Senate This thread is publicly owned (marxism, socialism, and left-wing ideologies)

It doesn't have to be one party. But all the parties would have to represent the interests of the workers. There can be no bourgeois parties. As wealth gets taken away from the bourgeoisie so that they become workers, not bourgeoisie, there would be no need for these parties anymore.

I know that this will be considered "authoritarianism" to you, but it's not. You are trained to think this way by your society.

 

A constitutional system which enshrines certain limitations upon property accumulation as well as certain requirements for workplace democracy would work, but that’s still within the framework of Western democracy. If you go beyond that (banning expression of ideas or parties which are considered ‘pro-bourgeois’) you’re going to slip further and further towards the Marxist-Leninist systems we have seen before.

 

Isn’t Vivec a self-professed Marxist-Leninist?

 

Yes.

Many societies can have ideas that are illegal. Sometimes, it's wrong to ban those ideas. Other times, it's not. For example, places that ban Nazi speech and ideology. That's a good thing, though there are people who disagree. It's always going to be a case of what's being banned that determines whether or not it's a good or bad thing to ban such an idea. You're never going to get me to say "it's always bad" or "it's always good." I believe capitalist ideas will always cause harm. I understand that you might not.

 

There are always going to be some things which are beyond the circle of acceptable speech. The problem is that as you tighten that circle and more authoritarian you have to be to uphold it, and then you start to have collateral problems. You want a system where the good ideas prevail, but they aren’t enforced. You don’t want to have the enforce against bad ideas - you want them naturally drowned out. Thats the only way you have a sustainable system and that requires change to general perception and consciousness of society. Such change happens slowly, but it does (and has been shown to) happen, and conservatives have not always been successful in stonewalling it.

 

I'm good with drowning out the bad ideas. But as I've said before, everyone is accepting of a little authoritarianism, on specific things. I don't see why I should be held to a special standard.

 

But isn't your circle of banned speech broader than that? You have in the past supported not just banning capitalist ideas, but critiques that could endanger the transition to socialism. That net gets ever-wider, and I don't see how it ever gets narrowed again.

 

I don’t think you are being held to a special standard. Your scope of banned ideas and speech is going to be broader than what mine would be.

 

In how I see it, this would suggest you're a social democrat. Which is different than being a democratic socialist.

 

Nowadays, the two expressions are pretty much used interchangeably by most people.

 

That's not the case in much of Europe, including the one you're from (as far as my experience dictates, which isn't comprehensive). In any event, the point is that they actually are very different things, even though they often taste the same...

 

Is there any actual topic/policy measure for which we could say "here a social democrat and a democratic socialist would likely differ" ?

 

Democratic socialists are typically actively looking towards the end of the capitalist system over time, meaning their policies are typically driven by moving towards a Marxist idea of society. This means that their ideas are not focused upon adapted to a capitalist system and are generally more radical. They generally have the more radical proposals at Labour Party conferences, and form their own distinctive radical faction in the party.

Social Democrats are typically about creating solutions to problems created by capitalism, however aren’t looking towards an eventual replacing of that system in the near or medium term. This means while their policies are often pro-worker they never pose an existential threat to capitalists. From personally experience social democrats are actually a lot more circumspect about the failings of capitalism privately, but don’t view radical proposals particularly helpful in getting anything actually done.

I think that democratic socialism is a bit of a cop-out to be honest. It’s for people who can’t commit to being revolutionary, but also don’t want to be mainstream social democrat, because then they have to own their compromises, so dance a middle ground. They want to be radical but not too radical.

 

@DarthPhilosopher
This seems all very abstract and academical, while on practical matters there is no real distinction.

 

I feel like I’ve tried to explain this to you several times.

There is only no real distinction if you think different motives, intention and policy proposals aren’t distinctive. It’s literally one of the fundamental internal tensions in all labour movements and parties, but sure, it’s just an abstraction…

 

And yet I just asked for any example, even a single one, and you couldn't provide it.

It sounds like the typical debate that is popular as a rhetoric exercise, but those who really have something at stake couldn't care less.

 

You asked for a topic which the two would differ and I provided one - their attitude towards capitalism. If you want policy differences all you had to do was look up the most radical proposals at Labour Party conferences and those are policy disagreements (i.e. abolish private schools and nationalise the banking sector, etc). In fact you could have just looked up the the political programme of any of the democratic socialist parties in Europe and found the policies you know social democrats wouldn’t enact. Democratic socialists are more radically opposed to capitalism and therefore their policy proposals are more radical than social democrats. It’s really that simple.

 

Given that no serious political party will openly advocate for the end of capitalism today, ultimately, whoever self describes as democratic socialist usually ends up promoting measures of social democracy anyway. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are an example.

 

A question that's been on my mind lately and that I've been hard pressed to find good info on- how would a socialist state deal with hyperinflation in the future? Would they simply give out goods based on rations, or put price or purchasing caps on certain goods?

 

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not an economist. But the question I always ask when inflation is brought up is....is this actually a natural rise in prices? If the price of these good were not increased, would the businesses be failing? If the answer is yes, then you have a genuine problem. But if the only thing decreasing is the profit margin, then I say the answer should be: accept lower profits. Don't raise prices. And a socialist government should be able to enforce that legally.

 

The issue these days is not even that there's a decrease in profits, it's that there's record-breaking, massive profits. A basic understanding of math is all that is required to grasp that if prices increase at a much greater rate than production costs while placing the blame solely on inflation is a ****ing con game. Which means that not being an economist is a benefit to figuring this out.

 

Capitalist governments enforce price controls, or at least used to. This was widespread practice during World War II. The last time it happened in the US was when Nixon did it in response to inflation in 1971.