On Wed, 21 Jan 1998, Thomas D. [Tom] Hall, THALL@DEPAUW.EDU wrote:
> Read social transformation carefully, and you will not find any
> cheerleading for capitalism. Rather, a grudging assessment that it has
> promoted more change than anyther social system, and is the first thing
> to come along in 10k years to reverse the steady if sporadic trend toward
> increasing inequality.
How is making this claim not cheerleading? Capitalism has not reversed the
trend towards increasing inequality. Capitalism put increasing inequality
into overdrive. Grudgingly accepting this "fact" makes for even better
propaganda, sort of the reverse of the good intentions fallacy.
But this is beside the point. I was making my judgment based on the
arguments Sanderson makes on WSN. These arguments are deeply ideological.
His arguments some months ago concerning human nature were not only bad
propaganda, they were revealed as illogical. The assumptions that underpin
Sanderson's arguments in his more candid moments are, following the right
turn in Harris and others, becoming more and more social Darwinian. This
argument simply does not rest on fact.
> Re former USSR: Yes it did more "catchup" than any other country. But
> also yes it was at its collapse still well behind in QOL the west.
It was "behind" only a few countries in the "west," assuming that you mean
by that term Britain, US, W. Germany, etc.. Only the richest capitalist
countries had better *overall* levels of quality of life. But USSR
challenged the richest countries on many of these measures. And USSR did
not have the deep poverty pockets of the richest countries, nor the level
of inequality. Compared with middle-range and lower-range capitalist
countries, covering the vast majority of the world's population, the
Soviet Union and the socialist world system were superior.
> Chris C-D, that is was part of a larger system that sought to contain,
> if not destroy it.
This is a crucial point. That the Soviet Union and the other state
socialist countries achieved what they did under siege conditions makes
their accomplishments that much more dramatic. One can just imagine what
might have been if the world capitalist regime had permitted the
development of socialism, but let's leave that to that realm.
> QoL in USSR/Russia is a redherring [sorry about the atrocious pun]
> regarding Marx and capitalism. The old saw about Christianity &
> socialism applies: good ideas, too bad nobody ever tried them. [Again
> the WST critique: you can't try them in only one country embedded in
> capitalist world-system].
I disagree with this well-known W-S/state capitalist argument. After
stripping away its scientific pretensions it amounts to no more than a
cop out to argue that there was no socialism in USSR. This is an
ideological attempt, dictated by left anti-communist sentiments, to remain
an *ideal* socialist by denying *real* socialism. Michael Parenti says
this perfectly: "No surprise then that the pure socialists support every
revolution except the ones that succeed." I have reviewed the arguments
that whatever exist in a capitalist world system must be capitalist and
have found that they are empirically unsound and logically fallacious.
Under this logic it is impossible for socialism to exist. The argument is
set up so that the arguer cannot lose. I regard the Soviet Union and other
state socialist countries to have comprised a socialist world system.
> Chris and I tried to argue in the end of Rise & Demise that we need to
> think of MANY alternatives for future world-systems and get out of the
> socialism a la Marx vs Capitalism a la A. Smith and think of
> alternatives, c, d, e, f, etc.
If you assume that socialism in our century failed, sure. But I don't
believe this. This century has seen a real alternative. Utopianism is not
a real alternative. And "third ways" have been among the ugliest memories
of the 20th century.
> Steve is right, to call it same or better than west on Physical Quality
> of Life is ludicrous.
Sanderson is incorrect in his polemic vis-a-vis the USSR.
And you have distorted what I said by injecting the vague phrase "in the
west" into the discussion. Here is what I wrote:
...the Soviet Union had a standard of living and quality of life
that far exceeded most capitalist countries before, during, and
since. In fact, the socialist world system puts the capitalist
world system to shame on quality of life and equality measures.
My post was not a flame. It was a reasonable assessment of Sanderson's
posts to this lists.
Andy