Socialism and communism, in theory, are structured to prioritize the needs of the people over profit or power. That slogan captures that ideal beautifully. However, history shows that the implementation of these systems falls short of their ideals. Issues like bureaucratic inefficiency, corruption, or the consolidation of power within ruling parties have led to systems that still reward the powerful or productive, just in different ways. I’d argue that the challenge isn’t the system itself but the difficulty of designing any system that fully aligns with such principles while addressing the complexities of human behavior and societal needs. Capitalism embraces it while socialism and communism pay lip service to ideals while also committing the same sins in practice. My point that it’s not exclusive to capitalism remains.
You mean cronie capitalism. The Fabian Socialist were big into eugenics, remember. Straight capitalism is based on a free and open market. That’s not what anywhere has.
Private ownership over the means of production and allowing people to hoard capital will ALWAYS concentrate wealth and will ALWAYS produce an oligarchy.
You just unironically made a “capitalism hasn’t actually been tried yet” post in a thread where you’re on the “communism and socialism never work” position.
The government exists as a check on the power of huge corporations in this model (and is required to enforce private property in the first place). Who stops the richest company from picking winners and losers? Who stops companies from buying up their competition then cranking up prices? You need a framework to keep the market “free” in the first place.
Anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron, right-libertarianism is an oxy moron.
The problem is capitalism, full stop. There’s no good and bad kind, there’s just capitalism. An owning class dictating over a working class isn’t freedom.
You don’t need private ownership over the means of production to have trade and markets and productivity.
That betrays a lack of understanding about leftism. Government control over the economy is one way, yes. But your two options aren’t public dictator and private dictator.
Worker coops, syndicated unions (anarcho-syndicalism), anarcho-communism, gift economy…
Within the confines of the system you can also balance power quite a bit with UBI, mandated worker councils, worker representation on the company board of directors, etc.
As long as people are not allowed to fend for themselves because everything is privatized and commodified and you need to work for someone else to stay alive then you will not have freedom, a free market that retains that power dynamic just gives your employer even more ownership over you.
I still had this in my clipboard from an earlier comment:
"The son of the worker, on entering life, finds no field which he may till, no machine which he may tend, no mine in which he may dig, without accepting to leave a great part of what he will produce to a master. He must sell his labour for a scant and uncertain wage. His father and his grandfather have toiled to drain this field, to build this mill, to perfect this machine. They gave to the work the full measure of their strength, and what more could they give? But their heir comes into the world poorer than the lowest savage. If he obtains leave to till the fields, it is on condition of surrendering a quarter of the produce to his master, and another quarter to the government and the middlemen. And this tax, levied upon him by the State, the capitalist, the lord of the manor, and the middleman, is always increasing; it rarely leaves him the power to improve his system of culture. If he turns to industry, he is allowed to work–though not always even that --only on condition that he yield a half or two-thirds of the product to him whom the land recognizes as the owner of the machine.
We cry shame on the feudal baron who forbade the peasant to turn a clod of earth unless he surrendered to his lord a fourth of his crop. We call those the barbarous times. But if the forms have changed, the relations have remained the same, and the worker is forced, under the name of free contract, to accept feudal obligations. For, turn where he will, he can find no better conditions. Everything has become private property, and he must accept, or die of hunger."
Socialism and communism, in theory, are structured to prioritize the needs of the people over profit or power. That slogan captures that ideal beautifully. However, history shows that the implementation of these systems falls short of their ideals. Issues like bureaucratic inefficiency, corruption, or the consolidation of power within ruling parties have led to systems that still reward the powerful or productive, just in different ways. I’d argue that the challenge isn’t the system itself but the difficulty of designing any system that fully aligns with such principles while addressing the complexities of human behavior and societal needs. Capitalism embraces it while socialism and communism pay lip service to ideals while also committing the same sins in practice. My point that it’s not exclusive to capitalism remains.
You’re comparing what corrupt communist leaders do to what capitalism does by design.
Yes, that’s what I said. I’m not defending capitalism.
You mean cronie capitalism. The Fabian Socialist were big into eugenics, remember. Straight capitalism is based on a free and open market. That’s not what anywhere has.
“Free and open markets” work in theory, lol.
Private ownership over the means of production and allowing people to hoard capital will ALWAYS concentrate wealth and will ALWAYS produce an oligarchy.
You just unironically made a “capitalism hasn’t actually been tried yet” post in a thread where you’re on the “communism and socialism never work” position.
The irony is delicious
I never said it’s never been tried, lol. But when the government picks winners and losers, it’s not a free market
The government exists as a check on the power of huge corporations in this model (and is required to enforce private property in the first place). Who stops the richest company from picking winners and losers? Who stops companies from buying up their competition then cranking up prices? You need a framework to keep the market “free” in the first place.
Anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron, right-libertarianism is an oxy moron.
The problem is capitalism, full stop. There’s no good and bad kind, there’s just capitalism. An owning class dictating over a working class isn’t freedom.
You don’t need private ownership over the means of production to have trade and markets and productivity.
Right, so corrupt governments only wanting control and power is the answer? That’s just the government being a massive evil corporation
That betrays a lack of understanding about leftism. Government control over the economy is one way, yes. But your two options aren’t public dictator and private dictator.
Worker coops, syndicated unions (anarcho-syndicalism), anarcho-communism, gift economy…
Within the confines of the system you can also balance power quite a bit with UBI, mandated worker councils, worker representation on the company board of directors, etc.
As long as people are not allowed to fend for themselves because everything is privatized and commodified and you need to work for someone else to stay alive then you will not have freedom, a free market that retains that power dynamic just gives your employer even more ownership over you.
I still had this in my clipboard from an earlier comment:
"The son of the worker, on entering life, finds no field which he may till, no machine which he may tend, no mine in which he may dig, without accepting to leave a great part of what he will produce to a master. He must sell his labour for a scant and uncertain wage. His father and his grandfather have toiled to drain this field, to build this mill, to perfect this machine. They gave to the work the full measure of their strength, and what more could they give? But their heir comes into the world poorer than the lowest savage. If he obtains leave to till the fields, it is on condition of surrendering a quarter of the produce to his master, and another quarter to the government and the middlemen. And this tax, levied upon him by the State, the capitalist, the lord of the manor, and the middleman, is always increasing; it rarely leaves him the power to improve his system of culture. If he turns to industry, he is allowed to work–though not always even that --only on condition that he yield a half or two-thirds of the product to him whom the land recognizes as the owner of the machine.
We cry shame on the feudal baron who forbade the peasant to turn a clod of earth unless he surrendered to his lord a fourth of his crop. We call those the barbarous times. But if the forms have changed, the relations have remained the same, and the worker is forced, under the name of free contract, to accept feudal obligations. For, turn where he will, he can find no better conditions. Everything has become private property, and he must accept, or die of hunger."
The Conquest of Bread
No one would want to. Letting capitalists run rampant (more so than they already do) would be extremely destructive for any society.
Is there a socialist society that has failed without the US crushing it?