Communism and Socialism megathread

[Constantinopolis]

Speaking of which, seeing that "Democratic Socialism" is such a popular option on the poll, I have a question for the Democratic Socialists here:

Do you actually support a non-capitalist society? If so, how do you expect to achieve it through electoral means, given the fact that no "socialist" party that was voted into power ever managed to come anywhere close to abolishing capitalism?

"If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." -- Emma Goldman

(well, that quote is not entirely accurate - voting can change things to a certain extent, but only to a certain extent; the point is that you cannot abolish capitalism by voting against it)

[Conscentia]

No it isn't. It diverged from it quite some time ago.

Wikipedia says it is democratic socialism.

Wikipedia says...

Social democracy is a political ideology that officially has as its goal the establishment of democratic socialism through reformist and gradualist methods.[1] Alternatively, social democracy is defined as a policy regime involving a universal welfare state and collective bargaining schemes within the framework of a capitalist economy. It is often used in this manner to refer to the social models and economic policies prominent in Western and Northern Europe during the later half of the 20th century.

Social Democracy generally refers to the latter, emphasised in bold red, these days.

[United Russian Soviet States]

Wikipedia says it is democratic socialism.

Wikipedia says...

Social democracy is a political ideology that officially has as its goal the establishment of democratic socialism through reformist and gradualist methods.[1] Alternatively, social democracy is defined as a policy regime involving a universal welfare state and collective bargaining schemes within the framework of a capitalist economy. It is often used in this manner to refer to the social models and economic policies prominent in Western and Northern Europe during the later half of the 20th century.

Social Democracy generally refers to the latter, emphasised in bold red, these days.

I assume that the Kalengian Social Democratic Labour Party from the NSG Senate was a democratic socialist party.

[Constantinopolis]

No it isn't. It diverged from it quite some time ago.

Wikipedia says it is democratic socialism.

What Wikipedia says and what is actually correct are often very different things.

[Chavista]

No it isn't. It diverged from it quite some time ago.

Wikipedia says it is democratic socialism.

It isn't. Social democrats want to reform capitalism. Democratic socialists want to be done with it.

[United Russian Soviet States]

Wikipedia says it is democratic socialism.

It isn't. Social democrats want to reform capitalism. Democratic socialists want to be done with it.

Social democrats still use "The Internationale".

[United Marxist Nations]

It isn't. Social democrats want to reform capitalism. Democratic socialists want to be done with it.

Social democrats still use "The Internationale".

A song isn't really determinate of ideology.

[The New Sea Territory]

Social Democracy isn't socialism. Doesn't really belong on this thread.

It is democratic socialism.

Social Democracy is regulated capitalism and a lot of welfare. That's not socialism.

[Prince Ruperts Land]

Can someone explain to me what's with all the democratic socialists? Or radical leftism in general? Why is it appealing, why do you think it makes economic sense, why do you think it can actually work as well as our status quo society does.

I became a Socialist because I learnt that Capitalism isn't the greatest system. Sure, it provides us with great things, however it's too corrupted to reform. I consider myself 'Socially Conservative, Economically Socialist'.

Social democrats still use "The Internationale".

Labour (UK) still use 'The Red Flag', yet they're not Socialist anymore.

[Blakullar]

How much like is the British Labour Party like the Bolshevik Party?

Labour is about as related to the Bolsheviks as ISIS is related to Tibetan Buddhism.

[New Terricon]

How much like is the British Labour Party like the Bolshevik Party?

Labour is about as related to the Bolsheviks as ISIS is related to Tibetan Buddhism.

Although I do applaud them for actually attempting to sound like they care for the common worker. But seeing the lifestyles that their party members adopt, I can't for a second afterwords believe that the UK's Labour Party actually can synthesize symphony for the proletarian.

[Bratislavskaya]

Labour is about as related to the Bolsheviks as ISIS is related to Tibetan Buddhism.

Although I do applaud them for actually attempting to sound like they care for the common worker. But seeing the lifestyles that their party members adopt, I can't for a second afterwords believe that the UK's Labour Party actually can synthesize symphony for the proletarian.

They set up the NHS, I'll give them that. Once upon a time they were semi-decent, as close to a workers party as you could get whilst still being fully capitalist. Now they are just the Conservative Party, but less shit really.

[Olivaero]

Speaking of which, seeing that "Democratic Socialism" is such a popular option on the poll, I have a question for the Democratic Socialists here:

Do you actually support a non-capitalist society? If so, how do you expect to achieve it through electoral means, given the fact that no "socialist" party that was voted into power ever managed to come anywhere close to abolishing capitalism?

"If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." -- Emma Goldman

(well, that quote is not entirely accurate - voting can change things to a certain extent, but only to a certain extent; the point is that you cannot abolish capitalism by voting against it)

I guess we'll vote in a socialist party into power at about the same time you lead a revolutionary cadre to topple the capitalist system

On a serious note I support a non socialist society, I think it's a very typical far left attitude you display when asking that question of questioning others devotion to the cause and I think it's incredibly unhelpful, I expect to achieve it through electoral means when the majority of the voting population has been convinced that the socialist way is the right way, thoes socialist parties that have been supported before were elected in on a wave of people wanting to have decent treatment but they weren't too bothered about if that occurred under a socialist or a capitalist system so there was no pressure for the parties to tear the whole thing down, just make it fairer. Until such a crisis emerges that thoroughly exposes the weaknesses and un-sustainability of the capitalist system I don't believe there will be a democratic socialist victory or a revolutionary socialist victory in the west. The revolution needs to first occur in the way people think after all after that well we'll see if the electoral system actually allows for change based on what the majority of people want, if it doesn't then you'll probably see a decline in democratic socialists in favor of revolutionary socialists. But as of right now I don't think it really matters either way, a revolution needs as much popular sentiment as \an election win, even more so almost.

[Arkolon]

Do Marxists feel ideologically compelled to believe in the labour theory of value? Do other communists and socialists follow suit? Why is it preferred to have a communist or socialist system wherein the value of all things is subjective? What does acquiescing to the subjective theory of value mean for proletarianism and the nature of the working class in socialism?

[United Marxist Nations]

Do Marxists feel ideologically compelled to believe in the labour theory of value? Do other communists and socialists follow suit? Why is it preferred to have a communist or socialist system wherein the value of all things is subjective? What does acquiescing to the subjective theory of value mean for proletarianism and the nature of the working class in socialism?

Marxian economics takes a bit of a unique perspective on the labor theory of value, in that, previous iterations ascribed to labor what was a magical ability to make something valuable. Marxists deduce that labor has a use value.

That is to say, labor itself doesn't produce value, the exchange value produced by labor is what gives it value. It is not because someone has put labor into something that makes it value, but that the person who has put labor into it demands something in return for his labor. Thus, the labor itself is a commodity to be bought and sold on the market. The amount of labor put into production is related to the value demanded in exchange. This is why things that reduce labor also lower the price of the product.

The use of something also affects its value; if there is no use for something, it is not very valuable. This; however, is less important because things that have no use seldom have labor wasted on them.

There is, of course, a lot more to it than that, but that will hopefully clear some of it up.

[Arkolon]

I think the LTV has more to do with the more time spent working on something means it is more valuable. It didn't explain why diamonds were more valuable than water, but Marxism and the anarchisms were all grounded in it. Labour obviously has a use value, but the LTV deduces that labour is the be-all-end-all, the prime source, the underlying thing that gives things more, or less, value. If you say that value is determined through supply and through demand, is the place of labour in this equation not be... redundant? And would you not also be out of touch with Marxist principles? IIRC Marx's pivotal economic principle was that the value of a product comes from the effort needed to make it.

[United Marxist Nations]

I think the LTV has more to do with the more time spent working on something means it is more valuable. It didn't explain why diamonds were more valuable than water, but Marxism and the anarchisms were all grounded in it. Labour obviously has a use value, but the LTV deduces that labour is the be-all-end-all, the prime source, the underlying thing that gives things more, or less, value. If you say that value is determined through supply and through demand, is the place of labour in this equation not be... redundant? And would you not also be out of touch with Marxist principles? IIRC Marx's pivotal economic principle was that the value of a product comes from the effort needed to make it.

Not all of the value, some of it. In the words of Marx (Critique of the Gotha Program):

"Labor is not the source of all wealth. Nature is just as much the source of use values (and it is surely of such that material wealth consists!) as labor, which itself is only the manifestation of a force of nature, human labor power. the above phrase is to be found in all children's primers and is correct insofar as it is implied that labor is performed with the appurtenant subjects and instruments. But a socialist program cannot allow such bourgeois phrases to pass over in silence the conditions that lone give them meaning*. And insofar as man from the beginning behaves toward nature, the primary source of all instruments and subjects of labor, as an owner, treats her as belonging to him, his labor becomes the source of use values, therefore also of wealth. The bourgeois have very good grounds for falsely ascribing supernatural creative power to labor; since precisely from the fact that labor depends on nature it follows that the man who possesses no other property than his labor power must, in all conditions of society and culture, be the slave of other men who have made themselves the owners of the material conditions of labor. He can only work with their permission, hence live only with their permission."


Labor itself only has exchange power, it is what it can produce that gives it use value. In the first chapter of the Critique of the Gotha Program, Marx lays low the fallacy of labor being the "be-all, end-all"

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/w ... a/ch01.htm

EDIT:* If I understand correctly, the "conditions that lone give them meaning" refers to the use of the product.

[Constantinopolis]

Speaking of which, seeing that "Democratic Socialism" is such a popular option on the poll, I have a question for the Democratic Socialists here:

Do you actually support a non-capitalist society? If so, how do you expect to achieve it through electoral means, given the fact that no "socialist" party that was voted into power ever managed to come anywhere close to abolishing capitalism?

"If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." -- Emma Goldman

(well, that quote is not entirely accurate - voting can change things to a certain extent, but only to a certain extent; the point is that you cannot abolish capitalism by voting against it)

I guess we'll vote in a socialist party into power at about the same time you lead a revolutionary cadre to topple the capitalist system

But people already have voted a socialist party into power. Multiple times. In multiple countries. Yet none of those parties ever abolished capitalism. That's the point.

I'm not saying that voting a socialist party into power is a hard thing to achieve. Not at all. Actually, compared to revolution, it's very easy. It has happened far more often than communist revolutions, that's for sure. What I'm saying is that voting a socialist party into power is ineffective. You can do it, yes, but it won't change much. It never does.

On a serious note I support a non socialist society, I think it's a very typical far left attitude you display when asking that question of questioning others devotion to the cause and I think it's incredibly unhelpful, I expect to achieve it through electoral means when the majority of the voting population has been convinced that the socialist way is the right way

That will never happen. The majority of the voting population is always apolitical. You will never convince the majority to become devoted to ANY particular ideology, socialist or otherwise. Even during a popular revolution, the majority of the population typically stay at home and don't get involved on either side!

No one ever wins elections by convincing the majority of the voting population of the rightness of their cause. You win elections by promising very concrete things (more jobs, less corruption, better roads, etc). That is why it's so difficult to win elections on a radical platform: Because you can't really convince these large numbers of apolitical people that we need a massive transformation of society in order to get better roads, or that socialism is the only way to get more jobs.

Rapid transformations of society happen when a significant minority of the population (it's never a majority) get very angry about something and decide to go out into the streets and risk their own personal safety in order to overthrow the government and accomplish some radical change. In general, social change is not driven by majorities. Social change is driven by large, dedicated minorities, sometimes with passive support from the majority.

You can get the majority of the population to say "meh, I guess I'm ok with switching to socialism." But you will never get the majority of the population to say "I am committed to socialism as the only way forward." You can get passive support from the majority, but not active involvement. And the same applies to any other -ism. Because most people simply don't care that much about politics.

Also, I'm not questioning your commitment to the cause. On the contrary. I'm saying that the electoral strategy is ineffective, and therefore, precisely because you are committed to the socialist cause, you should adopt a more effective strategy.

[Constantinopolis]

Do Marxists feel ideologically compelled to believe in the labour theory of value?

The vast majority of Marxists endorse the LTV, but not all. John Roemer and the Analytical Marxists developed a new type of Marxism in the 1980s which actually uses the subjective theory of value. However, it never achieved any kind of widespread popularity.

I think the LTV has more to do with the more time spent working on something means it is more valuable.

No, no, no. Not at all. That is a common misconception, but it is entirely false.

The LTV says that the more socially necessary abstract labour time ("SNALT") is spent on something, the more valuable it is. The terms "socially necessary" and "abstract" are both essential for understanding the LTV.

The term "socially necessary" means that useless labour doesn't count. The value of something depends on the labour that is necessary to produce it, given current social conditions and technologies. If the labour that was actually spent producing it was more than the necessary amount, the extra labour doesn't count. For example, suppose that, given current technologies, it is necessary to spend one hour of labour to make a chair. If I spend two hours making the same kind of chair, does that mean it's more valuable? No. The value depends on the socially necessary labour (one hour).

In Marxist theory, this is precisely the explanation given for why capitalist firms are under pressure to innovate and introduce new technologies. If the necessary labour time to make a chair is currently one hour, but some company introduces a new technology that cuts that time down to 40 minutes, then the value of a chair is reduced, and all the other companies that are still spending one hour per chair are wasting time (their chairs are only worth 40 minutes now but they're still spending one hour on each of them). So those other companies are under pressure to introduce the new technology as well, if they don't want to lose money.

As for the term "abstract", that means we understand that not all labour is the same, and skilled labour adds more value than unskilled labour. So, when we talk about labour time in general, we are assuming that there is some "exchange rate" between the different kinds of labour, so that one single kind of labour (the one we call "abstract" labour) can be used to represent all the others.

It didn't explain why diamonds were more valuable than water

Uh, actually that's an easy one. It obviously takes more labour to obtain a diamond than to obtain water.

[United Russian Soviet States]

My nation is a social democratic version of the Soviet Union.

[Sky Warrior]

Money is evil! I'm an anarcho-communist.

[United States Kingdom]

I love socialism.

[Old Tyrannia]

Can someone explain to me what's with all the democratic socialists? Or radical leftism in general? Why is it appealing, why do you think it makes economic sense, why do you think it can actually work as well as our status quo society does.

I became a Socialist because I learnt that Capitalism isn't the greatest system. Sure, it provides us with great things, however it's too corrupted to reform. I consider myself 'Socially Conservative, Economically Socialist'.

I like you, we can be friends.

The only good think Hoxha did was abolish military rank.

Did he actually do that? Sounds like a great way to render your military utterly ineffective.

The reason why anarchism (of whatever kind) is simply not feasible in a modern industrial society is because it is not possible to have a complex modern society where every dispute of every kind is resolved by negotiations and mutual agreement between the parties involved.

There are countless examples of situations where a mutually acceptable compromise is simply not possible. So either there needs to be an external authority with the power to enforce a settlement that upsets one party (or possibly both parties involved), or there will be no settlement, and society will break down in an endless string of unresolved disputes.

I agree with this post, but I'm not sure how this squares with the poster's professed Marxist-Leninist beliefs, considering that a stateless society is the supposed end result of socialism. Unless you intend to completely abolish "modern industrial society" in order to create the correct conditions for communism, which leads one into Khmer Rouge territory.

[Shigiel]

Speaking of which, seeing that "Democratic Socialism" is such a popular option on the poll, I have a question for the Democratic Socialists here:

Do you actually support a non-capitalist society? If so, how do you expect to achieve it through electoral means, given the fact that no "socialist" party that was voted into power ever managed to come anywhere close to abolishing capitalism?

"If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." -- Emma Goldman

(well, that quote is not entirely accurate - voting can change things to a certain extent, but only to a certain extent; the point is that you cannot abolish capitalism by voting against it)

I guess we'll vote in a socialist party into power at about the same time you lead a revolutionary cadre to topple the capitalist system

On a serious note I support a non socialist society, I think it's a very typical far left attitude you display when asking that question of questioning others devotion to the cause and I think it's incredibly unhelpful, I expect to achieve it through electoral means when the majority of the voting population has been convinced that the socialist way is the right way, thoes socialist parties that have been supported before were elected in on a wave of people wanting to have decent treatment but they weren't too bothered about if that occurred under a socialist or a capitalist system so there was no pressure for the parties to tear the whole thing down, just make it fairer. Until such a crisis emerges that thoroughly exposes the weaknesses and un-sustainability of the capitalist system I don't believe there will be a democratic socialist victory or a revolutionary socialist victory in the west. The revolution needs to first occur in the way people think after all after that well we'll see if the electoral system actually allows for change based on what the majority of people want, if it doesn't then you'll probably see a decline in democratic socialists in favor of revolutionary socialists. But as of right now I don't think it really matters either way, a revolution needs as much popular sentiment as \an election win, even more so almost.

But don't you think that, just as a workers' state in a post-capitalist society will be specially organised for the purpose of building socialism and protecting workers' interests, the state under capitalism is specially organised for the purpose of preserving capitalism and protecting capitalists' interests? The bourgeoisie chose to use an electoral system for a reason.

The reason why anarchism (of whatever kind) is simply not feasible in a modern industrial society is because it is not possible to have a complex modern society where every dispute of every kind is resolved by negotiations and mutual agreement between the parties involved.

There are countless examples of situations where a mutually acceptable compromise is simply not possible. So either there needs to be an external authority with the power to enforce a settlement that upsets one party (or possibly both parties involved), or there will be no settlement, and society will break down in an endless string of unresolved disputes.

I agree with this post, but I'm not sure how this squares with the poster's professed Marxist-Leninist beliefs, considering that a stateless society is the supposed end result of socialism. Unless you intend to completely abolish "modern industrial society" in order to create the correct conditions for communism, which leads one into Khmer Rouge territory.

This external authority need not be a state. There will still be various administrative bureaux in communism. As for law-related disputes...well, I can't really imagine there being a need for laws once the root causes of crime have been abolished.

[Constantinopolis]

This external authority need not be a state. There will still be various administrative bureaux in communism. As for law-related disputes...well, I can't really imagine there being a need for laws once the root causes of crime have been abolished.

Economic crimes will disappear in communism (e.g. stealing money, murdering people for monetary benefit, organized crime that exists in order to make a profit from illegal activities, and so on). But there will still be crimes of passion. People will still sometimes get angry and, in the heat of the moment, hurt or even kill someone else. No society can ever completely get rid of that sort of thing, unfortunately.

But yes, the external authority dealing with these few remaining crimes (and planning the economy) does not have to be a state.