Sponsor |  Thomas-Jefferson | Apr 10, 3:38pm | The discussion isn't about paracon, and Ha-Joon Chang isn't a source I respect any more than you respect the heritage foundation. The discussion is about libertarianism, anarchism, and the political spectrum generally.
As I have made clear via PM, the tendency to "write off" alternate views or sources which fail to conform to ones worldview is perhaps the unhealthiest aspect of modern leftism. Confirmation bias or pathological skepticism, call it what you will, it promotes and maintains ignorance.
Egocentrism aside, the sources your provided are less reputable by objective standards. Additionally they are opinion advocacy pieces, while I provided data. Positive vs. normative sourcing. One is economic, the other political; one logical evidence, the other rhetorical argument.
The questions remain:
are Libertarians (as in Classical Liberals) anarchists?
are anarchists, libertarian socialists, or "anarcho-socialists" properly labeled?
is there a positive or negative correlation between state intervention and economic success?
Discussion of "paracon", it's desirability, it's viability or etc. is a topic for another thread. I for one would not outlaw it, nor would I promote it in any way. Marxist states like N Korea obviously would not allow such schemes to be attempted however. Remember Animal Farm? The Lenins and Chomskys may dream of pie in the sky, but the Stalins and Pol Pots have a more pragmatic and brutal solution to the needs of the worker.
I insist on another path, one which leaves Marx and his failures behind, seeking instead viable and sustainable solutions. |
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|  SlaineMacRoth | Apr 10, 4:46pm | Thomas-Jefferson wrote:"The discussion isn't about paracon, and Ha-Joon Chang isn't a source I respect any more than you respect the heritage foundation. The discussion is about libertarianism, anarchism, and the political spectrum generally."
Parecon is a libertarian socialist (or anarchistic) economy. So yes the discussion is tangentially about that. More specifically it is when you question me about whether I'd prefer soviet style communism over a developed world economy that I understand how little you know about Parecon. Which is neither a soviet-style communist economy or a capitalist economy, or indeed a market socialist economy as existed in the former Yugoslavia. In fact, most Anarchists I know, now favour a Parecon type economy, for either an "economy of the revolution" if you will, or reform.
I've just read your PM and I have to say it is troubling that you have those views with respect to fascism. Again they are quite non-empirical. Particularly when you look at the current security boom, government contracts and incentives, mainly in the US.
Re facism historically, it is uncontroversial to say that most of the Western rightist circles of the interwar era supported the fascist regimes in Europe. The fascist version of extreme nationalism permitted extensive Western economic penetration and also destroyed the much feared labour movements and the left, and the excessive democracy in which they could function. (Similar in that regard to the US, Chicago school creation of Pinochet's Chile.)
For instance support for Mussolini was effusive despite the fascists destroying the parliamentary system and violently suppressing labour and political opposition.
More broadly speaking you seem to be assuming that all socialism is totalitarian in nature.
The greatest propaganda victory for the capitalists was to convince people that all kinds of socialism meant giving up control to a domineering state (and by contrast, that pro business market capitalism was a deep form of 'freedom')
The truest form of socialism is Libertarian socialism (or Anarcho Communism (same thing)) where workers control the means of production directly and with no authoritarian "democratic centralism" which is just a one way street to dictatorship.
Also, Fascism isn't the only possible end result of extreme right wing ideology. The alternative to fascism is libertarianism or laissez faire free market capitalism. Indeed there is an intersection in the venn-diagram there with todays hegemony of authoritarian neoliberalism (again Pinochet, Neocons, etc) and the dictatorship of the market.
After all it was Hitler who banned trade unions and said "We stand for the maintenance of private property. We shall protect free enterprise as the most expedient, or rather the sole possible economic order,"
There was also the problem with his putting democratic socialists, social democrats, communists, trade unionists and any one left of Atilla the Hun into the death camps ahead of the Jews and Gypsies.
So by saying that 'Hard Left and 'Hard Right' are essentially the same, it is only to look at one aspect. Totalitarianism is the common characteristic of all the most murderous regimes, whether they be 'communist' or 'fascist' or 'market fundamentalist' or 'theocratic'.
That's what both libertarians and anarchists oppose and work against.
(and I don't have the time to respond now via pm now but I will try in future.)
Thomas-Jefferson wrote:"Egocentrism aside, the sources your provided are less reputable by objective standards. Additionally they are opinion advocacy pieces, while I provided data. Positive vs. normative sourcing. One is economic, the other political; one logical evidence, the other rhetorical argument."
I'm not sure of your point here. I would merely repeating my previous post in pointing out how many of the sources I used are very much on the economic right. Either way there's mountains of evidence and data to show how nations have developed in the real world. These are cited in those links. Whereas you have used Heritage and WSJ, indeed your other links work against your case as I've argued. And yet...you've failed to respond to those arguments and points that I've made about those contradictions... |
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Sponsor | | Thomas-Jefferson | Apr 10, 6:10pm | "I understand how little you know about Parecon"
That statement is as overwhelmingly arrogant as it is ignorant. do you know what "empirical" means? I have personally studied and witnessed the fascism of the left. I have seen and tested it, therefore my knowledge of it is empirical.
Your usage of "left" and "right" is not the same as mine. When you contrast totalitarianism and free market capitalism, you begin to discuss a usable dichotomy.
Hitler was a leftist, and required trade union membership.
constitutionalistnc.tripod.com/hitler-leftist/ [constitutionalistnc.tripod.com/hitler-leftist/]
(I don't expect you to accept this link as authoritative, it is meant for informational purposes, to give you perspective on my position)
Can you show some evidence of "paracon" succeeding in the real world? I am aware of a few businesses who have managed to maintain there existence and produce a product or service. I am aware of no thriving or especially successful instance of this. The best two examples I know of are:
Woodman's foods (a business wherein the owner sold the business to the workers via stockshare. The business still exists, and is mildly successful)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodman%27s_Food_Market [en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodman%27s_Food_Market]
and the Linux community (not always a business, but inclusive of some businesses. Generally not very profitable for the workers. Functional for society)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_community [en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_community]
These examples are not necessarily "paracon", just the closest to a successful instance of it I could provide. |
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| | SlaineMacRoth | Apr 11, 5:34am | "Hitler was a leftist, and required trade union membership."
Groans. You're not one of those Liberal Fascism jokers* are you?
You mean the Nazi "union" called the German Labor Front, which, you know, took away the right to strike? Look in 1933 Hitler banned trade unions and he banned the Social Democratic Party. Hitler would put democratic socialists, social democrats, communists, trade unionists and any one left of Atilla the Hun into the concentration and work camps such as Dachau ahead of the Jews and Gypsies.
Hitler was a right-wing fascist nationalist who used socialistic rhetoric for electoral gain but who despised the left as show repeatedly by his actions and words. In practice he was as said "We stand for the maintenance of private property. We shall protect free enterprise as the most expedient, or rather the sole possible economic order," - Hitler, in that he was similar to the fascistic free-marketers of Pinochet's Chile and other similar dictatorships of Latin America.
* a review of same below.
powells.com/review/2008_03_06.html [powells.com/review/2008_03_06.html]
"But for all his chapter and verse on the proletarian rhetoric that Nazis employed, Goldberg somehow forgets to mention certain other salient matters, like the fact that within three months of taking power Hitler banned trade unions -- and on the day after May Day, 1933. Their money was confiscated and their leaders imprisoned. And the trade unions were replaced with the Nazi "union" called the German Labor Front, which took away the right to strike. Hitler did many worse things, of course. I single out this act because it would hardly seem to be the edict of a "man of the left." And there exist about a million nearly epileptic quotes from Hitler and Goebbels and other Nazis expressing their luminous hatreds of liberalism and of communism, none of which seem to have found their way into the pages of Liberal Fascism."
And yes I suppose that link probably says more than enough on your position - those FrontPage, CampusWatch, David Horowitz people are truly despicable.
Finally on fascism. If one were to put one's head down and were not Jewish or of the Left, then you could become very wealthy in Nazi Germany as highlighted by Orwell in his "The Lion and The Unicorn". Also check out the the profits of American corporations in Nazi Germany, such IBM, Ford, Coca Cola etc.
Profits über Alles! American Corporations and Hitler
historycooperative.org/journals/llt/51/pauwels.html [historycooperative.org/journals/llt/51/pauwels.html]
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Better Hitler than "Rosenfeld"
Throughout the "dirty thirties," corporate profits in the US remained depressed, at home firms like GM and Ford could only dream of the kind of riches their branch plants in Germany were accumulating thanks to Hitler. In addition, at home corporate America experienced problems with labour activists, Communists, and other radicals. What about the vicious trademarks of the Führer's personality and regime? Did they not disturb the leaders of corporate America? Apparently not much, if at all. The racial hatred propagated by Hitler, for example, did not overly offend their sensibilities. After all, racism against non-Whites remained systemic throughout the US and anti-Semitism was rife in the corporate class. In the exclusive clubs and fine hotels patronized by the captains of industry, Jews were rarely admitted; and some leaders of corporate America were outspoken anti-Semites. 14 In the early 1920s, Henry Ford cranked out a vehemently anti-Semitic book, The International Jew, which was translated into many languages; Hitler read the German version and acknowledged later that it provided him with inspiration and encouragement. Another notoriously anti-Semitic American tycoon was Irénée Du Pont, even though the Du Pont family had Jewish antecedents. 15 13
Corporate America's anti-Semitism strongly resembled that of Hitler, whose view of Judaism was intimately interwoven with his view of Marxism, as Arno J. Mayer has convincingly argued in his book Why Did the Heavens not Darken? 16 Hitler claimed to be a socialist, but his was supposed to be a "national" socialism, a socialism for racially pure Germans only. As for genuine socialism, which preached international working-class solidarity and found its inspiration in the work of Karl Marx, it was despised by Hitler as a Jewish ideology that purported to enslave or even destroy Germans and other "Aryans." Hitler loathed as "Jewish" all forms of Marxism, but none more so than communism (or "Bolshevism") and he denounced the Soviet Union as the homeland of "Jewish" international socialism. 14
In the 1930s, the anti-Semitism of corporate America likewise revealed itself to be the other side of the coin of anti-socialism, anti-Marxism, and red-baiting. Most American businessmen denounced Roosevelt's New Deal as a "socialistic" meddling in the economy. The anti-Semites of corporate America considered Roosevelt to be a crypto-Communist and an agent of Jewish interests, if not a Jew himself; he was routinely referred to as "Rosenfeld," and his New Deal was vilified as the "Jew Deal." 17 In his book The Flivver King, Upton Sinclair described the notoriously anti-Semitic Henry Ford dreaming of an American fascist movement that "pledged to put down the Reds and preserve the property interests of the country; to oust the Bolshevik [Roosevelt] from the White House and all his pink professors from the government services ... [and] to make it a shooting offense to talk communism or to call a strike." 18 Other American tycoons also yearned for a fascist saviour who might rid America of its "reds" and thus restore prosperity and profitability. Du Pont provided generous financial support to America's own fascist organizations, such as the infamous "Black Legion," and was even involved in plans for a fascist coup d'état in Washington. (Hofer and Reginbogin, 585-6) 19
As regards Parecon. (why the use of "paracon"?) Yes, there are examples of Parecon in action, just check out the wiki I linked to earlier. It is pretty recent development Ill give you that (circa 1991) and is perhaps more easily implemented into existing public services. The open source movement is comparable in the interaction between worker groups (programmer say) and consumers, but I wouldn't call it a Participatory economy. Also comparable are various co-operatives which are quite successful in the capitalist realm, however they again could not be seen as a Parecon. It's an idea for the future really, so that the problems of the past do not re-appear at the point of the prospect of a future economy. As far as I can see, some form of sustainable future will actually require something similar, particularly in its constraining of over-consumption. |
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Sponsor | | Thomas-Jefferson | Apr 11, 8:42am | Hasn't enough harm been done by Marx's postulated economic system? Why not try something with a proven track record... distributism for example.
"And yes I suppose that link probably says more than enough on your position - those FrontPage, CampusWatch, David Horowitz people are truly despicable."
I don't know who those people are, or why you use them as a slur and tar me with the same brush. Looking into them, Horowitz is apparently a neoconservative? That would be pretty close to my inverse, seeing as how I perceive neocons to be trotskyites seeking to ensnare the world in a global police state.
"left" and "right" are not terms we are likely to agree on, but we can probably agree that liberty is more desirable than oppression and abuse. I see no reason for opposing you in starting a small "paracon" business any more than I see a reason to allow such a scheme to dominate society.
True diversity can be healthful, seeking to force (untested) views to be uniformly accepted is not.
"Human law is law only by virtue of its accordance with right reason; and thus it is manifest that it flows from the eternal law. And in so far as it deviates from right reason it is called an unjust law; in such case it is no law at all, but rather a species of violence."
-Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, Ia-Ilae, q. xciii, art. 3, ad 2m. |
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