Lately I have been curious to know about libertarian socialism. The two terms seem to contradict each other, as I have absolutely no clue how a socialist society could exist without government coercion. The same goes for libertarian communism.
Could someone give me a simple breakdown of how this could possibly work?
Anenome:Disgree. Rights in one's self are inalienable. Maybe your right to a piece of property outside yourself is abandonable. But when it comes to rights in yourself you can only ever license that right to another, never abandon it.
I already know you disagree. We've been down this road before.
I'm assuming you mean "I believe that rights in one's self are inalienable" as opposed to what you said, which, if I take it literally, constitutes a factual claim. Anyways, what do you think is the difference between licensing a right to another and abandoning it? As I see it, if I abandon my right to life (for example) to one or more others, that means I license them to kill me if they so wish.
The keyboard is mightier than the gun.
Non parit potestas ipsius auctoritatem.
Voluntaryism Forum
Autolykos: I'm assuming you mean "I believe that rights in one's self are inalienable" as opposed to what you said, which, if I take it literally, constitutes a factual claim.
I'm assuming you mean "I believe that rights in one's self are inalienable" as opposed to what you said, which, if I take it literally, constitutes a factual claim.
No, I take it as a factual claim, since I don't think one can in fact alienate those rights.
Autolykos:Anyways, what do you think is the difference between licensing a right to another and abandoning it? As I see it, if I abandon my right to life (for example) to one or more others, that means I license them to kill me if they so wish.
The difference is future severance from that right. To abandon a right in your own property means to have no more say in it, which contradicts the inalienability of your will.
Even if I license my right to my life to another for the purpose of killing me, there is a passage of time between the license of it and the ending of that life, and I could break the contract during the period, change my mind. That affirms the inalienability.
Obviously once you're dead you're alienated from your rights in yourself--rights only make sense in the context of living things.
Under this rubric, the only way to abandon your rights in yourself is to die, you could not abandon any natural right and still be alive, all such farming out of your rights to another would be licensure.
If I may stick my nose a little deeper (I like this topic): this is indeed hard to tell I have tendency to agree with Anenome but...on the other hand by saying "you cannot abandon any natural right and still be alive" its taking a right away from you (and there is no way around this fact), the right to abandon your rights, just like killing yourself (which is also illegal by law) and is a right that doesn’t take away nobody else’s liberty or rights therefore could be legitimate.
I wouldn’t like to insert the notion of “passage of time” to justify the illegitimacy it seems a little artificial.
Anemone is basically saying that you can’t LIVE without rights even if you choose (just like the law says by the way) and that’s all he is saying. I would like to be able to explain why, but I guess it has something to do with the responsibility of your actions, or some way that affects others, because if it doesn’t affect others, I really can’t tell YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO GIVE UP YOUR RIGHTS. (says who? I want to and nobody is going to force me! Is it? Ironically maybe somebody had the right to force me because I have no rights)
So…the good news is this has nothing to do with the employer employee situation so we still on the right side here. And the other good news is that nobody is going to accept becoming a slave and if they do maybe they didn’t deserve having any rights to start with.
Anenome:No, I take it as a factual claim, since I don't think one can in fact alienate those rights.
Then either you're committing a category mistake or we're each talking about something different when we use the word "right(s)". As I see it, rights are entirely normative, hence there can't be any factual claims about them per se.
Anenome:The difference is future severance from that right. To abandon a right in your own property means to have no more say in it, which contradicts the inalienability of your will.
I think a person can certainly possess something without owning it. That just means it's owned by someone else. Hence I think a person can be in possession of himself without necessarily owning himself. Again, that just means he's owned by someone else.
Basically, possession and ownership are two different things to me. Possession is descriptive, while ownership is normative. Possession concerns facts, while ownership concerns rights.
Anenome:Even if I license my right to my life to another for the purpose of killing me, there is a passage of time between the license of it and the ending of that life, and I could break the contract during the period, change my mind. That affirms the inalienability.
By that reasoning, you must logically consider it to be legitimate for a person to change his mind after conducting a trade with someone. As I see it, once rights are abandoned, they can't be reacquired unilaterally. The only way to do that is by homesteading.
Anenome:Obviously once you're dead you're alienated from your rights in yourself--rights only make sense in the context of living things. Under this rubric, the only way to abandon your rights in yourself is to die, you could not abandon any natural right and still be alive, all such farming out of your rights to another would be licensure.
Please explain how it's possible to derive an "ought" from an "is".
The only valid 'is-ought' constructions in my view are those which correlate is's.
Such as, if you want to live, you ought not eat that poison mushroom which will kill you. Or, if you want to live, you ought to drink sufficient quantities of water, as water is necessary to survive.
I think we can assume most people inherently accept the value of continuing to live, generally.
"DemiProphet"
Its quite simple what I want, and I dont want to impose nothing neither I need to, I just think would be better for everyone (including me) to stop socialist rhetoric, as you think the opposite, nothing wrong with that and its quite simple.
I thing it would be much better if you would to accept true socialism, where everyone would get the full product of his labor.
Since I respect democracy and individual freedom
Socialism is about that. We want all people to be in control of their lives, and that everyone gets to participate in all decision making where decisions affect him. Not just that gets to decide to with master to subordinate so that master can order him what to do, how to do it, and how much to be payed for that.
unfortunatelly 95% of lefthists are not like you.
Depends who are you talking about. Leninist (who I suppose everyone means when they say "left" today) have nothing to do with socialism as espused by Owen, Hodgskin, Thompson, Spooner, Tucker, Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Berkman, Marx, Kautsky, Pannekoek, Chernov, and similar socialist theorist, they all talk about non-hierarchical systems of freedom for people to be the masters of their lives.
The problem is that for decades the two major propaganda centers- USA and USSR both called Leninist countries "socialism", which is false, and it's pretty hard for people to get around such strong propaganda and find out the truth.
Malachi
so its possible? Or did you mean to say "I have alienated someone elses labor before, I am a criminal in my own eyes"
I was an employee too. The owner did nothing, he had about a dozen gas pumps, and and he hired managers to manage about two dozen workers on each one. We all alienated our work to him, like every employee does to it's employer.
Ok Im aware that most comunists (or whatever you call them I dont even know anymore) reject most connections with any "comunist" regime, they always say "that was not real comunism, not real marxism,. not real socialism, and so on..." (unfortunatelly many dont even bother to reject the connection as if they are not ashamed (or aware) of all they did)
Which could lead a reasonable person to make the question: why? is it possible that maybe our system its only possible in theory and thats why it could never be properly implanted?
Even in my countrie the left always says that the policies of the government are never left, everything is always right, eventhou there is basically no party that has the courage to call themselves right wing. Their theories never failed they were just never put into practice correctly...therefore they are unattackable and above any criticism.
why? is it possible that maybe our system its only possible in theory and thats why it could never be properly implanted?
Socialism has been established twice in Europe, but it was destroyed, in the first example (Free Territory) by the Red Army, and in the second (Revolutionary Spain) by Franco's fascsist troops together with the Comintern commanded troops.
The second example, of Revolutinary Spain, shows that socialism is not only good in theory, but that it is very effective and beneficial for a society to organize itself according to socialism, and, as oppossed to Leninist countries like USSR, there doesn't need to be totalitarianism or suffering for anyone in order to modernize the country and get general well-being.
stsoc: The second example, of Revolutinary Spain, shows that socialism is not only good in theory, but that it is very effective and beneficial for a society to organize itself according to socialism, and, as oppossed to Leninist countries like USSR, there doesn't need to be totalitarianism or suffering for anyone in order to modernize the country and get general well-being.
Riiight. How do you respond to socialism's economic calculation problem then?
It doesn't apply to socialism, since in socialism there is no central planning. Socialism can exist with a free market, it's then called mutualism.
But, yes, there are socialist whose preferences are collectivist (myself included), and in socialism, they would not operate on the market, but would form (Bakuninist) collectives or (Kropotkinist) communes.
Here is a general socialist response:
http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/secI1.html#seci11
and the next chapter gives a response from a collectivist perspective.
I guess that if the United States became communist even "Soviet fashion" would be also great for a couple of months for 98% of the people like you all spending Bill Gates money and all would be a great party. But that doesnt make it right neither makes it good at the long term.
So...honestly I find it even hard to believe those examples really existed but taking your word, for how long did they last? because a couple of months would mean nothing to me (not to ask if they were so good why they didnt survive even after being destroyed).
I guess that if the United States became communist even "Soviet fashion" would be also great for a couple of months for 98% of the people like
USSR was not a communist or a socialist country, it was state capitalist, and no socialist (whether mutualist, collectivist, or communist) is in favor of state capitalism, and we see it as worse then both mixed economy and laissez faire capitalism (even though we've never seen laissez faire capitalism).
I find it even hard to believe those examples really existed but taking your word
Check online, and read some books about Ukranian Free Terrirory, and about Spanish Revolution, Revolutionary Catalonia and Andalusia.
(not to ask if they were so good why they didnt survive even after being destroyed).
Yes, don't ask that, because it's a stupid question.
Anenome:The only valid 'is-ought' constructions in my view are those which correlate is's. Such as, if you want to live, you ought not eat that poison mushroom which will kill you. Or, if you want to live, you ought to drink sufficient quantities of water, as water is necessary to survive. I think we can assume most people inherently accept the value of continuing to live, generally.
Okay, but my statement was in reference to you implicitly asserting that rights exist in an objective/descriptive sense as opposed to a subjective/normative sense. To be clear, I don't think rights exist in the former sense at all.
Actually is not a stupid question things that are good and work perfectly as a system tend to prevail while bad systems tend to disappear, people that lived under that paradise would still be fighting to get it back. But ok you think is stupid Im not trying to look smart anyway, just trying to find out how smart your theorie is.
About USSR being state capitalist....Im far from an expert on economics but I guess that is not capitalism at all since there was no free market at all, and there was no economic freedoom, so things like state capitalism dont make any sense to me. But OK lets just say was "something else".
Actually is not a stupid question
I guess that is not capitalism at all since there was no free market at all
You guess wrong. Capitalism is not defined by markets, but by it's notion of property. Markets can exist in a non-capitalist economy, like mutualism (a type of socialism), and capitalism can exist without markets (state capitalism). Laissez faire capitalism is not the only type of capitalism, state capitalism and mixed economy capitalism are the other two kinds. Laissez faire capitalism is just the only type of capitalism that never existed.