Well - you do think there is a "good" way to live. You believe you can have what you want because it does not affect others but they cannot have what they want because it might affect you. I could actually argue that your way of life if adopted by many would have a serious effect on others but that is another point. You are hung up on CO2 emissions. If technology is developed to reduce their effect then it will be good. You must know that scientifically there is great debate about how much CO2 is needed and how much is too much - or too little. My car only affects your environment if the emissions are greater than the ecosystem of the planet can neutralise. Nothing is bad in isolation. Your definition of theft is simply wrong and its misuse destroys any logic in your argument. You were closer when you stuck to "greed". What most people who go on about fat cats and the like fail to recognise is that they are themselves the fat cats to many others in the world. If you think you can take the worlds resources and then divide them equally between 8 billion then good luck with that. Ownership is just a convenient definition. Everybody dies so only "borrows" resources for a short term in the life of the planet. All ownership does is to give people the right - within legal restrictions - to use something as they wish to. You accept personal ownership of some things but choose to stop at some arbitrary point where you decide enough is enough. Again there is neither logic nor a "right" on this. Your wealth is probably abhorrent to your Indian prairie dwellers. Religion and religious belief is irrelevant. I am sure you are not saying because someone thinks a man died on a piece of wood and was brought back to life their views have any especial significance. I think you are really thinking about more of a compassionate view of the world. The Puritans I made reference to were simply bigots.
Ok. I am going to move away from the utopian model and use Britain as my starting point. I would like to see all essential industries and services under state control - where possible this would be an interim stage, and would be converted into either the Worker's cooperative, or the communal model. Some private enterprise would be allowed, but it's growth would be restricted, allowing no private enterprise to employ more than a certain number of employees. Private possessions would remain untouched other than that inheritance would be strictly controlled and marriage would be completely privatized ie. the state would not recognize it. The reasoning behind all of this is that a centrally controlled economy can respond quicker to national catastrophe, and to the environmental demands of the future. The second is to have the democratic principle anchored into our society - you cannot call a country a democracy if only the political sphere is involved. Allow the private sphere to dominate and it will be able to exert an undue influence on politics. True workplace democracy cannot coexist without collective ownership. My ideal Britain would involve a large degree of decentralization, together with the strengthening of local self sufficiency where
This always puzzles me. We almost all agree on the incompetence of all politicians even to do what they are paid to do - govern. Yet we would have them run companies? Or let them pick inexpert officials to do so? It beggars belief. At best I would allow key sector industries to have up to a 49% shareholding. That way the taxpayer could benefit from any profits made but the control of companies could be left to people who are expert at running the industry / service involved. There could also be something like a "golden" share that had voting control of directors/ senior employees remuneration / pensions/ bonuses and share options. But the state as an employer is a ridiculous idea. Why would you give someone with no specific expertise the ability to run something? Why are education and the NHS such a mess - because instead of leaving it to experts in their field to run, politicians stick their oar in. I honestly do not think you have considered the importance of growth to an economy - because you have an ideological not a scientific objection to it. Once growth slows, investment slows, unemployment rises and the vicious circle of an underperforming economy follows. Do you not see that it is only in the world that has industrialised -mostly by private enterprise - that has moved from an agrarian, poor society to the one we live in. You see some bad things about a modern economy and instead of putting in controls to lessen any bad effects and increase the good you would ram a block into everything and cause it to come crashing down. Look at how the UK has fared in the 10 years post 2008 to see the negative effect on all the social and other factors you want - due to recession. Look at North and South Korea. After the split one went on to mirror the West with a very high standard of living and the other is a basket case. If ever there was a simple example of capitalism versus chaos Korea is it.
First point which arises here is that I would be replacing the ownership class and not the managerial class - I do not trust politicians to run industries either. The government owns the firm, the managers are elected by the workers - simple as that. It really is high time that we faced up to the idea of a no growth society in the future - woke up to the idea that we have enough products already and that was is now required is their equitable distribution. Maybe to actually do the maths - the amount of goods being transported now is the same per day as for the entire year of my birth - are we, proportionally, 365 times better off ? There is too much trade in the World, and we need to cut back on this. It is also time to caste off the idea that only capitalism can produce technology - the fastest growth in this sector, historically, was in turning the USSR from an agrarian society into an industrial one between 1918 and 1939. A process which Britain, and America needed a lot longer to achieve. The truth is that, for all their faults, countries like the USSR and the GDR had no homelessness and not unemployed, there were no soup kitchens, and there was available child care for all working mothers to use. The fact that all the women leading political parties in Germany: Angela Merkel, Petra Fauke, Katrin Göring Eckart, Sahra Wagenknecht were all brought up in the GDR. tells us something about what conditions were really like there.Why should I have to answer for North Korea ? A country which has never been communist, and never will be.
I do not see why workers would have a clue what it takes to manage. About as good in my book as asking fans to manage their football team. Management is a skill as much as is being a doctor and a good manager is worth his weight. Asking workers to pick a manager is at best random. People run things best when they have a motivation for it and in my book profit is the best motivator. Councils with no profit motive waste money hand over foot. Witness how many of them spend to the limit of their budget in February and MArch in order not to lose any of their budget for the following year. You need an incentive to perform at your best - you cannot expect people to sacrifice personal life as so many top managers do unless it is worth their while. WIth no profit motive there is no drive for efficiency either - give in to union demands and employ people to make up the numbers why not? No growth equals no investment which equals stagnation which leads to misery and unemployment. It is really high time people who do not understand the importance of growth stopped preaching to give it up. Comparing the USSR with forced labour and gulags in a catch up mode to anything is ridiculous. If I employ somebody to move a chair to another room and then somebody to bring it back you would say I have two jobs. I would say you have two unemployed people wasting everybody's time. Nobody ever voted to switch to an East German type society from a western one - because they are not as good. If you had had food banks in the former communist bloc they would have been overrun - if you think the people were properly fed you live in illusion. Where have your East German women thrived - Capitalist Germany Nobody asked you to answer for North Korea and nobody said it was communist - I used it as an example to compare the different direction of government and ownership and the capitalist one was the one that succeeded.
I think that you will give me the credit of knowing more people who grew up in the GDR than you do Arturo. The vast majority I have met now know that the GDR was not so bad after all - at least for the majority. The problem was that many had a false illusion about what the West would be like. Unfortunately the reunification could have been a chance to blend the best of both systems, unfortunately it wasn't taken. Regarding workers choosing their managers - this is no different to citizens choosing politicians. If you say that the one is unsuitable to do this, then presumably you think the other is as well. They elect based on results.
I thought you always argued personal contacts were irrelevant. So you know how many? 100 out of a population of how many millions? I don't buy any personal "I grew up near there" argument I am afraid. You mentioned Merkel not me. I have seen thousands flee over the Berlin Wall or die trying so let's not see who has a bigger w.... eh? I am afraid your views are coloured so I would need someone a little more impartial if I did want to listen to "personal evidence.
I think you would need to see the present East German voting figures to see how 'enamoured' they are with the present system Arturo.
No. There are a lot of people in life discontented for a lot of reasons. Some people in the UK bang on about poverty as if there were actually many people in the UK in true poverty. I am a rational being and I see enough news and politics to be able to form a judgement for myself about the major shaping facts in the world. East Germany can present all the golden statistics they like about employment, housing or whatever but I do not need to be a brain of Britain to know their lives were poor compared to those in the West. Anyone who tries to tell me otherwise immediately arouses my suspicion. I am afraid asking you about conditions in certain countries would be like me asking someone at a Conservative rally what life would be like under Corbyn. They might give me a sincere answer but would I trust their judgement? I don't think so. They have an inbuilt bias which is reflected in what they say. However good and sincere they are I would not trust them as a sounding board for an impartial view. You are a good and honest person but I do not think your friends are drawn from a representative cross section of society. So I prefer not to go on personal opinion.
Moving on. My ideal society would not include people who dislike other people for who they are. Just because somebody was born rich or poor does not change their intrinsic human nature. We are all capable of love and hate, honesty and dishonesty. We can be honest or deceitful at different times. But one thing about our current society is that too many people represent those whose views they disagree with as dishonest or worse. Why can we not accept that we do not all share a common value system? Some people honestly believe that mankind is better if it is forced to struggle and not given everything on a plate - even when that ends up with some people being left very unhappy. Others cannot accept that and think that nobody should ever be left unaided and that everybody else should help them even if they choose not to help themselves. These latter people often present themselves as the good kind humans - perhaps they are - but when they then attack those who do not share their world view they actually show they are not so very different. They only want to defend people who they can identify with. Anyone can do that. I am not religious but like the Buddhist viewpoint that seeks not to judge others and not to wish harm to others whoever they are. Hatred does not figure in their existence (? can't think of the right word)
Leo I am not an apologist for the GDR. or for any other Warsaw Pact country. I have said that I have a lot of respect for the ideas of Kropotkin, amongst many others - yet the Soviet backed forces in the Spanish civil war helped to destroy a system based on Kropotkin's ideas. Anarchists have never had a natural home in the USSR. (Lenin did once allow Anarchist flags to be flown at Kropotkin's funeral - but that was it as far as mutual love was concerned). I believe in a Communism from below, which was detested and ridiculed in so called Marxist states. Now that the Soviet experiment is over we are free to research other forms of Communism which have a more human touch. There were some good things in the GDR - it was not better than the West - I would not have lived there, but for those at the lower end of the social scale they had jobs, homes and bread. The collapse of the system there has left a massive void - this is probably why 40-50% of them are now voting for far left or far right parties (although, to be honest the two extremes share a lot of common ground here). Strangely enough I do not really believe people are equal - in fact I think it's a dangerous idea, because it presumes that others will react to things in the same way I do. Better to say we are all unique (but all need each other) - and with uniqueness, no comparison is possible. I too want a World without violence, in thought or deed - but for me it would be a violent act to erect a fence around something and exclude others from it.
I did not suggest anything about your views - other than you have personal views and as such are not an "unbiased" observer. Just because in circles you move in you have had certain views expressed to you does not help me form a balanced view. Sorry but you just cannot have enough contacts - and those you do have will be from circles you frequent. Therefore whatever you tell me about your experience of tales of East Germany are irrelevant to me. So telling me you know more people than me does not make any difference. I will rely on more general and disparate viewpoints. These all suggest East Germany was not good
Grand to see views being expressed with a degree of logic. Of course I have followed every word to make sure that there was no abuse. I could have ignored it all. Still a few random thoughts from rural France. Somewhere above, was it this thread or another, cologne said that he could live with the one nation Tories of the 1960' s, but those days had gone. Yes they have gone, but then there was a degree of the country earning money by sound policy, and distributing the proceeds to provide decent services. I can give a bag of food to the food bank, or donate some money to a charity that is providing clean water to villages without such a basic means of living. I have no idea who will benefit, but don't really care as those organisations would not be there unless there was a need. My individual contributions will help a few, but it is only politicians at national, even international level who can make a real difference. Some religions believe in reincarnation, and if it were true imagine being something like a vole that is constant danger of providing a buzzard with dinner. Or of course you could return as a victim of war and become someone seeking a safe haven somewhere. I doubt that such thoughts cross the minds of western leaders. The real problem for me is when you don't see the politicians who are on the same wavelength as I am, ones that take account of everyone, not a select few, whether trades unions or rich bankers. More people voted for Clinton than Trump. May was thought to be increasing her majority by 50 seats and yet lost 30. I suspect that politics are becoming more extreme, and people do not know what to believe. The route towards the middle of the road politics is being lost, and the bulk of national populations are feeling unrepresented. I cannot equate electing a President or MP with that of a manager. How long would they get to prove they were unsuitable? 4-5 years. You require specialists to run a company of any size, in the same way that government needs specialist advisers. You finish up with chaos when politicians think they know more than the advisers, and send policy to the extreme right or left.
Did I really say that I could live with Tories from the 60s ? It must have been in a weak moment The voles in my garden appear to think that my role in life is to provide them with dinner from my vegetable plot. I wish the odd buzzard would pop round now and then.
I know you really meant it. I think you were so shocked by yourself that a moment became seven days. In a spirit of goodwill I can offer you many buzzards. You will have to come and collect them of course.
The mistake you are making here Arturo is that you are placing the managerial class in the wrong catagory. I have said repeatedly that I would replace the ownership but not the managers. If managers are not the owners of a concern, then they are responsible to the shareholders, and that is the case in most bigger firms. They are employed, exactly the same as the workers - albeit at a much higher rate of pay. In Marxist terms they are the aristocracy of labour, but still form part of the Proletariat. All that would happen is that they, also, would own the means of production together with the rest of the workforce, as opposed to performing a function for an owner, or a group of shareholders, who have distanced themselves from operations. I have already said that smaller firms (where the managers are also the owners) would mostly remain untouched.
Did history manufacture pictures of people being shot trying to escape East Germany? Ok - let's apply a little logic. Answer me a simple question please. I have a choice whether to go with everything I have ever seen and read and witnessed on film and video in history, politics and current affairs plus the very few personal contacts I have spoken to over the years - some of whom came from East Germany. Or I can go with the personal information supplied by one self confessed hater of the capitalist system and anarcho-communist who tells me East Germany was OK. Which should I go with?
I have not said that East Germany was Ok. I have said that there were some elements of it which were better for some people. The expression 'History is written by the winners' refers to the all embracing idea that Comminism failed and was evil - and the identification that East Germany was Communist and, therefore, proof that Communism can never work under any circumstances. The GDR was never going to be a model of Communism because of its status as a Russian occupied zone. After having lost 20 million dead in World War 2 (12 million of them civilians) the Russians were in no mood to pussyfoot around with the country. For those who had jobs and homes, who may not have had these in the West (both were considered as a human right under Communism) life was better. The fact that 40-50% of the population of the ex GDR are now voting for either hard left or hard right wing parties appears to suggest that many there are not happy with the present situation, and are rather nostalgic about the past. Now they are second class citizens in a united Germany. I am not a rabid hater of anything - in it's earlier days capitalism offered such things as upward mobility, and 'open' competition, and it may surprise you to know that Karl Marx had a great admiration for the USA. But those days are gone - there is no real social mobility and the 'open' competition has entered its monopoly stage. I am experimenting with other forms, and other ideas - there is more than just Anarcho-Communism (this is only a label) and the idea of common ownership predates both of these terms.
The universe is 14 or 15 billion years old - and who knows what preceded that? So if reincarnation exists and you come back as a vole or a war victim it is really unimportant - as is your current life - as in the blink of a celestial eye - you are reincarnated as a fat cat banker.
