It's frustrating to deal with communists.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by BeBro
But it's not communism there. Not if you go by Marx or Lenin or any other basic communist theory guys. They even have the evil empire of IKEA.

So?

There's two sides to communism. One part is the moral dimension, which stresses the misery and inequality caused by capitalism. The second is the historical thesis that claims that capitalism will eat itself and be replaced by a communist society.

Communists with brains recognize that the second is the result of a long developmentalist process and can't be created simply because people want it now. We aren't even close to the technology we would need to make it work. That being the case, the first part still holds and anyone who is a communist should be committed to producing a stable political system that fulfills these goals as best as possible. The Nordic welfare state seems to be the optimal form of social organization to achieve that goal.

The anarchists and so on who think we should overthrow the government tomorrow have one small problem. They have no idea what to replace it with. It's the same as those people who argue that China should have a democratic revolution right now, but have no idea what to do after overthrowing the Chinese government. Or those clowns who thought it would be a good idea to overthrow the entire Iraqi political structure without any sort of plan for what was next.

I fail to see what is unreasonable about any of these beliefs.

[Verto]

Originally posted by Agathon

bla bla bla i'm a filthy commie

Shuttup commie

[CrONoS]

Originally posted by Victor Galis
I'm on strike due to commies. (Well, at least I call them commies.)

??? Your university is on strike?

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Verto


Shuttup commie

Right. It's the gulag for you!!

(It's OK. I'll get you a place in the one we'll have for all the women who commit "counterrevolutionary crimes of lust". You may not want to leave)

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I guess I just hate being told ... that I don't know what I'm talking about....

So you come here for sympathy?

[chequita guevara]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_socialism

African socialism is a belief in sharing economic resources in a "traditional" African way, as distinct from classical socialism. Many African politicians of the 1950s and 1960s professed their support for African socialism, although definitions and interpretations of this term varied considerably.

After the independence of most African countries during the 1960s, newly formed African regimes could not easily claim a great victory over the Europeans if they continued to use the same system that those oppressors had designed, namely capitalism, since all imperial regimes had been mainly capitalist, even if their adherence to free markets was not absolute. Socialism was popular among African leaders because it represented a break from the imperial ruling tradition. Socialism seemed, to many, to be all that capitalism was not.

At the same time, however, advocates of African socialism claimed that it was not the opposite of capitalism nor a response to it, but something completely different. Nationalists claimed it was fully African, appealing to an African identity that was even stronger than anti-capitalism. Their socialism, they claimed, was merely a recapturing of the spirit of what it was to be African.

A multitude of reasons were presented in support of African socialism. Many believed that Africa was too far “behind” capitalist states in terms of economic development to compete fairly with them. Others appealed to a sense of unity that would not be provided by the competitive capitalist systems. Still others believed that the development of Africa should be planned in order to avoid wasting scarce resources, and avoid future class conflicts.

African identity and socialism were often intertwined. Some leaders claimed that Africa had always been “socialist,” and appealed to socialism as a unifying cultural element for Africans. This was not by any means the only form of African identity that they appealed to, but the combination of socialism and African identity was doubly effective in ending the era of old imperial regimes. Social revolution usually went hand-in-hand with socialism.

However, most regimes following African socialist programmes did not deliver on the promises of self-sufficiency, prosperity, and equality (partly as a result of Western interference supporting anti socialist movements), and as a result many have grown disillusioned with African socialism.

[CrONoS]

Originally posted by Agathon




Right. It's the gulag for you!!

(It's OK. I'll get you a place in the one we'll have for all the women who commit "counterrevolutionary crimes of lust". You may not want to leave)

Nice

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Agathon

So?

There's two sides to communism. One part is the moral dimension, which stresses the misery and inequality caused by capitalism. The second is the historical thesis that claims that capitalism will eat itself and be replaced by a communist society.

Communists with brains recognize that the second is the result of a long developmentalist process and can't be created simply because people want it now.

Well, we've rather seen that people don't really wanted the first practical form. If there's another form which can be more successful remains to be seen, but that is speculative now.

That being the case, the first part still holds and anyone who is a communist should be committed to producing a stable political system that fulfills these goals as best as possible. The Nordic welfare state seems to be the optimal form of social organization to achieve that goal.

I didn't say it's unreasonable, but that still doesn't make the Scandinavian model communism unless there's some definition of communism I'm not aware of which translates to capitalism plus a strong state-run welfare and social security system. Which is what you can find in various degrees throughout Europe these days.

Also criticism towards certain developments in capitalism is not something that is only done by communists. Social security measures have a long history, just think about that Bismarck guy. One can debate whether the influence of the (back-then marxist) SPD had to do with it (certainly), but that doesn't change that capitalist societies did adopt welfare and social security stuff, while still not becoming communist that way.

Now if communists support the Scandinavian way it's all fine, but do you honestly want to tell me that because of this the system as it is now in the countries mentioned is communist?

[chequita guevara]

"I failed. Let's admit it." Nyerere on his economic policies

[Agathon]

Originally posted by BeBro

Now if communists support the Scandinavian way it's all fine, but do you honestly want to tell me that because of this the system as it is now in the countries mentioned is communist?

No.

I'm saying that it is the system that communists should support for the time being. Sorry I wasn't clearer.

[chequita guevara]

Nyerere's failure wasn't in "implementing" socialism, which cannot be implemented as if it were simply a set of policies. Instead, Nyerere attempted to return Africa to its precolonial state, claiming that the original African societies were socialist. Of course it was a failure.

[Caligastia]

I imagine that society in the distant future will be communist because the average person will have a far higher level of morality. With the average person acting unselfishly, and with love towards all others, a system that would appear communist to us will naturally develop. I think present-day communists are mistaken in that they try to force high ideals. Doing the right thing must be a choice.

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Agathon
There's two sides to communism. One part is the moral dimension, which stresses the misery and inequality caused by capitalism. The second is the historical thesis that claims that capitalism will eat itself and be replaced by a communist society.

For the second side, what distinction do you make between capitalism "eating itself" and capitalism achieving all it is meant to achieve?

Some degree of Marx's proposed inevitibility of communism seems reasonable to me. Supply and demand seek an equilibrium. American jobs are going to Asia because they will work for less. Now their standards of living - and wages - are increasing so the jobs are moving to other Asian nations. Some day those jobs will leave Asia and move to Africa. The jobs will keep moving around to find the poorest regions with the lowest wages, raise their standard of living, and move again. Till one day, in theory, there won't be any dirt poor and destitute areas of the planet anymore.

We'd all be fairly equal and generally "middle-class".

I don't see why that would be called the collapse of capitalism, it seems to be the triumph of capitalism.

Obviously it is a lot more complex than that, but I think that is a general trend we can observe from today's global capitalism. It may be working too slow for some, too fast for others, but it at least seems to be headed in that direction. Call it capitalism or call it Marxism, it seems to be a good thing either way.

[Heraclitus]

You are negelcting the trend of the dying middle class.

[Whoha]

Originally posted by OzzyKP

We'd all be fairly equal and generally "middle-class".

I don't see why that would be called the collapse of capitalism, it seems to be the triumph of capitalism.

Wait until you see what an increasingly proletarian electorate is willing to support.