The Comment Factory

Socialists have always spoken of the historical leap from “necessity to freedom”. But this is not an idle dream: it is based upon the Marxian law of value, which is simply that the value of commodities fall as the productivity of human labor increases. Put differently, that which can be produced in near-total abundance, due to advanced technology, has as little value as the air we breath. With respect to the basic necessities of life – food, water, medicine, clothes, shelter, and even now education, transportation, sanitary work and living conditions, electricity, etc. – we are at a point of abundance. These things may not be as completely abundant as oxygen but they are at least to the point where they can be provided cheaply or possibly free of charge to every person on the planet (provided of course it is done in an ecologically sound manner).

To better illustrate both the objective foundations, as well as the moral justification for socialism, we can look at it in relation to the development of its older brother, democracy. Throughout history, political participation has been the privilege of the few, of the propertied classes. Even Athenian democracy, not to mention American democracy until the previous century, had property qualifications.

Why was this so? Were our ancestors simply unenlightened barbarians? Or did the division of political labor arise from the real conditions under which they lived? Most people had to work exhaustively for very little output; they lived at the subsistence level. They lacked the time to acquire a rudimentary education, let alone participate in politics. Aristotle’s writings on the subject were the norm in the Western world for centuries, whether for medieval societies or the original democracies as they existed prior to the late 19th century. Only the leisured class could participate in politics because only it had the time for educational pursuits. As he writes in Book seven of Politics:

“Now, since we are here speaking of the best form of government, i.e., that under which the state will be most happy (and happiness, as has been already said, cannot exist without virtue), it clearly follows that in the state which is best governed and possesses men who are just absolutely, and not merely relatively to the principle of the constitution, the citizens must not lead the life of mechanics or tradesmen, for such a life is ignoble, and inimical to virtue. Neither must they be husbandmen, since leisure is necessary both for the development of virtue and the performance of political duties.”

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This of course changed with the growth of trade and commerce, especially towards the end of what we call the “Middle Ages” and the onset of the “Renaissance” — more people than ever before acquired leisure time and demanded to participate, first in the religious and later in the political process. The development of the printing press was both an effect and a cause of this upward development of wealth creation. Heresy was spread and protected by princes and merchants with wealth independent of the feudal system. This was the seed of the revolutions of the past, both against the “spiritual“ monopoly of the Church and then the political monopoly of the monarchy. What was the privilege of the few, became in the hands of the philosophers that represented this enriched and leisured class (such as John Locke), a universal right of at least propertied males; first the right to freedom of religious and intellectual profession (to a limited extent), followed by the right to participate in government and politics.

But the leap from necessity to freedom could not as yet be completed. Political freedom was achieved first for the propertied classes, and only through pitched battles spanning centuries, the whole of the adult citizenry. The political franchise was extended to the lower classes without any further progressive developments in property relations. The propertyless wage-worker could eventually vote, but unlike the propertied bourgeoisie before him, this franchise was not based upon a revolution, and a subsequent establishment of new property forms to replace the old.

Political consciousness raced ahead of economic reality, for the objective, historical foundation for the leisure of the majority – which is in turn the only foundation for genuine democracy – had not yet developed. Not until the middle of the 19th century would the possibility for such leisure time even arise. As Frederich Engels wrote in Anti-Duhring:

“Only the immense increase of the productive forces attained by modern industry has made it possible to distribute labour among all members of society without exception, and thereby to limit the labour-time of each individual member to such an extent that all have enough free time left to take part in the general–both theoretical and practical–affairs of society. It is only now, therefore, that every ruling and exploiting class has become superfluous and indeed a hindrance to social development.”

We now have the technology to supply all of struggling humanity with at least the basic needs of life; the profit system, through its chaos and irrationality, denies many of these basic needs or provides them only at the most inferior quality. They are in many cases the luxury of the relatively privileged few in the imperialist countries that exploit and dominate the rest of the world, i.e. America, Europe, Japan, etc.

But just as political participation, once a privilege of the leisured class, became an inalienable right for all to enjoy, so too will economic stability and security, now a luxury of the upper classes of the imperialist countries (and perhaps the middle in times of prosperity), become an inalienable right for all. In both cases, these “rights” are made possible by the objective development of the productive forces of society. And in both cases it is the struggle between social and economic classes that will force the emergence and universal acceptance of these rights. For in the final instance a set of rights only represents a set of requirements for the further development of human civilization.

If the current worldwide economic crisis does not signify this, nothing will. The recent scandal involving Bernard Madoff is also a sharp indicator that history is “ready”, not for the leap from necessity to freedom – this has already been realized objectively – but for the masses to awaken to the simple fact that they have at their collective disposal the objective means by which to set themselves free of economic crises, violent wars, and material want.

There will always be those who point to a Madoff and declare, “He was one bad apple; you can’t condemn the whole system of modern financial capitalism because of him.” Aside from the fact that Madoff is only the latest in a long line of corporate criminals, this “one bad apple” and his fraudulent practices are going to cost the global economy tens of billions of dollars, perhaps more as the details continue to come in. Countless millions of lives will be affected for the worse, and the damage will take many years to repair. Modern financial capitalism has concentrated such enormous amounts of wealth and power in the hands of so few individuals that it only takes a few frightened investors demanding their money back for the entire system to begin to fall like dominoes.

For humanity to continue on this basis would be absolutely insane and inexorably self-destructive. Regardless of the difficulties that we would face in embarking on a new path, few scenarios can be worse than a global depression and a new world war. The frenzied right-wing attacks on “wealth spreading” can no longer be taken seriously. We must not only demand that the “wealth be spread”, but that the citizens themselves have direct control over whom it is spread to and for what purpose. “The wealth” can no longer be entrusted to a class of parasitic sociopaths and warmongers. “The wealth” is the product of the entire planet — not just Americans, not just Europeans, but the billions of workers around the world. It does not spring fully created from the minds of self-styled geniuses, but from the collective labor of global human civilization.

To deny humanity its continued right to exist on the principle of “property rights” would be as mad as if our own ancestors denied themselves political freedom out of respect for the “divine right of kings”. This is not to say, either, that all property must be abolished; only property in the means of production and the financial institutions of society, i.e. concentrated wealth in the service of society. For certainly, with all that has happened before us in the recent months, those who continue to argue for unlimited, unrestricted property rights over massive amounts of wealth are as irrational, superstitious, and contemptuous of the strivings of the great majority of humanity as the aristocrats and nobles of old were.

We must no longer be held hostage by fear of the unknown, or worse, a false equivocation of the possibilities of the future with some of the failures of the past. For all of their vices and faults, the advanced capitalist countries of our day have what Russia, China, and other “communist” countries never had before their revolutions; a deep commitment on the part of the majority to the principles of democracy. Let this be the foundation of the future economy, which I call “socialism” but which you may call whatever you please.