https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2003-05-09
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That and all the dead people, but they're not as vocal.
Bonus panel
this post was submitted on 26 Nov 2024
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Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
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I think the capitalism versus communism debate is mislabeled.
It really should be a discussion about decentralized decision making and centralized decision making
What? Neither communism nor capitalism is inherently centralized. The USSR centralized everything, but they were definitionally not communist.
Capitalism requires a centralized state to function, and also tends to centralize economic power over time.
You could say it's not as centralized as central planning but it's by no means a decentralized system.
It requires organized violence, which is easily facilitated by a centralized state, but I don't think the centralized state is necessary per-se.
I will definitely agree that it tends to centralize power over time, but I suspect this is true of all higherarchical systems of organization. Those with power will try to accumulate more.
Since power tends to centralize over time, a stateless capitalism which would be free of any regulation would pretty much always form a state in the end.
You need the monopoly on violence for capitalism to continue.
Sure, but that's not what was being argued.
Can you cite an example of decentralized communism I could read about?
P.S. Down voting me and also expecting me to participate in a polite and constructive dialog is counter productive, and also rude.
It depends on how you define the word. If you define it as "whatever awful shite Stalin did" then there is none. If (like me) you use " classless, moneyless, stateless society" then I can hardly conceive of an example real or hypothetical that isn't decentralized.
What would be a real example i could read about?
A real example, as in something that existed IRL? I have none that I'm Aware of. The assertion was that the argument between capitalism and communism was one of centralization and decentralization. I was illustrating that that was simply not the case. I don't need a real example of either to do that, since we are only speaking about ideas and how they interact with each other.
There are accepted definitions of both that allow for either to be centralized or decentralized. Thus, the argument between which one is better cannot merely be an argument between centralization and decentralization.
Fair enough the theory of different economic engines allows both to be centralized or decentralized.
As realized the economic engines that were labeled as communist were very centralized.
How would a decentralized communist society look like? How would different communes compete for scare resources? How would disputes be resolved?
The only straight answers I've ever received on the matter mostly ammount to wishful thinking.
A small community can definitely be communist, and it is possible to achieve inter-communal dependance with mutual trade relationships, but without a medium of exchange I suspect that it'd be far more difficult and other factors make the situation strike me as incredibly unstable, because the incentives to defect could easily outweigh those of cooperation.
The real answer is that I don't know, and we don't have enough data to say what would work.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt:_The_First_5,000_Years
I really like this book, and I think it's relevant to this discussion. It talks about how the original currency in history was not money, but reputation and relationships.
Once you scale out to the point where personal relationships are unsustainable, societies and history transition to something more material. Be it transactional barter, or what we think of is money today.
I appreciate the recommendation! Tyvm.