A single party system can be more democratic if it’s a consultative democracy and reflects the will of the majority, like how it works in China
Oh really? How do you hold the people in power accountable, then, if they’re part of the only party that is allowed to exist (which that party itself decided, what a coincidence!)?
In capitalism, a tiny class of people controls the most essential means of production and distribution for society.
False, that is the result of capitalism when it goes unchecked, not the definition. And different countries have different levels of checks on capitalism.
The state represents their interests, and any parties that exist must represent them
Yeah, no, that’s not the case. Otherwise explain to me how many western countries have leftist parties and even marxist-leninist parties. It’s just not the will of the majority. Which leads me back to the point: your (or even my) satisfaction with the results don’t measure how democratic a country is, despite the FUD spread by authoritarians and wannabe authoritarians to destabilize democracies by encouraging people to not participate.
Oh really? How do you hold the people in power accountable, then, if they’re part of the only party that is allowed to exist (which that party itself decided, what a coincidence!)?
Recall elections, consultative democracy, electing candidates, etc.
False, that is the result of capitalism when it goes unchecked, not the definition. And different countries have different levels of checks on capitalism.
Capitalism cannot be “checked.” Capitalism inevitably tends towards centralization of the essential means of production and distribution into fewer and fewer hands, but even in the earliest stages capitalists were far outnumbered by workers.
Yeah, no, that’s not the case. Otherwise explain to me how many western countries have leftist parties and even marxist-leninist parties. It’s just not the will of the majority. Which leads me back to the point: your (or even my) satisfaction with the results don’t measure how democratic a country is, despite the FUD spread by authoritarians and wannabe authoritarians to destabilize democracies by encouraging people to not participate.
Very few leftist parties can get anything done in western countries because the media is largely controlled by capitalists, and the state itself serves capitalists. Taking PSL as an example, a great deal more people agree with their positions than the ~1% of the vote they receive, but they are either actually barred from running, or receive a tiny portion of the vote due to not wanting to spoil your vote, as well as a lack of positive publicity from media (or any publicity, for that matter).
And if PSL or any other socialist party ever becomes large enough to receive a substantial percentage of the vote, we’ll see the mask of humanity fall from the face of capital. Not that that should stop us from organizing.
Yes, but who enforces the consulting and the usage of the information gathered from consulting? Without accountability, that’s just fantasy and/or simping for authoritarianism. Let’s not forget, every authoritarian leader, party or Organisation has its supporters who will claim they’re not authoritarian.
Capitalism inevitably tends towards centralization of the essential means of production and distribution into fewer and fewer hand
Except when it doesn’t. There are plenty of examples where countries that have capitalism based economies moved significantly to the left. Look at Nordic countries, for instance.
Very few leftist parties can get anything done in western countries because the media is largely controlled by capitalists
What about all the public broadcasters? There are many countries where they’re quite strong. And as to parties getting things done, what about:
Minimum wages
Welfare systems
Massive improvements in workplace safety
Universal healthcare
Childcare
I could go on and on, but that’s not the point. The point is that fascists are trying to weaken the electoral system because they know how effective it can be. Otherwise, they wouldn’t give a fuck. And part of the way they do that is by downplaying its efficacy in order to wear it down and eventually get rid of it.
Yes, but who enforces the consulting and the usage of the information gathered from consulting? Without accountability, that’s just fantasy and/or simping for authoritarianism. Let’s not forget, every authoritarian leader, party or Organisation has its supporters who will claim they’re not authoritarian.
The people hold them accountable, through the mechanisms I described previously. “Authoritarianism” is not a thing, all states are tools of the ruling class to oppress the rest, they are necessarily uplifting one class and oppressing the rest. Socialist states have the working classes as the ruling class.
Except when it doesn’t. There are plenty of examples where countries that have capitalism based economies moved significantly to the left. Look at Nordic countries, for instance.
Nordic countries offer sizable concessions to their working classes because the Soviets were right next to them, and already offered better safety nets. These are concessions, to prevent revolution, and are funded through imperialism and neocolonialism. The working classes do not actually hold state power. These countries are still highly centralized, dominated by finance capital, and rely on the export of capital to the global south along with huge megacorps plundering the global south to persist as they are. To get rid of imperialism and keep safery nets requires socialism.
What about all the public broadcasters? There are many countries where they’re quite strong. And as to parties getting things done, what about:
Minimum wages
Welfare systems
Massive improvements in workplace safety
Universal healthcare
Childcare
The state serves private interests in capitalism, this is why nationalizing within a capitalist economy is not socialism, and privatization within a socialist economy is not necessarily a restoration or capitalism. Public broadcasters are not representatives of the working classes, and you’re again giving examples of concessions given largely because of working class organization, not through the “democratic processes.”
I could go on and on, but that’s not the point. The point is that fascists are trying to weaken the electoral system because they know how effective it can be. Otherwise, they wouldn’t give a fuck. And part of the way they do that is by downplaying its efficacy in order to wear it down and eventually get rid of it.
Fascism is a result of the decay in capitalism and imperialism, and is where neocolonial methods are turned inwards. That’s what causes fascism to rise.
The people hold them accountable, through the mechanisms I described previously
So, free and fair elections. Well, now we’re back to square one, and pretty much describing how Western democracies work.
Nordic countries offer sizable concessions to their working classes because the Soviets were right next to them, and already offered better safety nets.
Ah, yes, the soviet Union, definitely not imperialist. Sarcasm aside, they literally did not allow their population to leave. They killed people who dared to leave. That’s not a sign of things going well, to mention just one.
The state serves private interests in capitalism
Just because you repeat it a hundred times doesn’t make it true. The very mechanisms you described are used (with varying degrees of success depending on how well the democracy functions) to keep the state accountable to the people.
you’re again giving examples of concessions given largely because of working class organization, not through the “democratic processes.”
So then why are these mostly things that parties campaigned on, got voted into power for and then implemented?
Fascism is a result of the decay in capitalism and imperialism
That’s a very, very broad interpretation that many historians would disagree with. But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that it’s the case. How do these capitalist structures decay into imperialism then?
So, free and fair elections. Well, now we’re back to square one, and pretty much describing how Western democracies work.
Nope. You’re making a metaphysical error, focusing on similar structures while ignoring the entirely different context, the class character of the state. The mechanisms of elections exist within a definite social context, and in the case of capitalism, capitalists definitionally hold power over the media, production itself, and more to gain what they want. The state exists to serve the ruling class.
Ah, yes, the soviet Union, definitely not imperialist. Sarcasm aside, they literally did not allow their population to leave. They killed people who dared to leave. That’s not a sign of things going well, to mention just one.
The Soviet Union was not imperialist, correct.
The USSR had steady and consistent economic growth, and provided free, high quality education and healthcare, full employment, cheap or free housing, and fantastic infrastructure and city planning that still lasts to this day despite capitalism neglecting it. This rapid development resulted in dramatic democratization of society, reduced disparity, doubling of life expectancy, tripling of functional literacy rates to 99.9%, and much more. Living in the 1930s famine would not have been good, but it was the last major famine outside of wartime because the soviets ended famine in their countries.
The USSR brought dramatic democratization to society. First-hand accounts from Statesian journalist Anna Louise Strong in her book This Soviet World describe soviet elections and factory councils in action. Statesian Pat Sloan even wrote Soviet Democracy to describe in detail the system the soviets had built for curious Statesians to read about, and today we have Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance to reference.
When it comes to social progressivism, the soviet union was among the best out of their peers, so instead we must look at who was actually repressed outside of the norm. In the USSR, it was the capitalist class, the kulaks, the fascists who were repressed. This is out of necessity for any socialist state. When it comes to working class freedoms, however, the soviet union represented a dramatic expansion. Soviet progressivism was documented quite well in Albert Syzmanski’s Human Rights in the Soviet Union.
The truth, when judged based on historical evidence and contextualization, is that socialism was the best thing to happen to Russia in the last few centuries, and its absence has been devastating.
Death rates spiked:
And wealth disparity skyrocketed alongside the newly impoverished majority:
Capitalism brought with it skyrocketing poverty rates, drug abuse, prostitution, homelessness, crime rates, and lowered life expectancy. An estimated 7 million people died due to the dissolution of socialism and reintroduction of capitalism, and this is why the large majority of post-soviet citizens regret its fall. A return to socialism is the only path forward for the post-soviet countries. A lot of Eastern European countries were swarmed with western capital during the destruction of socialism, which is what temporarily caused the rise of the far-right in these countries, but in time their problems will no longer be able to be ignored.
Just because you repeat it a hundred times doesn’t make it true. The very mechanisms you described are used (with varying degrees of success depending on how well the democracy functions) to keep the state accountable to the people.
This isn’t true, though. Concessions come from organized resistance, at the consent of the ruling class. Capitalists do not fear the state, the state serves them. What the people actually want is not what the state does, what happens is the state fulfills the will of the ruling classes and tosses the crumbs they deem necessary to keep the populace from outright revolting. This is why organization gains concessions, not the bourgeois democratic structure.
That’s a very, very broad interpretation that many historians would disagree with. But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that it’s the case. How do these capitalist structures decay into imperialism then?
I believe you mean fascism, not imperialism, so correct me if I’m answering the wrong question. The decay into fascism generally happens when the state begins nakedly applying colonial methods to the domestic population. In the US, for example, this involves mass incarceration of ethnic minorities, attacks on queer people, mass deportations, and the attack on left wing organizations. In Germany, it involved the brown shirts killing communists, and rounding up Jews, Slavs, queer people, disabled people, and mass murdering them.
Voting doesn’t stop this. Hitler was handed power, and the US has been fascist no matter which party is in control. Capitalists deem it necessary due to drops in imperialist extraction, and a need to respond to crisis that stands to upset their rule. It’s like a fever that kills off anything risking the system.
who enforces the consulting and the usage of the information gathered from consulting?
The electorate through their votes at the town/city and county levels, participation in unions and other groups like ethnic advocacy groups etc, and participation in the CPPCC, and protests directed over over real issues instead of broad colour revolution tier nonsense, to name a few avenues.
Look at Nordic countries, for instance.
May have moved left at home (if you ignore the rising austerity, racism and general shifting right they are experiencing alongside the rest of Europe) but they are more than happy to join in imperialism and neocolonialism abroad to finance what little compromises remain.
authoritarian
Could you please define this. As it stands authoritarian is the thought terminating cliche of choice for the unintelligent and uneducated to avoid having to investigate and reckon with the questions of substance such as class content of the state, state form, satisfaction of the people with the government etc.
Could you please define this. As it stands authoritarian is the thought terminating cliche of choice for the unintelligent and uneducated to avoid having to investigate and reckon with the questions of substance such as class content of the state, state form, satisfaction of the people with the government etc.
Normally I don’t respond to low level comments like this, but the intellectual laziness here is mind boggling. Dictionaries exist for a reason.
Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political status quo, and reductions in democracy, separation of powers, civil liberties, and the rule of law. Authoritarian regimes may be either autocratic or oligarchic and may be based upon the rule of a party, the military, or the concentration of power in a single person.
Authoritarianism, in politics and government, the blind submission to authority and the repression of individual freedom of thought and action. Authoritarian regimes are systems of government that have no established mechanism for the transfer of executive power and do not afford their citizens civil liberties or political rights. Power is concentrated in the hands of a single leader or a small elite, whose decisions are taken without regard for the will of the people. The term authoritarianism is often used to denote any form of government that is not democratic, but studies have demonstrated that there is a great deal of variation in authoritarian rule.
Authoritarianism: of, relating to, or favoring blind submission to authority [OR] of, relating to, or favoring a concentration of power in a leader or an elite not constitutionally responsible to the people
So which definition did you mean? Or did you have your own definition? Or is it possible that you now can see how it is such a broadly defined term as to be largely meaningless outside of thought terminating cliche? You incredibly smug shithead.
Oh really? How do you hold the people in power accountable, then, if they’re part of the only party that is allowed to exist (which that party itself decided, what a coincidence!)?
False, that is the result of capitalism when it goes unchecked, not the definition. And different countries have different levels of checks on capitalism.
Yeah, no, that’s not the case. Otherwise explain to me how many western countries have leftist parties and even marxist-leninist parties. It’s just not the will of the majority. Which leads me back to the point: your (or even my) satisfaction with the results don’t measure how democratic a country is, despite the FUD spread by authoritarians and wannabe authoritarians to destabilize democracies by encouraging people to not participate.
Recall elections, consultative democracy, electing candidates, etc.
Capitalism cannot be “checked.” Capitalism inevitably tends towards centralization of the essential means of production and distribution into fewer and fewer hands, but even in the earliest stages capitalists were far outnumbered by workers.
Very few leftist parties can get anything done in western countries because the media is largely controlled by capitalists, and the state itself serves capitalists. Taking PSL as an example, a great deal more people agree with their positions than the ~1% of the vote they receive, but they are either actually barred from running, or receive a tiny portion of the vote due to not wanting to spoil your vote, as well as a lack of positive publicity from media (or any publicity, for that matter).
And if PSL or any other socialist party ever becomes large enough to receive a substantial percentage of the vote, we’ll see the mask of humanity fall from the face of capital. Not that that should stop us from organizing.
Yep, more naked repression will happen, but on the flip side size is also a strength. It protects people.
Yes, but who enforces the consulting and the usage of the information gathered from consulting? Without accountability, that’s just fantasy and/or simping for authoritarianism. Let’s not forget, every authoritarian leader, party or Organisation has its supporters who will claim they’re not authoritarian.
Except when it doesn’t. There are plenty of examples where countries that have capitalism based economies moved significantly to the left. Look at Nordic countries, for instance.
What about all the public broadcasters? There are many countries where they’re quite strong. And as to parties getting things done, what about:
I could go on and on, but that’s not the point. The point is that fascists are trying to weaken the electoral system because they know how effective it can be. Otherwise, they wouldn’t give a fuck. And part of the way they do that is by downplaying its efficacy in order to wear it down and eventually get rid of it.
The people hold them accountable, through the mechanisms I described previously. “Authoritarianism” is not a thing, all states are tools of the ruling class to oppress the rest, they are necessarily uplifting one class and oppressing the rest. Socialist states have the working classes as the ruling class.
Nordic countries offer sizable concessions to their working classes because the Soviets were right next to them, and already offered better safety nets. These are concessions, to prevent revolution, and are funded through imperialism and neocolonialism. The working classes do not actually hold state power. These countries are still highly centralized, dominated by finance capital, and rely on the export of capital to the global south along with huge megacorps plundering the global south to persist as they are. To get rid of imperialism and keep safery nets requires socialism.
The state serves private interests in capitalism, this is why nationalizing within a capitalist economy is not socialism, and privatization within a socialist economy is not necessarily a restoration or capitalism. Public broadcasters are not representatives of the working classes, and you’re again giving examples of concessions given largely because of working class organization, not through the “democratic processes.”
Fascism is a result of the decay in capitalism and imperialism, and is where neocolonial methods are turned inwards. That’s what causes fascism to rise.
So, free and fair elections. Well, now we’re back to square one, and pretty much describing how Western democracies work.
Ah, yes, the soviet Union, definitely not imperialist. Sarcasm aside, they literally did not allow their population to leave. They killed people who dared to leave. That’s not a sign of things going well, to mention just one.
Just because you repeat it a hundred times doesn’t make it true. The very mechanisms you described are used (with varying degrees of success depending on how well the democracy functions) to keep the state accountable to the people.
So then why are these mostly things that parties campaigned on, got voted into power for and then implemented?
That’s a very, very broad interpretation that many historians would disagree with. But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that it’s the case. How do these capitalist structures decay into imperialism then?
Nope. You’re making a metaphysical error, focusing on similar structures while ignoring the entirely different context, the class character of the state. The mechanisms of elections exist within a definite social context, and in the case of capitalism, capitalists definitionally hold power over the media, production itself, and more to gain what they want. The state exists to serve the ruling class.
The Soviet Union was not imperialist, correct.
The USSR had steady and consistent economic growth, and provided free, high quality education and healthcare, full employment, cheap or free housing, and fantastic infrastructure and city planning that still lasts to this day despite capitalism neglecting it. This rapid development resulted in dramatic democratization of society, reduced disparity, doubling of life expectancy, tripling of functional literacy rates to 99.9%, and much more. Living in the 1930s famine would not have been good, but it was the last major famine outside of wartime because the soviets ended famine in their countries.
Literacy rates, societal guarantees in the 1936 constitution, reports on the healthcare system over time, and more are good sources for these claims.
The USSR brought dramatic democratization to society. First-hand accounts from Statesian journalist Anna Louise Strong in her book This Soviet World describe soviet elections and factory councils in action. Statesian Pat Sloan even wrote Soviet Democracy to describe in detail the system the soviets had built for curious Statesians to read about, and today we have Professor Roland Boer’s Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance to reference.
When it comes to social progressivism, the soviet union was among the best out of their peers, so instead we must look at who was actually repressed outside of the norm. In the USSR, it was the capitalist class, the kulaks, the fascists who were repressed. This is out of necessity for any socialist state. When it comes to working class freedoms, however, the soviet union represented a dramatic expansion. Soviet progressivism was documented quite well in Albert Syzmanski’s Human Rights in the Soviet Union.
The truth, when judged based on historical evidence and contextualization, is that socialism was the best thing to happen to Russia in the last few centuries, and its absence has been devastating.
Death rates spiked:
And wealth disparity skyrocketed alongside the newly impoverished majority:
Capitalism brought with it skyrocketing poverty rates, drug abuse, prostitution, homelessness, crime rates, and lowered life expectancy. An estimated 7 million people died due to the dissolution of socialism and reintroduction of capitalism, and this is why the large majority of post-soviet citizens regret its fall. A return to socialism is the only path forward for the post-soviet countries. A lot of Eastern European countries were swarmed with western capital during the destruction of socialism, which is what temporarily caused the rise of the far-right in these countries, but in time their problems will no longer be able to be ignored.
This isn’t true, though. Concessions come from organized resistance, at the consent of the ruling class. Capitalists do not fear the state, the state serves them. What the people actually want is not what the state does, what happens is the state fulfills the will of the ruling classes and tosses the crumbs they deem necessary to keep the populace from outright revolting. This is why organization gains concessions, not the bourgeois democratic structure.
I believe you mean fascism, not imperialism, so correct me if I’m answering the wrong question. The decay into fascism generally happens when the state begins nakedly applying colonial methods to the domestic population. In the US, for example, this involves mass incarceration of ethnic minorities, attacks on queer people, mass deportations, and the attack on left wing organizations. In Germany, it involved the brown shirts killing communists, and rounding up Jews, Slavs, queer people, disabled people, and mass murdering them.
Voting doesn’t stop this. Hitler was handed power, and the US has been fascist no matter which party is in control. Capitalists deem it necessary due to drops in imperialist extraction, and a need to respond to crisis that stands to upset their rule. It’s like a fever that kills off anything risking the system.
The electorate through their votes at the town/city and county levels, participation in unions and other groups like ethnic advocacy groups etc, and participation in the CPPCC, and protests directed over over real issues instead of broad colour revolution tier nonsense, to name a few avenues.
May have moved left at home (if you ignore the rising austerity, racism and general shifting right they are experiencing alongside the rest of Europe) but they are more than happy to join in imperialism and neocolonialism abroad to finance what little compromises remain.
Could you please define this. As it stands authoritarian is the thought terminating cliche of choice for the unintelligent and uneducated to avoid having to investigate and reckon with the questions of substance such as class content of the state, state form, satisfaction of the people with the government etc.
Normally I don’t respond to low level comments like this, but the intellectual laziness here is mind boggling. Dictionaries exist for a reason.
“No, I can’t define it”
-Wikipedia
-Britannica
-Cambridge dictionary
-Merriam-Webster
So which definition did you mean? Or did you have your own definition? Or is it possible that you now can see how it is such a broadly defined term as to be largely meaningless outside of thought terminating cliche? You incredibly smug shithead.