I believe that most human beings are rational, so it bothers me when I am completely baffled by the way someone thinks or has thought.

Today I was reading about communism at www.marxists.org. Although I disagree with a lot of Marxist ideas, generally speaking I think I understand where they are coming from.

However, I was reading about the relationship between communism and anarchism. I have always heard that Marxists believe that true communism can only come with the abolition of the state. I had always thought that was probably anti-Communist propaganda, because I couldn't believe that large numbers of intelligent people would actually believe it and be willing to fight and die for it. I thought it sounded so ridiculous that it must be a misrepresentation of what Marxists really believe, to make them sound ridiculously unrealistic.

However, documents on marxists.org make it clear that while Marx differed from anarchists on many issues, he agreed with them that perfect socialism would lead to the abolition of the state, since the state would no longer be needed to deal with class antagonisms. I think this is idealism bordering on stupidity. Even if you have a society without classes, you still need government to enforce laws, to protect individual rights, and to maintain order. Since I have no doubt that Marx was more intelligent than I am, I must be missing something.

So here's my question. Can anyone explain to me how anarchy could be both realistic and desirable in any intelligent person's mind?

Possibly, all the ideal models of how society should be have this flaw; that they depend on everyone being - if not altruistic or even just fair-minded - rational and well-informed.

(Anarchy seems to assume that everyone is reasonably humane and helpful, given ideal circumstances. Libertarian models claim to solve the problem of selfishness, but depend on everyone being street-smart and knowledgeable.)

I read somewhere that companies in 'crisis mode' work very efficiently; the office-politics, rules and heirarchies are set aside, and everyone just gets on with what needs to be done. This also depends on everyone knowing what should be done, realising that their job depends on it, and not taking the opportunity to do some self-advancing back-stabbing. That might work with 100 people, and not always then, but not with a whole society.

Maybe, if you're a rational and well-informed brainiac coming up with a brand new model for society - libertarianism, Marxism or whatever - it just doesn't occur to you that people on the whole aren't as interested in Society as you are, and can be self-destructive, dumb, and contrary. Of course the ideal model works well with an imagined number of virtual humans and therefore seems realistic and desirable, but it'll fall apart out in the real world, which is why a workable society tends to be an organic mess of compromises, traditions, innovations, injustices and contradictions.

This guy suggests, that for all his cleverness, Marx simply fell for the 'Noble Savage' myth:

"Marx and Engels... ...dreamed of a world that embodied all the values of the primitive, tribal society - of the Noble Savage. They imagined a world without merchants and therefore without commerce. It was a world without inequality and therefore without experts or professionalism. And yet this dream was the creation of highly sophisticated urban writers who felt that the revolution they were calling for would be made by the urban proletariat. There is an internal tension in Marxist theory that cannot be resolved - the contradiction between the sweet, bucolic dream they believed would be realized and the complex, urban structure that had shaped them and enabled them to formulate this very dream." www.jochnowitz.net

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Originally posted by Sarai:
I believe that most human beings are rational, so it bothers me when I am completely baffled by the way someone thinks or has thought.

Today I was reading about communism at http://www.marxists.org. Although I disagree with a lot of Marxist ideas, generally speaking I think I understand where they are coming from.

However, I was reading about the relationship between communism and anarchism. I have always heard that Marxists believe that true communism can only come with the abolition of the state. I had always thought that was probably anti-Communist propaganda, because I couldn't believe that large numbers of intelligent people would actually believe it and be willing to fight and die for it. I thought it sounded so ridiculous that it must be a misrepresentation of what Marxists really believe, to make them sound ridiculously unrealistic.

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The theory propounded by Marx and others, is that, once the peoples needs are being consistently met, and there is no need to protect against subversion or foreign interference, there will be less and less need for agencies of government, and they can be discontinued when they are no longer needed.

Anarchists seem to believe that government is inherently evil, and should be discontinued for the public good, whether it performs a useful function or not.

You might consider looking into the little monograph "Anarchism or Socialism" by Stalin. It should be available at any unversity library, although I doubt that your public library will have a copy.

Alan Moore

Thanks, Alan. You are always such a great source of information! I found the monograph on the internet: http://ptb.lashout.net/marx2mao/Stalin/AS07.html . I might be able to find it in my local library, but it would not likely be in English. I prefer to read such things in my first language. The internet is a wonderful thing, isn't it! I've just begun to read it and won't finish it for a bit, but at first glance, it is apparent that Stalin disagrees that anarchism and communism have the same ultimate goal. However, that is clearly NOT what Marx said, and is just another example of how Stalin was not truly a Marxist. It sounds to me as if Stalin was happy to remain in the dictatorial stage of Marxism, which, while not being idealistic, strikes me as being something much worse. As I said, though, I haven't finished it yet, and will post a comment once I do.

Newnickname -

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(Anarchy seems to assume that everyone is reasonably humane and helpful, given ideal circumstances. Libertarian models claim to solve the problem of selfishness, but depend on everyone being street-smart and knowledgeable.)

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Believe it or not, I believe that human beings DO want to be generally humane and helpful, and commit evils only out of ignorance. I certainly could be accused of being an unrealistic idealist - and have been, several times, especially here on AP!

However, no matter how humane and helpful people are, no matter how ideal the circumstances, I still can't understand how an intelligent person could find the government to be unnecessary. I can understand Liberals and Libertarians who want to LIMIT the government, but trying to ELIMINATE it seems crazy. No matter how smart, humane and helpful humans are capable of being, we are still human. Our social organization always needs some kind of leadership. Who will do the urban planning? Who will make sure that schools are available to everyone and are all of a decent quality? And if we all have equal resources in our lives, who will ensure that not everyone is doing the same cushy jobs? Who will make sure that someone is out cleaning up the streets? Who will do the hard physical labor? Even humane, reasonably intelligent and good-willed people are capable of being lazy! I'm the perfect example of that! Who will enforce laws? Even the best of us break laws some times. For example, no matter how humane we are, we'll all occasionally drive faster than we should if we're in a hurry or just enjoying the speed of automobiles.

I could see how a couple of idealists might fall for this, but millions of people shed blood for this idea. We must be missing something, don't you think? Or was Marxism simply attractive because of what it stood against (anti-Liberal, anti-Capitalist), and never really because of what it stood for?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Sarai,

And yet anarchists do seem to think government is unecessary. I think they'd see your views as those held by leftist scaredy-cats, unwilling to go all the way: "Unable to conceive of any forms of social organization in which concrete human individuals retain their freedom in voluntary, unforced, mutually negotiated unions, they pledge their allegiance to an ideological organizationalism which demands that all must subordinate their individual lives to the greater good of the "social" or of "society"-as expressed in particular forms of organization depending upon the variant of leftism involved." www.anarchymag.org

There's maybe a hint of cultish or religious irrationality here. Cults must hold 'impossible', or very radical, beliefs to mark themselves out from the common herd. Inside the cult, status comes from being the most committed and extravagant in opinion or action (that's partly how terrorism works, too - "You're not really one of us unless you die or kill for the cause, until then you're just a hanger-on, a wannabe.")

There are a lot of similarities between Marxism and religion - and people, it seems, are always ready to shed blood for such Big Ideas. You're right - Marxism does seem to promise justice and retribution now - and also a future heaven-on-earth; the "workers' paradise". Christianity and Marxism join seamlessly in liberation theology.

"If a new society is to be built, we may be sure that religion will have a hand in building it. Only religion has the power to destroy the old and to build the new. Whether that new creative religion will be absolutely destructive of the values incorporated in classical religion, or whether it will learn how to appropriate what is best in the insights of the past for its own uses, will depend to a large degree upon the ability of classical religion to come to terms with the ethico-political problems of modern industrial society, out of which proletarian religion is being born." Reinhold Niebuhr, 193-.

NNN- this is exactly what I was thinking. Marxism does sound very much like a religion.

For the first time in my life, I think I really understand the Cold War mentality. After really spending time reading Marxist ideas, I can suddenly understand why people were so afraid of it. It sounds deceptively intellectual, but when you really examine it, it is irrational. The good aspects of it seem based on faith, not fact. And the aspects of it that seem wholly provable, wholly believable, are frightening. And it is quite clear that Lenin fully intended to spread this religion around the globe, and that this was the Communist goal.

All my life I have been with those who laughed at the idea that Communism was ever a threat to the US. But if you read Marx's ideas, he says that for success, it necessarily HAD to happen in these countries: Germany, England, France, Russia and the U.S. And Lenin said it had to happen on a global scale. And it seems to have an ultimate goal that is beautiful but not possible.

Religion in itself is good and worthwhile. Faith in itself is not dangerous or wrong at all. However, it is only good and worthwhile on an individual and consentual level. When people try to force their faith on others, it becomes dangerous. That's why Marxism was dangerous. It was a form of religious fanaticism that necessarily tried to force its faith on everyone else.

This is as opposed to liberalism. While democracy, for example, is an ideal, it doesn't take faith to believe in it. We have evidence all around us that democracy works and is possible. We even have evidence that capitalism, with appropriate modifications, can work. We have no evidence that communism works or is even possible. There has never been a real communist country, and those that aim for communism get stuck at a stage that is antithetical to democracy, which even communists seem to agree is a good thing (but only after their faith-based idea of perfect equality has been established). Thus, liberalism is an ideal that has a basis in reality, while communism is an ideal that has a basis in faith- a religion, not a political reality.

It seems that perhaps the Cold War was not simply about our power-mad government combatting their power-mad government, which is basically what my professors never said but always implied, and which I always accepted as true. However, while the US didn't always do it right, maybe our government did the right thing in trying to combat communism.

I'd love to hear your comments on this.

Marx would have had none of that; for him democracy was just a sham. "The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them." This is a cynical view that many non-Marxists also hold; particularly of two-party contests between millionaires, as in the US presidential election.

I think, maybe, if you really appreciate democracy, you see it as one of those messy and unsatisfactory compromises that make up a real-world, workable society. More quotes:

'The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.' ~Winston Churchill

'Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those others that have been tried from time to time.' ~Winston Churchill

'Democracy is like a raft: It won't sink, but you will always have your feet wet.' ~Russell B. Long (This quote is also attributed to Churchill, with the added idea that totalitarianism is like a liner - superficially impressive but liable to sink catastrophically.)

What your professors were maybe implying was that the Cold Warriors didn't really have faith in democracy as it should be. They wanted to defeat communism and impose democracy by warfare (which suited the military-industrial complex); they used communism as a boogey-man to further undemocratic ends in their own country; and they idealised democracy as a panacea - an opposite, mirror image of the religiously-held Marxist ideology.

(Bush is making similar errors in Iraq.)

Democracy shouldn't be put on a pedestal as an ideal system, and it isn't something that can be imposed from above. It's a real-world, pragmatic compromise which - with a lot of grassroots good-will, and constant squabbling - works.

Any system thought up by theorists (in politics, or teaching, or nursing...) won't work as they imagined it would in practice.

In almost every field that involves humans, don't we usually find that the best practice is a flexible eclecticism - and an avoidance of absolute systems (even, in politics, an absolute faith in 'Democracy') that try to impose ideals on the real world?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: newnickname,

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I think, maybe, if you really appreciate democracy, you see it as one of those messy and unsatisfactory compromises that make up a real-world, workable society. More quotes:

_'The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.'_ ~Winston Churchill

_'Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those others that have been tried from time to time.'_ ~Winston Churchill

_'Democracy is like a raft: It won't sink, but you will always have your feet wet.'_ ~Russell B. Long (This quote is also attributed to Churchill, with the added idea that totalitarianism is like a liner - superficially impressive but liable to sink catastrophically.)

What your professors were maybe implying was that the Cold Warriors didn't really have faith in democracy as it should be.

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I think that you may have contradicted yourself a bit, NNN. What your first quotations indicate is that we shouldn't have FAITH in democracy, we should simply ACCEPT democracy for what it is. Democracy is not a religion; it is, as you say, a messy reality. Therefore to have expected anyone to have an idealistic faith in it is wrong; they simply knew what it is, knew that it is important, and knew that it is not compatible with communism.

I agree, however, that the Cold Warriors didn't embrace democracy as completely they ought to have. For example, the CIA sometimes helped stopped democratic processes from happening if they resulted in a Communist party getting elected. In this case, I think our government was wrong. Encouraging democracy should have taken precedence over stopping communism. Had we put MORE focus on encouraging democracy, elected communist parties would either have ultimately led to a kind of democractic socialism, which I see as perfectly okay, or they would have eventually been voted out of office. OR they would have ultimately become dictatorships, in which case we would have then been in the right to have helped the people overthrow them.

Thus, it is clear that no one idealised Democracy, and that if anything, they didn't focus on it enough.

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They wanted to defeat communism and impose democracy by warfare (which suited the military-industrial complex);

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This is exactly what professors of mine said. Now I'm not so sure. If you agree that communism should be defeated, then the most logical way to defeat a war for communism is to launch a war against communism. Now, personally, I am sympathetic with theories of non-violent resistence, but I fully recognize that most people on this planet, including the vast majority of the so-called "anti-war movement," have no patience with non-violent resistence and consider it to be unrealistic. So if we stick to what most people in modern times consider realistic, it is warfare. Now, if warfare benefitted some people, then so be it. But if you agree that communism needed to be defeated, then you must recognize that war was primarily waged to stop communism, and any other, more cynical benefits of war were simply bi-products of it - not the driving reason behind it.

Personally, however, where I think our government went wrong was its obsession with stopping communism. I agree that communism should have been kept in check, but I think the best way to do that would have been encouraging democracy, not simply stopping communism. We would have done better had we been obsessed with encouraging democracy, instead.

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they used communism as a boogey-man to further undemocratic ends in their own country;

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Who are "they"? We elect our leaders, and we are responsible for what happens in our own country. And to be honest, I'm not sure which undemocratic ends you are describing that came about as a result of fighting communism. If you mean McCarthyism, that accomplished nothing and ultimately died because it was so patently wrong. If you mean something permanent that wasn't eventually caught and reformed by the democratic process, I'm not sure what you're talking about. Could you explain?

You say communism was a "boogey-man," that is, a false threat. My reading about communism - from communist sources, nonetheless - indicates to me that it was not a boogey-man, but had every goal of a very real threat. But if believe that having a Communist Party in power a good thing, then I guess it was no theat at all. I personally think that would not be a good thing, and therefore see how it was a threat to those who oppose communism.

In fact, until I started reading communist sources, I agreed with you. It was reading the words of actual communists that made me begin to understand why Western nations were so concerned about it.

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and they idealised democracy as a panacea - an opposite, mirror image of the religiously-held Marxist ideology. (Bush is making similar errors in Iraq.)

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Not true. If they had really idealized democracy (or even better, simply accepted it as the messy reality that it is), they would have made democracy the most important issue. But they didn't. They made stopping communism the most important issue.

Bush, on the other hand, either 1)is making democracy the most important issue or 2) is making oil and/or power the most important issue. I don't know which is true. If the answer is 1, then I think he is on the right track. He is making democracy a threat - which isn't a threat at all if you recognize its virtues. If the answer is 2, then I think we are on the road to serious trouble, because if it is 2, then the first option can't really happen.

You can't accuse Bush of idealizing democracy on the one hand, NNN, and then on the other hand argue, as you do, that Bush isn't really fighting for democracy. You have to decide which is true.

If you think that Bush is lying or manipulating people to BELIEVE we are fighting for democracy, then that is certainly NOT the same thing that Marxists were doing. Marxists were NOT manipulating people while secretly fighting for another agenda. They really believed their religion and were fighting for it.

Democracy, as I already argued, is not a religion. It is real and we see that it can work. I don't have "faith" in democracy any more than I have "faith" in my car. I know my car works. So does democracy. If Bush really is fighting for democracy by removing barriers to it, then I think he is doing the right thing.

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Democracy shouldn't be put on a pedestal as an ideal system, and it isn't something that can be imposed from above. It's a real-world, pragmatic compromise which - with a lot of grassroots good-will, and constant squabbling - works.

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I agree. But if it turns out that most people in the world really want democracy, then it "imposing democracy from above" is not what Bush is doing. He is removing one barrier to democracy. Once those barriers are removed, democracy will grow from the grass-roots, as you say.

We saw the hint of possibility for that during the first Iraqi elections. In Iraq, we saw grass-roots good will, and we even saw squabbling from the results. I think this is a good sign- but only if Bush really means it when he says that once democracy is achieved (REAL democracy- not a puppet government determined by the US), the US will leave, and allow Iraq total self-determination.

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_Any_ system thought up by theorists (in politics, or teaching, or nursing...) won't work as they imagined it would in practice.

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True. But we can see if the theoretical model has a chance by seeing if, with slight modifications, it has a real possibility of working more or less as it theoretically should in real life. So in politics we see that liberalism really can work, with modifications from the theoretical model. We have never seen that communism really works, even with slight modifications. Communism has never actually occured even close to what Marxist theory envisions.

True Marxists would say it hasn't occurred because communism has not been embraced world-wide, but that eventually the capitalists that aim to stop it will be defeated. While I believe that a communist party could, theoretically, become a world-wide phenomenon, communism as Marx described it could not.

Democracy, however, really could.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Sarai,

I guess what I was trying to say was that 'Democracy!' shouldn't be abused as an imperialists' war-cry; people make democracies, they can't be given them. In the Cold War, the brutal tribalism of both sides was justified by appeals to supposedly noble ends - equality for all, or democracy for all - but it was really just bloody warfare as it always has been (except with weapons too scary to use; the one new twist, courtesy of technological advance).

I think, in Iraq, 'democracy' been used (once the original scare-mongering 'WMD' justifications fell through) as a slogan to justify an invasion which was more about old-fashioned tribalism and grabbing of resources. Bush, or PNAC, has a clear idea of what the important issues really are, and 'democracy on the march' is just the PR device.

In actuality, 'democracy' in Iraq seems (although the dust hasn't settled yet) to have simply brought about a kind of coup, whereby the Sunnis, who tended to be favoured under Hussein, the British and the Ottoman Empire, have been overthrown by the Shia (while the Kurds make a bid for independence).

I see your points, though; Bush - whatever his motivations - might have created conditions which might allow a real democracy to arise. And pacifism probably wasn't the appropriate response to Russian communism's ambitions.

I was thinking about McCarthyism - that totalitarian impulse didn't die; it's been revived under the Patriot Act. It's not just a few posters on this board who are saying, 'But why should prisoners have rights - they're prisoners?' Republican congressmen are saying it, too. Gonzales, who says torture of suspects is OK, has been confirmed in position.

Getting back to Marx, it occured to me that we need to remember how awful conditions for workers were when he was writing, and at the time of the Russian Revolution. Maybe any kind of change seemed desirable.

NNN- can I just say that I'm really enjoying this discussion? My husband can't believe I've logged on again, but I just had to see if you had responded.

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Originally posted by newnickname:
I guess what I was trying to say was that 'Democracy!' shouldn't be abused as an imperialists' war-cry; people make democracies, they can't be given them.

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No, they can't be given them. However, they can be prevented from having one - through oppression, dictatorship, exteme poverty, a lack of education, etc. etc.

I wonder if there isn't a real possibility for developed democratic countries to help remove those barriers to democracy in other countries.

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In the Cold War, the brutal tribalism of both sides was justified by appeals to supposedly noble ends - equality for all, or democracy for all - but it was really just bloody warfare as it always has been (except with weapons too scary to use; the one new twist, courtesy of technological advance).

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I guess I disagree here. I think both sides really DID have noble ambitions. It wasn't used as a tool for other motives. I think their motives really were what they said they were. I think the Western countries screwed up a bit by focusing too much on stopping communism at the expense of supporting democracies, but I think their desire to stop communism was correct. Nevertheless, I am sure that the communists really did think they were fighting for something good and noble, as well. They really did believe in Marxism. And I think the Western countries really did believe, and rightly so, that they were fighting against something dangerous.

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I think, in Iraq, 'democracy' been used (once the original scare-mongering 'WMD' justifications fell through) as a slogan to justify an invasion which was more about old-fashioned tribalism and grabbing of resources. Bush, or PNAC, has a clear idea of what the important issues really are, and 'democracy on the march' is just the PR device.

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I'm still not quite sure what I think about this. In some ways, I guess I'll just have to wait and see. If the US ends up grabbing large amounts of resources at the expense of the Iraqi people, I will be furious. However, I'm not sure that creating democracy isn't Bush's top goal in Iraq right now.

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In actuality, 'democracy' in Iraq seems (although the dust hasn't settled yet) to have simply brought about a kind of coup, whereby the Sunnis, who tended to be favoured under Hussein, the British and the Ottoman Empire, have been overthrown by the Shia (while the Kurds make a bid for independence).

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If Bush is there simply to grab resources from Iraq, democracy will not spread there. Any fuel we give the resistance to add to its argument that this is an imperialistic war will only strengthen the resistance. The resistance is opposed to democracy in Iraq, so any strength they receive is a blow to democracy there.

The only way democracy will happen in Iraq is if a) the majority of Iraqis want it and are willing to do what it takes to get it and b) if the occupying forces led by the US really intend to help the Iraqis gain self-determination. If we just build a puppet government that kowtows (sp?) to American whims with no regard for the Iraqis, democracy will never grow there.

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I see your points, though; Bush - whatever his motivations - might have created conditions which might allow a _real_ democracy to arise. And pacifism probably wasn't the appropriate response to Russian communism's ambitions.

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I'm not sure how a real democracy in Iraq could occur if Bush has strong alternative motivations. Some people say that Iraqis voted to SPITE the Americans, but frankly that just doesn't make any sense. We ALL want the Americans out of Iraq. Both the US and those who voted in the elections claim to want democracy. Those who didn't vote don't believe democracy would serve anything but the "American/Zionist agenda". So if a democracy really does result, then I would think it will please both the majority of Iraqis and the Americans. But again, only if it is a _real_ democracy, which can't happen if Bush starts hijacking Iraqi resources.

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I _was_ thinking about McCarthyism - that totalitarian impulse didn't die; it's been revived under the Patriot Act. It's not just a few posters on this board who are saying, 'But why should prisoners have rights - they're _prisoners_?' Republican congressmen are saying it, too. Gonzales, who says torture of suspects is OK, has been confirmed in position.

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Oh, it IS just a few posters saying that here - actually, I think it's just one. But I do see your point. You're right that this is a serious problem in the current fear-ridden US environment. However, the Patriot Act is a monster of its own. It didn't need the Cold War or McCarthyism to be born. And like McCarthyism, I don't think it will live a long life. I have no facts to support it except... er... faith in the democratic process. Gulp.

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Getting back to Marx, it occured to me that we need to remember how awful conditions for workers were when he was writing, and at the time of the Russian Revolution. Maybe _any_ kind of change seemed desirable.

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I agree absolutely. Stating that communism is not an idea that I particularly like doesn't mean that I bear ill will toward the communists. No one knew in the 18th century if democracy would really work- it was an idea that sounded good, so they gave it a go. At that point, I guess it was like a religion, too. They fought and shed blood for it and put it in place. Lo and behold, it worked. The communists gave their noble ideals a go, too. They fought and shed blood for it and put it in place - the only difference is that it didn't work.

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I am sure that the communists really did think they were fighting for something good and noble, as well. They really did believe in Marxism.

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I'm not sure that this is true - certainly not in the 50's and later. Most people under communism surely knew they were living in a corrupt and failing system, that had no hope of ever delivering the supposed perfect state, where government would be unecessary. The Cold War was maybe more about xenophobia, fear, nationalism and so on - the causes of wars for millenia.

True, but being forced to live under communism doesn't necessarily make one a communist.

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True, but being forced to live under communism doesn't necessarily make one a communist.

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That's true. Most people that were forced to live under communism want no part of it again.A lot of Russians today fear that exact same thing ,that their Country will slip back into a
Authoritarian State.