Originally Posted by
daft punk
Capitalism did work, it got rid of feudalism and that enabled the productive forces to be developed. It created the working class. The working class are educated and used to working in groups (unlike feudal peasants). Therefore, there is no real reason why they couldnt take over running the economy, after all, they are the economy, they are the ones doing everything. Marx said that capitalism was progressive and at certain times Marxists did support bourgeois revolutions (I mean before 1900, not Stalinism). For instance Marx supported the North in the American civil war.
But then capitalism started to become obsolete. The first major sign was when the capitalist powers errupted into WW1. This was down to Germany being a late developer but a fast one and wanting to not only join the big boys but become the alpha male. Of course that had to be stopped, and why not invade Iraq for oil while we are at it? No harm in that eh? After 3 million died the Russians said sod this for a game of soldiers.
Then we had Great Depression, fascism, and the world war round 2.
Only America emerged unscathed, in fact it emerged better off, and embarked on a round of global domination exercises. In the process they helped a few chosen countries get off the ground, eg Japan and South Korea. They had loads of wars and millions more died. In fact they nearly nuked China which would have been WW3.
Now the score is another world recession, loads of messy business eg Afghanistan, and half the world on less than $3 per day, with inequality increasing and inequality the cause of the recession.
Capitalism is in the doldrums, with low investment in manufacturing for decades, and the capitalists in the west giving up on real capitalism, resorting to playing the financial markets instead.
Do you have any idea how well capitalism has worked at getting the entire world out of it's poverty? You talk about how half the world lives off of $3 a day. Great. Do you know how much poverty and starvation there was before capitalism? Basically everywhere but western Europe had to face that. Now all of Europe, much of Asia, and all of North America is industrialized with a standard of living that would knock Adam Smith's socks off.
The single greatest age of discovery and advancement has occured under capitalism. Millions, billions even have been lifted out of poverty and now no longer have to worry about food shortages or their family members dying of such trivial things such as the cold or the flu or starvation. Sadly there are still plenty of people below poverty, who still have to worry about things like that but fortunately it is making inroads, and places such as India are starting to look up.
What has socialism brought? The brutal killing of millions in the Ukraine, commune farms in Russia that produce so little they rely on grain from capitalist countries to survive. Factories that produce worthless trash products in order to meet quotas. That is what happened under socialism. They needed to kill millions of people for no reason just to industrialize themselves, and even then they became so unproductive and inefficient in the Soviet Union that it collapsed.
You may tell yourself and others that socialism isn't like that, but it is the closest example we have and even then Stalin needed to kill millions to get it off the ground. Capitalism runs by money, socialism runs by fear.
Last edited by penguin1634; Oct 08 2011 at 12:34 PM.
We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.
Benjamin Franklin
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