That’s not a socialist state. It’s a capitalist state with welfare. If the political structure of the state itself has not been reworked to put the workers in power what you’re describing is just a state where the bourgeoisie (who control power) have decided to do welfare, usually for their own benefit such as reducing revolutionary energy by providing the workers with concessions (the welfare state). That is social democracy.
You do not have socialism without overthrowing the hierarchy that places the bourgeoisie as the ruling class:
Capitalism = Capitalists in power. Proles repressed.
Socialism = Proletariat in power. Capitalists repressed.
Communism = No more classes, only 1 class because the bourgeoisie have been completely phased out.
Representative “democracy” alienates the common man from the political process while maintaining a semblance of democracy. For this reason it is the ideal political form for capitalism, an economic system which alienates power from the masses and concentrates it in the hands of a few.
Class interests are the primary axis on which all political activity turns. Getting the working class to
does not help them, it helps those in power.
Representation is necessary as a matter of scale, though. There are other issues with small r republicanism that are more specifically nefarious, like the legalization of bribery, the tilting of power towards land owners via the senate, etc.
With modern technology I wonder how necessary representative style governments really are. Electronic voting already exists and works quite well, and is probably the most secure form of voting as long as it can be audited. Of course, at some point administration has to come down to individuals, but as long as those individuals are held accountable in some way then it seems that the actual democratic step (i.e. voting on policy) need not be mediated through representatives as is oft repeated to justify the status quo.
You might have been referring to this with republicanism, but there are different types of representation, too. Parliamentary democracies are not obligated to obey the wishes of their subjects, whereas soviet (council) democracies are a form of direct democracy, where representatives are merely delegates and are obligated to obey/communicate the wishes of their subjects. In my comment above I had in mind the parliamentary type, since that is the kind in which there is a buffer between citizens and political institutions which is used by the bourgeoisie to suppress changes which would undermine capital.
First step is abolishing wage labor and private property. Transitional political forms take on some form of direct democracy, probably something similar to soviet councils.
What about the absolute lack of “representative democracy” we experience under capitalism?
I’d argue that the capitalist system is more at odds with representative democracy than other systems mentioned. Most workers have no say in what is produced, who produces it, how they are paid, how much products are sold for, etc. Instead, we end up with figurehead CEO’s and nameless investors making all of those decisions, and of course they do everything to minimize costs, maximize profits, and disempower workers so that they can collect billions of dollars at the expense of the workers who actually make their companies run. If we had representative democracy do you think we’d have billionaires?
Whataboutism is a meaningless brainworm which the user invokes in order to ignore their own cognitive dissonance and inconsistent standards. You cry “whataboutism” when @[email protected] was correct to point out your own double standard. “All of this sounds at odds with representative democracy” implies that you believe genuine democracy is something we currently stand to lose.
What you need to understand is that Marxists are not interested in imposing utopian futures on the world. “What do you have in its place?” is the wrong question. Better questions: What currently prevents genuine democracy? What are the material conditions which both produce and maintain it? Then you get to work on changing those material conditions and removing the real basis which produces the problems.
Richard Wolff, a prominent marxist academic, talks often about a socialist system where democracy is employed in the workplace. He focuses less on reforms or abolition at the state/government-level, and instead emphasizes the bottom-up changes that giving workers power and agency (i.e., making it so workers at all levels are involved in the decision-making process of the companies that require their labour) provides. He has a youtube channel and podcast called “Democracy at Work” that provides great introductions to how he views things, and he has worthwhile podcast appearances on other podcasts like Lex Fridman’s, for example.
Consider how impactful countries like Wal-Mart or Amazon are in our daily lives. Their economic throughputs are larger than all but a few countries in the world, and their workforce populations are also larger than many countries. Clearly they aren’t organized as representative democracies?
Another question I wonder related to this, is what exactly makes “representative democracy” the gold standard? Is it even the gold standard?
Thanks for the answer. I consider myself a SocDem, at least in some areas, so what you describe sounds interesting. I can see the benefit of shared ownership and cooperatives, and wish we had more of them. So what you’re describing doesn’t sound alien.
I’m surprised at your highlighting of Amazon and Wal-Mart. You’re right, they are not democracies, but I think many would point to them as some of the worst examples of capitalism. In addition the reason they are so bad is because (Amazon in particular) is run as a dictatorship with a high level of exploitation of those at the bottom. Bezos is in control, and the workers have no say.
To your final question, I think the only thing that makes me view representative democracy in any kind of positive light is that everything else appears to be even more awful. Most people seem to head either towards a dictator who does the right thing (Ok there Anakin) or anarchy. Both are horrible. So until I hear a better idea, rep-dem for me.
The people en-masse being in control. Representative democracy, by it’s nature, creates a “ruling class”, the representatives. Only a direct democracy asks the people what they think of each and every issue, but that is impractical in my opinion.
…and I don’t feel that leaders of state owned capital are particularly any different from leaders of privately owned capital. Both are individuals in privileged positions of power that work to maintain themselves above the workers. To me it’s not the ownership that matters but the fact you have a ruling class at all.
Hence, what political system is required for a truly equal society?
The people en-masse being in control. Representative democracy, by it’s nature, creates a “ruling class”, the representatives. Only a direct democracy asks the people what they think of each and every issue, but that is impractical in my opinion.
No, that’s just our government/s. You can have representative democracy where representatives are beholden to their constituents, and where they are easily recallable if they do not follow those interests to a T. This is one of the many reforms socialists want to make to the democratic process.
…and I don’t feel that leaders of state owned capital are particularly any different from leaders of privately owned capital. Both are individuals in privileged positions of power that work to maintain themselves above the workers. To me it’s not the ownership that matters but the fact you have a ruling class at all.
Genuinely no offense but this is a position born of ignorance. Under a democratically run state economy the representatives only get rich through corruption. Under capitalism the owners get rich through the extraction of surplus labor value and the politicians in their pockets get rich through corruption.
Corruption is a drop in the bucket compared to surplus labor value theft. Compare how wealthy Pelosi is to how wealthy Jeff Bezos or Elon musk are. And people like Pelosi are only that rich because of insider trading, which couldn’t exist under socialism.
I learned that “capitalism” is an economic system, not a system of government.
Consider for 3 seconds that what you “learned” about the world is a product of the system that produced it
Capitalism is a system of government, and in capitalist countries, they teach their citizens that capitalism is at at odds with the state and not working in conjunction with it
Then what would be, according to you, the difference between a country with a democratic systen of government and a country with a “capitalist” system of government? Assuming both use capitalism as their economic system.
‘democratic’ is used today a lot of the time to describe neoliberal capitalist governments that are controlled (influenced greatly) by the capitalist class
for example we can look at somewhere like the US and point out how the majority of people in government are all rich capitalists and how through lobbying and campaign ‘donations’ and owning the media the capitalist class controls the government
marxists call this kind of state a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (capital), as opposed to a dictatorship of the proletariat (workers)
dictatorship here meaning general ‘rule’ not the specific meaning that the word has taken on more recently
so ‘democratic’ capitalist countries that exist today are under the “rule of the capitalist class” or “dictatorship of capital”
so if you wanted an actual democratic (in the real sense of the word) government, you’d need a government which is controlled by the majority of people, that is, the workers, a dictatorship of the proletariat
under such a system capitalists cannot be allowed to have influence on the government, which is something that is not really possible unless you implement tight capital controls like they do in China
the reason being that capital flight is a very real threat to a capitalist economy, and having that power over a government lets the capitalist class dictate terms and change laws to be favorable to them despite what the majority of people might want.
so to answer your question, the only way to have a government with a capitalist system not be controlled by capitalists is through suppression of the capitalist class, if they are allowed to have influence then you no longer have actual democracy.
What exactly do you mean by “capitalist class”? Is that only the people that dont work at all?
And why cant those capitalists and the “working class” BOTH have power over the government? Disregarding lobbying for a moment, how does each member of the “capitalist class” have any more influence on the government than each member of the “working class”?
the class of people that makes a living through ownership of capital, they do not need to sell their labor, as opposed to workers which need to sell their labor to survive.
Is that only the people that dont work at all?
it is people who do not need to sell their labor to survive, they make their living through taking the surplus labor value that workers generate. (they may also choose to work, but this doesn’t change their position, they have a choice to work if they desire, unlike a worker which doesn’t have a choice)
And why cant those capitalists and the “working class” BOTH have power over the government?
because one class here has more leverage over the government, and so in a conflict of interest the government sides with the capitalist class as can be seen during any economic crisis (or crisis of any kind really) where austerity measures are immediately implemented and worker rights are rolled back.
how does each member of the “capitalist class” have any more influence on the government than each member of the “working class”?
they do on average, but you’ll easily be able to find a small capitalist that doesn’t have more power than you to control the government.
the thing is, here we are talking classes and class interests, if those who control the government belong to the capitalist class then the government will do things that benefit most members of the capitalist class, there doesn’t need to be direct control by every single capitalist for them to benefit from capitalist control over the government.
to give an example, regulatory protections to protect employees from hazardous working conditions may be removed through the direct influence of amazon or some other large corporation, but, smaller capitalist corporations also benefit from this as they stop having to take on the cost of providing a safer working environment (they can exploit their workers more fully), in this way, the government is controlled by capitalist, but not every capitalist controls the government, yet the government works for the benefit of the entire capitalist class.
if those who control the government belong to the capitalist class then […]
regulatory protections […] may be removed through the direct influence of amazon or some other large corporation
This I dont understand because if everybody votes, the government represent the interests of the whole population (still disregarding lobbying), doesnt it? And if lobbying were the issue, we could just ban it…
if everybody votes, the government represent the interests of the whole population
This is simply false, representatives in the majority of neoliberal ‘democracies’ are not held accountable to the wishes of the people they are representing, and cannot be removed from their position with a simple majority from those who elected them, so then these people look towards those with influence (corporations, rich capitalists, etc) and then do things to please those groups in order to gain favor with them, like campaign donations, lavish luxurious trips and vacations, positive coverage in capitalist owned media, etc
(still disregarding lobbying)
Lobbying is not the only lever of power the capitalist class uses, the private ownership of mainstream media by capitalists means that all of their coverage would push capitalist interests, campaign ‘donations’ and funding is also used for control, to choose the candidates who represent your interest as a capitalist the best to win, and the candidates themselves are more likely to win if they come from a rich well connected upperclass background (meaning they are most likely capitalists themselves)
Regulatory capture is also a thing
There’s also the fact that capitalists also fund think tanks to publish studies that support their interests (no matter how far from the truth they have to stray) and are then used to support legislation that is in their favor (see global fossil capital and climate change), there’s also lots of astroturfing that goes on
And if lobbying were the issue, we could just ban it…
Even if you outlaw lobbying capitalists will still control the government in a myriad of other ways, capital flight being an example I didn’t mention in this reply yet,but this one is very strong and the US/WTO/IMF enforce it on as many countries as they can, the only way to have actual democracy is through forceful suppression of the capitalist class, only then you could imagine having a government actually controlled by the people while still having a capitalist market and a capitalist class
Amazed that I had to scroll down this far to read this. Capitalism does not magically create a fair society through the creation of value (which seems to be what its proponents keep saying: investors generating economic activity and wealth).
But similarly you could have a socialist economic system, with no real democracy. Which, as we’ve seen, devolves into a corrupt oligarchy.
We’ve seemingly lost this perspective in the decades since WWII, but a solid representative parliamentary democracy and separation of powers are the best way to create and maintain a fair society. It requires some other conditions too, like good education, free press, etc. but the core is a system where power is distributed and temporary, depending on democratic processes (elections).
This democratic legitimacy is what we should be defending at all costs, imho. It’s not sexy, though.
I learned that “capitalism” is an economic system, not a system of government.
So you could have a socialist state that funds essentials like healthcare and transportation through taxes with a market (capitalist) economy.
That’s not a socialist state. It’s a capitalist state with welfare. If the political structure of the state itself has not been reworked to put the workers in power what you’re describing is just a state where the bourgeoisie (who control power) have decided to do welfare, usually for their own benefit such as reducing revolutionary energy by providing the workers with concessions (the welfare state). That is social democracy.
You do not have socialism without overthrowing the hierarchy that places the bourgeoisie as the ruling class:
Capitalism = Capitalists in power. Proles repressed.
Socialism = Proletariat in power. Capitalists repressed.
Communism = No more classes, only 1 class because the bourgeoisie have been completely phased out.
This just made China’s system click in my mind. Thanks Awoo
All of this sounds at odds with representative democracy. What political system would you see working with socialism as you describe it?
Representative “democracy” alienates the common man from the political process while maintaining a semblance of democracy. For this reason it is the ideal political form for capitalism, an economic system which alienates power from the masses and concentrates it in the hands of a few.
Class interests are the primary axis on which all political activity turns. Getting the working class to
does not help them, it helps those in power.
Representation is necessary as a matter of scale, though. There are other issues with small r republicanism that are more specifically nefarious, like the legalization of bribery, the tilting of power towards land owners via the senate, etc.
With modern technology I wonder how necessary representative style governments really are. Electronic voting already exists and works quite well, and is probably the most secure form of voting as long as it can be audited. Of course, at some point administration has to come down to individuals, but as long as those individuals are held accountable in some way then it seems that the actual democratic step (i.e. voting on policy) need not be mediated through representatives as is oft repeated to justify the status quo.
You might have been referring to this with republicanism, but there are different types of representation, too. Parliamentary democracies are not obligated to obey the wishes of their subjects, whereas soviet (council) democracies are a form of direct democracy, where representatives are merely delegates and are obligated to obey/communicate the wishes of their subjects. In my comment above I had in mind the parliamentary type, since that is the kind in which there is a buffer between citizens and political institutions which is used by the bourgeoisie to suppress changes which would undermine capital.
…and so what do you have instead?
First step is abolishing wage labor and private property. Transitional political forms take on some form of direct democracy, probably something similar to soviet councils.
What about the absolute lack of “representative democracy” we experience under capitalism?
I’d argue that the capitalist system is more at odds with representative democracy than other systems mentioned. Most workers have no say in what is produced, who produces it, how they are paid, how much products are sold for, etc. Instead, we end up with figurehead CEO’s and nameless investors making all of those decisions, and of course they do everything to minimize costs, maximize profits, and disempower workers so that they can collect billions of dollars at the expense of the workers who actually make their companies run. If we had representative democracy do you think we’d have billionaires?
Literally “whataboutism”.
I’m not interested in how the current system is broken. That’s obvious. What do you have in it’s place?
Whataboutism is a meaningless brainworm which the user invokes in order to ignore their own cognitive dissonance and inconsistent standards. You cry “whataboutism” when @[email protected] was correct to point out your own double standard. “All of this sounds at odds with representative democracy” implies that you believe genuine democracy is something we currently stand to lose.
What you need to understand is that Marxists are not interested in imposing utopian futures on the world. “What do you have in its place?” is the wrong question. Better questions: What currently prevents genuine democracy? What are the material conditions which both produce and maintain it? Then you get to work on changing those material conditions and removing the real basis which produces the problems.
Richard Wolff, a prominent marxist academic, talks often about a socialist system where democracy is employed in the workplace. He focuses less on reforms or abolition at the state/government-level, and instead emphasizes the bottom-up changes that giving workers power and agency (i.e., making it so workers at all levels are involved in the decision-making process of the companies that require their labour) provides. He has a youtube channel and podcast called “Democracy at Work” that provides great introductions to how he views things, and he has worthwhile podcast appearances on other podcasts like Lex Fridman’s, for example.
Consider how impactful countries like Wal-Mart or Amazon are in our daily lives. Their economic throughputs are larger than all but a few countries in the world, and their workforce populations are also larger than many countries. Clearly they aren’t organized as representative democracies?
Another question I wonder related to this, is what exactly makes “representative democracy” the gold standard? Is it even the gold standard?
Thanks for the answer. I consider myself a SocDem, at least in some areas, so what you describe sounds interesting. I can see the benefit of shared ownership and cooperatives, and wish we had more of them. So what you’re describing doesn’t sound alien.
I’m surprised at your highlighting of Amazon and Wal-Mart. You’re right, they are not democracies, but I think many would point to them as some of the worst examples of capitalism. In addition the reason they are so bad is because (Amazon in particular) is run as a dictatorship with a high level of exploitation of those at the bottom. Bezos is in control, and the workers have no say.
To your final question, I think the only thing that makes me view representative democracy in any kind of positive light is that everything else appears to be even more awful. Most people seem to head either towards a dictator who does the right thing (Ok there Anakin) or anarchy. Both are horrible. So until I hear a better idea, rep-dem for me.
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What specifically is at odds?
I would guess they’re reacting to the idea of “repressing” capitalists
The people en-masse being in control. Representative democracy, by it’s nature, creates a “ruling class”, the representatives. Only a direct democracy asks the people what they think of each and every issue, but that is impractical in my opinion.
…and I don’t feel that leaders of state owned capital are particularly any different from leaders of privately owned capital. Both are individuals in privileged positions of power that work to maintain themselves above the workers. To me it’s not the ownership that matters but the fact you have a ruling class at all.
Hence, what political system is required for a truly equal society?
No, that’s just our government/s. You can have representative democracy where representatives are beholden to their constituents, and where they are easily recallable if they do not follow those interests to a T. This is one of the many reforms socialists want to make to the democratic process.
Genuinely no offense but this is a position born of ignorance. Under a democratically run state economy the representatives only get rich through corruption. Under capitalism the owners get rich through the extraction of surplus labor value and the politicians in their pockets get rich through corruption.
Corruption is a drop in the bucket compared to surplus labor value theft. Compare how wealthy Pelosi is to how wealthy Jeff Bezos or Elon musk are. And people like Pelosi are only that rich because of insider trading, which couldn’t exist under socialism.
Consider for 3 seconds that what you “learned” about the world is a product of the system that produced it
Capitalism is a system of government, and in capitalist countries, they teach their citizens that capitalism is at at odds with the state and not working in conjunction with it
Then what would be, according to you, the difference between a country with a democratic systen of government and a country with a “capitalist” system of government? Assuming both use capitalism as their economic system.
Bourgeois democracy vs proletarian democracy. Lenin wrote a lot about this.
Politics and economics are not independent of each other One explanation
‘democratic’ is used today a lot of the time to describe neoliberal capitalist governments that are controlled (influenced greatly) by the capitalist class
for example we can look at somewhere like the US and point out how the majority of people in government are all rich capitalists and how through lobbying and campaign ‘donations’ and owning the media the capitalist class controls the government
marxists call this kind of state a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (capital), as opposed to a dictatorship of the proletariat (workers)
dictatorship here meaning general ‘rule’ not the specific meaning that the word has taken on more recently
so ‘democratic’ capitalist countries that exist today are under the “rule of the capitalist class” or “dictatorship of capital”
so if you wanted an actual democratic (in the real sense of the word) government, you’d need a government which is controlled by the majority of people, that is, the workers, a dictatorship of the proletariat
under such a system capitalists cannot be allowed to have influence on the government, which is something that is not really possible unless you implement tight capital controls like they do in China
the reason being that capital flight is a very real threat to a capitalist economy, and having that power over a government lets the capitalist class dictate terms and change laws to be favorable to them despite what the majority of people might want.
so to answer your question, the only way to have a government with a capitalist system not be controlled by capitalists is through suppression of the capitalist class, if they are allowed to have influence then you no longer have actual democracy.
What exactly do you mean by “capitalist class”? Is that only the people that dont work at all?
And why cant those capitalists and the “working class” BOTH have power over the government? Disregarding lobbying for a moment, how does each member of the “capitalist class” have any more influence on the government than each member of the “working class”?
the class of people that makes a living through ownership of capital, they do not need to sell their labor, as opposed to workers which need to sell their labor to survive.
it is people who do not need to sell their labor to survive, they make their living through taking the surplus labor value that workers generate. (they may also choose to work, but this doesn’t change their position, they have a choice to work if they desire, unlike a worker which doesn’t have a choice)
because one class here has more leverage over the government, and so in a conflict of interest the government sides with the capitalist class as can be seen during any economic crisis (or crisis of any kind really) where austerity measures are immediately implemented and worker rights are rolled back.
they do on average, but you’ll easily be able to find a small capitalist that doesn’t have more power than you to control the government.
the thing is, here we are talking classes and class interests, if those who control the government belong to the capitalist class then the government will do things that benefit most members of the capitalist class, there doesn’t need to be direct control by every single capitalist for them to benefit from capitalist control over the government.
to give an example, regulatory protections to protect employees from hazardous working conditions may be removed through the direct influence of amazon or some other large corporation, but, smaller capitalist corporations also benefit from this as they stop having to take on the cost of providing a safer working environment (they can exploit their workers more fully), in this way, the government is controlled by capitalist, but not every capitalist controls the government, yet the government works for the benefit of the entire capitalist class.
This I dont understand because if everybody votes, the government represent the interests of the whole population (still disregarding lobbying), doesnt it? And if lobbying were the issue, we could just ban it…
This is simply false, representatives in the majority of neoliberal ‘democracies’ are not held accountable to the wishes of the people they are representing, and cannot be removed from their position with a simple majority from those who elected them, so then these people look towards those with influence (corporations, rich capitalists, etc) and then do things to please those groups in order to gain favor with them, like campaign donations, lavish luxurious trips and vacations, positive coverage in capitalist owned media, etc
Lobbying is not the only lever of power the capitalist class uses, the private ownership of mainstream media by capitalists means that all of their coverage would push capitalist interests, campaign ‘donations’ and funding is also used for control, to choose the candidates who represent your interest as a capitalist the best to win, and the candidates themselves are more likely to win if they come from a rich well connected upperclass background (meaning they are most likely capitalists themselves)
Regulatory capture is also a thing
There’s also the fact that capitalists also fund think tanks to publish studies that support their interests (no matter how far from the truth they have to stray) and are then used to support legislation that is in their favor (see global fossil capital and climate change), there’s also lots of astroturfing that goes on
Even if you outlaw lobbying capitalists will still control the government in a myriad of other ways, capital flight being an example I didn’t mention in this reply yet,but this one is very strong and the US/WTO/IMF enforce it on as many countries as they can, the only way to have actual democracy is through forceful suppression of the capitalist class, only then you could imagine having a government actually controlled by the people while still having a capitalist market and a capitalist class
Socialism is also an economic system.
Amazed that I had to scroll down this far to read this. Capitalism does not magically create a fair society through the creation of value (which seems to be what its proponents keep saying: investors generating economic activity and wealth). But similarly you could have a socialist economic system, with no real democracy. Which, as we’ve seen, devolves into a corrupt oligarchy. We’ve seemingly lost this perspective in the decades since WWII, but a solid representative parliamentary democracy and separation of powers are the best way to create and maintain a fair society. It requires some other conditions too, like good education, free press, etc. but the core is a system where power is distributed and temporary, depending on democratic processes (elections). This democratic legitimacy is what we should be defending at all costs, imho. It’s not sexy, though.
As opposed to the corrupt oligarchies liberal states are… I guess you just don’t call it corruption when it’s working as intended.