Endless growth is not physically possible. It is clear we are reaching the limit sometime soon, if we have not already gone beyond it. The irony is, more consumption does not deliver on the capitalist promise: we are not happier because we consume more: quite the opposite. This talk starts a conversation that is long overdue. I do wish he had talked some about the futility of the promise, of our current course, but all the rest is sound. Worth watching till the end... Ask a capitalist how an economy works were growth is moderate and resource-neutral.
Noam Chomsky has been answering that question for decades. In a word: Anarchism. Kropotkin has answered it more than 100 years, long before state socialism was adopted. Read "Mutual Aid" and "The Conquest of Bread".
Bullshit. Chomsky is not an anarchist. He is a statist and if you don't know that then you've never paid attention to a word he has actually said. And by the way, this guy Gar is a BS vendor.
A more brilliant speaker, I've yet to hear. Part of me would like to see him run as Jesse Ventura's V.P. in '16, but part knows he's doing far more good on a local level than he ever could as a top elected official. This is the first I've ever heard of him, and since this is from 2011, I hope he's well and at least still speaking.
I totally agree that we need to form uniquely American solutions to overcoming Capitalism. Workers Cooperatives will certainly need to be a big part of that movement as Capitalism will, as you said, produce mass unemployment and neglect as it meets its death knell. But workers cooperatives need to be the backbone of workers political struggle for political power. A Marxist, political Workers' Party-movement with its own infrastructure and organizations, needs to be the center of that movement.
Believe me, I understand all of that. Marx was indeed a critic of capitalism, just like Roger Ebert was a critic of movies. So detailing the issues in the schools of thought while also exposing how capitalism corrupts itself is something that I find interesting and fascinating. It actually makes me want to show this in the gaming industry and why the way we organize businesses means that we're about to go through another bust cycle in this industry based on the warning signs above.
Why only one comment. What are we (you all and I) are going to *do* about what we have just heard? Conceive of a five year project to steer our world society towards a sustainable future. Be realistic about the time scale: If everything goes well it is a five year project. Given the likely difficulties on the way, plan to stick with it for ten years. "...what *do* you want?... if you don't have an answer to that you're only playing around..."
That's not communism at all. The "communism" that you're referring to is a state capitalism of the USSR, which is pretty powerful but it's not Socialism, where the workers have the power to decide what they want through representatives or economic power.
It goes to show Jyagos, how effectively anti Socialist propaganda has permeated political thought. Because Stalin styled, Soviet socialsim failed, doesn't mean that Marx's ideas was wrong. The capitalism of today would not be recognized by Smith,Ricardo or Mill. These are not written in stone; they're how man chooses to organize himself. Some organizational styles will work better than others, but we're not dogmatically committed to any one idea, that would be irrational and stupid.
Now personally, I don't think that we will ever be completely free of "boom and bust" cylcles; I think that it is an inherent nature of economic activity that no economic ideology can eliminate completely. So what has to be offered is an alternative to traditional capitalistic solutions or to adapt Marxist solutions to take that into account. No ideology is written in stone. That was the problem with the Soviet style; it could not adjust to changing conditions. Stalin saw to that.
So now, why can't capitalism be examined and held to it's standards? We can elect to keep it, change it or eliminate it altogether. We can no longer be browbeaten into accepting it without question or have our loyalties questioned. Milton Friedman wanted to change capitalism also, nobody questioned HIS loyalties, did they?
No. In fact the irony is that social reforms like pension plans have accumulated reservoirs of capital, which are then channeled to pay off unionized government employee salaries, benefits and pensions, as well as extremely generous socialist supports for the general population. This is specifically what happened in the Germany and Greece case, respectively. The money hasn't been "invested" in any conventional sense at all, which is why it cannot be paid back.
Well, I would agree with you except that, the present labor infrastructure would hinder that. It was after all, the AFL-CIO that endorsed Ronald Reagan in the first place and many of my labor brothers and sisters voted against their interests since then. So until organized labor takes the risk of confronting the teeth of Taft-Hartley, and organizing as a workers party, I'm not optimistic that change will come from the ranks of organized labor as presently constituted.
Noprofit: You can't argue with someone who has already made up his mind. Now to be sure, capitalism will eventually be replaced; as all such things go. Will it "collapse"? Maybe not in the way we expect, after all, I'm sure that no one expected feudalism to go away as it did either. I think that what will most likely happen is that workers collectives and individuals will emerge as the dominant force because of the limits of corporate capitalism to find new markets
"Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence." "he theory of the Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private [slave, feudal, bourgeois] property." -Karl Marx Communism has a lot of meaning because much has been written about it.
So in essence, it may not take a Lennistic(?) type of revolutionary approach. After all, he dealt with a backward feudalistic economy, dominated by a monarchy in Russia and not a economically mature capitalistic economy with a increasingly oligarchic dominated government. We have to adopt a uniquely American solution that fits our unique American problems. While Lenin can be a guide, it can't be gospel. Even HE would have said that.
o pardon me i thought u were being sarcastic / dismissive of communism. i think im a marxist too, i dont think neoclassical or keynesian works too well long term.
I didn't make up anything at all and inequality is just as rampant in socialist countries as it is in open market ones. Compare Switzerland staying neutral in conflicts to say America fighting open wars of aggression to the French socialist president. Socialism allows everyone to share in the misery equally while Capitalism allows everyone to unequal share in the benefit. I'm sorry you can't see straight yet. The next big industrial industries are slowly opening up.
Eh, idealism on a grand scale. America is all about "me". We're going to have to go very hungry to adopt a lifestyle change like this. And, the government and its benefactors (corporations) are doing everything in its power to prevent that.
In democracy you as a citizen have the right to vote someone that will REPRESENT you. And in democracy there are usually different political parties. In communism yeah you can kind of "vote" but all the decision are made from the goverment, they decide what you have to study in university, your salary etc. So in some ways, yes, communism kills democracy but at the same time gives wealth to everybody in the country at the same level. My father is Albanian and has lived during communism.
The Soviet style was a misunderstanding of Socialism. People thought about the top down model but didn't think about giving the workers the egalitarian democracy that they fought hard for. The co-op model (ie democracy at work) is beginning to pick up steam and seems to be a stronger alternative to what others are proposing. That's far better for leftists since they usually prefer a grassroots option anyway.
" It is true that the EU is in crisis, but it is a socialist entity and has become too much of a drain on the free market activity in Europe." The EU is in a spiraling crisis because the economic policies of each and every single country of the Currency Union is decided nationally in a frame where capital is invested merely through the market. The EU has no way of redistributing surpluses from the surplus to deficit countries, as the Dollarzone has its political Union in Washington.
From Animal House (1978): Mayor Carmine De Pasto: If you want this year's homecoming parade in my town, you have to pay for it. Dean Vernon Wormer: Carmine, I don't think it's right that you should extort money from the college. Mayor Carmine De Pasto: Look, these parades you throw are very expensive. You using my police, my sanitation people, and my Oldsmobiles free of charge. So, if you mention extortion again, I'll have your legs broken. Remember. You didn't build that. Yes we can.
Yes... look at Greece, isn't it a nice cycle? 27% unemployment, 56% youth unemployment, 30% crash of industrial production since 2009 etc. Capitalism is over, Greece is the only future Capitalism can bring. Long Live Communism and the abolition of money.
Do you buy any products from those corporations? Capitalism reflects values or lack of values. Every dollar is a vote. Some people have more votes than others sure. These people can be bad people but the question is "what do you vote for?" Money talks... not your words.
Again, you're pulling up things that make NO sense. You choose to ignore how the US has distribution of wealth to the rich compared to Switzerland going in a neo-liberal direction to France which still has more equal distribution of wealth. You jump from country to country without any basis for your arguments and again, this is non-sequitor. Please stop arguing that Socialism is bad if you don't have any idea of what it's done for more Socialist countries.
Yes, Capital is going to necessarily become extinct within the next twenty years alone because of the natural limits to growth. The current systemic capitalist crisis of profitability will however bring it down within the next 24 months, if not sooner. Socialism in the spirit of Lenin and in the theory of Marx is the only viable and good future for humanity.
2:10 "There is a genuine interest in promoting democracy and liberty." This is untrue statement. There is no genuine interest in promoting democracy by USA American government. Look at the track record of the past 50 years. Look at the military interventions and look at our allies governmental structures: Shah of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Columbia, South Africa, South Vietnam, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador...
I disagree. Usually socialists are very much aware of how economies operate. Don't confuse their rhetoric for what they actually believe. The dialectic crisis between capitalism and socialism is that capitalists cannot protect their surplus, while the socialist success with coercion cannot be easily translated into productivity. The synthesis seems to be a socialist fascism where a rich ruling managerial elite control profits, but allow capitalists to operate with relatively few hindrances.
Your argument is nonsensical. If you understood the theory of surplus value and other aspects of capitalism, I would actually take your argument seriously. But all you're doing is ad homs based on nothing more than mere personal attacks. Good luck with your arguments to others, but you are just more interested in making up your own mind about supporting the status quo that has a lot of inequality.
