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What if Communism really hasn't been tried? Marx did outline very specific conditions
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Posted on 05/12/2012 8:09:38 AM PDT by ProgressingAmerica

I recently posted the article from the Founder of Fabian Socialism in America titled Where Socialism Was Tried and I got to thinking, what about Communism? Well, here's what he's written:

In broad outlines Asiatic, ancient, feudal, and modern bourgeois modes of production can be designated as progressive epochs in the economic formation of society. The bourgeois relations of production are the last antagonistic form of the social process of production — antagonistic not in the sense of individual antagonisms, but of one arising from the social conditions of life of the individuals; at the same time the productive forces developing in the womb of bourgeois society create the material conditions for the solution of that antagonism.

And we know what Marx considers to be the solution to this 'antagonism' - the dictatorship of the proletariat. Communism can't just be formed anywhere. It has to be done with the right conditions, the right way and in the right country. In short, the United States. Because of the specificity of conditions, Communism is probably the most utopian of all the ideologies of centralized planning. Here's a brief outline:

At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come in conflict with the existing relations of production, or — what is but a legal expression for the same thing — with the property relations within which they have been at work hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters.

Then begins an epoch of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed.

I hear Obama in that, particularly the last line. But nonetheless, if it's seemed to you that communists have had their eye on the USA the way a wolf looks at a lamb, then this may explain it for you. It's because we have that superstructure, we are a 'capitalist' country. The ideal country, the one that will prove Marx right, is the United States. A little bit more:

Then begins an epoch of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed. In considering such transformations a distinction should always be made between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, aesthetic or philosophic — in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out.

When our massive 'capitalist' country implodes and goes into revolution, then they can start their "fundamental transformation" of everything, not just the modes of production. That's what he's saying. But society has to go through all of the various stages of development and reach 'antagonism'(free markets) before it can be done the right way and go into Communism. America is realistically the only one that ever has reached this stage following the "correct" evolution.

Here's how I think this works: (1)Economies go up and down, that's normal. (2)A believer in some form of planning takes advantage of a down, and makes it worse as centralized planning has disastrous effects upon economies(such as the housing bust, or the Carter years) and you end up in a true economic crisis. (3)Then, a strong-man comes in(who happens to be a hard core communist) and proposes to save the day. A "rising star" like Van Jones.

I say all of that because Marx' theory misses the boat: Free markets don't implode, the built in corrective mechanisms work. Free markets have to be forced by government to implode. If they can force it to implode(as Obama is clearly doing) then we can reach the worker's paradise.


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To: ProgressingAmerica

Communism has been tried and convicted. Only whackos would want to pardon it. I recall the ‘60s where oh so many nhippies decided to live in the utopia of communes. A few years later, they did not exist because they discovered first-hand that when folks can sit on their ass and let others provide for them, the workers get dissillusioned and soon refuse to work harder to support the leeches. The Soviet Union changed their mode to a more Capitalist form for the same reason - farmers decided they didn’t need to bust their asses and not reap any extra benefits/profits than those they fed - it fell apart from inside. The Gipper knew that when he made the “Tear down this wall” speech.


21 posted on 05/12/2012 9:05:04 AM PDT by trebb ("If a man will not work, he should not eat" From 2 Thes 3)
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To: mtg

Well, I certainly don’t buy into it. When they say that true communism hasn’t been tried, this is probably what they mean.

Liberty requires eternal vigilance.


22 posted on 05/12/2012 9:07:34 AM PDT by ProgressingAmerica (What's the best way to reach a you tube generation? Put it on you tube!)
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To: ProgressingAmerica

Marx actually admitted that his theory would fail because it would create an elite which would destroy his ideals.

So, since, we have seen a mix of socialist systems which based his ideals with mass murder and elite rulers.

No system can survive without banks, and important manufacturing. In short, they need some capitalism to survive.

It all implodes after a time because of lack of trust. They kill each other off. Much like the mafia I would guess. Steal and kill to get what what is wanted..only on a huge scale.


23 posted on 05/12/2012 9:08:05 AM PDT by crz
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To: ProgressingAmerica

We don’t have to try socialism to know it cannot work.

The economist Ludwig von Mises showed in 1920 [1,2] that since a socialist economy destroys price information via government intrusion, the myriad of participants in the economy are unable to make a fully rational calculation about true profit and loss. Any economic activity that operates at a loss cannot be “sustainable”, a concept the left loves to scold us about, yet cannot really grasp.

Taking another approach, the Nobel economist F.A. Hayek showed that a national economy had such an immense myriad of dynamic economic relationships that no single committee or bureaurcracy, no matter how smart or how well staffed, could possibly know enough to direct prices or production levels. His Nobel Lecture [3] was entitled The Pretence of Knowledge. Hayek had previously used this idea as the basis for a very thorough article [4] on the subject, “The Use of Knowledge in Society.”

When these two different withering critiques of socialism are combined, it is easy to see that not only is it dangrously foolish to think that economic decisions can successfully be made by government, but that competing bureaucracies will invariably react to the consequences of intrusions in the marketplace by each other. It would be like trying to control the height of waves on a lake by measuring them from the back of a boat circling in its own wake.

Socialism is also morally bankrupt, for it demands we accept the premise that we can each live at the expense of others, despite how this violates the Commandments that forbid coveting and theft.

[1] Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth by Ludwig von Mises
http://mises.org/pdf/econcalc.pdf

[2] Why a Socialist Economy is “Impossible” by Joseph T. Salerno
http://mises.org/econcalc/POST.asp

[3] The Pretense of Knowledge
http://mises.org/daily/3229

[4] “The Use of Knowledge in Society,” American Economic Review, XXXV, No. 4; September, 1945, pp. 519–30.
http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=92


24 posted on 05/12/2012 9:14:16 AM PDT by theBuckwheat
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To: ProgressingAmerica

One little problem no communist country has ever solved. How do you convince the productive minority to keep working while receiving none of the benefits of their own labor? Communism is slavery.


25 posted on 05/12/2012 9:14:43 AM PDT by ArcadeQuarters (Anyone But Romney)
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To: SampleMan
  a r r r g g g h !
26 posted on 05/12/2012 9:15:36 AM PDT by tomkat (TEAM INFIDEL)
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To: ProgressingAmerica
Has communism been tried? I don't think so. The problem is that when people encounter one another they are either oppressive, subservient or competitive. Neither sets the stage very well communism, which requires selfless coexistence. That's pretty rare for even two people, let alone the masses. Get the population down to, say, one, and maybe it'll work. And maybe not. Few leftists can coexist even with themselves without without explosions of one sort or another.
27 posted on 05/12/2012 9:21:52 AM PDT by wgflyer (Liberalism is to society what HIV is to the immune system.)
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To: ProgressingAmerica

People have free will. Free will has to be repressed in order for people to be in 100% compliance with the central planners. This repression can only be achieved through the brutal use of force.


28 posted on 05/12/2012 9:26:54 AM PDT by mikeandike
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To: ProgressingAmerica
Free markets have to be forced by government to implode.

The only way that socialism or communism could truly come into existence by peaceful means would be if property owners voluntarily donated their property to the socialist state. But, since this will never happen,because it is incompatible with human nature, if socialism or communism is ever to exist, it can only come about by means of aggression-force applied on a massive scale, against all private property.

29 posted on 05/12/2012 9:28:09 AM PDT by mjp ((pro-{God, reality, reason, egoism, individualism, natural rights, limited government, capitalism}))
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To: ProgressingAmerica

Communism as envisioned, cannot exist.

For communist to “work”, without becoming tyranny, every person in government must be utterly altruistic. Every single one. No exceptions.

That is literally impossible.

Even if it were, the fact even then that a huge portion of any given population would find such a system even if it did “work”, to be tyrannical simply by lording over every single person means it STILL wouldn’t “work” even if it did.

Communism relies on force.

Therefore every single communist system will (rapidly) devolve into murder and tyranny.

Always.


30 posted on 05/12/2012 9:29:57 AM PDT by Cringing Negativism Network (Vote for the straight guy.)
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To: GenXteacher

Where is the rest of this list? I would love to have a copy.


31 posted on 05/12/2012 9:33:46 AM PDT by kempster (HIPPO)
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To: StonyBurk

> What if the sky really was green and the grass blue?

This is something that I’ve lived the last 44 years of my life with. My wife is Vietnamese. The Vietnamese language makes no distinction between green and blue. It’s the same word for both. The result is that when Vietnamese people learn English the color chart doesn’t quite set in. When my wife tells me to get something green, she may very well mean blue or vice versa. Anyone else with a Vietnamese spouse will know what I’m talking about.


32 posted on 05/12/2012 9:34:05 AM PDT by BuffaloJack (End Obama's War On Freedom.)
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To: BuffaloJack

Lol that’s interesting.

Chinese has a similar quirk:

The spoken words for “he” and “she” are identical.

That’s why you’ll sometimes hear Chinese say “he” about a woman. Or vice-versa.


33 posted on 05/12/2012 9:37:16 AM PDT by Cringing Negativism Network (Vote for the straight guy.)
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To: Cringing Negativism Network
"For communist to “work”, without becoming tyranny, every person in government must be utterly altruistic. Every single one. No exceptions. That is literally impossible."

Some monastic communities/orders historically subscribed to a general philosophy of communal property and a "from each according to his abilities" mindset.

While they managed some degree of success, there were some fundamental differences between these insular communities and modern communism.

First, these communities were/are God centered, not state centered, so while the humans participating in them may not have been perfect, the altruistic ideals motivating them were.

Second, the members joined of their own free will, with the goal and intent of divesting themselves of private property and in most cases, pledging a vow of poverty.

Finally, in most cases, even when the goal was most closely realized the mendicants frequently relied on external contributions or exchanges of goods and services with the outside world.

In other words, some limited communist principles can be succesfully implemented where the express purpose of the members is to join voluntarily and to remain poor...and even then some modicum of free markets come into play.

34 posted on 05/12/2012 9:46:29 AM PDT by Joe 6-pack (Que me amat, amet et canem meum)
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To: BinaryBoy
How do you convince the productive minority to keep working while receiving none of the benefits of their own labor?

Robotics. The USA is on the cutting edge because of our large military spending. All we need to make the final leap is a robotics cold war, or a real robot war, with a competitive opponent. After the war, for the first time in history the welfare state will finally become sustainable. It's ironic that conservative white male engineers, which generally hate the welfare state, will be the ones that finally make it work.

35 posted on 05/12/2012 10:08:46 AM PDT by Reeses
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To: kempster

http://www.uhuh.com/nwo/communism/comgoals.htm


36 posted on 05/12/2012 10:21:41 AM PDT by GenXteacher (You have chosen dishonor to avoid war; you shall have war also.)
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To: ProgressingAmerica

COmmunism has not andnever will be “tried”. The transition To Communism requires a totalitarian dictatorship which will never be relinquished to allow the “Worker’s Paradise” to bloom. The entire idea of communism is snake oil and only idiots buy it.


37 posted on 05/12/2012 10:47:07 AM PDT by wastoute (Government cannot redistribute wealth. Government can only redistribute poverty.)
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To: ProgressingAmerica

Communists in America are cowardly and of weak character. They crave attention and relish the opulent life they can lead here.

If the day were to come that they were suddenly irrelevant, not covered by the press, treated as outcasts and no way to make a living...would any of them move to a Communist country to live under Communist rule?

The answer would not only no, but hell no.

If they moved to a Communist ‘paradise’, they would wouldn’t be ‘special’ anymore, they wouldn’t be idolized by faithful followers, they wouldn’t be funded for their activities and the state controlled press would treat them for what they are...just another Communist among a society full of Communists.


38 posted on 05/12/2012 11:14:23 AM PDT by RetSignman
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To: ProgressingAmerica
Paul Johnson's Modern Times in the first chapter entitled The First Despotic Utopia clearly exposes the necessarily violent origins of communism, with particular emphasis on Lenin.

His Intellectuals shreds Marx to ribbons, exposing him for the fraud he was:

What Marx could or would not grasp, because he made no effort to understand how industry worked...what emerges from a reading of Capital is Marx's fundamental failure to understand capitalism. He failed precisely because he was unscientific: He would not investigate the facts himself, or use objectively the facts investigated by others. From start to finish, not just Capital but all his work reflects a disregard for truth which at times amounts to contempt. That is the primary reason why Marxism, as a system, cannot produce the results claimed for it; and to call it 'scientific, is preposterous.

It's horrifying that the liberal "education" establishment has gained such a foothold that his fevered fantasies are promoted as credible and viable and capitalism is reviled from kindergarten (subtly) and openly in institutions of "higher" learning.

We're doomed unless we can reverse the process. I'm not sure we can before it's too late.

39 posted on 05/12/2012 12:19:21 PM PDT by Madame Dufarge
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To: Madame Dufarge

We’re doomed unless we can reverse the process. I’m not sure we can before it’s too late.

It will take very large steps and I fear we will not be able to instill enough terror in politicians to get those large steps out of them. Eliminate the department of education. Eliminate state departments of education. Implement a rigorous screening process to remove all communists from any position in education. Books about communism put on a restricted shelf in libraries, must be at least 25 to access. Leftest heroes should be denigrated and made objects of ridicule.

And the above is just a start!


40 posted on 05/12/2012 2:28:04 PM PDT by W. W. SMITH (Maybe the horse will learn to sing)
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