The Activist

The Socialist Ideal and the Capitalist World
The values of socialism are the exact opposite of those of capitalism: the principle of cooperation replaces that of acquisitive competition. The socialist vision is of a world without social classes, in which all people’s material needs are met and everyone is able to fully develop his or her creative potential. In such a world, the dichotomy between “work” and “leisure” is overcome. People are no longer forced to do the same thing their entire lives. Production is no longer the ruler of society but instead is subservient to society; when all economic and political institutions are democratically controlled, the economy is no longer a separate and privileged field upon which everything else depends. This doesn’t mean that under socialism work would become perpetually enjoyable, or that human beings would become angels, but humanity would finally be able to consciously control its own destiny and the arbitrary use of power would no longer be possible.

Democratic socialism is therefore the heir of the best aspects of classical liberalism. There is nothing wrong with the freedoms that classical liberalism holds dear: the freedoms of association, speech, press, assembly, and so on. The problem is that under capitalism these freedoms are greatly restricted and hollowed out. Liberal freedoms can only be fully secured in a socialist society, where property rights no longer take precedence over political, civil, and social rights.

Socialism is, therefore, not about authoritarian central planning or mere state ownership as existed in Russia, Eastern Europe, or China. It is not about replacing the rule of private capitalists with the rule of state bureaucrats. But it does involve replacing the dictatorship of market forces with deliberate, democratic economic coordination. Defenders of capitalism claim that this is technically infeasible, and many people accept their arguments. But there are real precursors and aspects of socialism that exist today, under capitalism.

• In Argentina, workers from Buenos Aires have formed worker-managed co-operatives by taking over factories abandoned by their former owners. Their success proves that workers don’t need bosses-arbitrary, authoritarian work relations are not necessary.
• There are also international “direct trading” networks which develop fair trade links between European consumers and cooperatives of small scale growers of coffee and cocoa in Africa and Latin America. In such a “socialized market” prices are determined by social objectives instead of commercial ones and non-economic values are prioritized.
• Much of the internet now runs on open-source software, written not for profit but for the pure satisfaction of creating a useful product. This anticipates a future in which productive social labor becomes an end in itself. It shows that private corporate property has become a constraint on the development of technology.
• A current capitalist goal is an automated shop floor, with functions such as purchasing, stock, and sales in the retail outlets linked electronically to the factory floor. The real problem is its complexity, which is a result of rivalry in profit making and the business secrecy that this requires. If sales could be predicted and planned in advance, then this would be workable-but it requires the end of the business cycle of “booms” and “busts,” which is impossible under capitalism. Despite the fact that companies spend millions in marketing efforts to discover consumer wants and to improve the usability of their products, the real problem is not what consumers want, but what they can afford to buy, and it is this element that is the most unpredictable of all and lies behind the operation of the business cycle. Fixing this problem requires the overcoming of the contradiction between private consumption and collective production.