LBird
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
alanjjohnstone wrote: “What extent should local democracy have over issues that have wider implications?”
That’s the key political point, alan.
There has to be a higher political authority than the ‘local’, to determine ‘extent’.
Within democratic socialism, I would call this higher political authority ‘democratic humanity’. It would be the highest court of humanity.
Any other ‘final court’, or ‘ultimate authority’, whether individual, elite or divine, would not be ‘democratic’.
MS wrote: “I do not think that he said what you are saying. The SPGB/WSM has always supported the democratic possession of the means of production by the vast majority of the working class, if that is not a democracy, what can we call it?”
But I entirely agree with this political statement, MS.
But, given the arguments made here by the SPGB members and supporters, why don’t they class ‘physics’, for example (we could also ask about ‘maths’ or ‘chemistry’) as a part of ‘the means of production’?
It seems, as I’ve said before, that the SPGB thinks ‘democratic socialism’ will be the democratic producers (your ‘working class’) controlling ‘widget production in factories’, but not ‘ideas production in universities’.
Thus, the SPGB separates what Marx unites – ‘theory and practice’, ‘thinking and doing’. ‘Social production’ requires ideas and actions, it is conscious activity.
So, MS, I can support your politics, but the SPGB can’t.
Lew, are you seriously suggesting that ‘democracy’ wasn’t at the heart of Marx’s political position?
Surely, every single thing Marx wrote, was underpinned by his democratic politics?
If you think that this view that ‘Marx is fundamentally democratic‘ is untrue, I think that the onus is on you to disprove it.
Perhaps we are now getting to the SPGB’s heart of darkness.
MS wrote: “Socialism/Communism will eliminate the concept of nations and borders, but it will not eliminate the cultural and local practice of some peoples around the world, and they would be able to do their own communal decisions”
You’ve expressed a very clear political position, MS.
My political question is ‘who determines what is a valid (in the eyes of humanity) ‘cultural and local practice’, within your ‘Socialism/Communism’?
Unless there is democratic control by humanity, then what would your society do with ‘locals’ who insist, for example, in cutting the clitorises off little girls? That is a dramatic example, but sums up the problem. It could be ‘locals’ who kill gays, ‘locals’ who are an elite and who want to maintain capitalist relations by force over their communities, etc.
Your political position, which is to leave power within ‘localities’ to the exclusion of the democratically-expressed wishes of humanity within socialism, would prevent us intervening in ‘practices’ which we democratically declare to be abhorrent.
alanjjohnstone wrote: “Humanity regularly votes BD’s views out of kilter since he is a member of an organisation that places its position to the vote. And that position is frequently rejected.”
The same happens to me and you, too, alan. And always will. Democracy involves majorities and minorities.
If you want to move the discussion onto ‘how will socialism organise its democratic production?’, that’s fine by me. It’s both an interesting and needed discussion, IMO.
But first, we have to agree that your notion of ‘democratic socialism’ is the same as my (and I claim, Marx’s) notion of ‘democratic socialism’.
I think ‘democratic socialism’ means all social production will be democratic. To me, the clue is in the name.
If you disagree, then fine, let’s discuss that issue first.
My first question is ‘who will be in control of this (portion?) of social production that is not under democratic control? And why term it ‘democratic socialism’ if all or parts of it are not democratic?
robbo, I’ve genuinely answered all the questions in your post, previously. You’re just ignoring what I say, so there doesn’t seem much point giving the same answers again.
The difference between us seems to be a political one – I’m a democrat, who regards society as the active subject; you regard individuals as the active subject, and so you reject democratic controls.
Bijou Drains wrote: “If, in a socialist society, a vote was held re Marx’s view of the social production of theories (which by definition must be a socially produced theory) was held and the vote rejected Marx’s theories, would you subsequently also reject those theories also, knowing that not to do so would be anti democratic and anti socialist?”
When the time comes to reject Marx views (as it will come, as history shows, because humanity constantly changes its views), then I (if still alive, it might take generations of social development to occur) will adopt the newly democratically-produced scientific views of humanity.
I can ask you the same question – what would you do, BD, if humanity democratically pointed out that your views were out of kilter with the rest of humanity?
Yes, twc, I’m a democratic communist and a follower of Marx.
If ‘TRUTHS’ aren’t to be determined democratically, who is to determine ‘TRUTHS’, in your version of a clearly non-democratic ‘socialism’?
It’s a political question, and the SPGB should be able to answer it.
Bijou Drains wrote: “So just to clarify, L Bird, for those of us who haven’t been following this thread particularly closely, your view is that Marxist theory states that all science is social produced and that it therefore follows that as it is socially produced it, alongside all theoretical approaches, should be subject to democracy, and not to follow the outcome of that democratic decision would not only be anti democratic it would be anti socialist?”
If you don’t agree with ‘democracy’ in all social production, BD, you’ll have to tell us all what you do propose for ‘democratic socialism’.
Are you going to propose that, for example, Mengele should be the arbiter of his own science?
So, if ‘anti-democratic’ is not ‘anti-socialist’, who are the ‘anti-democrats’ that you support?
alanjjohnstone wrote: “And MS is right…without action, without translating ideas into practice…”
But MS, like robbo, doesn’t argue for ‘translating ideas into practice’, but for ‘practice’. That is, supposedly ‘theoryless’ practice.
Because, if they did argue for that, they’d have to explain their ‘ideas’ to us – which is just what they refuse to do.
Marx’s point is that ‘theory’ precedes ‘practice’. And the proletariat has to consciously produce its own ‘theory’, before it ‘practices’.
Or, we could leave the ‘theory’ to The Party, and just do what they say. I’m not convinced, and I don’t think history aids your case, alan.
robbo203 wrote: “I, by contrast, am saying there is simply no need for democratic control to be exercised in this case. It serves no useful purpose”
Yes, I know your political position.
Marx’s political position is that ‘democratic social production’ does serve a useful purpose.
His whole political output was based upon that premise.
You don’t agree – fine. It’s just pointless arguing that Marx supported elites controlling social production. You’d be better outlining what/who you think should control social production.
To some extent, you already have – and it’s not ‘humanity’, but sections of it. If you honestly believe that, argue for ‘sectional political control’, in contrast to my ‘democratic political control’.
We have a political disagreement, robbo. No amount of debate is going to change our contrasting opinions. We’d be better arguing openly about what our politics are. We don’t share the same politics.
MS wrote: “What peoples must do at the present time is to take consciousness and overthrow capitalism and create a new society, to eliminate hunger, unemployment, homeless, and diseases, we are not going anywhere with theoreticians and philosophers”
But what would you do if Lenin declared that he was employing ‘Scientific Socialism’ (Engels’ term), and following robbo’s recommended ‘scientific method’ (let the ‘scientists’ determine for us, because we’re busy with our individual ‘each to our own’ activities), and he decided to ‘eliminate hunger, etc’ by instituting an undemocratic Party regime?
If we were living in such a system, we’d have no theoretical basis on which to base our reaction. How could we argue with Lenin’s ‘Scientific Socialism’?
Unless we clearly root our politics in ‘democratic social production’, we’re going to come unstuck. This isn’t just a pointless ‘theoretical’ debate. It concerns the whole of humanity.
robbo203 wrote: “…it is this interaction between them that makes this cognitive process a “social product”” [my bold]
But this ‘them’ is not ‘society’, robbo.
It’s the ‘interaction between humanity’ that creates social products.
All you’re doing, as Marx warned that all ‘materialists’ will do, is ‘separating society into two’, the one (an elite) above the other (the masses).
So, for you, ‘physics’ is an elite activity (thus not requiring democracy), and not a social activity (which would require democracy).
robbo203 wrote: “I dont see the point.”
As I keep emphasising, robbo, it’s a political point. About power.
robbo203 wrote: “Instructing a scientist to discontinue pursuing a particular line of scientific enquiry because a majority of her colleagues had “democratically decided” it was not worth pursing seems bonkers to me. And against the whole spirit of scientific enquiry”
That’s what every political supporter of bourgeois methods says: that ‘democracy’ equals interference in ‘individual freedom’. And they’re correct, it is.
Let’s take a ‘scientist’ – err…. Mengele, for example. Fully trained, academically-qualified, supported by his professors at their university, conducting cutting-edge research. If I was an occupant of his research facility, the least that I’d vote to do is ‘discontinue his line of scientific enquiry’. In fact, I’d probably vote to discontinue him.
I’m afraid Mengele, and every other scientist on this planet, must be subject to the democratic control of the masses.
We get to choose: theories, methods, philosophies, practices, universities, curricula, funds, actions, matters, allocation of resources, ideas, applications, developments, technologies… these are not in the hands of an elite.
That’s democratic socialism, robbo. The democratic control of all social production.
alanjjohnstone wrote: “Hegel and Marx are a mystery to me but i somehow think that the answers LBird looks for are hidden there.”
If it works for you, alan, and helps you to understand Marx’s fundamentally social perspective, that’s fine by me.
robbo203 wrote: “Also LBird I still want to know from you is whether you believe the cognitive process itself of contributing to scientific theory is something that ought to be subject to “democratic control”.” [my bold]
Well, I thought I’d answered this, but once again, yes.
‘The cognitive process itself‘ is a social product, not the product of an isolated, biological, individual.
Social production must be subject to democratic control.
If not, who is to control, and how, ‘the cognitive process itself’?
I’ve given a clear answer to your question, robbo, so I hope you give one to mine.
Who? By what political process?
