michael perelman wrote: > > Capitalism has had centuries to try to get it right. No country has > ever really instituted socialism, which began in poor countries with > serious external threats. Even so, the growth in the USSR and China was > impressive.
The debate between cb & David makes no sense to me at all, so I will take this paragraph in abstraction from its context. Capitalism _has_ gotten it right from the very beginning, and will continue to get it right as long as it merely exists, since "capitalism" is not an agent but a complex of relations. "Getting it right," then, can have no meaning other than continuing to exist. (Only abolition of the wage system can place a tombstone on the grave of this comples.) It is also incorrect, I think, to speak of a nation instituting or not instituting socialsm. Prior to the day/year/generation when humans look back and see no sign of capitalism in the days of their great grandfathers, socialism remains a PROCESS, a struggle, NOT something that can or can't be instituted. The socialist revolutions of the 20th century were merely part of that process, and viewed historically rather than metaphysically, they succeeded magnificently in what was their actual task (however their leaders may have conceived that task), namely bringing their nations into the 20th century, establishing abstract equality of "citizenship" as opposed to hierarchical place, and thereby (againin retrospect) produced the totally capitalist world that we live in for the first time. Possibly - just possibly, not certainly -- the actual struggle for socialism can now begin, though as Rosa Luxemburge (and after her Benjamin) argued, the outcome of the struggle between socialism and barbarism is by no means assured. One cannot impose blueprints on history. Carrol _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
