MarxSchmarx
3rd June 2013, 05:39
I thought of posting this in Science and Environment, or hell even chit-chat, but decided it would be of use to all around if right-wingers could chime in as well.
A commonly cited benefit of socialism is that production will go towards human need, and that truly meaningful advances to social progress will be prioirtiezed over the trivial. For example, one of the benefits frequently touted by those of us on the left is that medicine will flourish under socialism. It has been said, for example, that we should ask not whether this or that therapy will cure cancer, but whether the workers occupying the factories will cure cancer.
So here is my immodest proposal. For one specific medical field, caitalism has largely provided the solution. And the social implications of this solution are far from trivial.
And this is infectious diseases. Currently, infectious diseases are quite treatable and are no longer considered a serious health problem in wealthy countries. The situation is very different in developing countries, yes. But insofar as capitalism has "worked" in places like Japan, America and Switzerland, a capitalist health system has largely mitigated infectious diseases as a serious problem. The machinery of capitalism has provided the wherewithal to cure most diseases (in the form of antibiotics and vaccines) and these are continuously being improved. AIDS is a possible exception, especially in certain demographics.
The ability of the capitalist system, taken as an aggregate, to solve medical problems therefore seems very real. Of course, the same could be said for the ability of the system in, e.g., Cuba and the USSR to solve real medical problems. It is no accident that the broad absence of infectious disease problems in much of the former eastern bloc (excepting, again, AIDS and likely tuberculosis in the ex-USSR) is due to a highly sophisticated, essentially non-market driven distribution system.
But ironically, one would have thought the capitalist system better at treating indvidual diseases like cancer and heart disease than infectious diseases, which are inherently deeply social.
Even if of course capitalism made shit smell like roses and gave us all a pony, I would reject it for its inherently dehumanizing nature. But at least as it concerns one argument, namely, improvement in medical technology, I think capitalism has proven it can do an OK job despite competition for top talent from parasites like Monsanto, Lloyds and Google.
I'm kind of curious what others think of this idea. Our knee jerk response to how socialism will make things better often involves citing medical advances. And maybe capitalism places undue constraint on medical innovation. But I think the case of the effective "curing" of infectious diseases in the global north, by and large, argues against the idea that signficant public health gains are impossible under capitalism.
Perhaps this is the core problem with why diseases haven't been eradicated in the third world, although this isn't so much a critique of capitalism per se as it is a critique of how capitalist ideas are implemented under current coditions, which even American lolbertarians would describe as imperfect.
Just to clarify, I am hardly a capitalist, but am merely interested in how others see this argument. Given that there is no serious example of "actually existing socialism", are claims of medical improvements under socialism largely beside the point? Do they distract from the core of the critique of capitalism, unduly exposing our arguments to an aspect of human existence which grudgingly capitalism seems to have delivered, at least for some segment of the global population?
A commonly cited benefit of socialism is that production will go towards human need, and that truly meaningful advances to social progress will be prioirtiezed over the trivial. For example, one of the benefits frequently touted by those of us on the left is that medicine will flourish under socialism. It has been said, for example, that we should ask not whether this or that therapy will cure cancer, but whether the workers occupying the factories will cure cancer.
So here is my immodest proposal. For one specific medical field, caitalism has largely provided the solution. And the social implications of this solution are far from trivial.
And this is infectious diseases. Currently, infectious diseases are quite treatable and are no longer considered a serious health problem in wealthy countries. The situation is very different in developing countries, yes. But insofar as capitalism has "worked" in places like Japan, America and Switzerland, a capitalist health system has largely mitigated infectious diseases as a serious problem. The machinery of capitalism has provided the wherewithal to cure most diseases (in the form of antibiotics and vaccines) and these are continuously being improved. AIDS is a possible exception, especially in certain demographics.
The ability of the capitalist system, taken as an aggregate, to solve medical problems therefore seems very real. Of course, the same could be said for the ability of the system in, e.g., Cuba and the USSR to solve real medical problems. It is no accident that the broad absence of infectious disease problems in much of the former eastern bloc (excepting, again, AIDS and likely tuberculosis in the ex-USSR) is due to a highly sophisticated, essentially non-market driven distribution system.
But ironically, one would have thought the capitalist system better at treating indvidual diseases like cancer and heart disease than infectious diseases, which are inherently deeply social.
Even if of course capitalism made shit smell like roses and gave us all a pony, I would reject it for its inherently dehumanizing nature. But at least as it concerns one argument, namely, improvement in medical technology, I think capitalism has proven it can do an OK job despite competition for top talent from parasites like Monsanto, Lloyds and Google.
I'm kind of curious what others think of this idea. Our knee jerk response to how socialism will make things better often involves citing medical advances. And maybe capitalism places undue constraint on medical innovation. But I think the case of the effective "curing" of infectious diseases in the global north, by and large, argues against the idea that signficant public health gains are impossible under capitalism.
Perhaps this is the core problem with why diseases haven't been eradicated in the third world, although this isn't so much a critique of capitalism per se as it is a critique of how capitalist ideas are implemented under current coditions, which even American lolbertarians would describe as imperfect.
Just to clarify, I am hardly a capitalist, but am merely interested in how others see this argument. Given that there is no serious example of "actually existing socialism", are claims of medical improvements under socialism largely beside the point? Do they distract from the core of the critique of capitalism, unduly exposing our arguments to an aspect of human existence which grudgingly capitalism seems to have delivered, at least for some segment of the global population?