I actually agree with much of what you say here, and so I'll only respond to a few points....: 'To make a science of socialism, it had first to be placed upon a real basis' Engels wrote as he famously dismissed 'utopian' socialism. The scienceš that Marx and Engels employed, however, was only historical interpretation.* It proved to be effective enough for studying capitalism (which had existed for centuries) but it was inadequate for studying 'modern' communism (which, in Marx's time, had existed only briefly during the Paris Commune). Although Marx's
1:Capitalism really only existed after roughly 1680, or the after math of the English revolution, and that really only made production capitalism and the extraction of Surplus value a possibility to be created by the industrial revolution.
2:Its worth remembering the difference between the ANglo-US use os Science, and the european (OF Charlies time). Science for the Anglo-US tradition means empiricism, whereas in europe it meant systematised learning.
3:Marx had very little to say on Communism, because he did not believe it existed in his time (one of the few texts in which he says anything about Communism is 'The German Ideology', which is why I am not so sure of your cavlier dismissal of the whole text...). All he could say was teat teh commune, or various other things, could lead to full communism, throughhis re-interpretation of the hegleian mast-slave dialectic.
analysis of surplus value (the unpaid portion of a commodityšs value that labor adds to capital investment) was accurate, his speculative claims concerning capitalism's 'inevitable downfall' remains unsubstantiated. Without an empirical base of research to support its
hypothesis, Marxian socialism is not a science as science is known today.
1:See above for defs of science.
2:we are yet to see if that downfall is inevitable, although Marx's point was more that the proletariate would one day be in a position to eliminate capitalism (it is now, it only wants the will to do so). The important thing is not the Trotskist formulation that Proles have a monopoly on teh revoluion, but that only the proletariate can eliminate class through its revolution. Marx was pointing out that only the proletariate was capable of brining about communism, as he saw the situation then, he made no real speculation as to what that transformation would entail.
(Morris in 'Socialism from teh roots up' defends this position, pointing out that Bacon and a few others would not have been able to see the way in which mercantilism would work out at its inception, only that they wanted it, thus we cannot extroplate, or impose an idea of the future upon socialism...)
: Behaviorism's central premise is that the environment determines the development of an individual.
My one problem with this, much like my objections to structuralism, is that this casts teh process in a sort of one way determinism, teh individual is the passive recipient if their environment (correct me if I'm wrong) rather than an entity in negotiation/dialogue with their environment, able to draw upon their history and experience to combat what is going on. In terms of the old base/superstructure number, this gives ALL power to teh base, and makes the superstructure only a shadow. The Socialist Party draws the formulation as 'The base determines superstructure, but superstructure influences the base.', that through a dialectal relationship we can influence and change our own environment, on the basis of our historical individuality. There cannot be a revolution in the world before there has been a revolution in thought, but that revolution in thought requires a possibility for it to exist in the material world.
: (2) Small communities of voluntary associations, exercising only group and peer censure, are best suited to realize cooperative behavior.(2)
I can't disagree with this at all, but such small groups are going to have to relate toother groups, if only to get teh goods they need...
: An important advantage the small voluntary association has over the state apparatus is that: the more diversity there is in a society, the more mediation (rules) there must be to accommodate the inevitable conflicts that diversity brings; whereas the more a community shares similar values (upon forming a community), the less mediation (rules) will be required.
Agreed, but again, societies must relate to one another, and that requires a mechanism for them to do so...
