Someone correct me if I'm wrong:
Socialism and Capitalism are economic systems/theories.
Democracy and Fascism are political systems/theories.
So you could have Democratic or Fascist Socialism (I would actually consider modern communist countries to be Fascist Socialist in practice), and you could have Democratic of Fascist Capitalism. I think a lot of discussions about these subjects would fare a lot better if these distinctions were better understood, though I will say, this discussion has been pretty good at keeping these two vectors parsed out.
The basis of Capitalist theory was laid down in the late 1700's and early 1800's. Socialist theory was formulated in the mid-1800's through the first half of the 20th century. I think both of them share the same weakness: they are predicated on the assumptions of the Industrial era, and are basically outdated. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but both count on a balanced flow of Capital, Labor, and Materials for a healthy, functioning state/economy/society, and from what I remember of Adam Smith, it was pretty much assumed that these would have equal mobility and weight, forming a system of checks and balances. Socialism, so far as I know, never really disagreed with this assumption, it just disagreed as to whether the invisible hand was capable of (or even interested in) distributing wealth to its greatest social benefit. Capitalism also seems to operate on the assumption that Capital is the "executive" branch of the system, whereas Socialism places its emphasis on Labor.
Skip forward to the 21th century and that balance has shifted quite a bit. Capital is now ultra-mobile, flying over national boundaries with the ease of a signal bouncing off a satellite, materials move at the slightly slower speed of jet travel and, labor...well, labor really doesn't move that well, especially over national boundaries. Again, if I recall correctly, Adam Smith assumed that people would be able to move to where work was available, which works if you are talking about people moving from farm towns to Manchester for factory jobs in 1870's Britain or from the rural South to Northern steel mills in 1940's United States, but not so much if you are a factory worker in Indiana whose company has moved its entire manufacturing operation to Mexico, or a software worker whose company has moved not only all its support, but also a large part of its development to India. As I joked to one of my friends, "The commute from Seattle to Issaquah was bad enough, but the commute to Bangalore is more than I can manage."
So there is one weakness, in my eyes, that both systems relied on a system of checks and balances that is now broken. Also, neither one of them really seems to have any grasp on how intangible property should be handled, and least, not to the degree that it was discussed in any of the Intro courses I had to take in college. And when some of the wealthiest and most powerful corporations in the world are based entirely on intangible assets, thats a big gap.
But here's where I get all tree-huggy and stuff: Capitalism centers around the demands of Capital (well, duh), Socialism focuses on the needs of Labor...
Who's doing Materials?
Materials? What are you talking about? say Smith and Marx. Why would we waste our time building theory centered around materials? We're never going to run out of materials, like forests, or healthy soil, or oil, or drinking water. Right?
To some degree, I think the Capitalism vs. Socialism debate is besides the point now. I don't believe either one of them really has a solution for the crisis of Materials. I can't remember where I heard this, but sometimes when you debate something endlessly and never come to a productive conclusion, it's because you're asking the wrong questions.
So there's my attempt to drag this thread off on an entirely different tangent, I've got it out of my system. Please, carry on.
Socialism and Capitalism are economic systems/theories.
Democracy and Fascism are political systems/theories.
So you could have Democratic or Fascist Socialism (I would actually consider modern communist countries to be Fascist Socialist in practice), and you could have Democratic of Fascist Capitalism. I think a lot of discussions about these subjects would fare a lot better if these distinctions were better understood, though I will say, this discussion has been pretty good at keeping these two vectors parsed out.
The basis of Capitalist theory was laid down in the late 1700's and early 1800's. Socialist theory was formulated in the mid-1800's through the first half of the 20th century. I think both of them share the same weakness: they are predicated on the assumptions of the Industrial era, and are basically outdated. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but both count on a balanced flow of Capital, Labor, and Materials for a healthy, functioning state/economy/society, and from what I remember of Adam Smith, it was pretty much assumed that these would have equal mobility and weight, forming a system of checks and balances. Socialism, so far as I know, never really disagreed with this assumption, it just disagreed as to whether the invisible hand was capable of (or even interested in) distributing wealth to its greatest social benefit. Capitalism also seems to operate on the assumption that Capital is the "executive" branch of the system, whereas Socialism places its emphasis on Labor.
Skip forward to the 21th century and that balance has shifted quite a bit. Capital is now ultra-mobile, flying over national boundaries with the ease of a signal bouncing off a satellite, materials move at the slightly slower speed of jet travel and, labor...well, labor really doesn't move that well, especially over national boundaries. Again, if I recall correctly, Adam Smith assumed that people would be able to move to where work was available, which works if you are talking about people moving from farm towns to Manchester for factory jobs in 1870's Britain or from the rural South to Northern steel mills in 1940's United States, but not so much if you are a factory worker in Indiana whose company has moved its entire manufacturing operation to Mexico, or a software worker whose company has moved not only all its support, but also a large part of its development to India. As I joked to one of my friends, "The commute from Seattle to Issaquah was bad enough, but the commute to Bangalore is more than I can manage."
So there is one weakness, in my eyes, that both systems relied on a system of checks and balances that is now broken. Also, neither one of them really seems to have any grasp on how intangible property should be handled, and least, not to the degree that it was discussed in any of the Intro courses I had to take in college. And when some of the wealthiest and most powerful corporations in the world are based entirely on intangible assets, thats a big gap.
But here's where I get all tree-huggy and stuff: Capitalism centers around the demands of Capital (well, duh), Socialism focuses on the needs of Labor...
Who's doing Materials?
Materials? What are you talking about? say Smith and Marx. Why would we waste our time building theory centered around materials? We're never going to run out of materials, like forests, or healthy soil, or oil, or drinking water. Right?
To some degree, I think the Capitalism vs. Socialism debate is besides the point now. I don't believe either one of them really has a solution for the crisis of Materials. I can't remember where I heard this, but sometimes when you debate something endlessly and never come to a productive conclusion, it's because you're asking the wrong questions.
So there's my attempt to drag this thread off on an entirely different tangent, I've got it out of my system. Please, carry on.
