Hi Dave --
Platt leans to the right, DMB and many others here lean to the left.
RMP tried to straddle the fence but in the end he too leans towards the
socialist side of the spectrum. He defends socialism because in theory
it's
intellectual, more moral, but lays it aside because by and large as
practiced it doesn't work. He defends capitalism because it works, but in
the same breath discounts it as less moral because it is not intellectual.
He is torn between his love of theory and his understanding that theories
are subject to the pragmatic test of how good they work. Nowhere is this
more crucial than at the social level.
I'm not an historian, but I don't see the basis for RMP's argument that
Socialism is "more intellectual or moral" than Capitalism. Certainly these
human qualities do not define the practice of the two contrasting political
ideologies. F. A. Hayek points out that Socialism is "authoritarian" in
that it makes property and the means of production subservient to
government, whereas Capitalism is basically "democratic", respecting the
right of individuals to own private property and the rewards of their own
productivity.
"It is rarely remembered now that socialism in its beginnings was frankly
authoritarian. It began quite openly as a reaction against the liberalism
of the French Revolution. The French writers who laid its foundation had no
doubt that their ideas could be put into practice only by a strong
dictatorial government. The first of modern planners, Saint-Simon,
predicted that those who did not obey his proposed planning boards would be
'treated as cattle.'
"Nobody saw more clearly than the great political thinker de Tocqueville
that democracy stands in an irreconcilable conflict with socialism:
'Democracy extends the sphere of individual freedom,' he said. 'Democracy
attaches all possible value to each man,' he said in 1848, 'while socialism
makes each man a mere agent, a mere number'. Democracy and socialism have
nothing in common but one word: equality. But notice the difference: while
democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint
and servitude."
"To allay these suspicions and to harness to its cart the strongest of all
political motives - the craving for freedom - socialists began increasingly
to make use of the promise of a 'new freedom.' Socialism was to bring
'economic freedom,' without which political freedom was 'not worth
ving.' --[Hayek: The Great Utopia]
I ask you, which is more "intellectual" -- a centralized government that
holds all the power and controls the people as a collective society, or
individuals who freely exercise their power to produce wealth and elect
government officials to represent them?
Speaking for myself, even if it were true that centralized power and state
control are necessary for an "optimally effective" economy, I would opt for
the preservation of individual liberty and free enterprise. (Incidentally,
Adam Smith was wrong "that the amount of the world's wealth remained
constant and that a state could only increase its wealth at the expense of
another state." People and resources, not the state, are the creators of
wealth.)
As for all this talk about the "morality of Socialism" as opposed to the
"greed of Capitalism", I suspect most of the MD participants privately would
concur with me.
Thanks for this exposition, though, David. It is well done and obviously
thought-provoking.
Best regards,
Ham
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