Some Thoughts on Socialism

Away from the often complicated nuances of theory, I would say that socialism is simply the attempt to artificially inject a greater degree of justice and fairness into our myriad goings on. Its success depends on the notion that 'justice' and 'fairness', though abstract concepts, must be forced, through our own labours, to be given real concrete existence in the world. Of course, any government or monarchy or even a tyranny may claim that their form of governance is permeated by considerations of 'justice'. The divine right of kings may be invoked to forestall more democratic assemblies and the justice here imagined by the authoritarian monarch is no less than the justice of allowing God's will operate through his own divinely sanctioned wishes. Of course, the wedge of the Enlightenment has displaced the 'intermediary' rule of the divine proxy with the egalitarian notion that not one of us has rational claim to especial heavenly foresight. Here, we have the first levelling that makes possible a more socialist means of political organisation for all at once the formerly 'natural' hierarchy sustained by the central king and his network of lords, earls and dukes is displaced from the locus of power by a nominal democracy.

I think, both because socialist 'states of affairs' don't have any reality outside of what we ourselves give to them and that they are absolutely necessary for our survival, the 'movement towards socialism' will always result in a tension between 'power centres' and peripheralised power seekers. Points of high tension naturally result in wars and revolution whereas periods of tolerable equilibrium result in extended times of peace. It is always then necessary to encourage a notably disenfranchised bloc to assert that right which is naturally theirs and to ensure the overall elasticity of a socius which is now global and increasingly integrated. The recent globalisation of this socius, which I understand to be that domain in which we are responsible actors, has merely expanded the region, out beyond the confines of the tribe, the empire and the nation state in which we may be said to have our (still abstract) commitment to 'justice' and 'fairness'. Of course, some still belong to a tribe, some to an empire, some to a nation state and many more have affiliations in between. Still others again, perhaps the majority, who knows, deny even the necessity of these abstractions and here lies perhaps the greatest source of tension; life givers, and life takers.

Sometimes discussion is given an enormous kick start by jettisoning entirely what is supposedly regarded as knowledge. Well, let's not be too dismissive. It's always nice to know where ideas had their reputed origins and so picking them up and developing from this point where there is an attested origin an 'informed' discussion is considered to be possible. A wiki or a google will tell us of early pioneers; Robert Owen and so on, it will emphasize Marx and the attempt to put the matter on a scientific footing, maybe the Chartists too and certainly the early Social Democratic parties - and all these thinkers and organisations have certainly played a role in refining modern notions of what socialism entails or should entail. But in the spirit of answering the query I think what's required here is more a personal impression of what 'socialism' is or should be, whether those impressions are positive or negative or otherwise.

I would say that anyone who has developed a negative impression of what socialism is well, then, necessarily we would have to visit such issues as Cold War ideology and so on because it seems strange otherwise that such a wholly positive concept as 'tending towards being more socially integrated' which is what the adjective, on the face of it suggests the meaning of 'socialism' to be - why, on these grounds would anyone object to 'socialism'? Only because a certain form of the signifier 'socialism' has become that most objectionable of beasts, the mark and stamp of a discredited political ideology.

If we bear in mind that the as yet neutral signifier 'socialism' has many signifieds, many potential meanings, then we might begin to sniff some diesel. The Socratic approach is required I fancy. We could in the first instance dispense completely with the discussion of how 'socialism' as it would be discussed in an academic context evolved and instead focus on how even capitalism in its rawest forms has necessarily elements of a socialist character built into it. Anything, indeed, just to shake up the rootedness of the inherited conventional signifier/signified relations of the term.

"Stalinism" and "Maoism" for example, for long periods and for too many people clearly led to unacceptable levels of suffering. The "Capitalist" west, which was never entirely capitalist, but had incorporated elements of socialist thinking to alleviate the worst deprivations that provided so much of the ballast for the earliest Marxist critics had, in the face of these regimes, seemingly prospered, therefore the tendency was to point to the different characteristics of each system's mode of economic organisation. A simple formula is arrived at whereby the one system is classed as "capitalist" and the other "communist" without observing certain 'external' elements and 'constraining' factors within each which may have either precipitated decay on the one hand and contributed to an artificial growth on the other.

First of all we may mention the rapid industrialisation which was deemed necessary in both China and Russia to generate the kind of self-sufficiency which was arguably required to defend both of the 'Marxist' regimes from the aggressive actions of their ideologically opposed Western neighbours. Thus it may be argued that were Stalin not ruthless enough to impose compulsory grain seizures thereby generating the capital necessary to accelerate armament production the entire Soviet state would have been swamped by a White Army (Mark II) sponsored by the Western powers. The 'communism' that developed in China and Russia did not in other words proceed in a vacuum but was shaped and conditioned by its (antagonistic) relationship with the West.

Another factor which at times leads to a confusing crossing of swords over the legacy of this kind of applied socialism is the different ways by which the ideas of the past have been inherited by stalwarts and defenders of the respective ideologies. In the West it is often overlooked how the 'Marxist' social democratic parties of Germany, France and Russia, prior to the Bolshevik revolution, drew much of their support from those ideologically opposed to imperialism, or at least very much attuned to the inherent unjustness of the colonial project. Thus, for many struggling for independence within the Ottoman, British, French and German empires the October Revolution signalled less the installation of a new mode of economic organisation and more the announcement of a general contraction of Empire and the ushering forth of their own self-determination.

This view was immediately reinforced by the Bolshevik decision to unilaterally renounce all title to Russian dominions thereby securing the support (in the minds and hearts at least) of independence leaders all over the globe, particularly in India, were the National Congress consistently aligned itself within the Soviet sphere. So, there's an important anti-imperialist dimension which needs to be considered when assessing the reasons why 'communism' still retained such a mystic appeal even after the revelations of Khruschev's 1956 denunciation of Stalinism. It would also be self-evident to Marxists within the communist enclaves that the imperialist hold of the European powers contributed to their 'unnatural' economic growth via the system of skewered trading relations established with the colonies; ie the exploitation of cheap labour and raw materials.