, moving a factory to another country would probably be a last resource.

"Everyone owns the car factory in your neighborhood but everyone in the nation needs a car. Are you going to sell those cars then as you would in a capitalist society? "

Indeed. If the product is bad the company still goes out of business. I do notice that collective ownership requires a set of people who is more financially educated.

"In essence, there is no such thing as the 'people' owning the means of production. It goes right to the government."
Well , the government has to run some services ( some people have a hard time admiting that ) . But collective ownership seems like an interesting alternative. It both empowers people and gives them more responsibility.
There are several levels of collective ownership:
1) It can be owned by the employees only , as Kantega
2) It can be owned by the "customers" as is the case with the Grameen Bank.
3) It can be owned both by the workers and the locals.
4) It can be owned by all the members of a country ( this would be the extreme case, but a mechanism should be enabled as to halt the actual ownership by the state).

What I am thinking is that by having collective means of production and markets the end result should be more stable allthough some efficiency is lost in the process.

Kantega - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
Grameen Bank - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

See above.
You want communal ownership but to maintain a capitalist system outside of each individual company. How does that address anything?

In many ways. A cooperative will more likely distribute income more evenly among its members. Some action's like creating a highly polluting plant might be either stopped by the same employees or shareholders.
Third, an institution like the Grameen bank is unlikely to gain anything from predatory lending ... because the gains will be split among the borrowers ( and shareholders).

Among ITS members. Again, you are avoiding the problem - deciding WHO those owners are.
And no, the Grameen is not going to 'avoid' predatory lending - more than its members are going to get loans there under anything short of ownership by everyone and then we are right back to where we started.

 

[CultureCitizen]

Wrong. China is communist and doesn't pretend otherwise. It allows businesses to operate at their discretion and right now they put the environment on the back burner to rake in as much money as they can.

That depends on your definition of "communism" and "capitalism".
But taking a fragment form wiki :

Nobody with a brain uses wikipedia for anything definitive. Play your stupid games with somebody else.

I am willing to discuss if you provide links. But I will definitvely not engage into a discussion with definitions taken from your head.

 

[Iceweasel]

Wrong. China is communist and doesn't pretend otherwise. It allows businesses to operate at their discretion and right now they put the environment on the back burner to rake in as much money as they can.

That depends on your definition of "communism" and "capitalism".
But taking a fragment form wiki :

Nobody with a brain uses wikipedia for anything definitive. Play your stupid games with somebody else.

I am willing to discuss if you provide links. But I will definitvely not engage into a discussion with definitions taken from your head.

I posted one but I can't read it for you.

 

[CultureCitizen]

1
: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
}

Does the disjunctive or exist within your semantic field ?

 

[Uncensored2008]

Does the disjunctive or exist within your semantic field ?

It simply isn't relevant, beyond a Kibbutz or hippie commune, collective ownership means the state.

Socialism is simply the ownership OR control of the means of production by the state. China is a socialist country that has allowed a segment of private ownership to create an incentive for people to produce, CONTROL of production remains the domain of the PRC, but certain zones are allowed which stimulate production through a state controlled private ownership program.

China remains totalitarian, as socialism must be.

 

[2aguy]

I've started this thread to explore the different paths and obstacles that might appear while switching to socialism. But before engaging into any discussion it is necesary to establish a working definition.

"Socialism is a social and economic system characterised by social ownership of the means of production and co-operative management of the economy."

Here it is important to distinguish "social ownership" and "state ownership". While it can be argued that when the state owns a company it does so having in mind the best interest of the society, it is often the case that the company is used to advance the agenda of a group of people holding office. Certain mechanisms must be in place in order to ensure true social ownership is ensured , like transparency and democracy. In any case, when the state has the control of several companies, we might be facing a scenario of state capitalism and not of socialism.

From my viewpoint cooperatives are the closest form of social ownership to date.
Can you think of any other ways to achieve social ownership?
What would be the drawbacks of having a large number of companies organized in such a fashion?
Do you think such arrangement is compatible with the free market ?
Share your thoughts.

The biggest obstacle in the pathway to socialism.....the 20th century....mass graves filled with 70-100 million people in the name of socialism is just a teeny, tiny bit off putting to people who actually pay attention to things like that............

 

[Uncensored2008]

The biggest obstacle in the pathway to socialism.....the 20th century....mass graves filled with 70-100 million people in the name of socialism is just a teeny, tiny bit off putting to people who actually pay attention to things like that............

The problem is that people don't pay attention. People also don't think. Offer a ghetto moron a "free" Obama phone and they are on board for socialism. Even 7 years later, when they never got the Obama Phone, they still praise his name - people are stupid. Socialism preys on the stupid - it is the con that they will get something for nothing.

Stupid people cannot grasp the simple fact that Milton Friedman made so clear "there is no such thing as a free lunch." Someone always pays. Theft of the product of the labor of the middle class given to the underclass is done by the elites to purchase political power against the middle class. If such a time happens that the middle is crushed - i.e. we have Socialism and the elite are not threatened with a usurping middle class, then the lower class will be forcibly suppressed, as is always the case in Socialism.

Socialism is ultimately the repackaging of feudalism to be sold to the stupid. A tiny, permanent aristocracy ruling the masses with an iron fist, feeding scraps to the begging fray as they see fit.

 

[dblack]

Socialism is ultimately the repackaging of feudalism to be sold to the stupid. A tiny, permanent aristocracy ruling the masses with an iron fist, feeding scraps to the begging fray as they see fit.

Exactly. Supplanting economic power with political power is just putting the warlords back in charge.

 

[danielpalos]

He hadn't read our federal Constitution?

If you are referring to Marx, there is a good chance he read our Constitution, and even took time to congratulate Lincoln on his election.

Then, why was Marx allegedly against the Utopian Socialism of our federal Constitution and supreme social law of the land?

Socialism starts with a social Contract.

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

 

[Sidekick]

I've started this thread to explore the different paths and obstacles that might appear while switching to socialism. But before engaging into any discussion it is necesary to establish a working definition.

"Socialism is a social and economic system characterised by social ownership of the means of production and co-operative management of the economy."

Here it is important to distinguish "social ownership" and "state ownership". While it can be argued that when the state owns a company it does so having in mind the best interest of the society, it is often the case that the company is used to advance the agenda of a group of people holding office. Certain mechanisms must be in place in order to ensure true social ownership is ensured , like transparency and democracy. In any case, when the state has the control of several companies, we might be facing a scenario of state capitalism and not of socialism.

From my viewpoint cooperatives are the closest form of social ownership to date.
Can you think of any other ways to achieve social ownership?
What would be the drawbacks of having a large number of companies organized in such a fashion?
Do you think such arrangement is compatible with the free market ?
Share your thoughts.

First of all, you offer a definition of socialism expecting that it's the same for everyone, but that's not how it works with any political system. My definition of socialism, "a mobscene of zombie whores hellbent on consuming everyone and everything in it's path until there's nothing left but misery and depression," will always be equally valid to yours whether you like it or not. So, then what, resort to some elitist intellectualism in an attempt to sooth your individual ego by discounting my point of view? You see, for as much as you value your sense of enlightenment and compassion for humanity, you have yet to learn the reality of parallax.

What is it then to be interacting with a dollhouse, expecting the models to have blank expressions or Mona Lisa smiles, positioning them into whatever form you like? What happens when you discover that real people are not such toys, that individuals are well endowed with free will, volition, and all manner of desires you could never have anticipated, including the power to kill you if you dare to impose your ideology upon them? You want a pathway to socialism, you're setting yourself up to be either the victim or perpetrator in a state of mass murder where the very humanity you cherish will be lost.

Furthermore, in the spiritual way your rhetoric is sterile, lacking a passion for life and living. That sort of plastic soul is like to be monotonous gray, void of the colors and flavors that makes culture worthwhile. There are no universal concepts or ideals, there is not even real proof that such a thing as the universe even exists, for there are many worlds, to each his own.

 

[regent]

He hadn't read our federal Constitution?

If you are referring to Marx, there is a good chance he read our Constitution, and even took time to congratulate Lincoln on his election.

Then, why was Marx allegedly against the Utopian Socialism of our federal Constitution and supreme social law of the land?

Socialism starts with a social Contract.

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Marx was against most socialist movements except his, and his didn't work.

 

[sealybobo]

with whatever industries deemed 'necessary' being run by government, or, if you prefer "the people"

There is a crucial distinction between "the people" and "the government". One which I hope people begin to understand.

Me too! Let's talk about that. What is that distinction, in your view?

This would be a good example :

Co-determination - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

1. Board of directors: Prior to 1976, German coal and steel producers employing more than 1,000 workers commonly maintained a board of directors composed of 11 members: five directors came from management, five were workers' representatives, with the eleventh member being neutral. (Note: Boards could be larger as long as the proportion of representation was maintained.)

Thanks to the years during which a co-operative culture has been in place, management requests from workers for proposals to improve operations or increase productivity, for example, are no longer considered mere legal formalities; they represent recognition of the fact that workers play an important part in plant success.

And here is another example :

"Grameen Bank is owned by the borrowers of the bank, most of whom are poor women. Of the total equity of the bank, the borrowers own 94%, and the remaining 6% is owned by the Bangladesh government.[25]

The bank grew significantly between 2003-2007. As of January 2011, the total borrowers of the bank number 8.4 million, and 97% of those are women"
Grameen Bank - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

And example of which? The people, or government?

Motly people, though the government did have some involvement in the german co-determination case.

I like this co-determination

Co-determination would allow workers at the biggest companies to elect representatives to the board of directors. That would give workers a say in things like wages, mergers, changes in corporate strategy, and the hiring or firing of a C.E.O.

Why not? Why do we have CEO's from other companies sitting on the board of directors at other companies? Why? Because they all take care of each other. Why shouldn't workers have a seat at the table?