If socialism is public ownership of the means of production and capitalism is private ownership of the means of production, then what is “social democracy”, a “mixed economy”? The factory is either owned by the state, or it is not. Where is the middle ground?
What about cooperatives? Why does everyone assume companies have to be either owned by the state or by capitalists who don’t work there?
@Hyolobrika@social.fbxl.net @interfluidity@zirk.us
Cooperatives are worker owned so they can exist under socialism. I'd be in favor of turning all companies into coops instead of state ownership. Not a big fan of any centralized government.
@Hyolobrika@social.fbxl.net @interfluidity@zirk.us
Well they can also exist under capitalism but if all companies are coops then that's effectively socialism yk what I mean.
@dushman @Hyolobrika It’s not effectively socialism, bc some cooperatives might be extraordinarily successful, earn very high per worker profits, others might yield quite meager incomes, nothing would ensure full employment by some cooperative, guarantee education, housing, medicine, or retirement income. It’d be an interesting economic form, perhaps much better than contemporary capitalism, but still distinct from what most people are after from socialism.
@Hyolobrika@social.fbxl.net @interfluidity@zirk.us
Yeah it's more or less what I mean. I want worker ownership of the means of production but without central state planning of the economy.
@dushman @Hyolobrika @interfluidity Hmm, what happened were mainly dictatorships, with the authoritarian nature filling in the void that merely having cooperative ownership leaves all around.
Anarchy in the "most people decide to work together of their own accord, using soft pressure on uncooperative ones to dampen their mischief" sounds cool, but i doubt humanity can achieve it as a one-step thing.
So i guess a state as a facilitator (aggregating open overarching questions like how much economy vs. ecological preservation, providing an infrastructure for mass decision making) would be nice, but still not achievable as demonstrated by people voting for autoritarians. Can't have freedom if most don't want it.
Even the vestigial democracy is hollowed out by lobbyism.
So the question i see unanswered is with what to replace the right of the strongest with until humans can reach adulthood?
