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3 models of global (democratic) socialism

by Gernot Kohler

21 February 1999 18:46 UTC


my thanks to several of you who responded (online or offline) to my earlier
post re counter-elites. Two offline respondents mentioned that the wsn
software fooled them and that they thought they were responding to wsn. 
   I explored the topic a bit more, using the search engine of wsn+ipe, and
came up with the following semi-rambling thoughts:

(1) wsn and ipe contributors tend to agree that the present world is
dominated by capitalist elites (global and national).
(2) offline respondents pointed out that there is a special category of
global elite -- namely, criminal elites (as in "Russian Mafia", etc.)
(3) as the concept of "elite", as seen in wsn and ipe circles, is largely
synonymous with "bad guys", the social force which could conceivably
improve the world is not described (in wsn + ipe) as  "counter-elite" but,
rather, as a    "counter-movement". There are two variants of this notion
-- namely, (a) "counter-hegemonic movement" (Gramscian) and (b)
"anti-systemic movement" (non-Gramscian leftist). Here I am wondering: Is
not the leadership of a counter-movement a "counter-elite"?
(4) What is the prospective role of elites in something that might be
called "global democratic socialism"? [This is a utopia-oriented question.]
Here one could, tentatively, claim that there are three broad models of
"global (democratic) socialism" -- each with a different view of global
elite. The three models are sharply at odds with each other, due to the
fact that "democracy" has three distinctly different meanings in each of
the three models, as follows:
(5) ANARCHIST MODEL of global democratic socialism. Here "democracy" means
"no governmental structures". There is no government. There are no elites.
The world is a system of self-governing workers groups.
(6) DICTATORIAL MODEL of global (democratic) socialism. Here "democracy"
means "dictatorship in the name of the proletariat". There is a global
government. There is a dictatorial elite. "Democracy" is  here the same as
dictatorship a la Lenin or Castro.
(7) HUMAN RIGHTS MODEL of global democratic socialism. Here "democracy"
means a process and global governance in the spirit of the Universal
Declaration on Human Rights. There are global elites who promote human
rights, including political rights (liberties), economic human rights (good
standard of living for all) and ecological sustainability. This model has
also been called "humane governance", in opposition to the present
"inhumane (global) governance" (e.g., Richard Falk, On Humane Governance,
1995).
(8) In conclusion: Did I miss any important model of global democratic
socialism? Finally, it appears that the (leftist) "world(-)system(s)"
movement cannot be a unified movement since there are at least three
sharply differing (leftist) utopias for the world(-)system, roughly along
the mind grooves of the traditional anarchist/menshevik/bolshevik split.

my apologies if the above is overly simplistic.
Gernot Kohler
Oakville, Canada


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