Capitalism - Capitalism works, in theory.

[Moskitto]

You know that quote from the Simpsons, "I agree with you, In theory, Communism works, in theory."

Well my brother said that to something my mum said while half looking at me (there's a constant capitalism vs communism war going on between us.)

Then my dad said the most unexpected thing. "Capitalism works, In theory."

And hell, my dad isn't even a socialist and he can see the system has flaws.

[peaccenicked]

Marx in 'Capital' criticises capitalism as being wasteful,
if we look at unemployment, the crap on the TV and Radio. The emptiness of much of the education system.
The culture of crime and fear which infiltrates peoples life.If we look at the dire poverty in the third world. And
then who will go around saying capitalism works. The ones who are happy, with an 'I am alright Jack' mentality.These people are conservatives. They have got a few more crumbs of the rich man's than a crippled Afgan child.
So they become loyal to the State, support the war.
After all they believe it is their side.
Now they all read Animal Farm which proves that Communism does nt work. They point to Stalin and corruption in the workers movement but they can't see
their own petty corruption. They want to believe communism doesnt work, they don't want it to work,
because they think they are too weak and powerless to do anything about it. They go on about selfish human nature because they are the ones who are selfish but in the most short sighted manner. They can't see that they are helping to destroy the future. For the State that they are loyal to, is polluting the planet. At the end of the day they can't really be bothered with politics
because it means thinking about the planet seriously.
These people have no solutions and have blind faith that the crumbs will keep on coming off the rich man's table. Unfortunately, it takes tragedy to move them at all and usually they go the wrong way at first , but
if they don't die miserable, they might have found the natural home of humanity, in the resistance.

(Edited by peaccenicked at 4:35 pm on Jan. 6, 2002)

[CommieBastard]

when i started reading this post i got a weird sense of deja vu, and also a sense of some future events..
i wont say what they are tho, cos it's probably bullshit...

[Mclaren]

Everything works in theroey in the practice that counts

[Dreadnaht1]

Actually in theory Capitalism doesn't work. It shows the use of classes wich will easily lead to a class gap in which povery stricken people will arise and become the magority and eventually will feel the need to change the system. Hence Capitalism in theory is really just the eventual demise of itself somewhere down the road. Any system with an increasing gap cannot survive and cannot have 100% support of it's people. CAPITALISM DOESN'T WORK.

-Dread

[Reuben]

If we are to look at capitalist theory, I.E. adam smith etc, it tells us that the mnarket will universally supply for peoples needs. Cleary not the case.

[Mclaren]

Well how come it does. Okay nit well but it works and may be not yet ti thenteroey but it wirks

[CommieBastard]

How do you define whether a system works?
i would define a working system as being not one which can merely perpetuate itself, but one which provides for the needs of all of it's constituent parts, i.e. the people. By that definition, capitalism doesn't work...

[Moskitto]

i wouldn't tell someone in africa who's so thin you can see their bones that capitalism provides for their needs after showing them a picture of an obese american.

[Dreadnaht1]

Hahaha...

[HardcoreCommie]

I see how capitalism makes american's obese, but if africans don't have capitalism how does it make them emeciated? just wondering how this can be reconciled.

[Reuben]

Africans do have Capitalism. Africans do not have the industrialized western luxury economy which we are taught to associate with cpaitalism. However the world has a distinct role within the global capitalist system.

CommieBastard, what you said is exactly the point, that peopole advocate that capitalism works merely because it is able to perpetuate itself, without setting any criteria.

[HardcoreCommie]

so then africans have capitalism without the capitalism? I don't understand. If they don't sell anything or BUY anything, then they don't have capitalism.

[CommieBastard]

ok, WTF?!?! do you have NO awareness WHATsoever? since the fuck when did africans not buy and sell anything? WHAT THE F U C K? ? ? ? ?

*jaw drops in total disbeleif at how someone can be so incredibly ignorant*

[Imperial Power]

CommieBastard your correct South Africa buys and sells alot, but then again then used to be a British Colony.

[Guest 128411319]

"Africans do have Capitalism."

Ha. Haha.

"ok, WTF?!?! do you have NO awareness WHATsoever? since the fuck when did africans not buy and sell anything? WHAT THE F U C K? ? ? ? ?"

Capitalism, my friend, does not exist in anarchy. An authority to enforce contracts reliably is a prerequisite, and one which very few Africans enjoy. That's why they're poor. Not because we're rich, but because they do not have stable governments and legal systems to allow real market transactions. Yes, they can buy and sell anything, but this is not neccessarily capitalism. They can also steal anything without fear of reprecussion (unless they steal it from the wrong person). Starving Africans do not live under capitalist systems. Moskitto's repetition of his perplexing comment about starving Africans and pictures of heart attack victims is as inane now as it was yesterday.

[Son of Scargill]

Sorry Guest 128411319,but YOU ARE talking bollocks!!!
African capitalism is the shitty end of the stick of your beloved system,if you can't except it,then fuck off and live the rest of your comfortable life in blissfull ignorance.Western corporations own nearly all of the productive land.Cash crops abound,the people who formerly lived on this land are given the ultimatum of working for the man,at a seriously shitty wage,or they can fuck off and live on a rock pile and starve.The elite in these countries are paid off handsomely to enforce these resettlements,and to protect the corporate interests with extreme prejudice.Just because a lot of the elite are corrupt,and end up embezzeling millions,does not mean it is not capitalism.It just means that they are not as adept,or subtle,as their western counterparts.So,because labour is shit cheap,the goods produced are sold to mainly European and American markets at a fraction of the price than if they were produced here.Then you're stereotypical"Fat Bastard American"can afford to buy as many hamburgers/corn dogs as he can stuff into his face with his vastly inflated wage(brought to you by our sponsor"200 yrs of trades union and labour activism!").
As for your asumption that you can steal whatever you like,with no fear of reprecussions you can't have seen african law enforcement at work.Brutal is not the word.They shoot first,with pump action shotguns,then try and work out if the person they just blew away was actually commiting a crime.If not it doesn't matter,what's anyone going to do about it anyway.The justice system is as corrupt as the police and business community.If a criminal is actually caught alive,then they can expect sentences of hundreds of lashes(as well as a stay in a beautiful african jail),or,if it's serious enough,hundreds of lashes and death by hanging.Hmm!Looks like they've got nothing to fear there then.

As for I.P.s theory that South Africa "buys and sells a lot"because it used to be a British colony,nearly all of africa used to be a colony of one European power or another,that's a seriously weak point.Maybe he should have said it had a better economy because the white minority held onto the slavemasters mentality for longer,and were quitely kept afloat by Britain,Holland,Germany and America,even though these same nations were supposed to be upholding sanctions against S.A. I would have thought I.P.was an uncaring,self-serving wanker,but at least he would have been right.

[HardcoreCommie]

look capitalism sucks and all, but you're wrong about how it works in africa. There is no such thing as african capitalism, western corporations do not own all the productive land. First off there is nary a parcel of land that can be called productive, second of all one of the major problems facing africa is the lack of foreign investment.
Cash crops do not abound, look at how much africa exports and see if they have any cash crops. The problem is that africa hasn't undergone capitalism...then without this transition stage, they will never have communism.

[Son of Scargill]

I grew up in Kenya,maybe it was all a very long dream.

[Mclaren]

I agree that no system can have 100% suppotrt unles its 1 or 2 people so both captailsim and commuinsm can not have 100% support..

Okay quote me on this "Commuism does work but the challenge is the work on a 10million plus population"

[CommieBastard]

my god, this is completely unbeleivable...
AFRICA HAS CAPITALISM.
my sisters boyfriend is from africa, and i have studied africa in detail, i know a LOT about it, so do not go round spurting this ignorant crap.
No land in africa productive? oh but to laugh...
the only unproductive land in africa is that directly in the middle of a rainforest, and that in the sahara desert. The sarhel regions are productive for cattle and crop, and one major problem is they are being overfarmed. Coupled with recent droughts, this has caused a downward creep of the sahara. In the bordering regions of the rain forest there is a hell of a lot of crops being grown, as the rainforests are being cut back. To the south of the rainforests there is also lots of productive land. There is a vast cheap labour resource, and reasonable mineral wealth in regions. There is an efficient infrastructure in most african countries, and only one or two suffer from governmental problems. The continent of africa (which you seem to be speaking of like its a single nation...) is actually very productive, however, if you look at the money generated for the people there, it's very little. why? because the people who own most of this production are foreign corporations who are sitting there fat-cat style sucking away the life of the continent.

As for law, sos is completely right. And yet, let us contrast this with the US, where if you are rich, you can afford to put lawsuits on virtually any matter forward... yet if you are poor the best lawyer you can afford is lionel hutz and his rent-a-law. You fool(s) are truly blind.

[Moskitto]

Did you know that the world coffee and cocoa prices have slumped?

You wouldn't know if you looked at the price of coffee.

Sad thing is prices for raw materials are actually set by western corporations. Even capitalists admit that and some of them are trying to do something about it, that's why there's "fair-trade" products.

And it's not that western corporations actually "own" the land as such. It's more a problem of the cash crops are grown on the good ground because that's how the colonial powers used them. Now the problem is that they don't have the money to replant the land to grow something else. A large cash injection is needed. Something like the marshall plan, but on a world scale.

[Capitalist]

Capitalism

Democracy

Freedom

Anything that promotes competition between people will create a system that works. The problem with these systems is that they can be abused.

Slave Labor / Mafia Control (Abused Capitalism)
Well paid workers / Quality Products / Decent Prices (Good Capitalism)

Lobbyists / Political Party Control / Self Appointed Cuban President (Abused Democracy)
Open Debate / Multiple Candidates / Equal Press Coverage (Good Democracy)

Murder / Stealing / Rape (Abused Freedom)
Speech / Assembly (Good Freedom)

[Moskitto]

Well paid workers / Quality Products / Decent Prices (Good Capitalism)

Tell a Kenyan who's growing Cocoa to sell at prices set by western companies that he gets fair prices.

Or on the other hand, if you actually want to make the system better for all by buying fairtrade http://www.traidcraft.co.uk , except you won't be able to buy the orange juice capitalist. It's called a "blockade."

[Dreadnaht1]

Cappy: "Self Appointed Cuban President (Abused Democracy)"

And isn't he a good one? If he wasn't I think he would've been overthrown a long fucking time ago.

-Dread

[Reuben]

Capitalist. What you are obviously unaware of, is that the existence "good capitalism" which you use as the basis of your support for capitalism, is contingent on the situation of the third world.

This is exemplified by the way America (the "good capitalists") have instuted the "abused democracy" you refer to, to protect their own capitalist interests.

Example 1. 1954: American troops, C.I.A. and United Fruit company are involved in a military coup against elected government of Jacobo Arbenz to protect the interests of the United Fruit Company, central to America's economy.

Example 2. Turn Of the century: Cuban rebels had liberated %80 of the Island themselves. U.S. troops step in and following the liberation America occupies cuba for three years and leaves on the condition it can enforce the Platt Amendment, awarding America the right to militarily intervene whenever it felt its interests were threatened.

[Capitalist]

I won't purchase anything from Cuba as long as Castro is in power.

They can keep their slave made orange juice!

I also don't purchase Chinese Goods (or try very hard not to - I don't know how many times I've accidentally purchased something Made In China).

If I was living in the 1800s I probably wouldn't be wearing cotton either - considering it was made by slaves too.

[Moskitto]

Actually not all fairtrade products are produced in Cuba. Many sources from many countries are used.

Cocoa from Ghana
Sugar from Costa Rica

The only problem with it is the coffee which really sucks.

Although a product called "Excellant tea direct from the growers" is very good.

Anyway i doubt you'd be able to purchase the orange juice, there's an embargo.

[El Che]

listen to Son of Scargill you fools

[gooddoctor]

i'm hearing too much bullshit being spouted on this thread. some people are trying to tell me that if the africans have more capitalism they will be fine, and that somehow they don't have it right now. what africa has is the most perfect form of capitalism on the planet, anarcho-capitalism, capitalism without rules. the imf and the world bank are tearing down the laws, regulations and social works that protect africans from capitalism. or perhaps would argentina's capitalism fit the bill for africa you useless fucks? (sorry, nothing personal) imagine the economic problems argentina is having, about as right wing capitalist as you can get. now try transplanting that system onto countries that have even less capital to invest and are even more powerless in the face of american globalisation. the misery that argentines face today will be astronomical in africa. they will be absolutely fucked without proper social structures in place and rampant capitalism will kill millions. capitalism cannot bring development to africa, it's a lie, but the corrupt and powerful african politicians desperately want to be capitalist, but capitalism won't allow it to be. they must remain weak capitalist countries so that america may remain rich. america has capitalism, but it is tempered by social institutions like the courts which protect people from the extremes of capitalism. if you don't think africa trades, then where the fuck do you think we get most of our textiles, tobacco, food stuffs etcetera, the sky? read a newspaper for god's sakes. i can't be bothered to go into depth but if any of you cretins who thinks they know what's best for africa when millions are starving wants to reply, i'm sure we here can show you the true face of globalisation, the side you don't get to see on cnn.

[HardcoreCommie]

I wouldn't call argentinian capitalism right-wing, actually by pegging its currency to the dollar, argentinians violated market rules.

Moreover, Africa hardly has "perfect capitalism" there is no anarcho-capitalism in africa, there is anarchy. You say that IMF and WB are tearing away social programs that protect africans from capitalism. Don't delude yourself, africans never had social programs of the sort because the govt. budgets weren't big enough.

GOvt budgets aren't big enough because there is nothing to tax. There are hardly any African corporations and personal income is so low that tax revenues are hard to get at. Moreover there is no foreign investment to tax.

Africa needs to develop capitalism in order to develop a viable economic infrastructure upon which equitable distribution of economic well-being can be achieved.

Today africa wouldn't be helped by socialism. What is there to distribute equitably?

[Dreadnaht1]

Land. It's all controlled by wealthy market owners and power-dons. I would simply assume socialism would return all the land back to the people in equal distribution.

-Dread