In an anarchist society, how would one implement a business idea? [Archive]

(A)

16th August 2016, 04:22

In an Anarchist Market you would be free to produce your product (assuming you where able) but any help you would need would be that of Mutual assistance and not of Employees. Assuming currency was still in use (Pre-communist Anarchism such as Anarcho-Syndicalism or Mutualism) you would not as an anarchist pay wages or hire employees. Instead your idea would draw support and willing participants would be full partners in your efforts. The employee / employer relationship is inherently exploitative and the wage system is plainly theft. The justification for this relation and theft is the existence or private property and proprietary information. Once you share your ideas; anyone would be able to freely replicate your idea as their would be no state backed property rights or copyright.

In a post-currency Anarchist market (Anarcho-communism, pure Anarchism, True Communism) production would be done for use and so your production for yourself and others would be done voluntary. If a group of people where needed their would be no exchange of money (as their would be none) the production would be done in the name of common interest and mutual aid.

A union of workers (with and without currency) would be equals who share the common goal.
If there is no interest in your idea then it would be only you working to produce your own good.

Ben Weissman

17th August 2016, 20:24

(A)

17th August 2016, 20:55

He could be a leader if those he worked with respected his leadership but he would not have authority over them. By right of starting the enterprise he would not gain power over those who are needed for his enterprise to flourish. That is not to say that he may not very well end up with the enterprise all to himself. If a group of people help me build a printing press but have no need of it then they could leave me to my printing. If they then wanted stuff printed by it it would be right of me to offer the press they helped build freely. Same for anyone asking for printing. In a world governed only by Mutual Aid & the common cause of Anarchism then offering your help freely is just "good business".

GalickyH

4th September 2016, 15:50

But this is very important question - how to ensure that people will have guaranteed their own initiatives. Supress this type of initiative or activity is mistake, as we could see in socialist regimes - for example in Czechoslovakia before 1989.

ckaihatsu

4th September 2016, 19:18

[P]eople would help to produce [your idea] both because they might be personally interested in it, or they would do so with the knowledge that, should there be something that they wish to create, that, given the same conditions, the community would assist them in that as well.

Not an anarchist.

That aside, I think people tend to prefer this touchy-feely individualistic viewpoint of a post-capitalist liberated production because -- of course -- it's small-scale, personal, and tangible.

But would it be the way things should *really* be done -- ?

In thinking of smallish, constrained, perpetual 'communities' it becomes downright *instinctual* to think of 'chipping-in', in return for implied 'social capital' (local political capital), so that one becomes generally considered as a 'good person' and would be seen as worthy and deserving of *reciprocal* cooperation in the future, for one's more-personal initiatives of liberated-production that then require the help of others.

Sorry to be the one to point it out, as usual, but isn't this just a kind of *commodification*, all over again -- ?

One is *commodifying* their 'local social identity' into that of a 'good person', through appropriate liberated-labor inputs over time as a part of larger group efforts, with the future expectation of receiving that 'goodwill' back, when one has one's own personal projects that would benefit from additional persons' efforts.

Would those who don't actively, consistently 'play the game' fall into general social *disfavor*, with insufficient social standing for making spontaneous calls on others for any kind of larger social effort, or 'project' -- ?

Would some collectivized equipment / resources like a printing press or raw steel always be *off-limits* to the one who was usually *passive* and *non-cooperative* in relation to the past group projects of others, regardless of overall material productivity -- ?

The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. The trials resulted in the executions of twenty people, fourteen of them women, and all but one by hanging. Five others (including two infant children) died in prison.

The episode is one of the Colonial America's most notorious cases of mass hysteria. It has been used in political rhetoric and popular literature as a vivid cautionary tale about the dangers of isolationism, religious extremism, false accusations, and lapses in due process.[1] It was not unique, but a Colonial American example of the much broader phenomenon of witch trials in the early modern period, which took place also in England and France. Many historians consider the lasting effects of the trials to have been highly influential in subsequent United States history. According to historian George Lincoln Burr, "the Salem witchcraft was the rock on which the theocracy shattered."[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salem_witch_trials

---

I include the historical example of the Salem witch trials to say that, if economic activity and material prosperity should happen to *take-off* in the initial period of a post-capitalist political economy, perhaps *people* could be similarly *dehumanized* in their locally-bound social status since they'd be non-socially-cooperative 'dissenters' in a prevailing social environment of fevered *cooperation* and *hyper-productivity*, not dissimilar from the newfound global trading role of Salem in the 18th century.

A post-20th-century post-capitalist social order shouldn't be formed in a fragmented *patchwork* of separatist geographical groupings, with one's economic activity and social status dependent on that *local* grouping of people / liberated-laborers, because then that would be a de-facto empirical reality of *socially commodified* individuals, by local group or 'tribe'.

G.U.T.S.U.C., Individualism - Tribalism

http://s6.postimg.org/izeyfeh9t/150403_2_Individualism_Tribalism_aoi_36_tiff_x.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/680s8w7hp/full/)

Some *better* kind of approach to political economy should be commonly adopted, one that has the functional economic-material flexibility to be *portable* and accepted *anywhere in the world* -- so that no one is artificially constrained to only one or another locality (out of thousands globally) since any parochial approach would effectively *commodify* the individual within those circumscribed social bounds.

(A)

5th September 2016, 00:27

No its not commodification. Its Use-value production. Cooperatively producing items as a society for their direct use and not for their trade.
Their is no *better* Politics or political economy. All politics rely on Polity. Polity is Not Anarchist. Polity is built from some form of institutionalized hierarchy.
Institutionalized hierarchy as in the relation between state and citizen, Owner and owned. Anarchism seeks to end the Capitalist relationships created threw of Polity/Politics, Government/governance, State/nation.

ckaihatsu

5th September 2016, 18:01

No its not commodification. Its Use-value production.

I don't deny that use values would be produced -- I don't deny even that the prevailing norm of liberated, enlightened cooperation over the means of production would *mostly* set-the-pace for determining the character of such a post-capitalist society.

But my previous point stands -- even the most-collectively-enlightened, successfully-productive social order would have to guard against the inevitable pitfalls of its success, with people possibly becoming *too externalized* outside themselves as human beings. The production of goods, even on a fully collectivized basis, would still require *liberated labor* as a material resource, so people *could* become increasingly *de-personalized* as a matter of course, the more overall work done, and the more use-values produced.

Cooperatively producing items as a society for their direct use and not for their trade.

Well, this is *new*, coming from you -- you're usually touting the benefits of intercommunal *trade*, with the use of the market mechanism.

How, then, with your revised position here, could goods conceivably be distributed inter-continentally, if you continue to subscribe to the 'patchwork-of-communes' layout over the world's terrain -- ?

Their is no *better* Politics or political economy. All politics rely on Polity. Polity is Not Anarchist. Polity is built from some form of institutionalized hierarchy.
Institutionalized hierarchy as in the relation between state and citizen, Owner and owned. Anarchism seeks to end the Capitalist relationships created threw of Polity/Politics, Government/governance, State/nation.

Okay, well, no one here is arguing for any kind of institutionalized hierarchy.

You now have one foot in the 'heaven' camp of communism, meaning that you think all politics would somehow *end* with the overthrow of capitalism, as though everyone would suddenly share the exact same mindset regarding how the world should look, and what should be produced going-forward.

(A)

5th September 2016, 20:08

No I am not for trade between communes as a form of use-value production. That is something that you picked up from a different conversation about the transitional move of production. Also you misuse the word commune in refrence to my previous statements.
In a pre-Communist society that still uses a form of exchange; be it Labor credits, Mutualist currency or some other form of exchange value then the exchange would not be between communes but between individuals or groups of individuals.

Commune: A community intended to live by a certain set of ideas and values. (Nudist, Communist, ETC)
Union: A community of workers
Municipality: A community centered around a set of local infrastructures that it manages
Community: All of the above and any group of people that share a similar identity.

You think that Municipality's would trade with each other because the Municipality have control over the Subjects of labor within their borders.
This could be true of Democratic confederalism (Kurdistan) or Libertarian Municipalism (Bookchin) which I would not be against as a Revolutionary method
but not as a transitional form of socialism or Long term mode of production because eventually each municipality would become a form of state with authority over the
Subject of labor and possibly the whole of the means of production.

What I WAS talking about in this pre-communists form of exchange is the exchange of needed goods between individual workers or Unions of workers. Not between Communes but community's who use the means.

That is not what we are talking about here.

++++

I am not Utopian; I dont believe in a perfect system nor the goal of creating a unified scientifically perfect process of production that will transcend all previous means and perfect humanity.
That's what most of the Communists around are trying to do; Create a Communist Utopia.

I am simply taking a stand against unjust systems and theorizing about the implementation on a completely just society. One without Property, Ownership, Nations and states, Politics and profits.
The Utopian vision of a perfect communist society or the means by which to reach it could be set against the working class and I will point out how certain principles such as social-ownership or bureaucracy/administration are inherently
Anti-communist as their foundations are statist, capitalist and unjust.

GLF

6th September 2016, 08:03

I don't know about an anarchist society, but in my ideal socialist society, a business idea would be implemented with consideration of the collective good as the sole criteria. Rather than profit motive influencing whether or not an idea is a good one, the question that must be asked is simply, "is this something that is useful and good for the people?". If it is useful and good for the people, and assuming said person is qualified, he/she would be hired by the people's state and given funding for production. If the venture was successful, the person would be entrusted with even more. As always, promotion and rewards are according to production and merit in a socialist society. The best workers prove themselves by the sweat of their brow rather than the whiteness of their skin or the richness of their parents.

(A)

6th September 2016, 10:05

assuming said person is qualified, he/she would be hired by the people's state and given funding for production.

So your idea of Socialism is Capitalism. Literal state capitalism where people are hired and paid by the state to work for the profit of the owner of the business; the state.
Wow.

GLF

6th September 2016, 10:59

Um, no? Perhaps you should read the entirety of my post before taking one thing I said and posting it entirely out of context.

There is no such thing as "state capitalism" in any real meaningful sense. It's often just a snarl word used by revisionists to detract from their own perverted commodity fetishism (which they have the gall to call "materialism"). Nothing is off limits or sacred, if it can be used, it should be. If people can be put to work, they should be. It's important to remember that we're dealing with real people with real needs, not statistics, graphs or philosophy textbooks. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with any of these practices that you deem "state capitalist" provided they better people's lives. Unfortunately, people on the left have this tendency to be very factionalist and lose sight of the bigger picture. The revolution is about people. Living, breathing people with real human needs. If the state taking an active role in meeting these needs and engendering a total societal transition to communism puts you off, then I would question your commitment to the most important aspect of our movement: the people, and the workers.

But then again, you're anti-leninist, and have admitted as much. So this is expected.

ckaihatsu

6th September 2016, 15:27

No I am not for trade between communes as a form of use-value production.

It doesn't *matter* whether you're 'for' it or not, because the post-revolution world would certainly not be *optimal* for your favored localist, self-sufficient-types of liberated-production -- perhaps the world will *never* be 'productively equivalent', regardless of geographical location, if it had to continue mining mineral deposits, as for iron ores, copper, etc.

So the objective reality would be one of *supply chains* for the liberated production of complex-type goods, perhaps having to span across *continents*. You've advanced no proposed political economy that could handle this kind of realistic situation.

That is something that you picked up from a different conversation about the transitional move of production. Also you misuse the word commune in refrence to my previous statements.
In a pre-Communist society that still uses a form of exchange; be it Labor credits,

My 'labor credits' is *not* exchange-based whatsoever -- here's from the intro again:

[I] have developed a model that [...] uses a system of *circulating* labor credits that are *not* exchangeable for material items of any kind. In accordance with communism being synonymous with 'free-access', all material implements, resources, and products would be freely available and *not* quantifiable according to any abstract valuations. The labor credits would represent past labor hours completed, multiplied by the difficulty or hazard of the work role performed. The difficulty/hazard multiplier would be determined by a mass survey of all work roles, compiled into an index.

In this way all concerns for labor, large and small, could be reduced to the ready transfer of labor-hour credits. The fulfillment of work roles would bring labor credits into the liberated-laborer's possession, and would empower them with a labor-organizing and labor-utilizing ability directly proportionate to the labor credits from past work completed.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/blog.php?bt=14673

---

Mutualist currency or some other form of exchange value then the exchange would not be between communes but between individuals or groups of individuals.

Commune: A community intended to live by a certain set of ideas and values. (Nudist, Communist, ETC)
Union: A community of workers
Municipality: A community centered around a set of local infrastructures that it manages
Community: All of the above and any group of people that share a similar identity.

You think that Municipality's would trade with each other because the Municipality have control over the Subjects of labor within their borders.

I'm only going by *your* past-expressed positions -- I have no recognition of a 'municipality' entity in my statements, and I don't advocate any kind of exchanges or 'trades'.

This could be true of Democratic confederalism (Kurdistan) or Libertarian Municipalism (Bookchin) which I would not be against as a Revolutionary method
but not as a transitional form of socialism or Long term mode of production because eventually each municipality would become a form of state with authority over the
Subject of labor and possibly the whole of the means of production.

What I WAS talking about in this pre-communists form of exchange is the exchange of needed goods between individual workers or Unions of workers. Not between Communes but community's who use the means.

It doesn't matter whether you call them 'communes' or 'communities' or 'municipalities' -- functionally they're all equivalent because they're all *geographically circumscribed*.

You haven't advanced any approach for the *generalization* of production over several geographical locations, as would be required for the production of the complex-type goods, like electronics, that we enjoy today.

And, remember, any kind of trade or exchange equals commodification, which is commodity-production through the management of (resulting) exchange-values.

That is not what we are talking about here.

++++

I am not Utopian; I dont believe in a perfect system nor the goal of creating a unified scientifically perfect process of production that will transcend all previous means and perfect humanity.
That's what most of the Communists around are trying to do; Create a Communist Utopia.

I am simply taking a stand against unjust systems and theorizing about the implementation on a completely just society. One without Property, Ownership, Nations and states, Politics and profits.
The Utopian vision of a perfect communist society or the means by which to reach it could be set against the working class and I will point out how certain principles such as social-ownership or bureaucracy/administration are inherently
Anti-communist as their foundations are statist, capitalist and unjust.

'Social ownership' is *not* synonymous with 'bureaucratic administration':

Social ownership refers to the various forms of ownership for the means of production in socialist economic systems; encompassing public ownership, employee ownership, cooperative ownership, citizen ownership of equity[1] and common ownership.[2] Historically social ownership implied that capital and factor markets would cease to exist under the assumption that market exchanges within the production process would be made redundant if capital goods were owned by a single entity or network of entities representing society,[3]

Social ownership would enable productivity gains from labor automation to progressively reduce the average length of the working day instead of creating job insecurity and unemployment. Reduction of necessary work time is central to the Marxist concept of human freedom and overcoming alienation, a concept widely shared by Marxist and non-Marxist socialists alike.[6][7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_ownership

ckaihatsu

6th September 2016, 17:03

[H]e/she would be hired by the people's state and given funding for production. If the venture was successful

I find these aspects to be somewhat problematic, though not necessarily a 'deal-breaker' -- how do you conceive of the composition of this 'people's state', and what kind of economics would prevail overall to enable 'funding' -- ?

Also, how would a venture be judged to be 'successful', exactly -- ?

I think moneylessness should be brought about as quickly as possible, so as to preclude all commodity-production in favor of various-scale liberated-production -- with communistic free-access and direct-distribution -- so that only *use values* would be considered in regards to whatever project, eliminating all possibilities for the continuation of exchanges and exchange values.

GLF

6th September 2016, 18:24

ckaihatsu

6th September 2016, 19:16

I am not speaking of an ideal communist society but a socialist one, therefore the state I reference is the proletarian dictatorship ruled by the vanguard party. I know not to take anything for granted but I thought that this was already pretty basic stuff - I tend to forget that people here represent many different ideologies and I sometimes get lazy and don't go into as much detail as I should. This is my fault.

What I mean by "funding" is merely access to production capital. And like you, I also believe that the current role of money should be abolished as soon as possible. In fact, I wouldn't disagree with anything you wrote there. But I also understand that the problem is the way we think as a society. We are in consumption mode and the transition from socialism to communism will not happen overnight. Part of my ideology in regards to changing the underlying motive of business ventures is in regards to this way of thinking that permeates society. It's not about statism or state capitalism or anything of the like. It's about the state taking an active role in fostering an environment that's more conducive to communism, one where the state, as well as the current mode of production, is abolished entirely.

With that said, I'm not an economist - just an idealist. Take my musings with a grain of salt.

Okay.

I understand that seizing the (bourgeois) state -- as well as all productive assets -- may be strategically necessary, depending on actual conditions at the time.

My concern, though, paralleling that of the anarchists, is that the revolution could possibly get bogged-down by adhering to the inertia of past socio-material practices, like that of capital and wages, mostly for the sake of people's habitual convenience (that we're all used-to receiving and using wages / money).

It seems that if the revolution stretched-out long enough to where *production capital* would be needed, as for the construction of new productive assets (factories), that maybe the priority at that point should instead be for a straight-line to moneylessness, at the expense of potential new productive assets. Once all currencies / exchange values had been decisively abolished the new, if shrunken, world economy could be re-established anew on solidly *humane* practices, for unmet human need, using its own self-organization of its own voluntary liberated labor (a communist-type gift economy).

On the other hand, perhaps wielding the shell of the bourgeois state *could* empirically facilitate new practices, since the bureaucratic organization itself would already exist (though we wouldn't want a standing bureaucratic *institution*, or elite). I think it's on *economic practices* that we could most-likely move farther, faster.

I muse back.

= D

(A)

6th September 2016, 20:15

Ownership is a capitalist concept that can easily be remedied. You want to end the use of money and trade but maintain the force that created all of these things.

Ownership is a Law that requires a state, a government and police to enforce it.

What is owned is property.

Property is theft.

The law that regulates ownership is capitalist as is is an exploitative means that steals from the worker.

In order to end capitalism you have to end the capitalistic relation ship between owner (Private/state) and worker. You cant just pass a law that makes money illegal and expect capitalism to die. If that where a logical possibility
then reformist would be as well. Just make capitalism illegal and their you go problem solved. But that's not the case. Capitalism is the relation between exploiter and exploited; Ownership is the means by which the working class is made slaves.

State socialism is Capitalist because of this relationship between owner and worker. And before you say the workers state is of and for the worker remember that is the illogical basis for Hitlers national socialism and all political fascism. that the state and the people are one and the same nation and that what is good for the state is good for the people.

That is empirically not the case. What is good for the worker is good for the worker and what is not is the (Private/state) ownership of the means of production and the product of labor.
State ownership is private ownership as the state and the worker are not and can never be one.

GLF

7th September 2016, 04:06

Okay.

I understand that seizing the (bourgeois) state -- as well as all productive assets -- may be strategically necessary, depending on actual conditions at the time.

My concern, though, paralleling that of the anarchists, is that the revolution could possibly get bogged-down by adhering to the inertia of past socio-material practices, like that of capital and wages, mostly for the sake of people's habitual convenience (that we're all used-to receiving and using wages / money).

It seems that if the revolution stretched-out long enough to where *production capital* would be needed, as for the construction of new productive assets (factories), that maybe the priority at that point should instead be for a straight-line to moneylessness, at the expense of potential new productive assets. Once all currencies / exchange values had been decisively abolished the new, if shrunken, world economy could be re-established anew on solidly *humane* practices, for unmet human need, using its own self-organization of its own voluntary liberated labor (a communist-type gift economy).

On the other hand, perhaps wielding the shell of the bourgeois state *could* empirically facilitate new practices, since the bureaucratic organization itself would already exist (though we wouldn't want a standing bureaucratic *institution*, or elite). I think it's on *economic practices* that we could most-likely move farther, faster.

I muse back.

= D

Yes, I can understand your concerns and agree. The inertia of past socio-economic experiences is what I meant when I talked about people's mindset. I know this is all probably going to seem overly cliche, but the revolution really does start within each person. The first thing that has to change is the mindset...we are all conditioned to consume, spend, use, etc. It goes without saying that the path to communism coincides with our ability, as a society, to collectively cast off these chains - chains which stretch beyond any one regime or state. The symptoms persist for while yet, even after the source of infection is removed.

I don't really see it as wielding the shell of the bourgeois state as much as I feel it's people repossessing, at least for a time, something that was theirs to begin with. The state apparatus, in as much as it existed and served the ruling class, under socialism would exist solely to serve the proletariat and facilitate a smooth transition to statelessness and communism.

This is actually a very common point of contention among communists of the Marxist-Leninist mold and anarcho-communists. I think we all want to get to the same place, we have just have different ideas on how to bring it about. I often wonder what people like Democracy have in mind after the overthrow of the capitalist class. Are we all going to just snap out of it as if a spell had been broken, gather round and sing like the munchkins in the wizard of oz? I know it sounds like I jest, but I'm actually quite serious. There will be challenges: threats foreign and domestic, needy people, infighting, counter-revolutionary insurgents, etc. We're not just going to gather round arm and arm and sing kumbaya.

(A)

7th September 2016, 10:03

I often wonder what people like Democracy have in mind after the overthrow of the capitalist class. Are we all going to just snap out of it as if a spell had been broken, gather round and sing like the munchkins in the wizard of oz? I know it sounds like I jest, but I'm actually quite serious. There will be challenges: threats foreign and domestic, needy people, infighting, counter-revolutionary insurgents, etc. We're not just going to gather round arm and arm and sing kumbaya.

The end of the state system (Capitalist class) will not be done over night nor in a short period of time. This fight; this revolution on a world scale will be as varied as people themselves and I admit to supporting Many Many methods of simultaneous and ongoing struggle. From political action to protect and expose our ideas to the masses. Duel power such as espoused by Murray Bookchin and in practice in Kurdistan and other places; and of course my favorite; armed, militant, violent and world wide destruction of the state and its means of oppression.

For me the revolution will not end until ALL states, ALL class and ALL property are gone and all that is left is Anarchism. A permanent revolution against ALL forms of power.

The fall of the "capitalist class" as you call it will not be complete until Anarchism is reached.
Not Anarchy then Anarchy
"The struggle will sow the seeds of the new society that will follow."

ckaihatsu

7th September 2016, 14:38

Ownership is a capitalist concept that can easily be remedied. You want to end the use of money and trade but maintain the force that created all of these things.

You're conflating 'mercantilist / bourgeois force', with 'a workers government, without elitism'. ('Force' is an *abstraction* that has to be *socially contextualized*.)

Ownership is a Law that requires a state, a government and police to enforce it.

What is owned is property.

Property is theft.

The law that regulates ownership is capitalist as is is an exploitative means that steals from the worker.

In order to end capitalism you have to end the capitalistic relation ship between owner (Private/state) and worker.

True.

You cant just pass a law that makes money illegal and expect capitalism to die. If that where a logical possibility
then reformist would be as well.

True, and no one here is arguing for reformism.

Just make capitalism illegal and their you go problem solved. But that's not the case. Capitalism is the relation between exploiter and exploited; Ownership is the means by which the working class is made slaves.

State socialism is Capitalist because of this relationship between owner and worker. And before you say the workers state is of and for the worker remember that is the illogical basis for Hitlers national socialism and all political fascism. that the state and the people are one and the same nation and that what is good for the state is good for the people.

I don't see anyone here arguing for socialism-in-one-country, or 'Stalinism'.

I think you're not-realizing that state socialism / state capitalism was the *unintended result* of a forcibly-imploded workers revolution (October Revolution).

But what if the so-called 'state socialism' was actually *worldwide* and didn't depend on any kind of elitist substitutionist institutional bureaucratic hierarchy -- that it was actually collectively controlled by the world's workers -- ?

That is empirically not the case. What is good for the worker is good for the worker and what is not is the (Private/state) ownership of the means of production and the product of labor.
State ownership is private ownership as the state and the worker are not and can never be one.

(A)

7th September 2016, 20:19

Would i have to stand for the pledge of workers allegiance every morning in school? Would their be cops roaming the streets? Would the 'world nation' have a claim over the land and water and air? Would their be law by legislation dictating how I live?

State socialism in any form is capitalism assuming that the state has authority based on its ownership of the land. It can be the best form of capitalism humanly possible but that does not logically justify the ownership (theft) of the land.

State property is private property.

The relation between owner and worker must end for capitalism to end. If the nation owns the land then the nation is the Capitalist.

GLF

8th September 2016, 04:03

Would i have to stand for the pledge of workers allegiance every morning in school? Would their be cops roaming the streets? Would the 'world nation' have a claim over the land and water and air? Would their be law by legislation dictating how I live?

No. But in school, children would be taught about the revolution and intellectually equipped with the tools to think critically, resist right-wing indoctrination, and fight reactionaries. Does this strike you as authoritarian? I wouldn't be surprised if it did. :rolleyes:

State socialism in any form is capitalism assuming that the state has authority based on its ownership of the land. It can be the best form of capitalism humanly possible but that does not logically justify the ownership (theft) of the land.

Under the proletarian dictatorship, the state apparatus of the vanguard party is the right hand of the international worker. Your argument is tantamount to saying, "once the slaves gains access to the shackle keys, then they become slave owners". I mean, are you serious?

The relation between owner and worker must end for capitalism to end.

That's the point.

If the nation owns the land then the nation is the Capitalist. Um...why? First of all, "the nation" and "owning" are capitalist concepts. But I see no logical reason why one must conflate any type of rule with capitalism, specifically when it's pertaining to the rule of the working class.

Antiochus

8th September 2016, 04:53

Ugh. Amazing how the forum admins seem to orgasm at the thought of banning people for the most trivial of 'offenses' (usually not agreeing with them) but allow some baboon who is espousing an "Anarchist Market" to post under the pretense that the is a "Socialist".

(A)

8th September 2016, 06:15

Either because supervision is lax, that only weak Faux-marxists cant handle debate or that I am a socialist and Market socialism is a form or socialism. Hell the entirety of the USSR was capitalist yet I am sure many here are still pro-ussr.
IF you dont like the conversation you are not being forced to watch. Why dont you go and watch some TV or something.

Location -C

You are right that Nation and Ownership are capitalist concepts; yet that is what State-socialism is built upon. the idea of the working class being subservient to a new better master in the form of a "Socialist" Nation.
I am not saying that the slaves will become the new masters; I am saying that the goal would not to become again slaves to the state. That the formation of a new state in a previously liberated area is tantamount to recapture and bondage to a new master.
The land belongs to those who work it and not a nation state who's borders are decided by war and theft.

The state is a form of tyranny that exists only to exploit its citizens and maintain its power. This relation is Capitalist as a new ruling class if formed.

Only by taking direct action against the ruling class and their means of oppression (The state) can the working class Liberate itself from the bondage of citizenry.

GLF

8th September 2016, 18:50

You are right that Nation and Ownership are capitalist concepts; yet that is what State-socialism is built upon. the idea of the working class being subservient to a new better master in the form of a "Socialist" Nation.

Oh, please. That's not at all what the socialist state is "built upon". The lower phase of communism, the socialist state, is about working class liberation and representation; it's about hyper-democracy, with diversity in discussion but unity in action. It's about creating, through the democratic process, the conditions conducive to the higher phases of communism, and always towards the desired end of an international, stateless, free and democratic society.

In ascribing certain unconditional qualities to the very concept of governance, without consideration for any secondary characteristics or extenuating circumstances, you are flirting dangerously close to non-materialism. You keep saying that X is necessarily bad, but offer up absolutely nothing of substance to demonstrate why it's bad, particularly in the context of socialism and the revolution.

Do you believe in boogeymen, too? How does someone like you make omelettes? Just curious...

(A)

8th September 2016, 19:44

I crack a few state eggs. Then what comes out is the free yolk of communism that was previously imprisoned by the state egg apparatus of exploitation by the ruling shell.

I am all for violent revolution... I am constantly begging Americans to use their right to overthrow the tyrannical government to do so...

But for me the revolution is against the power of the ruling class and not the individuals who make it up. I could care less about the rich; I care about how they are kept in power.
The state is that tool and only when ALL states are gone will the revolution end.

I want a simultaneous world wide revolution against the state and its tools. Disband the army's; the borders and the police.
Not a imperialistic war between capitalist nations and socialist nations. A class war between the working class and the state that oppresses them.

GLF

8th September 2016, 23:19

That's all well and good, but I am trying to tell you that such a world, such a revolution, doesn't just up and happen. We have to make it happen. You talk about disbanding the army, the borders and police. Okay, what then? What about counter-revolutionaries? Fascists? Infighting? Masses of hungry people? Lawlessness? Social upheaval? Race riots? These are just a small number of the things that will be facing us once capitalism is in it's death throes. What do you propose, sir? That we all join and hands and sing, "We are the world"?

We all want to get to that place, the dream we all share as socialists. But it won't just "happen". Capitalism will fall nation by nation, with wars between nations and within nations. The revolution, one in essence, is not monolithic in practice. A socialist bloc comprised of individual states, working together and fanning the flames of revolution in other countries, is the only way by which international communism will come about. And not until then can total statelessness, a truly communist society, become our reality.

(A)

9th September 2016, 01:36

"Anarchists seek to create an awareness that oppression cannot be only fought but ended; and that the struggle against an unjust system will create the seeds of the future society that will replace it."

The revolution will not be possible in the slightest until the working class is ready to replace the society created under capitalism.
You assume that a class that will overthrow all that has come before it then would be incapable of managing itself. That the working class is incapable.
What of Solidarity; Community; Mutual aid and benefit?
Do you believe in any of the principles on which the goal of the working class's struggle for liberation is founded upon?

Coggeh

9th September 2016, 06:00

Location C:

Such a disgraceful abuse of a socialist history. What army had the Bolsheviks when they helped liberate the Russian working class? this militaristic machoism amongst Stalinists, Maoists and others flys so blatantly in the face of Marxism to such a degree its almost absurd. Any revolutionary society is borne from the working class itself, a vanguard should and only exists to pave the way for a democratic workers organisation of society.

Yes we need to learn the lessons of the past (23 armies invading Russia etc.) However, on a basic level Stalinism finds its fault with a revisionist view of history that skews Marxism to suit the idea of a "Socialist Nation-State" and as you say : "A socialist bloc comprised of individual states, working together and fanning the flames of revolution in other countries". This is simply not possible under the idea of Socialism in one country or separately in many. Only through a permanent workers revolution can we see socialist state resistances to the diminishing influence of Capitalist nations. No solutions exist when pragmatism is the policy, buddy up to France and the UK and sell out Spanish workers till the cows come home.

GLF

9th September 2016, 10:49

Such a disgraceful abuse of a socialist history. What army had the Bolsheviks when they helped liberate the Russian working class? this militaristic machoism amongst Stalinists, Maoists and others flys so blatantly in the face of Marxism to such a degree its almost absurd.

What are you talking about? Please read the entire conversation. I never once endorsed any type of military aggression. In fact, I've spoken out against it here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/195945-USSR-Era-Was-Stalin-good-after-all?p=2874507#post2874507).

Any revolutionary society is borne from the working class itself, a vanguard should and only exists to pave the way for a democratic workers organisation of society.

That is exactly what I was saying! You're just fucking with me, right? The other poster, "Democracy", is against the vanguard party, and said so himself here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/195874-Vanguard-party?p=2873515#post2873515). That's what this is all about. He is anti-leninist (http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/196010-Traditional-left-right-way-of-seeing-politics-doesn-t-make-any-sense-to-me?p=2874933#post2874933) and is opposed to the very concepts you are defending in your unwarranted rebuke of me.

As for the rest of your post, I really don't see what it has to do with me, considering that I am not a Stalinist and never pretended otherwise. Suffice to say that in the future, you should spend a little more time looking into things before choosing sides in an argument as you might otherwise come across as very foolish.

Now scamper away into the previous comments to search desperately for something, anything, to use against me in an effort to save face and pretend your original point holds water.

ckaihatsu

9th September 2016, 14:16

[I] am saying that the goal would not to become again slaves to the state. That the formation of a new state in a previously liberated area is tantamount to recapture and bondage to a new master.
The land belongs to those who work it and not a nation state who's borders are decided by war and theft.

You've *killed* the strawman -- you keep arguing against a 'state' formation, as though the bourgeoisie was just-hiding all along, and then they *spring up* out of nowhere to quickly re-install their elitist state apparatus while everyone is looking away at something else.

You're asserting a scenario of 'the formation of a new state in a previously liberated area', but what would the socio-historical conditions *be* for this to occur -- ? Maybe *because* you're so lax with the possible practice of formal worker control (as in a potential workers government) this kind of thing *could* be allowed to happen, in your conception of things.

(A)

9th September 2016, 18:14

SO you; in an attempt to prevent the formation of a new state instead form a new state and claim authority over the entire working class?

Its simple. No state is Legitimate. No violence perpetuated by the state against the working class, law, prison, cops, property, is anything but gang violence and mob rule.
I am not against organization but The Legitimacy of violence of the state and the claim of land (theft by force) by the state.

ckaihatsu

9th September 2016, 18:33

SO you; in an attempt to prevent the formation of a new state instead form a new state and claim authority over the entire working class?

*I'm* doing that -- ??

How -- ?

Its simple. No state is Legitimate. No violence perpetuated by the state against the working class, law, prison, cops, property, is anything but gang violence and mob rule.
I am not against organization but The Legitimacy of violence of the state and the claim of land (theft by force) by the state.

GLF

9th September 2016, 19:13

SO you; in an attempt to prevent the formation of a new state instead form a new state and claim authority over the entire working class?

Democracy, it would help clear up some of our misunderstandings if you could at least have a proper understanding of what Marxist-Leninists are actually advocating. A way to start is to familiarize yourself with the concept of democratic centralism.

Its simple. No state is Legitimate.

Legitimacy? You're actually serious with this shit. Where there exists legitimacy, there exists a legitimizer. Are you sure you're not the who is being authoritarian? You certainly have a gift for laying down the do's and don'ts.

- - - Updated - - -

*I'm* doing that -- ??

How -- ?

Yea, he has a real penchant for non-sequiturs and circular logic. I think he's a nice enough guy and everything but he has the critical thinking skills of a drunken pirate on steroids.

ckaihatsu

9th September 2016, 19:27

drunken pirate on steroids.

Been meaning to do that....

= D

(A)

9th September 2016, 19:32

I suggest reading this. https://libcom.org/library/karl-marx-state

ckaihatsu

11th September 2016, 14:27

I suggest reading this. https://libcom.org/library/karl-marx-state

I find the typical revolutionary obsession with past events to be well beyond the point of useful instructiveness most of the time.

Your repeated line of 'Anarchists got bulldozed by the Bolsheviks' isn't invalid, but it's *inappropriate* given the prevailing conditions of the time, which you don't describe, and ignore completely.

I'll counterpose *my* line, which is from the 'vanguard party' thread:

[Y]ou're only examining history from the standpoint of the *subjectivity* of the vanguard party itself, without taking into account the overall conditions of *duress* that were placed upon the Russian Revolution, yielding its subsequent political trajectory.

Under better circumstances, *without* numerous countries' military invasions, I'm sure the internal consolidation of power would *not* have had to happen, with far-more-beneficial social outcomes.

(A)

11th September 2016, 21:24

I have spend many many posts explaining how "Under better circumstances" nothing changes because the state is a bourgeois relation between those who rule (Government) the apparatus (the state) and the people who are subject to its authority over property (the nation).

Even under the best of circumstance you are still advocating for bourgeois rule over the workers as you are placing a state over the workers. Literally crating authority over them and the land that they rightfully should have the power over.
The Liberalism of this argument is that the workers would have control over the state apparatus; that they would form the government. This idea (See America) is faulty. Their is clearly a ruling class and a working class in every Liberal democracy (Socialist or capitalist) that has ever existed. Are things better under socialist regimes? In a lot of cases yes; but we are not looking for better; we are in the business of Revolution against the ruling class; not the reform of the ruling class to better oppress us.

Why did Marx not use the term Capitalist and worker? Because the capitalist is not the only form of exploitation against the worker and to say that they are is A-historical and completely missing his point about the Materialism of History.
Whoever has authority over the land and the worker is bourgeois.
Creating a state to hold authority over the land in the name of the working class is Liberal bourgeois.

ckaihatsu

12th September 2016, 13:11

I have spend many many posts explaining how "Under better circumstances" nothing changes because the state is a bourgeois relation between those who rule (Government) the apparatus (the state) and the people who are subject to its authority over property (the nation).

Even under the best of circumstance you are still advocating for bourgeois rule over the workers as you are placing a state over the workers. Literally crating authority over them and the land that they rightfully should have the power over.

Not all states are the same, as you're explicitly admitting here:

Are things better under socialist regimes? In a lot of cases yes;

---

The Liberalism of this argument is that the workers would have control over the state apparatus; that they would form the government.

It's not merely 'liberalism' to call for workers control over the means of mass industrial production and also the state apparatus, if appropriate -- it would be *revolutionary*.

This idea (See America) is faulty. Their is clearly a ruling class and a working class in every Liberal democracy (Socialist or capitalist) that has ever existed. Are things better under socialist regimes? In a lot of cases yes; but we are not looking for better; we are in the business of Revolution against the ruling class; not the reform of the ruling class to better oppress us.

Why did Marx not use the term Capitalist and worker? Because the capitalist is not the only form of exploitation against the worker and to say that they are is A-historical and completely missing his point about the Materialism of History.
Whoever has authority over the land and the worker is bourgeois.
Creating a state to hold authority over the land in the name of the working class is Liberal bourgeois.

No one here is calling for bourgeois-type / elitist state-bureaucratic authority and control over 'the land' and all means of mass industrial production.

(A)

12th September 2016, 20:46

Wow read much into nothing chris?

Canada is clearly better then america but that does not make the state any less capitalist; Just as both the U.S.A and the USSR where both capitalist regimes fighting over world domination. Both started with the best of Liberal intentions. Liberation from a tyrannical monarchy; strong constitutions that put the peoples rights above the state; or so we where told. But they both exploited the labor of its working class; engaged in endless war for expansion and betrayed the revolution at every turn.

-----

I call for worker direct control over their means of production and the product of that labor to be given to the community of their own volition.
NOT for the workers state that control's ALL production and all of the product of the workers labors. That owns the land and creates laws against the working class. That Alienates the worker from his labor even for the most "benevolent" of causes.
Marx spoke against this alienation in his works.

-----

No one here is calling for bourgeois-type / elitist state-bureaucratic authority and control over 'the land' and all means of mass industrial production.

Their are many people here calling for and idolizing the USSR and other bourgeois-type / elitist state-bureaucratic authority's and their control over the land and all means of production.

Antistalinism is a hatred of the revolution.

This kind of Anti-Marxist bullshit is what I am talking about. We are not allowed to be critical of the clearly bourgeoisie Stalin; the dictator of the USSR because then; according to the tankies; we are against the revolution that he destroyed and left salted.

GLF

13th September 2016, 10:14

"Democracy" is basically the communist version of a red-letter Christian. I'm not religious but my family happens to be, hence why I notice this. It's really self-righteous, arrogant and factionalist to stubbornly claim to have knowledge of a one true doctrine. It's what leads to religious/political wars and strife. I guess some people just won't accept that all ideas change over time. Even Marx was a revisionist of earlier forms of socialism.

ckaihatsu

13th September 2016, 14:56

Wow read much into nothing chris?

I'm just going by what you're giving me, which is:

Are things better under socialist regimes? In a lot of cases yes;

So, again:

Not all states are the same, as you're explicitly admitting [...]

---

Canada is clearly better then america but that does not make the state any less capitalist;

Just as both the U.S.A and the USSR where both capitalist regimes fighting over world domination.

No, this is too simplistic and inaccurate.

The USSR was playing catch-up at industrialization, and did it very well, while the U.S. was already industrialized. The USSR was *expansionist* of its bureaucratic-collectivist administration, while the U.S. has been *expropriation*-based, profit-driven, and *imperialist* -- these are distinctly different kinds of bases-superstructures.

Both started with the best of Liberal intentions.

Nope, this is just factually incorrect -- Stalinism, or strongman-bureaucratic control, derived from the imploded Russian Revolution.

Liberation from a tyrannical monarchy;

strong constitutions that put the peoples rights above the state; or so we where told. But they both exploited the labor of its working class;

This part itself is accurate.

engaged in endless war for expansion and betrayed the revolution at every turn.

The USSR wasn't about endless war, though the U.S. is, because it's imperialist.

The American Revolution was a *bourgeois* revolution, while the Russian Revolution was both anti-monarchical and about *workers control* of the means of mass industrial production, initially.

I call for worker direct control over their means of production and the product of that labor to be given to the community of their own volition.
NOT for the workers state that control's ALL production and all of the product of the workers labors. That owns the land and creates laws against the working class. That Alienates the worker from his labor even for the most "benevolent" of causes.
Marx spoke against this alienation in his works.

Their are many people here calling for and idolizing the USSR

No there aren't.

and other bourgeois-type / elitist state-bureaucratic authority's and their control over the land and all means of production.

Nope.

This kind of Anti-Marxist bullshit is what I am talking about. We are not allowed to be critical of the clearly bourgeoisie Stalin; the dictator of the USSR because then; according to the tankies; we are against the revolution that he destroyed and left salted.

Go for it -- go ahead and be critical of Stalin and see what happens.

(A)

14th September 2016, 02:58

Location C do you like stalin and Lenin and Mao and Trotsky?
Do you wish that they have not fallen and that the USSR was still in existence today?
Do you support or denounce the actions of the USSR?

Am I right that people like and support the actions taken by the USSR or an I wrong; do you agree that the USSR was way off track in their methods?

GLF

15th September 2016, 03:55

Democracy, do you like McCarthy and Mussolini and JFK and Reagan?
Do you wish that everyone would just believe victor history and that anti-soviet McCarthyism was still in existence today?
Do you support or denounce the actions of those who opposed the 20th century communists and waged war to stop the spread of socialism?

Am I right that people are completely brainwashed by capitalist perspective of history or am I wrong; do you agree that westerners have lied and poisoned people (including some socialists) against the USSR?

(A)

15th September 2016, 06:50

I know it to be the case; I used to be a Trot.

But my critique of these people comes from the standpoint of the worker; not the ideologue.
I simply want my comrades to be liberated from the authority of private property. Does not matter if its called the peoples property.
I dont care if you call your private property Marxist; Its not.

Marx called for every system that existed to be put to the test and all forms of authority have been found wanting.

Antiochus

16th September 2016, 04:28

Actually Democracy is just a petty-bourgeoisie ideologue if not just an outright troll. He went on several threads making comments (not exhaustive):

1) Some business leaders in Bolivia were correct in murdering a government representative because they called their business a "cooperative".
2) He argues from the typical liberal position that a violent revolution is not possible and instead we must "provide an alternative an let people choose it", i.e allow the status quo to remain and engage in meaningless huckstering (e.g calling exploitative labor "cooperatives").
3) Calling the Russian revolution a "Liberal" revolution. Hysterical considering he is nothing but one.
4) Equating the Soviet Revolution with the (later) Soviet State.

The funny thing is that this buffoon blasts Lenin and then has a quote from Charlie Chaplin as his signature. Maybe in his mind the latter was the "true revolutionary".

(A)

16th September 2016, 05:34

1) I was asking why the site was supporting a capitalist government over a workers strike. Its called learning.
2) I am 100% for the violent over throw of all private property and institutions that maintain it. But I also belive that we have to create a system of revolutionary education before that can happen.
3) The creation of a republic is historically the job of liberals. See* America.
4) Lenin wanted to create a republic and he himself was a parliamentarian. Other Marxists criticized him for this (Trotsky and Luxemburg to note a few). The ideology of the revolution was correct; I disagree with the method they chose.

Sewer Socialist

16th September 2016, 06:14

Democracy also said state ownership was socialist, giving Nazi Germany as an example. Literally every term Democracy uses makes no sense and contradicts what they've written earlier.
Extremely nationalistic and authoritarian states can own the means of production... by definition they would be socialist. (Hitlers National socialism)

ckaihatsu

16th September 2016, 13:52

In a bid to counter D's overgeneralization of the 'state', and resulting pessimism and fatalism about a workers' self-organization ('vanguard' and/or 'workers state'), I'll point out that many in today's society often go into the *public* (vs. private) sector in order to lend some kind of efforts -- albeit necessarily empirically constrained -- to the *public good*, through tasks of *social service*.

I don't see why it's so difficult to conceive-of this 'public sector' being rapidly expanded to encompass much, if not all, of those things that the *private sector* does, in business' aim / realization of profits.

The typical right-wing response is that 'Oh, the government will just screw everything up' -- which *is* a partially empirically correct assessment, and that's why we're not liberals, arguing for an *actual* principled expansion of the existing government / public sector. Instead, with *workers* themselves in power handling all matters of societal functions, it would be like a *total* expansion of government 'turf', but then run by the employees (workers) themselves, thus fully displacing all *private*-sector interests. (With workers in power worldwide any *private* enterprises would be comparatively *more expensive* with their economic requirement of profit-expropriation, compared to the workers state doing the same thing *cooperatively*, for free-access and direct-distribution on the basis of humane need.)

GLF

16th September 2016, 18:47

1) I was asking why the site was supporting a capitalist government over a workers strike. Its called learning.

You're the one calling it a capitalist government. You erroneously label things. Just because we don't fall in line with your rigid and very narrow understanding of socialism doesn't mean we are capitalists.

I am 100% for the violent over throw of all private property and institutions that maintain it. But I also belive that we have to create a system of revolutionary education before that can happen.

Which is one of the things the socialist state apparatus aspires to accomplish. But you call that capitalism and authoritarianism. Before private property and institutions can be abolished they have to first be seized. Then we create a system of revolutionary education - one of the prime functions of the most politically active and educated segment of the proletariat, the vanguard party. How can you admit that such things are required but oppose them actually being done?

The creation of a republic is historically the job of liberals. See* America. That's debatable. In any case, who said anything about creating a republic? Do you even know what a republic is?

Lenin wanted to create a republic and he himself was a parliamentarian.

http://i.imgur.com/IIDVhK7.jpg

(A)

16th September 2016, 20:21

Democracy also said state ownership was socialist, giving Nazi Germany as an example. Literally every term Democracy uses makes no sense and contradicts what they've written earlier.

The state privately owning the means is capitalism. Any exclusive ownership of the means of production is capitalism in one form or another. Statists like to call private ownership of the means by the state socialism.
What is is?

Does the exclusive ownership of the means by the state make it Capitalism

Or does the Exclusive ownership of the means by the state make it socialism.

If we are going to have only two options it must be one or the other.

I find neither desirable and wish to end not just the existence of the state or the capitalist but the very notion of the exclusive right to property as Anti-communist and therefor counter-revolutionary.

-----

Which is one of the things the socialist state apparatus aspires to accomplish

Yep the state exclusively owning all of the means of production and using police to protect their property is so obviously Socialism I dont know what I was thinking.

Never before has a a "socialist" nation done anything to abuse and oppress the working class nor extract from them the product of their labor and given them scraps in return.
Never has the leader of a "socialist" nation lived in a mansion while others lives in slums.

My argument is simple really.

If capitalism is the right to have exclusive control over the/a means of production. Then A state having this exclusive control over the means of production is capitalist.

Capitalists are just micro-states that have all of the characteristics of such. Borders, governments, GDP, Taxes, Armed protection.

Why dont we just give control of the economy to capitalists; buy stocks in the company and just work for them. By your understanding of socialism that would define a socialist society.

------
Also you said that Lenin being a liberal is debatable; well what is your argument. Debate it. That's why we are here. Not on this site to drink the maoists kool-aid.

GLF

16th September 2016, 21:32

If capitalism is the right to have exclusive control over the/a means of production. Then A state having this exclusive control over the means of production is capitalist.

See this is the problem. You have your own definitions of things. Capitalism (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/capitalism) is not merely the right to have exclusive control over the means of production.

You say that simply having control of the means of production makes one a capitalist. So by your rationale, when the means of production is finally seized and returned to the workers, at that moment the workers become capitalists. Do slaves become slave-owners once they gain the keys to their shackles?

The means of production itself is not going to vanish. There will always be work to be done and workers to do that work. Capitalism is about keeping it all in the control of private interests. The state is the apparatus used to maintain that control. These are facts. Your definitions are totally wrong.

(A)

16th September 2016, 23:04

Sewer Socialist

17th September 2016, 02:30

Okay, you're getting closer. Yes, socialism is the negation of ownership, and there is no such thing as socialist capitalism. But capitalism is not the only system of ownership - this is true of all class societies, like feudalism.

What makes capitalism unique is not the ownership of objects, but the particular social relationships between people. The relationship between objects is only the veil that hides the relationships between the people that valorizes them. Capitalism is uniquely the supremacy of value, the domination of people by their need to produce value to live their lives, it is the logic of value that directs society. It is the reinvestment of value into new forms to expand commodity production.

This is true regardless of bourgeois ownership, or state ownership, or worker ownership. The domination by value is fundamentally the same; the logic of value directs society in all three of these scenarios.

There's a reason that Location C's "socialist" states were so similar to bourgeois ones - they are all societies governed by value and exchange. The people apparently in charge all had to abide by commodity production, profit, and reinvestment in more capital.

In other words, a system of capital; capitalism.

(A)

17th September 2016, 07:45

So I am correct in saying that a government that rules the state; rules the industry and has police to protect those property rights (the right of the state to control capital) is a capitalist one?
What about country's with private industry? are they socialist?

Like Bolivia. People here have call it socialist but is it? Do the workers control the means or production? does the state even control the means of production? Have they ended all private control of industry?
http://www.latia.org/top-10-companies-in-bolivia
here are the top ten corporations in so called socialist Bolivia.

GLF

17th September 2016, 09:59

The dictatorship of the proletariat is not >A< dictatorship; it is the direct control of the means of production by the workers that operate them.
The workers take direct control over the means of production.

So you are in favor of the dictatorship of the proletariat? You do realize that the proletarian dictatorship is the lower-phase of communism, right? It is the means to the desired end, not the end itself.

And while this is neither here nor there, most of the people I've heard use that term are not exactly what I'd call anti-Lenin.

There's a reason that Location C's "socialist" states were so similar to bourgeois ones - they are all societies governed by value and exchange. The people apparently in charge all had to abide by commodity production, profit, and reinvestment in more capital.

In other words, a system of capital; capitalism.

I agreed with your comment for the most part. But as for the part I quoted, I feel it's worth pointing out that capitalism is an international system, and one that holds the entire world hostage. At no point did I claim any communist state to have existed. Socialism is not the end of capitalism - communism is. Socialism, from a materialist standpoint, is a stage of human development stemming from the unsustainability of free-market capitalism and the rise of the class-conscious worker. In a political and practical sense, socialism is a transition from capitalism to communism. But unfortunately some vestiges of the former stage inevitably remains in decreasing amounts until the next stage of human development is fully realized.

This is not an excuse, let alone an endorsement, for capitalism.

(A)

17th September 2016, 10:50

Well if you consider capitalism to be the dictatorship of the means of production by the capitalist class then the means of production being directly in the hands of the workers who operate them would be the dictatorship of the working class.

This does not mean that the working class should ever allow its vanguard to form a dictatorship over them or the means of production as that would be giving up direct control for the new ruling class.
The arguments that support that idea are based in liberal or fascist beliefs about society.

Fascist: The state is for the people; all power to the state.
Liberals: The state is of the people; all meaningful power to the state.

Scratch a Liberal and a Fascist bleeds amI right.
----

Ok I will relent here.

The question is and always will be the best way to transition.

I find the notion that control over the means or production or the working class by a state to be the least likely way to lead to Communism as these things are fundamentally Anti-Communist.
What is not fundamentally Anti-communist (and here is where I will get the hate) is the Market Mechanism.

If we are talking moving from one mode or production where one group of people has control over all production and therefor distribution in the form of capitalism
replacing that with a new form of control over production and distribution is not a real change. Just a change of hands.

The goal of putting production into the hands of the worker means that the mode of distribution must also be in the hands of the worker.
This is why revolutionary Mutuaism is the logical first step in the transition from the capitalist mode to the next.

Mutualism to be clear is free market socialism. The means of production are fully in the hands of the workers and their is no government or state or boss to direct distribution. ALL production is done for the purposes for use.
Without the ability to extract labor by the commodification of labor NOR the ability to own property Capitalism can not exist.
The ONLY reason this is not Communism is the temporary use of money as we transition from exchange for profit to exchange for use.

I highly suggest reading Proudhon and some other works if you have not already. Kropotkin as well.

I can link if you actually want to read.

GLF

17th September 2016, 17:08

Fascist: The state is for the people; all power to the state.
Liberals: The state is of the people; all meaningful power to the state.

Wrong. Under fascism, the people are for the state, not the other way around.

Fascism: all corporations, special interest groups, and unions are made organs of an all encompassing state, and the classes are motivated by way of propaganda, to be driven by various social constructs, to collaborate in it's defense and expand the rule of the few. Private property and social hierarchy remain intact. All industries vital to state hegemony, however, are socialized, whereas industries that are not vital are strictly regulated and overseen by a government authority that centrally plans all aspects of the economy and life in general. Profits are private in it's corporatist system, with losses socialized. Rich man's socialism. Simply put, fascism is an all-encompassing, totalitarian state.

Liberalism: a philosophy which emphasizes individuality and personal liberty. Classical liberals believe that society is more productive and healthier when people look to their own material interests on an individual basis, rather than collectively. Liberals tend to oppose central planning and government regulation of capital in favor of a laissez-faire system in which the means of production is completely at the mercy of private interests.

Scratch a Liberal and a Fascist bleeds amI right.

Um, no. You are actually way off.

Sectarian

17th September 2016, 18:29

I live in Portland, Oregon, which as far as I can tell, is basically an anarchist society. There are all sorts of anarchists with businesses here, they get along fine and the government doesn't get in their way much.

Fellow_Human

17th September 2016, 19:51

Liberalism: a philosophy which emphasizes individuality and personal liberty.

That's not the essence. The most revealing thing to know about liberalism is that it is the ideology of the petite bourgeoisie, of the "middle class" in its stricter sense (not the bullshit modern American sense). You don't come to know it through idealistic slogans like "liberté," "égalité," "fraternité," or even its theory; you understand it through its history, the class struggle replacing feudalism with capitalism, and the radical-revolutionary competition of liberalism against the conservatism of the nobility, who, with industrialization, merged with the bourgeoisie, filling its uppermost, rentier, politician-funding, "haute" echelons.

ckaihatsu

18th September 2016, 15:01

Firstly Its not "simply having control of the means of production" its having exclusive right of authority over the means of production. The exclusive rule over society's productive capability.

The part of my argument you are conveniently avoiding is the difference between a workers state and the actual workers.
You want to give The exclusive rule over society's productive capability to a government that supposedly represents the workers that they have authority over. If the government has exclusive authority over the means of production then becomes the capitalist and the citizen the worker.

I want to end The exclusive rule over society's productive capability.

I want every worker to have the ability to manage their own productive capability and end the alienation of the worker from his work. All society relies on interdependence so all production should be done interdependently.

The dictatorship of the proletariat is not >A< dictatorship; it is the direct control of the means of production by the workers that operate them.
The workers take direct control over the means of production.

D, I'd really like for you to reconcile the latter part of your post here, with the initial part of your post.

I *agree* with this latter part, but, for some reason, you keep implicitly defining a workers state as being a-governmental-other-that-has-exclusive-rule-and-authority-over-the-means-of-production.

Now where the *fuck* did *that* come from -- ?

If the workers are in direct control of the means of production, *and* they want to coordinate themselves across their own communes / localities, perhaps all the way up to the global scale, then why can't that be called a 'workers state' or 'workers government' -- ?

Here's from another thread:

[P]roduction can be carried out for use value without exchange.

What happened to your 'market' line that you've been touting all this time -- ?

*My* position hasn't changed in the slightest, and now you're projecting / foisting *your* (apparently discarded) 'exchange' approach onto me, which is inaccurate on your part.

If you now think that production can be carried out for use-value only, without exchanges / exchange-values, then how exactly would such liberated-production be carried out over an extended geographical terrain (several communes / localities together) -- ?

http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/196010-Traditional-left-right-way-of-seeing-politics-doesn-t-make-any-sense-to-me?p=2875510#post2875510

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Well if you consider capitalism to be the dictatorship of the means of production by the capitalist class then the means of production being directly in the hands of the workers who operate them would be the dictatorship of the working class.

This does not mean that the working class should ever allow its vanguard to form a dictatorship over them or the means of production as that would be giving up direct control for the new ruling class.

So what I'm hearing is that you have a *strong*, *deep* concern with a resurgence of elitism from within the ranks of the working class, collectively empowered after their overthrow of bourgeois rule.

It's a *valid* concern, but you're continually turning it into something of a *cottage industry* with your repetition and redefining of terms themselves -- that makes it more of an *annoying political anxiety*, really.

[T]he question is and always will be the best way to transition.

I find the notion that control over the means or production or the working class by a state to be the least likely way to lead to Communism as these things are fundamentally Anti-Communist.

But is there a valid distinction to be made between a 'state' in general (meaning elitist rule), and a 'workers state', meaning collective empowerment and workers self-coordination at all scales -- ?

What is not fundamentally Anti-communist (and here is where I will get the hate) is the Market Mechanism.

I'll repeat this, from you:

[P]roduction can be carried out for use value without exchange.

(Note that production-for-use-value-only-without-exchanges is *mutually exclusive* with use of a market mechanism, since markets imply the use of exchanges and exchange-values.)

If we are talking moving from one mode or production where one group of people has control over all production and therefor distribution in the form of capitalism
replacing that with a new form of control over production and distribution is not a real change. Just a change of hands.

The goal of putting production into the hands of the worker means that the mode of distribution must also be in the hands of the worker.

Yes, and none of this is at-odds with the concept of a 'workers state', or 'workers government', since there would be no elitist 'other' operating in the same global socio-political 'space'.

This is why revolutionary Mutuaism is the logical first step in the transition from the capitalist mode to the next.

Mutualism to be clear is free market socialism. The means of production are fully in the hands of the workers and their is no government or state or boss to direct distribution. ALL production is done for the purposes for use.

But with *any* kind of markets there are *exchanges*, and thus *exchange values*.

(How would disagreements and disputes over exchanges / exchange values be mediated in such a purported 'free market socialism' -- ?)

Without the ability to extract labor by the commodification of labor NOR the ability to own property Capitalism can not exist.
The ONLY reason this is not Communism is the temporary use of money as we transition from exchange for profit to exchange for use.

I highly suggest reading Proudhon and some other works if you have not already. Kropotkin as well.

I can link if you actually want to read.

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Scratch a Liberal and a Fascist bleeds amI right.

Um, no. You are actually way off.

I interpret D's statement here as being that liberals are inextricably tied to the mechanism of capitalist markets, for anything economic, so that, in practice / the real world, liberals keep ceding political ground to the logic of the markets, wherever they may go (income inequality, fascist or fascist-like consolidation of power, etc.).

(A)

19th September 2016, 09:26

I will repeat. The idea that a workers government or a workers state is possible as the idea of a Liberal democracy. Would you have parliamentarians passing bylaws and managing production and taxing the worker and investing in capital?
I am from so called Canada and let me tell you; Parliaments fucking suck.

How hard is it to imagine a system where the worker/unions are the democratic process but they dont have the authority to pass social or economic controls. They cant just vote 50+1% to ban alcohol or Set curfew.
A system where the workers control their own lives on their own and their workplaces communally? A market without money or trade where each worker/union produces to directly meet the demand without the use of a unnecessary centralized state

A Soviet society without the Congress of Soviet's.

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The Liberal argument; LocationC; is that the state is republic of the people. "A a state in which supreme power is held by the people and their elected representatives."

I interpret that is OF the people.

Fascism on the other hand maintains a class division between the members and a relation to them; not of them.

Was it not you making the argument that Liberals where a stones throw from fascism?

Fellow_Human

19th September 2016, 13:15

How hard is it to imagine a system where the worker/unions are the democratic process but they dont have the authority to pass social or economic controls. They cant just vote 50+1% to ban alcohol or Set curfew.

So basically anarcho-syndicalism?

ckaihatsu

19th September 2016, 13:26

I will repeat. The idea that a workers government or a workers state is possible as the idea of a Liberal democracy.

No -- considering your 'How hard is it to imagine...' section below, I'd say we're going around and around because of semantics. It's too bad, though, that you insist on misinterpreting the regular meaning of 'workers government' / 'workers state'.

Worse still, even, is that you can't imagine post-capitalist coordination for production taking place on larger scales than whatever is in front of anyone's face.

I'll add that today's improved productivities translate to better likelihoods *of* locally-based production -- almost self-sufficiency by any given geography -- but that *logistical* reality should be *beside the point*. If such a people *want* to do some kind of global production, then they *should*. The coordination around such would necessarily be *centralized*, at some scale, for whatever items, thereby precluding any conceivable need to turn to the market mechanism.

Would you have parliamentarians passing bylaws and managing production and taxing the worker and investing in capital?
I am from so called Canada and let me tell you; Parliaments fucking suck.

How hard is it to imagine a system where the worker/unions are the democratic process but they dont have the authority to pass social or economic controls. They cant just vote 50+1% to ban alcohol or Set curfew.

As far as general *social* ('civil') policy / practice goes, I'm *almost* with you.

I don't think *only* (active) workers and (bottom-up) unions should be the participants -- it should be *everyone*, regardless of work status.

Also I don't think a post-capitalist society should be 'hands-on' only for *production* activities and not for *social* / civil ones. But I don't think that such a post-class-division society would need to be *heavy-handed* ('authoritarian') about such matters, either. I'd imagine it would just have to 'get its shit together' at some point and then cobble-together some widely acceptable 'guidelines' over general social practice. In such an egalitarian context, with a demonstrably clear prevailing consensus over this-or-that, such collectively self-conscious mass decisions would transparently become the social norm, and would soon feel 'natural' to most everyone.

A system where the workers control their own lives on their own and their workplaces communally?

Okay -- 'collectively'.

A market without money or trade where each worker/union produces to directly meet the demand without the use of a unnecessary centralized state

No markets, please -- again, exchanges imply exchange-values, which implies commodity-production all over again.

'Centralization' just means 'bottom-up coordination across two or more localities, per-item, without any separate, standing administration'. (Note the middle panel on the following illustration for a 'sketch' of this.)

Multi-Tiered System of Productive and Consumptive Zones for a Post-Capitalist Political Economy

http://s6.postimg.org/cp6z6ed81/Multi_Tiered_System_of_Productive_and_Consumptiv.j pg (http://postimg.org/image/ccfl07uy5/full/)

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A Soviet society without the Congress of Soviet's.

Ehhhh, it's unfortunately not the best example to use, since the soviets didn't have time to flourish, and the Congress of Soviets had a *bourgeois*-type substitutionist-political-representative and supreme-power kind of character to it -- understandable in historical context -- and is probably the basis for *your* political mindset of 'the-state-being-authoritarian-regardless'.

(A)

19th September 2016, 21:51

I did not use the word trade... Stop being dense. I said production to meed demand.

I did not say trade my state issued labor credits for a toothbrush.
I did not say trade my labor directly for a toothbrush.
I did not say the word trade.

No authority over production.
No authority over population.

The foundation of a central authority over either implies a right to make rules and pass laws that does not exist legitimately. It exists only based on the use of violence and property law.

I make a rule and everyone has to follow it or I will send my police to beat, arrest, imprison and possibly kill you. And it is completely legal.

A monopoly on violence. You can form a think tank union and have people voluntarily listen to your propositions but cant use of force to establish law.

No states; No classes. No government no capitalism.

ckaihatsu

19th September 2016, 22:25

I did not use the word trade... Stop being dense. I said production to meed demand.

I did not say trade my state issued labor credits for a toothbrush.

This is another misrepresentation of my 'labor credits' model since the labor credits themselves are *not* exchangeable for goods / resources / materials of any kind, nor is there any kind of an institutional state apparatus present.

I did not say trade my labor directly for a toothbrush.
I did not say the word trade.

No authority over production.
No authority over population.

The foundation of a central authority over either implies a right to make rules and pass laws that does not exist legitimately. It exists only based on the use of violence and property law.

I make a rule and everyone has to follow it or I will send my police to beat, arrest, imprison and possibly kill you. And it is completely legal.

A monopoly on violence. You can form a think tank union and have people voluntarily listen to your propositions but cant use of force to establish law.

No states; No classes. No government no capitalism.

Okay, this is mostly a repetition of your standing-anxiety-about-a-surprise-state line.

Since your approach is so 'organic' would you care to address the possibility / potential for an inadvertent exploitation of a subset of the population, as described here at this other thread -- ?

[I]n a socially egalitarian society that has overcome the class divide, people would face all socially necessary tasks *collectively* -- if there's a *gradient of distastefulness* over all of these tasks, that would then produce a *gradient of unwillingness* among those in the population (less-distasteful = more-willing, and more-distasteful = less-willing).

So in such an even-handed social context who *should* do the more-distasteful tasks -- ?

It shouldn't even be a matter of individual *willingness*, because the society has to resolve these post-capitalist socio-material issues on a *collective*, *consistent* basis, as a matter of hands-on social policy:

If society allowed certain people to be doing the *gruntwork*, *consistently*, it would amount to de-facto *exploitation* because those people's standard-of-living was *reduced* (due to doing distasteful tasks), compared to everyone else's, who *weren't* doing distasteful tasks *at all*.

You're also not-addressing the 'inadvertent exploitation' issue from above -- what if some people *love* to grow hemp (etc.), and decide to dedicate their lives, 24/7/365, to the duties of hemp cultivation -- ? One may be tempted to respond 'Great!', but would it be socially *fair* (egalitarian) to collectively *allow* this kind of unceasing self-sacrificing effort for the common good while most-everyone-else is just *using* that hemp (etc.) and being a self-absorbed rock star -- ?

http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/196010-Traditional-left-right-way-of-seeing-politics-doesn-t-make-any-sense-to-me?p=2875510#post2875510