... to each according to his needs.

[Bombay]

I asked this question in an another thread. In anarchism/communism how would the society prevent people from being greedy?


Would it be possible to take more than you need? How would it be controlled people wouldn't just take too much food, clothes electronic devises ect.? I know a person is able to eat a certain amount of food but what is a person goes to the "store" (or whatever is the place where you get your stuff from) and takes 25 different cell phones and 5 SUV's? How many vehicles you'd be allowed to own?

[Crusade]

I asked this question in an another thread. In anarchism/communism how would the society prevent people from being greedy?

It's supposed to happen in a post scarcity society. But before that the results would be pretty hilarious. "COME ON DAWG I'M STARVING HERE I'M NOTHIN' BUT SKIN AND BONES", "FUCK THAT SKINNY ASSHOLE, I WEIGH MORE THAN THAT TOOTHPICK I NEED MORE TO FILL ME UP, I NEED IT MORE, WHAT ARE YOU SOME KIND OF REVISIONIST?" "As a buddhist, I don't believe we truly need anything. You only believe you need it to remain in your current form. Do no be a slave to your desires" "REVISIONIST, OFF WITH HIS HEAD"

repeat

[Broletariat]

I asked this question in an another thread. In anarchism/communism how would the society prevent people from being greedy?
Through gradual socialisation that removes valuing greed, and instead valuing things like Mutual Aid

[chegitz guevara]

Greed is a response to scarcity. Eliminate scarcity and greed becomes a burden.

[Bombay]

I guess you guys are right. I've never been a greedy person (I think we all are greedy to a certain degree though) so I really don't know what's going on in a greedy persons mind. Well, capitalism encourages greed and is based on it so it's no surprise it's so common.

[Bombay]

One question that came to my mind is about houses and apartments. How would the society decide which person lives in which house? I mean there are many very small apartments in "bad" neighborhoods, who would have to live in those cheap apartments? I live in a apartment of only one small room (thanks capitalism!) and I'd like to get a bigger one. How would I do it in true communism?

[robbo203]

One question that came to my mind is about houses and apartments. How would the society decide which person lives in which house? I mean there are many very small apartments in "bad" neighborhoods, who would have to live in those cheap apartments? I live in a apartment of only one small room (thanks capitalism!) and I'd like to get a bigger one. How would I do it in true communism?

Oddly enough I live in Spain and - guess what? - there are 3 million empty houses over here despite the homelessness. So take your pick. Even in crowded little UK there are 1 million empty homes. This is to say nothing of all those commerical properties and office blocks that will become available for useful purposes when we get rid of the crazy money system

[mikelepore]

Greed is a response to scarcity. Eliminate scarcity and greed becomes a burden.

How could you know that? Maybe it's typical in any society for most people to take accumulation as far as they can go, and to stop only when reality puts up some kind of barrier before them. Maybe if the world were different such that everyone could have a 100 room mansion, then the average person would consider it a modest standard to have a 100 room mansion. I think wealthy hoarders are the same personalities as anyone else, but the finite barriers that they find inhibiting them happen to be located much further out. It's unknowable whether this is true.

[chegitz guevara]

It's hardly unknowable. We know from previous societies that people only take as much as they can carry. Ancient humans, and our close cousins, chimps, will simply leave tools that they've made when moving to a new location and make new ones, because it takes less effort.

We know from this society, that people need to be bombarded with constant messages to consume and have to be manipulated into doing so.

If you could go out and get whatever you needed when you needed it, why would you bother stockpiling it at home?

[Bombay]

We know from this society, that people need to be bombarded with constant messages to consume and have to be manipulated into doing so.

This is a good point IMO. People buy stuff they don't need only because of marketing.

[mikelepore]

It's hardly unknowable. We know from previous societies that people only take as much as they can carry.

Ancient society didn't have music players, DVD recorders, photography equipment, or special gear needed for ten different sports. The tendency to hoard possessions depends on those objects having been invented.


Ancient humans, and our close cousins, chimps, will simply leave tools that they've made when moving to a new location and make new ones, because it takes less effort.

The need for ancient people to avoid carrying an anvil or a grinding stone on a long migration on the back of a horse is not going to give us a hint about whether people in a technological society will want to acquire a lot of possessions.


We know from this society, that people need to be bombarded with constant messages to consume and have to be manipulated into doing so.

A conclusion about trends can't be made from one data point. There is one earth, it is class ruled, and people behave this way, people have a drive to accumulate possessions. That's one data point.

Ancient society is another available data point, but it's irrelevant. The means of production were the forests and streams, so it doesn't provide any hints about a technological society.

I don't see that we are being bombared with messages to consume. Given that we are going to consume up to the limit of our spending power, we are bombarded with messages to select the brand of the advertiser that is paying for the given message instead of the competitors' brands. Other than the pressure to choose among brands, the extent of consumption in general is discouraged by the fact that most people don't have enough money to pay their debts.


If you could go out and get whatever you needed when you needed it, why would you bother stockpiling it at home?

Fewer steps. Just grab your camera or telescope or skis or karate equipment and you're ready to go. You already have the features and setups that you are accustomed to. Apparel in every possible color that was already checked for the correct fit.

The total amount of empirical data to indicate whether this characteristic in human beings will continue on the other side of a revolutionary change in the economic and political systems: none.

What philosophers have reasoned out will happen doesn't count.

[robbo203]

I don't see that we are being bombared with messages to consume. Given that we are going to consume up to the limit of our spending power, we are bombarded with messages to select the brand of the advertiser that is paying for the given message instead of the competitors' brands. Other than the pressure to choose among brands, the extent of consumption in general is discouraged by the fact that most people don't have enough money to pay their debts..

This is not quite true. I think there is a considerable amount of evidence pointing to systematic pressure on consumers to buy buy buy. The process begins very early. You should read Juliet Schor's seminal work "Born to Buy" which focuses on the way the advertising industry latches on to even very young kinds and grooms them into becoming commited consumers right up through the various stages of their lives. It is a fascinatingly chilling read and a scathing condemanation of market totalitarianism with its insidious ability to seep into every corner and crevice of our lives

As for your remark that "Other than the pressure to choose among brands, the extent of consumption in general is discouraged by the fact that most people don't have enough money to pay their debts" well that rather proves the point doesnt it? People have run up huge debts in part because they have been recklessly encouraged to consume more and more. Ones identity and sense of self worth is intimately tied up with consumption under capitalism. In the UK for example, personal debt by April 2010 stood at a record level of £1,460bn. This is more than the total value of what the whole country produces in a year. Thats absolutely massive. Im sure its simliar in the US and elsewhere in Europe

Governments have been complicit in the promoting an ideology of consumerism. People buying more means more business and more profits which in turn means more tax revenue and the like. In the early 20th century the US government launched large scale propaganda campaigns to get people to buy more and so help turn the wheels of commerce as a matter of "patriotic duty". The same sort of bullshit has been promoted more recently by the Chinese state capitalist regime as Ive said elsewhere

[autonomous bomb thrower]

I have been having trouble lately differentiating between the phases to each according his work and to each according his need. Please correct me if im wrong but the phase from each according ones ability, to each according ones work labour is rewarded by the amount of time contributed to production. But in the phase from each according ones ability, to each according ones needs labor is no longer rewarded by the amount of time contributed to production but labor is rewarded by free acess to all commodities.

If this is the case what commodities is the worker entitled to? Of course basic needs but what about commodities such as instruments, books etc.

[robbo203]

I have been having trouble lately differentiating between the phases to each according his work and to each according his need. Please correct me if im wrong but the phase from each according ones ability, to each according ones work labour is rewarded by the amount of time contributed to production. But in the phase from each according ones ability, to each according ones needs labor is no longer rewarded by the amount of time contributed to production but labor is rewarded by free acess to all commodities.

If this is the case what commodities is the worker entitled to? Of course basic needs but what about commodities such as instruments, books etc.


In the Critique of the Gotha Programme Marx differentitated between a lower phase of commununiusm and a higher phase. Both phases being based on the "common owenrship of the means of production" had in common, the absence of wage labour, money and so on. The lower phase is sometimes confused with the brief political transition perod Marx proposed called the "dictatorship of the proletariat". It is also sometimes incorrectly equated with socialism when in fact "socialism" traditionally was really just another term for communism, not a separate stage en route to higher communism.


There is a good explanation of all this here:

http://bataillesocialiste.wordpress.com/english-pages/1975-the-myth-of-the-transitional-society-buick/

In the higher phase of communism, when the productive forces had develped sufficiently, there would be no further need for rationing via labour vouchers. Though Marx did not use the term "free access" that is certainly what he meant would happen when the springs of cooperative wealth flow more abundantly as he said. No rationing means logically that you have free access to the things that you yourself decide that you need. Greed becomes pointless when there is enough for all and social status is no longer determined by the consumption and accumulation of wealth (which would be the case where everyone had free access to this wealth).

Free access would apply to all wealth not just satisfiers of "basic needs". My own take on this is that while the goal of universal free access is what should be aimed for, an element of ratioining might be retained for some some low priority goods such as luxury items. However, rationing does not have to involve anything so elaborate or complex as a universal labour voucher system. I advocate a "compensation" model of rationing whereby those who inherit relatively poorer housing conditions from the time of capitalism should be "compensated for" by having priority access to rationed goods such as luxuries. These goods will tend to be less abundant anyway because of the way in which resoruces would be allocated in communism which give priority to the production of important things like food, healthcare, sanitation etc. Communities could arrange their own system of discretionary rationing perhaps using some sort of fairly simple sort of points system for the allocation of ration coupons

[farleft]

I asked this question in an another thread. In anarchism/communism how would the society prevent people from being greedy?

Would it be possible to take more than you need? How would it be controlled people wouldn't just take too much food, clothes electronic devises ect.? I know a person is able to eat a certain amount of food but what is a person goes to the "store" (or whatever is the place where you get your stuff from) and takes 25 different cell phones and 5 SUV's? How many vehicles you'd be allowed to own?

Yes it would be possible to take more than you need but there would be no point. You can't sell or make profit from taking 25 mobiles so they would just be in a draw not being used. There could be no gain or point.
Greed is not part of human nature but a condition of our current economic and social system.