Can Communism Ever Work?

Earlier this week I wrote on another thread about the mistakes that Marx made in identifying certain socio-economic structures (such as the Market) as products of Capitalism, when they were in fact products of the Industrial Age. Communist revolution was really a revolution of industrialization in most contries where it took hold (Laos and the Khmer Rouge is a good example of the exception). So the market, for example, was just as much of a dehumanizing force of alienation in a communist country as it was in a capitalist country.

I am writing a book on Post-Modern trends and where it could be taking us. The working title is, 'Metamorphosis of the Gods.' Both Communism and Capitalism are products of the Enlightenment and the Modern Age. Capitalism is surviving the modern age much better than communism, but both systems are becoming obsolete. If you define communism as the aim of Marxist theory, i.e. that it develops on a pregression of society based on Marxist theory, then I do not believe it will be achieved.

This is a rough draft excerpt from a chapter on that subject in my book, that tells why it is becomig obsolete and would not happen:

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"But technology is creating a new kind of entrepreneur—one that combines both telecommuting and technology into what some economists, according to an article in the The New York Times, dated Friday, October 5th 2012, call “jobless entrepreneurship.” One such entrepreneur interviewed by the NYT referred to this as the next level of telecommuting, “…the level of telecompanies.” He told the NYT that he thinks, “…we’re all headed toward an agent economy, where everyone becomes an agent or a service provider instead of an employee at some big corporation.”

Start-up companies are being hailed as the backbone of job creation. The problem is that start-up companies are hiring less full-time employees than ever-before. Entrepreneurs are finding that they do not need the kind of staff they used to require. For example, there are online services that handle much of the back office operations that companies used to need office managers and other back office people for. Even accounting and payroll can now be completed more easily and efficiently by online services. Often times a one-man operation can be opened up at low cost and low overhead, which then is able to hire telecommuting consultants to make up for additional manpower, and expertise needs.

Labor statistics demonstrate this new trend: around the end of the 20th Century, the average number of employees per each start-up was above 7, and around 4 ½ Million of the nation’s workforce was employed by a start-up business. In 2011, the average start-up hired an average of less than 5 workers, and the total workforce working at a start-up was less than 2 ½ Million (Bureau of Labor Statistics).

Let’s go back to the problem of ownership of the means of production. Marx saw this as a capitalist problem because it was the owners of capital that owned the means of production. This led to the exploitation of labor, dehumanization and commodification of the individual, and alienated him from his production. Marx urged the workers to grab the tools from their owners and rise up in revolution. But we now know that the problem was not one of capitalism, but rather one of the Industrial Age, and the State merely replaced the Capitalist in the Marxist society.

However in this ‘agent economy of telecompanies’ a whole new dynamic is taking shape that may very well solve such problems. In that same NYT article we read about the author of “The Lean Startup,” Eric Ries, who explains that Japanese manufacturers in the 1980’s learned the value of manufacturing in smaller batches. This revolution in manufacturing has evolved to a point where, “Now you can rent the means of production instead of owning them.”

Such trends fit in very well with what Alvin Toffler described as the Third Wave, which would replace the Second Wave, or Industrial Age. The agent economy reflects what Toffler referred to as the rise of the Prosumer, an individual who becomes partially or largely separated from the market and it’s dividing wedge of producer and consumer. The prosumer produces more on his own (a do-it-yourselfer so to speak) than the traditional producer/consumer (individual of the Industrial Age). It also reflects the trends he saw in corporations, moving towards a small is beautiful ethic; towards new franchising structures, a move away from concentration to dispersal, and a breakdown of the traditional management hierarchy.

This certainly is a constructivist trend. It is a Post-Modern development that has plenty of kinks to be worked out. The skyrocketing of healthcare is one of them. This transition to a new labor structure is perhaps one reason why unemployment remains sticky while the nation continues to move forward in production. Such levels of unemployment and the tight labor markets may very well induce more agent type entrepreneurship. But it will keep the labor markets tight for those who either do not want to take such entrepreneurial risks or lack a skill set for such a venture.

It also forces us to question political strategies that place emphasis on job creation through entrepreneurship over the development of education and the development of other social policies aimed at arming America to become more competitive. These trends suggest that entrepreneurs cannot be relied upon to create more jobs for the rest of the labor force. Instead, it may be more productive to arm the rest of the labor force, and especially the labor force of the future, with the skill sets and abilities to become their own agents, or telecompany entrepreneurs of Post-Modern America. Then there is that big thorn—the highest costing social assistance—our health care system, which needs to be fixed, allowing such Post-Modern laborers to be able to take care of their health in this new cultural evolution."
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The worker is easily exploitable in Marxist theory because he does not own the means of production, and is therefore at the will and whims of the owners of capital. But if we evolve into a society where most of the labor force owns the technology, the information, and/or the other commodities of the new age, and ownership of production is no longer a tool of subjugation, then the workers of the world have taken back ownership of their own souls. They have grabbed their own control over their own means of production----which is the whole enticement of communism as a political theory.

 

it can work but i dont think a country will prosper under it. now china can be an example that im wrong but if you see the suicide rate there that tells you that it isnt very good for the people there. so to me it depends on what you mean by "work". because clearly its working in the sense that they are a superpower there but when people are making 32 cents an hour that isnt "working" to me

 

It can if people stop having negative ideas about the system. Read works by Karl Marx. And just another thought for a country to be considered communist in my
Mind they should follow most of what Karl Marx wrote about.

 

Would Marx have been happy if he were a worker?

 

Technically China is "Communist with Chinese Characteristics".

 

Good one!

He probably rationalized that he would be happy, but I'm sure after a month or two struggling in the fields, or working in the factory...

By the same token---would those Laotian students, who learned about communist principals while studying in Paris, and then founded the Khmer Rouge, be happy as peasant farmers?

 

Talking about Pathet Lao or Khmer Rouge? (Laotian 'Laos' communists or Kampuchean 'Cambodia' communists)

Pol Pot, although unsuccessful, is a fine example of how the movement from socialism to communism, where true equality of all is achieved, can be finally accomplished and 'MADE' to work by eliminating capitalism and returning to an agrarian society.

ANY form of government can be MADE to work, but the real question we should be asking is "Is there a single form of government that everyone would find acceptable without infringing greatly upon the sovereignty of individuals?"

IMHO there exists no such form of government and therefore we are best served by having minimal central government, and most power exercised at the lowest levels of government which allows individuals the freedom to move about in pursuit of the happiness they desire, and are entitled to according to our Declaration of Independence as written by Thomas Jefferson.

 

Yeah man, that sounds great.

Oh hang on, I just remembered; Khamer Rouge killed a bunch of people just like me because they didn't fit in with their vision.

 

They're all equal when they're all in a grave.

 

A truly classless society is one in which the extremes have been removed by one means or another.

 

So, you're OK with killing me to get your ideal world?

It's a yes or no question.

 

are you serious?

and hey china works. but it is a repressive gov't and i'd much rather live over here

 

i will say this though: china's economy was callapsing so they had to make some reforms to get them where they are now.

BUT why communism really doesnt work,, is this
there will alwayz in any society, in any country, be those, or that 1 person to try and get more,, and more power. look at stalin. look at hitler (i know he wasnt communist), look at saddam. are you starting to get my point?
in these communist countries, eventually you are going to get a caligula. already happened w/ stalin.

 

If you're trying to impose communism on me, yes. Been there, done that 1965-1968.

 

Government worker labor unions are the nearest extent of achieving communism as a form of government.

 

No, because it utterly ignores the reality of the human condition...IE, we are pack-oriented primates, and require some form of alpha to function as a society. That's why constitutional monarchy works so well, and that's why everyone in America thinks we have an emperor instead of a president.

In other words, it fails for the same reason that free market libertarianism fails...Because it was designed by humans for something other than actual humans to accomplish.

 

Utopias are built on bones. Big stacks of bones.

 

Utopias are unachievable on a large scale no matter how large we make the stacks of bones. Even at small scales they tend to deteriorate.

 

Utopias are impossible in any group larger than 7 people, and damn unlikely even at that size.

But they get built anyway - on stacks of bones, as I have mentioned - and the sputter along for a while (say, 1917 - 1991 or 1933-1945), and then collapse under even more bones.

Anything that ends in "ism" should be avoided like the plague.

 

I see freedomworks.org is making 'Atlas Shrugged' Part 1 available online today, and part 2 is going to the theaters October 12th.