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[Steven not Believin']

The free market always fails to maintain a supply/demand equivalency, proving once again that capitalism is always a failure.

[jimwalton]

Every economic and political system has its strengths and weakness. Capitalism has shown itself to be far more capable of success and sustenance than Marxism, Communism, totalitarianism, or monarchies. While capitalism is rife with abuses and failures, it is still the most workable economic strategy for world economic health.

[Steven Not Believin']

Well, capitalism is the best system we've had so far, but that was also true of feudalism before it collapsed and was replaced by capitalism, so I don't really see capitalism's successes as being a reason not to work towards a better system. And while capitalism is better at producing vast amounts of wealth it tends to keep that wealth in the hands of a few.

[jimwalton]

Agreed that capitalism produces vast amounts of wealth to keep it in the hands of the few, but my observations were the same of Communism. The fat cats in the Kremlin and in Beijing were living like royalty while the farmers and industrial workers were living in poverty. Feudalism, monarchies, marxism all suffer from the same weakness: human nature.

Francis Fukuyama, neo-Hegelian philosopher, in an essay from about 20 years ago wrote that democratic capitalism was the last great idea. He said: History is built on great ideas. A great idea comes along. A society wraps itself around that idea and expresses that idea in its culture. When that idea is exhausted, a new society comes along with another great idea. And so on. We have come to the end of history, because the last great idea has been expressed. There are no new ideas to appear on the human scene. The future indefinitely will be wrapped around this last great idea of human history, which is Democratic Capitalism. The two ideological challenges to democratic capitalism in the 20th century have been vanquished: fascism and marxist socialism. Nothing can compete any longer against democratic capitalism. Democratic capitalism is the wave of the future.

Fascism and Marxist socialism have both been weighed in the balances and found wanting. (Not that Democratic Capitalism is the light of glory. It is, as you and I both agree, full of problems and weaknesses, as is any political-economic system.)

[Steven Not Believin']

I would certainly agree with your assessment of the USSR and China. The Soviet Union was by-and-large a failure, and China was even worse. However, socialism has as a necessary condition: worker control of the means of production. State control of the means of production is no less exploitative than capitalist control of those means. I do think that critical analysis of the failures of past attempts at moving past capitalism are essential to any future socialist project. However it's hard for me to accept the notion that capitalism is the end point of the dialectic. Capitalism thrives on exploitation. Exploitation isn't essential to success but it makes it easier. To talk on human nature, capitalism rewards the darker aspects of human nature, exploitation and control. And obviously I hate fascism with a passion, so I need no convincing on its failures.

Also, as an aside I'm glad we can have this conversation and that you are willing to listen and provide criticism. That's important and it's healthy. Living in an echo chamber does nothing for progress.

[jimwalton]

I think it's fair to say all political/economic systems thrive on exploitation. We can rightly condemn something of every system imaginable because of the common denominator: human control. What is even worse, though, is anarchy, because it's a destructive means to a destructive end, with no input to lead us anywhere near a place of order and justice. In order to survive as a species with some sort of reasonable social contract, we need to choose an authoritative structure that will get us as close as we can to a position of reason, fairness, justice, and peace. Democratic capitalism, despite its intense failures, has been far more successful in that regard than fascism or marxism, and assuredly more successful than anarchy could ever achieve. The problem, according to Fukuyama, is that all the alternatives have been presented. There are no other ideas. Democratic capitalism, for all its foibles, is the most civilized approach to governance. It is the responsibility of all the people to be watchdogs over it to keep it just and not exploitative. It's government of the people, by the people, and for the people. A just, moral society is the only hope for a just and moral governmental model, but justice and morality have their greatest possible impact in democratic capitalism.

[Steven Not Believin']

I deny that's an accurate representation of Anarchism, though. Anarchism is about community control and organizing around community and workers' councils. It's not an absence of order, it is a rejection of hierarchy and state. Communities would self-govern and self-police for the good of all people.

And there are examples of successful anarchist organization during the Spanish Civil War and with Makhno in the Ukraine during the Russian Civil War.

[jimwalton]

Anarchism is a rejection of hierarchy, but community control and workers' councils are going fail at self-governance and self-policing for the same reason the state fails: the will to power. As anyone versed in group dynamics will confirm, any assemblage of people will subdivide into hierarchies of control and power. You can't escape exploitation by simple rather than complex structures, and I can guarantee you that communities will govern with the same subsets of domination, injustice, exploitation and inequalities that are present in state hierarchies. Again, it's human will to power and the drive of pride that ends in corruption that is present in all systems, anarchy included.