(Reposted in this community cuz I didn’t get any responses in the original community that I posted this under)
This is how I understand the communist utopia: Workers seize means of production. Means of production thus, start working for the proletariat masses rather than the bourgeoisie class. Thus, technological progress stops being stifled and flourishes. Humanity achieves a post scarcity-like environment for most goods and services. Thus, money becomes irrelevant at a personal level.
In all this, I can’t see how we stop needing a state. How can we build bridges without a body capable of large scale organisation? How would we have a space program without a state for example? I clearly have gotten many things wrong here. However, I’m unable to find what I’ve gotten wrong on my own. Plz help <3
Edit: Okay, got a very clear and sensible answer from @Aidinthel@reddthat.com. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to link their comment. Hence, here is what they said:
Depends on how you define “state”. IIRC, Marx drew a distinction between “state” and “government”, where the former is all the coercive institutions (cops, prisons, courts, etc). In this framework, you need a “government” to do the things you refer to, but participation in that government’s activities should be voluntary, without the threat of armed government agents showing up at your door if you don’t comply.
Statelessness is held to be necessary because, in the simplest terms, power corrupts.
If we institutionalize authority - if we create a structure in which authority is vested and positions within that structure that are held by specific individuals - then sooner or later (and history has shown that with communism it’s generally sooner) self-serving fuckwads will capture those positions, then bend them to serve their own interests and the interests of their cronies and patrons, to the detriment of everyone else.
And yes - there are practical problems with not having institutionalized authority.
But the thinking of those who advocate for statelessness is that those problems can be, and would be, solved if people had the opportunity. But first we have to get the self-serving fuckwads out of the way, and the only way to do that is to not have institutionalized authority in the first place.
The biggest issue I see is self serving fuckwads don’t go away. They’ll import themselves a la Putin if they think they can get away with it. They’ll create their own institutions a la the Mafia if there’s nothing else.
The second problem is there are large groups of people who want to be under some Authority to the extent they get populist / fascist stuff going or invent ones like in Religion.
I just don’t think people “freed from institutional authority” are inherently going to not just recreate it, probably worse…
All of that is the fruit of people living for generations under oppressive hierarchical power structures.
Just like we can’t say humans “naturally are greedy” we also can’t say they “naturally will give themselves over a ‘populist leader’”.
In less hierarchical societies, people naturally are more skeptic of authority and populism.
Like when the North American native peoples of the North East first encountered Europeans, and couldn’t possibly understand how the sailors had “bosses” who “told them what to do”. The idea of following a leader like that didn’t make much sense to them at all.
Over the short term (in an historical sense), that’s certainly the case.
I just mentioned on another post that I liken it to individual growth. Just as individuals can and often do mature to the point that they no longer need or desire a mommy and daddy, so too can our species as a whole mature. And I believe that, if we don’t destroy ourselves along the way, we not only can but will.
But even if we don’t destroy ourselves along the way, yes - that’s still many, many, MANY generations away.
Ok, so then would be correct to say that the communist utopia is a sort of singularity (consider y=1/x, where x=0). It can never be achieved, but the goal should be to get as close to it as possible. We will never achieve total post scarcity. However, we can achieve post scarcity for things like food, shelter, clothing, healthcare, education, then probably internet access, smartphones, video games and so on.
We can never eliminate institutions of authority, but we can reduce their presence as much as possible. For example, we can never eliminate the police force, as there still would be some sociopaths who we would need protection from. However, as society would progress, crime would drop such that we would require smaller and smaller police forces.
So in conclusion, am I right in considering the communist utopia as a singularity?
It can never be achieved
Why not?
If an individual can outgrow a need for a mommy and daddy to watch over them and tell them what to do, then so can a species.
But yes - for the relatively short term (in the anthropological sense), such a system is effectively impossible, so yes - “the goal should be to get as close to it as possible.”
And in fact, the only way that it can be achieved is incrementally, as ever more individuals reject the whole concept of institutionalized authority. Eventually, a point should be reached at which the view that it’s illegitimate is so widespread that those who claim it will no longer be able to exercise their claim.
Or to put it in simplistic and not-really-accurate terms, the claim “I’m the President of the United States” will be as ludicrous as the claim “I’m the Emperor of the Universe,” and will be treated with the same disdain.
We will never achieve total post scarcity.
I agree.
The extent of the universe as a whole might well be infinite, but the extent of the resources to which humans can have access most assuredly is not.
We can never eliminate institutions of authority
I disagree.
I not only think we can - I think that unless we destroy ourselves first, we inevitably will.
Again, it’s akin to an individual outgrowing the need for a mommy and daddy, just on a broader scale.
For example, we can never eliminate the police force, as there still would be some sociopaths who we would need protection from.
Except that the police are ever more likely to BE sociopaths than to protect us from them.
That’s the exact problem I mentioned in the last post - hierarchical authority effectively rewards and thus selects for sociopathy.
People with morals, principles, integrity and/or empathy will have things that they’ll refuse to do.
Psychopaths don’t have those constraints - if so inclined, they’re willing to do absolutely whatever it takes to get what they want.
So all other things more or less equal, psychopaths actually have a competitive advantage in hierarchical systems.
Which is exactly how and why “power corrupts.”
So in conclusion, am I right in considering the communist utopia as a singularity?
Roughly, though it would be more accurate, if less appropriate to this STEM-obsessed era, to call it an “ideal.”
The analogy with mommy and daddy doesn’t really make sense.
Unless your parents are filthy rich or very powerful, they usually can’t provide you anything you can’t do yourself once you reach a certain age.
The same is very much not true with a stateless society vs the mafia.
If you are part of the mafia, even just as a lowest level thug, you will have an advantage over being the person who gets blackmailed by the mafia.
I know, many Americans and also people from other countries have very traumatic experiences with the local police and thus a very bad opinion about them. That’s understandable, especially if you have never seen what good policework looks like. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
In most Central European countries, for example, the policework is really positive. Sure, there are negative examples there too, nothing is perfect, but most of these countries are in the very top of the safest countries (discounting micronations that are too small for statistically relevant data).
Of course, power corrupts. And because of that, modern democracies have a lot of safety nets that stop hostile legislation. And since these safety nets are staffed by people voted in by very different groups of people than the legislators, these are actual checks and balances compared to the farce that happens in the USA.
That’s another issue: The political system in the USA is not a democracy, but a presidential two-party-system in which the votes of most people don’t count. They basically vote in a dictator (ok, not fully, but if the party holds senate, house and surpreme court, it is a dictatorship, and in a two-party-system that happens pretty easily) every few years and Government just does whatever they want, because nobody can hold them accountable, and in the worst case they’ll get voted back into office two legislatory periods later.
And if you don’t live in a swing state, your vote just doesn’t count.
The USA has had their system for far too long and never had a chance to overhaul the whole system. So politicians are using centuries old loopholes, wide enough to drive a cargo ship through them, and nothing is stopping them, because the people in power got to power in this system and changing anything is just a risk for them to lose that power.
I’m not a fan of the current capitalism, but your explanation has some internal contradictions.
So to not have an institutionalized authority that coerces people to follow the rules, you first coerce (or even kill) the self-serving fuckwads.
Say you managed this during a revolution where generally everything goes. Revolution is done and now how do you guard your system from self-serving fuckwads using that power vacuum to gain even more power than before?
Do you just hold lynchings whenever some envious randos thing that someone holds too much power?
How does one get a fair trial if there is no judge or jury? War tribunals?
So to not have an institutionalized authority that coerces people to follow the rules, you first coerce (or even kill) the self-serving fuckwads.
No - you explicitly do not. It’s impossible to get out of the trap of some claiming the power to nominally rightfully force the submission of others through some claiming the power to nominally rightfully force the submission of others.
The only way it can come about is if humanity evolves into it - grows the fuck up, collectively as well as individually.
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Anarcho-capitalism is just a can of worms. Capital represents power hence an uneven allocation of them, i.e. capitalism, is incompatible with anarchism.
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Depends on how you define “state”. IIRC, Marx drew a distinction between “state” and “government”, where the former is all the coercive institutions (cops, prisons, courts, etc). In this framework, you need a “government” to do the things you refer to, but participation in that government’s activities should be voluntary, without the threat of armed government agents showing up at your door if you don’t comply.
But what if someone doesn’t comply?
When someone who owns the path to your house decides they won’t let you use that path anymore.
Or when the guy who owns the water works doesn’t like you and decides that your house won’t get any water any more?
Or even more simple: what if you and your neighbour have a conflict that escalates further and further? Should you just duel? Or maybe shoot the neighbour in their sleep before they do it with you?
And lastly: To get to this state, you need to coerce the current coercive institutions out of said power. Is that not being coercive yourself?
There are different ideas how (and if) this could work. E.g. worker’s councils that form at a factory level (or similar - people who are working closely together), and then you might have higher levels of cooperation where e.g. all roadworking collectives in a region send delegates to coordinate who builds which road, what roads are even necessary etc. You’d probably want cooperation in another dimension as well: delegates of road working collectives coordinating with teamsters, urban planners, manufactureres of building materials, … But it would be networks of networks, not a top-down structure responsible for everything from kindergartens to space exploration and equipped with military and police power.
You might want to check out The Disposessed by Ursula K. LeGuin or bolo’bolo by P.M. for some more ideas.
The problem I have always seen is how do you deal with bad actors in general? It always eventually comes down to force.
No police or military just means that eventually some one will come in and take over.
