Since I am not a supporter of communism, this is false.
Capitalists are evil, though…
Capitalists are evil, eh?
So, what kind of viable economic system is better than capitalism?
This is a common tactic used by supporters of the status quo: simply claim that dissidents are just bitter. The nice thing about it is that it is an all-purpose tactic–it works on anything. Bitterness implies a certain disappointment at one’s own failures, which is surely meant by those who use this tactic. It is a subtle ad hominem attack meant to impugn one’s opponent. Needless to say, it is dishonest (how do YOU know, after all?), and it serves to channel the debate into a question over the motives of the debaters.
Actually, though, I am quite happy with my own situation. I have everything I need, really, and make fairly good money doing what I love. I have no complaints, really. This doesn’t mean, though, that I don’t see the system as evil and exploitative. It is. And not only for the domestic working class, but for the billions in the Third World who we keep poor and hungry with our military and economic might. This country has enormous wealth, which it has used to become the most reactionary force on Earth, keeping the vast majority enslaved under a highly exploitative system.
This is a separate issue from the issue of distribution of wealth. I agree that it is better for the benefit of an enterprise to go to the people who did the work. But, I bring up this example to point out the insanity of how our society distributes wealth. It is just crazy that a basketball player can make $10 million per year, while a teacher makes $40 k. There is something seriously fucked up with our society when this happens.
It depends on what you mean by “people.” The sentence would be correct if you said the market is driven by what rich people want. It certainly isn’t driven by what the majority want. Like, for example, the majority in the U.S. wants a Canadian-style health care system, and has wanted it for several decades, but it hasn’t happened because such a system would hurt those in power. There are countless other examples.
Why should you have a boss? I don’t think we should have bosses at all. I think that the means of production should be cooperatively owned and run democratically.
It includes keeping people down, yes. It includes forcing the vast majority to live under a wage-slave system that I find intolerable. Really, I think it is remarkable that people put up with it. It also includes repressing those who work for change, which is done around the world by imperialist forces.
In the capitalist system it is often the lazy fool who is rewarded the most. Just look at G.W.Bush, the quintessential lazy fool, who has reached the very apex of the capitalist system. In every sense that is truly important, in those areas where people act as human beings toward each other in a spirit of mutual aid and support, capitalism provides for a vicious inequality. The hard-working are not rewarded under capitalism, they just provide the fuel for the system, and the bodies for the capitalist class to stand on.
What I mean by equality is equality of outcome. “Equality of opportunity” is a non-concept used to justify the current state of inequality. I favor a system where people are rewarded in proportion to how much effort and sacrifice they put into their work, but where the society works together, as people want to do.
You make money?!?!
You feelthy Kapitaleest!
Anyhoo, since the op was about the fall of communism and not the failings of captalism, what say we get back on track? I’d be kinda curious for gigster to come back and tell us if the original question has been satisfactorily answered, or at least if the homework assignment was finished on time.
Every other economic system that has existed is viable.
Which system is better? It depends on what you want out of an economic system. For the ruling class, capitalism is pretty much ideal, so for them another system would not be better. For the vast majority, though, there are alternatives that are better. If you want a system based on greed and the sanctification of personal material gain at the expense of the environment and everybody else, then capitalism is fine. If you don’t, then there are alternatives that are better.
Personally, I think the best system for a modern society would be based on anarchist principles. Anarchist FAQ There has been significant thought put into how such a system could work, one that is based on cooperation and direct democracy. One example of this is called Participatory Economics:
www.parecon.org
Most people would agree. But most people also resist higher taxes to give teachers significant pay raises. It’s not some sort of grand elite keeping teachers’ salaries down…it’s normal folk who vote. There’s your direct democracy.
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Really? Cite?
Really? Cite? And make sure it’s a cite that most people have a Canadian-style health care system as a top priority, rather than just something that folks think would be “nice, I guess.”
I’ll give you a clue. If people were really demanding a universal health care system then they would have it. But people aren’t. So they don’t. You obviously have no experience in Congress.
By all means, provide them. With cites. According to the criteria I laid out above.
Then you are obviously insane. Every enterprise needs a central coordinator in order for it to run properly. Preferably, someone with some sort of expertise in the area. I’d really rather not have a bunch of laborers democratically voting on the proper way to build a building, instead of a central architect/engineer making decisions and delegating responsibilities.
The rest of your post is just ridiculous blathering.
I take that back. Every large enterprise needs a central coordinator. Small enterprises can do without in many cases.
These two statements saved me from having to refute many of the things that you said about communism (such as: Russia had a large middle class under Kruschev). However, those statements tell me that you have basically been hijacking (if not worse*) this thread.
If those are your feelings then start a thread about the evils of capitalism, capitalists, etc. Don’t use a thread about communism to bad mouth capitalism.
[ul]
[sup]Could he mean “straw man” or “trolling”?[/sup][/ul]
The comment that capitalists are evil was made in response to the straw man ElJeffe set up: “Therefore, anything that crashed and burned either wasn’t ‘true’ Communism, or was working fine until the Evil Capitalists came along and used their vile magical powers to shut it down.” I do believe that capitalists are evil, or more precisely that capitalism is an evil system that selects out the evil to rise to the top. How else am I to respond?
The most common response to why communism is bad is that capitalism is more “efficient,” or better, or whatever. My point has been that capitalism is not more efficient than communism.
You obviously do not know what direct democracy is, but as for the other question it is simply not true that people resist higher taxes if they go to teachers’ salaries or other social programs.
It is a much deeper problem, though, than just raising teachers’ salaries. The fact that a basketball player makes approximately 100 times as much as a teacher is a symptom of a more general sickness with our culture. I point it out to try to draw attention to the sickness, not so much to the symptom, which is bad enough. The sickness has to do with the priorities of the economic system we live under, and the ways that resources are allocated. This cannot be fixed by simply voting for whichever ruling class party you think will increase teachers’ salaries.
That the market is driven by what rich people want? I mean, it’s virtually a tautology, and should be obvious. You make a profit by selling things to people who have money. What is it that you are disputing here?
Generally health is something people are pretty concerned about. Here are a few sites:
Chiroweb: “For the first time in more than four years [in 1999], Americans believe health care is the most important issue the federal government should address.” Note: Health care is usually one of the top 2 or three issues for voters.
CT Green Party:“Nader supports universal health care now, through establishing a Canadian style system in the United States. Repeated polls have shown 60 to 75% of Americans support this position and repeated studies have predicted it would save hundreds of billions of dollars a year.”
epinet states: “The American public does indeed seem to support the ideal of universal health care coverage. An October 1999 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll reports that 67% think that the federal government should guarantee health insurance coverage for every American. Similarly, a June 1998 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found 77% of the public supporting a guarantee of coverage for all Americans, regardless of health or employment status. Between 59% and 72% supported a federal government guarantee of health care for all Americans in CNN/Time surveys from 1993 to 1995, and a 1994 Harris poll shows 86% of the respondents agreed with the statement that we need health reform that will guarantee universal health insurance for all Americans. There is even sizable support expressed for a system along the lines of the Canadian single-payer system. A July 1998 Zogby poll reports that 51% of likely voters support a government-run health plan financed by taxes. Harris polls in 1988 and 1991 and a LA Times poll in 1990 all found more than 60% of the respondents preferred the Canadian system (as it was described to them) to the American system. Additionally, a large majority of Americans – 80% in a 1997 Louis Harris/Kaiser survey – support making sure all children have health insurance.”
This is all the more remarkable given how hostile the corporate media has been to the idea of universal health coverage. The following FAIR article discusses a bit about corporate media dishonesty in covering the health care issue:
U.S. Media Favor Radical Health Reform-- for Canada
As usual, the corporate media is against anything that hurts corporate profits while only helping the majority.
Why? You are making a very severe mistake in assuming that congress responds to what people demand. It doesn’t, and never has. Clearly, from the data I provided above, Americans want universal coverage, but we don’t have it. I believe that the first politician to propose universal health care was Harry Truman (correct me if I am wrong). This is something we should have had many decades ago. It would cost much less than our current system, and would cover everybody. Yet, we don’t have it, because powerful special interests block it from happening.
Another example is the nation’s war policies. About 90% oppose the sale of U.S. weapons to undemocratic, repressive governments, according to a poll conducted by the nonpartisan National Security News Service. [ cite ] So how can it happen that the state carries out a policy that is opposed by 90% of the population? Well, in 1996, according to the previous cite, “the top 25 arms exporting companies alone doled out a record $10.8 million to influence votes in Washington.” These numbers have gotten higher over the past several years, but I couldn’t find an internet cite for a story. At any rate, we see that powerful interests can influence public policy that is overwhelmingly opposed by the population.
Generally, when the population is opposed to some policy the ruling class would like to carry out, this will simply be off the agenda, it won’t even be discussed. So, when was the last time you heard any politicians or anybody in the corporate media even discuss the issue of arms sales? When they can’t eliminate the topic from discussion altogether, a great effort is made to frame the debate in such a way that the policy favored by the ruling class is carried out no matter which way the debate goes. The most obvious example of this is in the presidential elections. In the last election, for example, Gore and Bush argued over who would increase the war budget the most, whereas the majority of Americans have favored reducing the war budget and increasing social spending, apart from times of war. The way the debate is framed, though, does not allow the possibility of actually cutting the war budget–that is simply off the agenda. The Democrats and Republicans do have differences, but their similarities are much greater. In particular, wherever there is a conflict between the general population and the ruling class, the Democrats and Republicans are united with the ruling class. So, when it comes to arms sales, for example, the Democrats and Republicans agree that we should continue to export tons of arms every year to autocratic regimes that abuse basic human rights. Other examples abound: so-called “free trade,” corporate globalization, the war budget, the prison-industrial complex, the drug war, and on and on. Basically, what you have are two dominant parties controlled by the rich. So, the rich control both major parties, the corporate media, the economy and academia. The rest of us have to use other means to get our ideas out.
Why? There is nothing contradictory with democratic organization and delegation of responsibilities. When building a building, for example, you could have a democratic process to decide how much to spend, who will do which parts, etc., but the actual building could be carried out with specialized labor. Such an economic system is described in depth here:
www.parecon.org
None of the above ranting has anything to do with the fall of the Soviet Union.
Actually, the fact that American capitalism could allegedly do all the oodles upon oodles of evil that Chumpsky suggests and outlast the USSR is a tribute to its robustness, tovarish.
To return to the OP of why communism has failed, perhaps we can address this in the widest sense, and assume that what the OP writer meant by “communism” was the economic system designated as “communist” by U.S. ideologues. That is fine with me, as long as we are clear that this designation is by no means uncontroversial.
Well, if we accept these assumptions, then the main reason communism failed in Eastern Europe was that it was highly repressive of individual rights. When there was a bit of oppenness under Gorbechav, this spilled into peoples’ revolutions that swept away the old regimes. Reaganite propaganda notwithstanding, this had little or nothing to do with anything the U.S. did.
As for why it failed in the rest of the world, this is mostly because the imperialist forces killed everyone who was a “communist.” Any country that attempted a leftward move was undermined by western imperialist forces, generally organized by the U.S. Let’s only consider post WWII, leaving aside the shameful record in Spain and Italy, etc. In the cases of Iran (1953), Guatemala (1954), Congo (1961), Indonesia (1965), Chile (1973), democratically elected leftist governments were overthrown in U.S. backed coups which led to the installation of fascist dictatorships, who could be trusted to ensure that leftists didn’t do anything funny, like use the democratic process to change their governments. The most brutal case was the case of Indonesia in 1965, when Suharto, backed by the CIA, eliminated Sukarno, and proceeded to go on a rampage leading to a huge bloodbath and 500,000 - 1,000,000 deaths. This was applauded across the spectrum in the U.S. and other western capitalist countries, because it eliminated the only political party in Indonesia with a broad base of influence, the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party). Decades of brutal repression followed, but with the benefit of a “paradise for investors” as described by the Wall Street Journal, where you could get 9 year old girls to make $200 shoes for pennies a day. The story in the other countries is all too similar.
Those countries that made a genuine move to the left were simply attacked outright, as in the case of Vietnam, Cuba, Nicaragua, Laos, Cambodia, and Grenada.
In the post-WWII period, the western imperialist countries, organized mostly by the U.S., created an incredible world-wide terrorist network whose purpose was to maintain the economic system organized by the U.S. after WWII. It’s prime purpose was to subvert “communism,” by which was meant any moves toward the left. No country was allowed to escape the fate of countries like Vietnam. Even tiny countries like Grenada and Laos, who couldn’t conceivably pose a threat to the U.S., were crushed when they attempted some progressive reforms. The reasoning is simple: you cannot allow a country to become a good example. This is the “domino theory” in reality. If one country is allowed to organize itself outside of the U.S. controlled economic system, this creates the threat of a good example, which could spill into neighboring countries, and eventually the rest of the world.
The principle still operates today, of course, but with recourse to new pretexts now that the “communist” pretext is gone. A few days ago, for example, senator Henry Hyde proposed overthrowing the democratically elected government of Venezuela, because the president, Hugo Chavez, is a “clear and present danger” to “U.S. interests.” He is even alleged to be forming a Latin American “axis of evil” with Castro and newly-elected Brazilian president Lula.
In short, communism failed because it was crushed by force wherever it arose.
You can set up and knock down strawmen with the best of them. Last time I checked, citing the people you’ve met doesn’t really qualify as great proof of your point. By this logic, I could say that based on all the people I’ve met, Jews are greedy and blacks are criminals. I’d be wrong, and a racist to boot, but my logic would be as sound as yours is here.
Others think that billions in the Third World are poor and hungry, because their countries don’t have working capitalist systems. Fifty years ago the Pacific Rim was poor and hungry; just look at what they’ve accomplished! It seems unduly harsh to blame capitalism for the economic condition of countries that use some other system.
Henry Singleton, the founder and CEO of conglomerate I worked for, was a self-made billionaire when he died. Singleton was brilliant and hard-working. Same for Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, America’s top winners in the game of capitalism. Whle these three people were becoming outrageously wealthy, they were also creating jobs for the rest of us and their firms were delivering important products and services to the whole world.
Communism as it has been practiced by Russia and China failed to provide as well for the citizens in my view because of the problems of central planning. If the people doing the central planning always made correct decisions about how much of a certain thing will be needed in the future or the best way to farm etc. Then people would not be wasting their time with less productive ways of doing things. But the central planners are not always correct and what ends up happening is the whole country ends up doing things poorly. Contrast that with countries without central planning. Lots of people try different things and it is seen what things work and what things do not. People do things in a more efficient way or they are replaced by people or companies that do.
On another point I am always somewhat appalled when I read things like this.
The communist regimes that we have seen like Russia Cambodia China have committed some of the most horrible atrocities the world has seen in trying to set up their societies of justice and equality. These atrocities have been of two kinds. 1) general repression of the people to ensure that dissenters did not hinder the progress of the revolution. 2) Poor policies that end up killing millions of people because upset to things like farming caused wide spread famine and death. If this is what it takes to get justice then the cure looks worse than the disease.
You started well, but then you slid back into capitalist-bashing.
Systems of government that are repressive of individual rights have existed for thousands of years. Communism failed beucase for the first time there was a viable alternative that offered the possibility of individual freedom, wealth and security. Could that have been… capitalism?
And the rest of your post was theaforementioned capitalist-bashing. Sure, the Americans strangled democracies, doing things that anyone might call evil, but for every Guatemala, Chile and Indonesia, there’s a Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia. America had its Vietnam, the Soviets had their Afghanistan. Both superpowers engaged in violent methods (that sometimes failed) to keep satelite nations on their side, but the Americans are still around and the Soviets are not, hence the American system “won”.
The exact opposite is the case.
Most of the world, at least the Third World where countries cannot defend themselves, has had the capitalist “free market” model forced upon them. This has been accomplished through various institutions of the western imperialist countries like the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization. Where countries have opted out of this economic system, they have been attacked or strangled to death, as in the case of Nicaragua, which underwent both. The process of forcing countries to privatize their markets is misleadingly called globalization. You may have heard of it. It is misleading because it is just one particular form of global integration, a form involving a sort of hyper-commercialism. People used to refer to Fascism as “capitalism with the gloves off.” That wasn’t really true, since you had elements of mysticism and ultra-nationalism that aren’t really the sine qua non of capitalism. But, “globalization” really is capitalism with the gloves off.
Basically, what has happened is that emerging countries have been forced to privatize their markets. Every country that has followed these prescriptions has experienced disaster. Argentina, for example, was the poster-child of globalization, as it followed every rule laid down by the IMF. The result was a total collapse of the economy. Almost all of Latin America has had this model forced on them, in the face of overwhelming popular opposition. The result is entirely predictable: low growth and stagnation, but with the benefit that the populations remain a source of cheap labor, and the natural resources of the countries are open to exploitation by multi-national corporations.
Those countries that have had high growth have done so by violating free market principles. The U.S. and western European capitalist countries certainly violated free-market principles when they were emerging economies, and the same is true for evey country that has become a major economy. The Pacific Rim economies that have grown, for example, have radically violated free-market principle, employing very protectionist policies. South Korea, for example, used to have the death penalty for capital flight.
In short, the most capitalist economies have been utter failures, whereas the economies that have grown have done so by violating free market principles.
This just doesn’t make sense. What are you saying? That people looked over and saw how good it was in the U.S. and revolted? This is quite childish.
It is not true that for every Guatemala there is a Hungary. The fact is that during the Cold War, Soviet imperialism was confined mostly to Eastern Europe, along traditional invasion routes from Western Europe. On the other hand, U.S. imperialism was world-wide. There is no Soviet analoge to U.S. imperialism in places like Vietnam or Indonesia.
It is also instructive to examine how the two empires treated their colonies. Particularly enlightening is comparing behavior in colonies where the two powers had the most influence. So, we can look at, say, Poland or Hungary in the case of Russia, and Guatemala or El Salvador in the case of the U.S. Well, in the case of the Soviet colonies, they were repressive of individual rights, yes, but the degree of internal repression was orders of magnitude worse in the U.S. client states. Furthermore, while the U.S. bled its colonies dry (and still does) keeping the people in its colonies severely oppressed, Russia actually had more capital flowing out from Russia to its colonies.
It is also kind of silly to say that the Americans “won” because their system was better. This leaves out the huge natural advantages Americans enjoy. Remember that Russia was basically a western European colony at the beginning of the 20th century, while the U.S. was already the richest country in the world by far. What we should be amazed at is not that the U.S. “won,” but rather that the USSR was even able to put up a fight.
No. The African countries are in such a mess is not because of free trade and capitalism. It’s because they have nearly non-functional governmental economic policies, warlords, and disease wiping out the population.
The governments have no grasp of fiscal or monetary policy. Their currencies are hyperinflated. The “land redistribution” in countries such as Zimbabwe are a joke. There is no way of ensuring the stability of economic systems, not because those systems are flawed, but because investors are afraid that there might be a new government tomorrow. Should Africa become more stable politically, perhaps these countries could be made to flourish.
Also, I completely agree that the IMF has done some bad things, as have the EU. Their wrongs are not, however, based on capitalism, they stem from a fear by the EU and the US to open up domestic markets to cheaper goods produced overseas. In fact, this dispute is one of the main issues in the Doha (sp?) round of trade negotiations that are currently underway.
Also, the “teacher/ballplayer” analogy doesn’t really hold water. A quote from the New York Times article, published Jan 22, 2000.
This is not to say that a teacher’s salaries should not be raised. I’m just saying that, if that teacher were to educate as many people as a baseball player entertains, than that teacher should be worth massive amounts of money.
That is the symptom. What is the cause?
I was very amused by the article from the bourgeoise hack Steven Landsburg. Hilarious.
First he informs us that Jeter makes more because more people watch his baseball games than are taught by a teacher. I am glad to have that pointed out to me. Then there is made this incredible equivalence between the value of being entertained by a baseball player, and being taught. I mean, if you make that equivalence, you really shouldn’t have the right to live in a civilized society. I love this part too: “But here’s what the grumblers overlook”
LOL
“The grumblers.” Oh, yes, indeed, those who see something wrong with a baseball player earning $10 million per year to play a game, while teachers struggle to survive–they are just grumblers.
Well, this is what we should expect from the New York Times, the “Newspaper of Record.”
Disgusting. Simply disgusting.