: Get off your high horse and get out in the streets and agitate!I can appreciate your passionate challenge.
I would like to suggest a tactic that is perhaps a little less heroic, a little less dramatic, but very much grounded in positive, proactive social change. The tactic is socialist intentional community. Eschewing both the 'all or nothing' tactics of state-seizure 'vanguard' parties and the quest for higher wages of trade unionism, the Utopia 2000 movement encourages the formation of socialist 'islands' that initially do not seem to challenge capitalist hegemony yet incrementally work towards withdrawing more and more (supply and demand) resources from the capitalist economy.
Utopia 2000's goal is to create independent trade economies between different socialist communities. Advantages to this form of socialism are that it: (a) would test its commitment to socialism in practice instead of theory, (b) would obviate the indefinite wait for 'mass' action, (c) would possess legitimacy based on existing law, (d) could initially sell its 'cottage industry' products to capitalists (as well as trading them amongst other socialist communities), thus accessing a large market until enough communities have formed to establish a socialist series of varying industries, (e) would not threaten any working people who oppose it, (f) would operate on a small enough scale to render unnecessary any bureaucracy, and (g) would permit various models to co-exist without 'inter-party, factionalist' conflicts.(1) Disadvantages, of course, include (a) creating an initial savings fund, (b) operating without economies of scale, and (c) resisting propaganda campaigns and legal machinations of the capitalists---all challenges overcome by long-term communities Twin Oaks, East Wind, and Los Horcones.
: [W]ho here has taken the final deciding democratic vote, and no matter which "side" you were on (ie the majority vote, or the minority), you were still disciplined enough to carry out the wishes of the majority. I want to repeat that this is in the framework of an organization of like minded people - ie you agree in principle of what you are trying to achieve (in my case socialism) but all the fine tuning of activity and strategy has to be constantly worked out and decided on.
Quoting Marx and advocating democratic centralism ('still disciplined enough to carry out the wishes of the majority') will not advance socialism in the 21st century any further than it did in the 20th. (For example, what constitutes a 'majority'? Is it 51%, 75%, 90%, or complete consensus? What recourse would the minority have to advance its claims? If all decisions are 'final' after debate, what would attract new members?) As Lenin made clear, the state is an instrument of coercive mediation between classes, whether controlled by the proletariat or the bourgeoisie.(2) As history has made clear, the working class has an intrinsic, deep-rooted suspicion towards state apparatus---rejecting even (Keynesian redistributive) collective gains in favor of individual (libertarian 'tax cut') gains. Socialism must free itself from the monopolizing grip Marxism (state socialism) has had upon it for the last 100 years in order to move forward!
The 'left' can always be counted upon to agree that capitalism is a rapacious social structure. Nonetheless, the left has offered many different policies for distributing material and social goods in more equitable ratios. The problem, as Utopia 2000 sees it, is that left tendencies often minimize or evade entirely the issue of division of labor.(3) Significantly, Marx himself defended division of labor---the notion that some people will work in the factories while others will work in the offices, and so on, receiving varying wages as a consequence.(4) However, as long as labor is divided (into skilled and unskilled), interests will inevitably divide amongst society. This issue is much more than 'fine tuning of activity and strategy'!
Utopia 2000 is to the left of Marxism. Utopia 2000 advocates an equal distribution of both skilled and unskilled work as well as complete wage standardization. What is lost in productivity would be gained in governance-sharing---a not unimportant sacrifice. How self-interest can be aligned with collectivism is to have the consequences of all decisions affect all members equally.(5) Without repudiating division of labor, this is not feasible.
: [A] scientific way to get rid of capitalism...
Distinguishing their ideology from the 'utopian' ideologies of other socialists, Marx and Engels claimed that their their brand of socialism was truly 'scientific.' Like many 19th century grand theories, this one was flawed by its resistance to relativism that initially made it so compelling.(6) The 'science' that Marx and Engels employed, however effective as agitation, was merely historical interpretation. It was effective enough for studying capitalism (which had existed for centuries) but it proved inadequate for studying communism (which had existed only briefly during the Paris Commune). In short, Marxism is not a science as science is known in the 20th century.
Utopia 2000 believes that B.F. Skinner and behaviorism has provided a scientific basis for socialism in the 21st century.(7)
Reducing dependence (variable-interval reinforcement) provides a key to social harmony, not 'increased productivity' (the first order of the revolutionary day as proposed in The Communist Manifesto). The reason for this is that 'needs' are indefinitely extensible. Here Skinner made a valuable contribution to revolutionary theory: 'The experimental analysis of behavior has clearly shown that it is not the quantity of goods that counts (as the law of supply and demand suggests) but the contingent relation between goods and behavior.' This brings us to a second key to social harmony: the subtler, yet more compelling, issue of alienation. This is the supreme defect of capitalism. Marxism, however, demonstrated similar structural flaws.(8) Put simply, a janitor in a factory would have more necessities, even luxuries, after the revolution seizes the means of production, but would remain a janitor in a factory.
Promising abundance to all is the great tradition of Marxism.(9) However, abundance is always predicated upon increased productivity which is predicated upon an ever hypertrophied division of labor. Division of labor, however, cuts a section of the population free from unskilled work, which creates a skilled class of individuals not subjected to the same contingencies as everyone else. This inevitably establishes hierarchy, which necessitates abridging the liberty of many. As a socialist tactic, promising abundance will never compete with capitalism's promises of abundance. Socialism must free itself from Marxism, abundance, and the division of labor. Socialism must employ new tactics, new promises, and new incentives that truly distinguish it from capitalism.
Tomorrow's slogans: Job rotation for all! Government participation for all! Equal contingencies for everyone! Move socialism forward!
Notes:
1. For example, one community might operate by consensus, another by a 'planner-manager' system, and another by traditional majority rule.
2. See The State and Revolution, Lenin's Selected Works, Moscow: Progress Publishing, 1968, pp.266 and 286.
3. Classic revolutionary texts that fail to address division of labor include: (a) The Communist Manifesto, (b) Bill of Rights Socialism (Gus Hall, CPUSA), and (c) Arguments for Revolutionary Socialism (John Molyneux, SWP).
4. See Capital, vol. I, International, 1967, pp. 357-58, and Wages, Price, and Profit, Marx & Engels' Selected Works, International, 1968, pp.210-11.
5. 'A number of men are to divide a cake: assuming that the fair division is an equal one, which procedure, if any, will give this outcome? Technicalities aside, the obvious solution is to have one man divide the cake and get the last piece, the others being allowed their pick before him. He will divide the cake equally, since in this way he assures for himself the largest share possible.' (John Rawls)
Now substitute jobs for cake: if you were to choose between a 50% chance of being trained for and assigned a skilled job and a 50% chance of being trained for and assigned an unskilled job, or a 100% chance of being trained for and assigned a 50-50 cut of each type of work, what would you choose?---the 50% risk of always having to do unskilled work or the guarantee of doing skilled work at least 50% of the time?
6. The 'proletariat' as grave-digger of capitalism. However, if you place an American 'proletariat (say, a UPS driver) in Mexico or the Philippines (along with his or her running water, television set, and Ford Escort) suddenly the 'proletariat' becomes an 'opportunistic' member of the middle-class.
7. See Skinner, Contingencies of Reinforcement: A Theoretical Analysis, Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1968, pp. 29-50; The Design of Experimental Communities, Cumulative Record (3rd ed.), Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1972, pp. 58-65; and Human Behavior and Democracy, Reflections on Behaviorism and Society, Prentice-Hall, 1978, pp.3-15.
8. Unless one wishes to take the dubious position of insisting that Russia, China, Poland, Yugoslavia, GDR, Korea, Cuba, and Vietnam all 'misinterpreted' Marxism.
9. See Lenin, The Immediate Tasks of the Soviet Government, op. cit., p. 405; Stalin, Foundations of Leninism, International, 1939, p. 126; Trotsky, Literature and Revolution, Russell & Russell, 1957, pp. 249-53; Mandel, Marxist Economic Theory, vol. II, MR Press, 1968, pp. 663-64; and Sweezy, Modern Capitalism and other essays, MR Press, 1972, p. 97.
