From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!CAD:ucbesvax!turner Newsgroups: net.politics Title: Re: what IS wrong with socialism - (nf) Article-I.D.: ucbcad.692 Posted: Wed Feb 23 17:43:16 1983 Received: Thu Feb 24 21:00:42 1983 #N:ucbesvax:7100002:000:7634 ucbesvax!turner Feb 21 17:05:00 1983 Oh, Ziggy, here you go again: The best argument for this position [anti-socialist] skips over the never ending theoretical debates on political systems and looks at the fact of the matter in the world today: Socialist countries are the least free, the most oppressive, and the most imperialistic in the world today. I can make an argument against socialism that doesn't make reference to this "fact of the matter," but I'll save it for later. I'd rather get into this so-called fact. Here, taken from your note, is a hierarchy of evil as measured in terms of human rights abuses. worst: certain "unaligned" socialist countries 2nd worst: Comecon countries best: "capitalist" or mixed-economy OECD - which are "paradises of civil liberties and economic opportunities." Of course, there are a few trifling ommisions from this attempt at a comprehensive list: South Korea, South Africa, Indonesia, the Philipines, Pakistan, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and Haiti, among others. Now compare these with those in your "worst" list. Using the best available figures (and I think Amnesty International does a good job on all counts, including ther Commmunist countries), we find that, perhaps Kampuchea and Vietnam compare with some of the worst, but by and large, the situation in "unaligned" socialist countries (say, Cuba or Yugoslavia) is not one where people are being randomly murdered and whole villages being wiped out. Now look at the economic systems in these countries. By and large, you might have some state-owned sectors (Oil, for example), but for the most part, they are "capitalist". So it would seem that there isn't much relation between basic freedoms and economic systems. (Obviously, I hold the right to live regardless of one's beliefs to be more basic than any economic rights. You, Ziggy, may object, saying in your dogmatic way that when we lose THOSE rights, we automatically lose the right to life. But look again at that list.) Well, what IS the most common factor in THIS list of human-rights violators? Barring some obvious cases (Iran, for example, which is as bad or worse than before), the common element is that they all have as a central economic policy the encouragement of investment on the part of the capitalist "paradise" countries. Another common element is the presence of U.S. aid to police and armed forces, except where the disgust of U.S. congress (or its constituencies) has barred this sort of aid. How is this aid used? Quite frequently, to prevent people from exercising an economic right which even you, Ziggy, would have to grudgingly admit is inalienable: the right of workers to collectively and freely bargain with their employers over issues of pay and control. That is, the right to sell one's own labor under the best possible conditions one can obtain. Yes, even as Alexander Haig wept crocodile tears over the military crackdown on Solidarity and the detainment of Lech Walesa, he was renegotiating aid to Turkey and Brazil, where labor leaders of Walesa's prominence are shot in the streets without judgement or trial. Note that Lech Walesa is now back on the streets, without a job, but getting his full electrician's pay. Not to argue for the Polish generals, but they do seem to know how to handle the population better than some of the dictators propped up in the U.S. sphere of influence! And how does the suppression of this economic right to organize a workplace serve American interests to the extent of the aid given? Or does it, ultimately? In the short run, of course, people in the U.S. and other "capitalist paradises" win out: they can buy commodities which were "fabricated" in thecountries at much lower prices. Labor that would cost 5$/hour here might cost $5/day over there. But this discount is gained at the real expense of the life and liberty, of the people who work in countries. But then Marxist revolutionary comes around and says: it doesn't have to be this way. And what do they do? Ziggy, what would YOU do? With your younger children not eating, your older children in jail, getting paid less each year in real income? How else is this clout used? In many of the countries, we find the left-overs of feudalism of the former colonizers. The economy is largely agrarian and impoverished, with some very wealthy people at the top who have inherited their positions. (Or, at least, were the local mafia until the client state - France, Britain, the U.S. - decided that the old feudal lords were too soft and installed these crooks. This is what happened in VietNam. Read "The Politics of Heroin in South-East Asia.") Large foreign agribusiness concerns come into these countries and help erect farming systems which squeeze the marginal peasant populations off their land. The governments are basically their paid gun-men. The large-scale graft networks of United Fruit in Guatemala is a prime example of this strategy. Former small land-owners fall prey to much larger ones backed by troops, and end up as peons with no homes, no rights, and less than they had before. But you would summarize socialism to these people as follows: In other words succesful socialism is the tyranny of the many over the individual, and most socialism in practice is just plain tyranny. Not very persuasive, though, if you have lived under the tyranny of the very many by the very few, is it? But this is what goes on in the countries. And who benefits from this? The "capitalist paradises". And would THEY change it? No, because they ...just know what they like, and they don't like the Gov'mint telling them what to do. Right. The Gov'mint can tell the countries what to do, but not us, who are getting fat on those police-states. THAT's not your vaunted free enterprise, now is it? Well, just drop me a line the next time you want to skip over some never-ending debates on political systems and go straight to the real evidence. I might save you some embarassment. [Entering Confession Mode:] Hey, Ziggy, listen: I was once a Libertarian hard-liner. No wait! come back! It's true! I read Ayn Rand when I was thirteen, and it took me a decade to get self-deprogrammed. I'm serious. It took me 10 years to become disillusioned with laissez-faire capitalism. If the world were already pretty straightened out (i.e., approximate equality of nations, or no nations at all and equality of people) it might be a great idea. But it is not the one true answer to all the world's problems. Especially if it blinds you to what the world's problems really are, which is what it did to me. Capitalism imposed at gun-point is no better than Communism at gun-point. Equally seriously: I'm grateful that I was a Libertarian. It means that I can stand up to doctrinaire socialists (and there's a lot of 'em in Berkeley) with the reasons why THEY are full of shit. My view of the ideal society is, I think, closer to yours than theirs. But you'll have to shed some illusions and do some reading before we can really talk. My Last Flame at You (I Promise!) Michael Turner