Complex questions don't have easy answers. History is full of contradictions and a truly dialectical approach tries to take these contradictions into consideration rather than parroting One Dimensional coping narratives about history. As far as podcasts go, I think we did a pretty decent job of giving a nuanced analysis of the USSR's economic and political problems. Of course we didn't have enough time to talk about all of them (as there were MANY). Was a pleasure to have this discussion with you!
I love your work on YT 1Dime, but I think you're letting some internet demagogues cloud your perspective on the modern West's left-wing movements. Often times, the loudest people in the room have the fewest listeners. Just because someone gets alot of RT's and likes on Twitter for instance, does not mean even half of those people internalize or believe that Tweet wholly or in its greater implications/conclusions. Theres lots of "Tankies"(My word for apologists of: Assad, Taliban, Kim fam, Putin, Xi, large public figures representing non-western govt, nobody uses Tankie accurately online anyway) whom have little to no understanding or useful application of Marxist theory(when theyve actually read it that is lol) yet loudly proclaim to have the answers to skeptical yet curious onlookers. Otherwise I think you did, mostly good here with TMP(probably my fav Marxist channel outside of SocialismForAll). My main criticism, as trivial as my opinion may be to you, is that at times you really came off in these 2 conversations as an "Ultra-Left" critic that Lenin himself mentioned. I understand how youre attempting to provide a constructive contrary narrative to the broader Marxist space online, but at the same time I find myself thinking while listening that "these arent new criticisms, even Soviet writers have said this, its all historically contextualized." and also this too "what else could they pragmatically have done? A key trait of Soviet policies were legislating from the same corner youve been backed into". This is not to say things like "MAO CALLING ROCK MUSIC BOUJEE IS HISTORICALLY CONTEXTUALIZED AND YOURE A LIB" no, but theres a limit to whats constructive and to whats just wishful thinking. Do you think there wont be massive coloumns of "Ultra-Left" professional complainers sighting every single thing wrong with your personally designed socialist republic? And that you could solve it's problems with just good morals and ethics? I highly doubt so. I dont mean to sound so critical, but a little perspective goes a long way in our most critical moments. Good work though, we need you in this space. I dont think youre a liberal or soc-dem or wtf else these donkey brained boozos in the comments are saying.
41:15 when they start talking about how capitalism doesn't actually reward "hard work" and productivity in service and entry level office jobs: SO. FUCKING. TRUE. My current and prior employers all had me as a top/best performer on the team or in the department and yet I and other top performers consistently got fucked out of promotions, got the exact same pay raises as everyone else, and this is not an uncommon complaint about capitalism.
Why would it? There always has to be jobless people ready to take any job they can get, so if you arent’t happy and want a raise, you can just easily be replaced
Remember the scene from Catch-22 when his CO wanted to "be his pal.."? That's the problem I run into all the time. You can do a complete shit job every day, but if the boss likes you, that's far more important for your success.
Lower stage socialism is about rewarding hard work (capitalism rewards good luck and amoral behaviour). But the ultimate goal is to abolish hard work. I'm a manual worker, and believe me, the whole point of technology out to be to get rid of drudgery. No amount of money is worth destroying my body for.
The problem with this claim is that, such real life examples are not necessarily valid against capitalism, since we don't exactly have capitalism... Just like the paradox of tolerant state is that it must be intolerant towards radical intolerants to protect itself from them, the capitalism, in order to protect free market, must have corporate business banned, to prevent existence of entities powerful enough to shape law and thus market regulations in their favour. The current state of things, with transnational corporations which are not one with any actual living person and have numerous legal (and fiscal) priviledges is a condition that was once considered to be a sworn enemy of free market and something deeply pathological. To connect it with your case; if you're working for a large corportation like let's say AT&T, in true free market there should be like a hundred smaller competing companies instead of this one. Even if you don't work for a corporation yourself, having thousands more companies to choose from would have likely improved your position.
@@piotrmalewski8178To protect the "Free market" we must regulate the market, Doesn't sound very free, It's obvious that monopolies and the centralization of capital are a natural occurrence under said systems. The free market you talk about Doesn't exist.
The working class of the eastern block wanted the luxury of the USA. Only thed didn't know how their comrades on the other side of the atlantic lived. 90s were big shock because it turned out socialism allowed for the working class to live as middle class Note: class here is used in coloquial, not in Marxiat sence
Well, I think that was the most mention of cybernetics I've heard on RUclips *not* in a Paul Cockshott video. I remember the first time I heard of cybernetics it was in a Soviet movie I watched, a slapstick comedy directed by Leonid Gaidai and it was just this very strange futuristic sounding work just sort of name dropped in this very rustic peasant setting and I remember thinking "what the fuck is that?" It's unreal how close we came and yet how far short we fell from what we could have achieved.
@@themarxistproject Can't wait for that video! very interesting topic that of cybernetics. Another thing, have you ever considered making a video about Unequal Exchange? given the fact that your channel is one of the most centered on marxist theory, it would be quite ad hoc for you to do it
This is great. Totally fair and balanced criticisms. I wish everyone could hear what modern socialists think about the USSR, it might open them up to the core concepts.
1 minute in and I already heard the Soviet cosmonaut anthem. Truly visionary. One can only wonder what could the Soviet Union achieve if they have the technology of our modern world.
I get that Japan did some nasty shit late in their brief colonial empire, but until around 1936, Korean QoL, education and wealth drastically increased under Japan. They were a poverty stricken shithole prior and had similar perceptions in Asia as Ireland and Africa at the time. Hell, even the cultural genocide they were known for pretty much has no basis prior to 1936, since Japan is the ones that popularized the modern Korean written language and heavily encouraged Korean culture (since they were trying to promote Korea as a core part of the Japanese Empire, rather than a subject of it. The idea that Korea under Japan was even remotely similar to something like India under Britain is basically propaganda. There was no 'brutal exploitation' per sae and moreso 'the god damn fascists once again'.
@@fearedjames that definitely sounds like colonial apologia. With all due respect. People claim the same thing about British imperialism in Africa which I also don't buy. It's more likely it was just as brutal as any other form of the same thing elsewhere. Their occupation of Northern China started in 1931.
@@sky_professor3051 Except there is no basis for the British improving any part of Africa except nice ports to ship resources. The only evidence of Japanese exploiting Korea prior to 1936 is progressive dominance over Korean farmland by Japanese businessmen, an expected result with the vast economic superiority of Japan at the time. Japan spent half their tax revenue on developing Korea, widely expanded the number of schools. Ran programs for Japanese university students to learn Korean and work in Korea and vice versa. Spread the modern Korean writing system in order to improve literacy rates after centuries of Korean rulers suppressing it. By the 1930s, Korea had gone from its cities looking like the worst shitholes you'd see in Africa to being comparable to Japanese cities. When you read literally anything about horrible shit the Japanese did in Korea, you will find that 100% of the time, the policy started in 1936 or later. The change in policy post 1936 is honestly a fucking shame. Pretty much the inverse of Japan of prior.
Paying people the same for the same labor time is criticized by Marx in the Poverty of Philosophy. In general I think that book can be thought of as a Marxist critique of the (late) Soviet economy.
Ох, два часа экономического анализа конца СССР на английском, да это именно то, что мне нужно перед сессией. Действительно спасибо, тяжело найти "нейтральную" оценку чего-нибудь касаемо экономики СССР.
30:50 The commenter who claimed "social-democracy did better than the Soviet Union", are you taking into account that these bourgeois dictatorships can only adopt this "successful social-democracy" by imperializing poor countries? The bourgeoisie can only continue earning profits while at the same time maintaining a labor aristocracy by exploiting the workers of the dependent peripherical countries
This is pure cope. Norway, Finland, and Denmark were not “imperializing poor countries” nor did they have any colonies at the time they had their robust welfare states.
@@Theorychad99 Finland dismantled their social democracies nowadays and they were attacking Roma people, horrifying treatment of people from those who scream human rights towards the USSR
@@Theorychad99 read “Riding the Wave” by Torkil Lauesen. Although it talks mostly about Sweden, it shows in which ways the nordic countries indeed can sustain their level of development due to the exploitation of the third world
I'll highlight some problems that I think I found in this very productive discussion: at 1:42:09 1dime talks about Allende and how he tried to move away from soviet style bureaucracy; that is good, but when a marxist talks about the chilean experience he cannot forget to add that Allende moved away from the USSR in the right wing direction, not the left one. He was a reformist, not a revolutionary, and instead of using a revolutionary system he tried to implement socialism using capitalism and the bourgeios state, and this eventually led to his demise. Also at 1:46:14 1dime makes a HUGEEE mistake by praising eurocommunism as a valid alternative to soviet style socialism. In fact, eurocommunism was basically just democratic socialism and led to today social democrats and neoliberals. Eurocommunists did talk about the undemocratic aspects of the USSR but from a liberal and right wing stand point: "In the east they're not democratic like us, they don't have more parties like us!!!". The class aspect is gone. Taking Italy as an example, eurocommunism was the final result of a revisionist process started with Togliatti and his "italian road to socialism" that distanced itself from the eastern bloc from a liberal right wing perspective. It's no surprise so that in 1991 most of the euro"communists" dissolved the italian communist party and became social democrats and liberals! And, PLEASE, don't associate Gramsci with eurocommunism! Gramsci was exploited by Togliatti for his reformist purposes, but he was no reformist or eurocommunist! He was, in fact, a revolutionary who tried to follow Lenin's path (in the dispute in the soviet party he tried to reconcile between the parts but at the same time he preferred Stalin's side to the opposition). The image of Gramsci as a "civil" eurocommunist is dear to the ruling class because it makes him a harmless liberal intellectual, and he wasn't. Other than this, I agree that marxist-leninists and all other socialists should read him more
Most certainly projection. 1) I have criticized Allende many times for rejecting the DOTP and have repeatedly emphasized the failures of reformism. 2)I don’t praise Eurocommunist anywhere. Also there was not one form of Eurocommunism. There was a right reformist wing and a left revolutionary wing. I only said that their criticism of the USSR was more valid than the left liberal/Socdem criticisms of it.
@@1Dimee Regarding Allende, I'm not saying that you prefer social democracy to the dotp, I'm saying that you should have made that clearer. But I do think that in general you do sometimes show some small liberal perspectives on democracy. Like, after the Allende point you talk about the lack of liberal democracy civil liberties in the USSR, which there surely was, but the argument must be put in a complex manner, 'cause I can think of many ways in which the Soviet Union had more liberal civil liberties than the liberal West itself. The use of the world totalitarianism also is a big no. And in the wonderful videos you made about Putin's Russia you seem to make the argument,correct me if I'm wrong, that it was Gorbachev who brought democracy to the Soviet Union. That seems to me a dangerous way of thinking, because it conflates liberal democracy with democracy. Although some of Gorbachev's reforms were good, I don't see how for example jewish soviets started living in a more "democratic" society when antisemitism was de facto rendered legal again through Gorbachev's implementation of "freedom of thought". For the eurocommunism thing, I guess that we'll have to define the term, because for all I know it refers to the Berlinguer-Carrillo-Marchais line which also influenced other communist parties such as the british one and the finnish one, and it definitely not had a "left revolutionary" line. On the contrary, the whole problem of eurocommunism is that it's a buzzword which masquerades the abandonment of communism in favor of democratic socialism/social democracy through a dubious "third way" between reformists and revolutionaries/USSR supporters. I don't know if there are other usages of the term (in my native language certainly there aren't), but if not Gramsci is not on the same side of eurocommunism ( you mistakenly say "Gramsci and eurocommunism" as if they stand on somewhat similar grounds). Eurocommunists and Gramsci differ in many ways; for instance eurocommunists were reformists, Gramsci was a revolutionary; they were anti soviet while Gramsci was a leninist etc.
One big criticism I have to Dime I believe was the one making this point on the "barriers of innovation" section. The thing about it, at least in cinematography (I'm sure it would be at the least similiar for other fields), is that restrictions on what you could NOT do in your art were very clear to the point that the general public knew about this restrictions. But things weren't hunky-dory in the west, creative control was (and still is) actually more repressive and limiting than what the USSR had, their methods were just more covert and indirect than those of the USSR. George Lucas actually talked about this in one interview (ruclips.net/video/SWqvaMEFIdI/видео.html), he was very critical of the film industry in the west and claimed soviet cinematographers had more creative freedom.
I don’t think 1D’s point was that the Socialism itself is not innovative, but rather the state’s hostility to transparency and pluralistic thinking prevented the adoption of innovations that could have allowed the USSR to surpass the USA (Such as OGAS). The USSR was definitely more innovative in some ways (such as art and science) but also less innovative in other ways. For example, the soviet bureaucracy was against pursuing OGAS because they were afraid of transparency and didn’t want to lose the state’s tight grip on information. The state’s grip on information was so big that they even banned photocopiers in the Brezhnev era. I highly recommend you read People’s Republic of Walmart by Leigh Philips and Towards A New Socialism by Paul Cockshott. They talk a lot about how The Bureaucracy and lack of transparency/openness impaired socialism’s ability to develop.
@@Theorychad99 Well you didn't attack or address at all my point with your comment. I wasn't even talking about the innovation of X or Y system. What whas even the point of your comment if you're not even going to address mine? I've read both of the books you've recommended me, but then again, they are almost completely irrelevant to my point. Did you reply to my comment by accident? I talked exclusively about the freedoms or lack of freedoms in the art domains, and assert that being an artist in the Soviet Union was less restrictive than being one in the west.
@@Theorychad99 Whatever his point was, Socialism is not innovative. In centrally planned economy the question is always; 'do we need something?', while on free market the question is 'can we make something new that people maybe will like?' This makes free market to spend a lot on development by speculation. Even if it's something silly, like a new kind of candy, chances are as a result something useful will be invented. The great development of electronics in the West was largely a result of speculation over potential demand for consumer electronics.
Just four things: 1.- What's the name of the intro song? it's awesome 2.- If you don't like soviet music you're a psychopath 3.- Good reading list, but I would add 2 more: First, "How the World Works" by Paul Cockshott. Is even better than "Towards a New Socialism", and I think it makes clear that socialism, taking all into consideration, has worked better than capitalism. Second, Albert Szymanski's books, both "Is the Red Flag still Flying?" and "Human Rights in the USSR". He isn't like those writers that explain how AES should work or are supposed to work, but rather how they work in practice, with a lot of sources and empirical evidence. He's quite balanced, dispelling myth propagated by liberals, contextualizing controversial aspects and criticizing where is due. Actually, I was a little bit surprised that none of you mentioned him. 4.- Finally, and in utter good faith of course (I already flattered this discussion in Twtiter from my account named "Cybersyn"), I have a big critique to you 2: I think, in general but not always, when comparing AES with capitalists countries, you center the discussion too much on 1st world countries. Maybe the exception was at the beginning when The Marxist Project compared the USSR with Latin America (where I'm from). But the rule for capitalism is the third world in general. Actually, living standars in mid 19th century Europe were like those in the 3rd world today, and that began to change at the end of that century, when imperialism became more a thing. That's why, for example, Cockshott states in "How the World Works" that, if you compare the standars of living in the Eastern Bloc in the 70's and 80's, they would qualify as "abundance" compared to the times when both Marx and Engels were writing, but of course the concept of "abundance" has changed through time. For example, now it would probably include access to internet. This is also important regarding civil liberties. The main reason why Western Europe and other Western Ofshoots have more of those, is because workers there can afford a more decent standard of living because of imperialism. Therefore, they're less likely to revolt (that's why successful revolution have happened in the 3rd world), along with a much more effective ideological hegemony. Perú and Brazil, for example, despite being formally liberal democracies, are much more repressive than countries of the Eastern Bloc where. Unions are very harrassed, enviromental defenders are killed, censorship, while veiled under a liberal "freedom of expression", is much more exclusive, police is more brutal, connection between money and politics is more blatant, etc. Maybe the GDR would be more "authoritarian" (I hate that word) compared to Sweden, but not if you compare it with Mexico or India, trust me. That's why I like so much Dependency Theory, and also World System Theory. Every comparisson with the 1st world must take into account the reality that its high standar of living is deeply interconnected with the super exploitation of the 3rd world. That's why I'm so sure that, despite all the shortcomings mentioned in the discussion that I agree on, socialism is superior to capitalism if we take "superiority" as providing a better standar of living. Finally, I think that facade of more "liberty" in the 1st world is going to fade even more as neoliberalism is prevaling more each day, mainly because of the falling rate of profit. You can see it now: Assange was imprisoned by the europeans, and is being treated much worst than that piece of shit of Solzhenitsyn in the USSR. Also, you have all the censorship of russian media like RT and Sputnik. That's because, at least in the media, there is no longer western monopoly, you have RT, TeleSur, Sputnik, CGTN, PressTV, among others, which are wide spread throughout the world. RT in spanish is the most popular news network in Latin America.
I don’t think once can discount the liberty critique so easily. To put it simply, if you can’t leave the country or enter the country without a state sanctioned tour, then it is a totalitarian society plain and simple. It is an important category and difference between socialist countries like Cuba versus North Korea, the DDR, and modern China. In Cuba you can enter and leave the country pretty easily and they don’t censor the internet. In North Korea they censor the internet and people who try to escape the border get shot. Also you can’t visit the DPRK without a state sanctioned tour, which is all the evidence you need that they have a lot to hide…
- This isn't in order to "discount" the liberty critique, not at all. This is about analyzing things dialectically, not falling into a binary logic of "Good" or "Bad". - I do agree that there was unnecessary repression, we could only argue the degree of it. - My point is, when we analyze the level of repression inside the Eastern Bloc, and categorize it as "authoritarian" or not, you need a scale or criteria, something to compare it with. You don't say if it is authoritarian or not in a vacuum. The thing is, they main comparisson in the discussion is against western europe and western offshoots like Canada, Australia and New Zealand. What I say, is that comparison isn't fair at all. The west countries are not the whole capitalist world, all the third world is capitalist too. So, If we're going to assess the degree of the Eastern Bloc it should be against the whole capitalist world. - I said that, in my opinion, the level of repression in countries like Brazil, India or Nigeria, formally liberal democracies, is far worst than in the USSR or in socialist Bulgaria. But of course, I agree that Canada or Belgium were even less repressive. - Why is this important? because, in order to make an assesment of civil liberties in the Eastern Bloc, we have to compare it with what existed at that time, not with an ideal society. We can conclude that it tested poorly against the West but not bad against the periphery or third world. Also, I would add that the degree of civil liberties present in the west is mostly possible due to imperialism. But, like in the other comment, I know you think this is nonesense, despite the fact that there is massive evidence for this and several authorts who have written entire books about it. Give it a read if you want to know more. - There is massive evidence to conclude that with more exploitation you need more repression. That's why I say that the lesser degree of repression you have on Western Europe it's thanks in no minor part to imperialism in the periphery. Actually, that degree of civil liberties in the west is something relatively new, from the 20th century onwards. Before that, when imperialism wasn't much of a thing yet, the west used to be much more repressive. So, taking into account the geographical factor (all the third world too instead of just the West) and the chronological factor (that capitalist countries have been repressive as fuck unitl the 20th century and are becoming increasingly less free since the advent of neoliberalism) we can conclude that, for capitalism, a high level of repression has been more the rule than the exception. Therefore, to assess the socialists experiments just against the exception isn't fair at all don't you think? - Actually, despite having a higher degree of civil liberties, Cuba isn't as you put it. There is some censorship on the internet, although is rare, and despite you can get out of the country it isn't that easy, for several reasons. This video explains it a little bit ruclips.net/video/DXBYlC4-0bQ/видео.html - I don't consider the term "Totalitarian" accurate, it isn't useful if you want to analyze reality scientifically. Domenico Losurdo wrote a good essay about this awm.or.kr/bbs/data/document/1/Losurdo___Critique_of_Totalitarianism_(2004).pdf (is very short btw). - I think you have a very cartoonish view of the DPRK. Actually, you can leave the country, despite not being as easy as it should be, there are many north koreans in China or even in Russia. But I think it's a lost battle to recommend you good material about it, you simply won't believe me.
I’m gonna be honest only the soviet anthem is good, the rest of the music is super boring, I mainly listen to rock, metal and rap so it makes sense why I wouldn’t like orchestras with singing in Russian
23:51 There was a time when there were no jeans in Yugoslavia and smugglers were getting clothes from Italy and re-sold them in Croatia, at least this was in the early 60s i don't think that was a thing later. For cars there were long waiting lists, if you order from Zastava. My dad used to tell me how people were smuggling chewing gums and pantyhose to Bulgaria and they were bringing back to Yugoslavia some of their processed food like compote. In Yugoslavia there were sometimes milk shortages where my parents grew up, idk if it was because of some cow disease because it wasn't something that occured very often (in a capitalist economy you might find milk on the shelves but priced very high to lower the demand and look like the milk production is sufficient to satisfy everyone). Also have to be noted that even the USSR wasn't like monolith, i'm pretty sure Belarus had better consumer choice than Tajikistan. Every socialist state had it's own challenges.
Yup, it was very different. My grandparents told me stories how the USSR was a lot poorer than and they had to have a run for their clothes as they arrived in Soviet village in cars and dressed in jeans (those were produced in Poland by early 70s). Private trade eg. with Turkey was quite popular. I saw a documentary about a guy who bought 3 identical Fiat 128s in a row so he wouldn't attract so much attention as he was constatly driving between Poland and Turkey to trade and he was wearing those cars so quickly he had to buy 3. Shortages were frequent. My grandpa said he almost had a heart attack when Militia was giving him a push, and he had half a pig from then illegal production in the trunk. On another occasion my grandma drove through half of Poland without a battery in the car, because none were available, so she couldn't turn the engine off. Meat was always in short supply, so often payments eg. for reparing a car were made in hams and other meat products instead of money.
Didn't Poland never collectivized agriculture? People could work on their land and raise animals. I know that there were shortages in the 70s.@@piotrmalewski8178
the soviet union housing style cant be understood outside of the gistorical conditions , the same designs were due to the plan to give hoise to everyone in a transitional period ..that is why they used the same designs but that can be solved by hiring designers to plan for many designs , these designs will be divided into categories based on the price of every design with different features . the people of every salary category will vote on the designs of each category and now we know which designs people like and which not . every product has the aspect of personal favor , must be planned based on voting
Glad you took this problem up George. The fundamental reason for the uniform design of soviet housing was not lack of time or money. It was about the lack of democratic input from the people who were going to be living there. This problem was not unique to the USSR. We had exactly the same problem with the local government constructed tower blocks in Britain and many other countries. And for the same reason - lack of democratic participation by those affected by decisions.
@@patbyrneme007 It wasn't even lack of input, it was unnecessary oppresion. Just like today, there was enough people with formal qualifications to approve a certain design as being safe etc. The law just didn't allow this. You had just a few designs to choose from and that was it. In their defence they were efficient but whoever had money would alter the look of their house later on anyway, sometimes in very radical manner.
While I disagree with a lot mentioned here, I don't think Stalin was a revisionist for suggesting socilaism and one country. I also do not think that Deng Xiao Ping was reviosionist for intriducing market elements as those reforms were based on material conditions of the USSR and China. However, I find this podcast great as it is really great for shaking off hauntology. For me, variation of Marxism based on materlaist analysis and dialectics are not revisionist. Personally, my stance on the Soviet Union was that it was a great sucess if you put the context where it came from. A backwards feudal empire, being attempt 1 in lasting socialism, a brutal civil war, a founder that died too early, a violent powerstruggle that Stalin won, the gold blockade and other sanctions, sabotage from outside and from within, the great patriotic war and many more.
Exactly, though I think this discussion focused a lot on the counter arguments against the very dogmatic branch of ML and that's why it came out quite negative towards the USSR. I mean all things considered, had the whites won the civil war, it would've never reached such a position of power. Like we can just see Russia now really. Furthermore, I believe the USSR leaved behind a lot of valuable experimenting to in part guide our future projects.
57:06 Animal Farm was definitely about Stalinist era of the USSR. Orwell went to Spain in 1936 to fight fascism. When he gets there he joined the POUM because of their close ties at the time to the ILP, who had helped him travel to Spain. The Communist Party of Spain, in a bid to postpone the revolution until after the fascists were defeated, allied with the bourgeouise against the POUM and the CNT. In the process the Communist press label the POUM as fascists. He left one week before he was to stand trial for espionage and treason. One of the precursors to the POUM was Trotskyist party with close ties to Trotsky. So the sentiment that the USSR of the 1930s had strayed from the 1917 Revolution would have been common in the group with which Orwell served. Or, just read what Orwell said in the Preface of the Ukrainian edition of Animal Farm (1947): "But on the other hand it was of the utmost importance to me that people in western Europe should see the Soviet regime for what it really was. Since 1930 I had seen little evidence that the USSR was progressing towards anything that one could truly call Socialism. On the contrary, I was struck by clear signs of its transformation into a hierarchical society, in which the rulers have no more reason to give up their power than any other ruling class. Moreover, the workers and intelligentsia in a country like England cannot understand that the USSR of today is altogether different from what it was in 1917. It is partly that they do not want to understand (i.e. they want to believe that, somewhere, a really Socialist country does actually exist), and partly that, being accustomed to comparative freedom and moderation in public life, totalitarianism is completely incomprehensible to them." www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/books-by-orwell/animal-farm/preface-to-the-ukrainian-edition-of-animal-farm-by-george-orwell/
Orwell was a 5th column sc um and you are payed by his foundation to post this
Год назад+2
Just FYI, 1975 state of the art supercomputer, CRAY-1 is about 10-15x slower than your basic smartphone CPU from 2015(in this is in many way just thermal thing). Mid-range desktop CPU from 2015, 2000x faster than CRAY-1. Modern iPhone chip capability, 10000x Cray-1.
A nuanced discussion of the relative successes and failures of Marxism in its historical practical applications? I wasn't aware that was allowed on the internet.
Please see Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel’s theory of Participatory Economics, the best thought-out vision of a decentralized planning. And Albert’s left-wing economic insights about 20th century socialism and rejection of market planning (and distribution at the scale of the economy) in principle
Yes and no. 1. It depends on who you ask/read. Specially after the SocialDemocrats - Communists split. 2. I think we need to improve the distinguishing characteristics between classes in society. There is _still_ people calling burgeoise and proletariat the wrong ones due to missunderstandings and omisions.
@@KozelPraiseGOELROeh, people forget bureaucratic capture. Although I don’t respect anarchists Bakunin was right when he talked about the representatives of the Proletariat becoming a new ruling class separate from the proletariat in his critique of Marx
Florence definitely wasn't the first. They had merchants but they didn't have any production and that's kinda the root. The class contradiction between the worker and the capitalist didn't really exist in Florence since nothing was made lol
1Dime really talked over Marxist Project a bit too much. It was kinda getting cringey as things went on and he kept pausing then restarting right when MP was going to respond. Still, a good repository of info. Just be more wary next time. I could almost feel MP's frustration at getting cut off SO OFTEN 😬
@@Theorychad99 Given that 1Dime promoted several Trotskist talking points and that he also criticized nearly every "Marxist" camp except for Trotskyism, leads me to believe that he is in fact a Trotskyist.
""Socialism in one country is a revisionist idea"- Average Trotskyite" Friggin' Trotskyites, socialism was never in just one country! The Soviet Union consisted of fifteen Soviet Socialist Republics-Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Belorussia, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. There were also half a dozen satellite states as well-Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and East Germany. And of course Yugoslavia who broke decisively with Stalin on a few issues, making it an independent socialist state.
I really love this series of videos--highly informative. One thing that I'm hazy about after listening is when the quotas and the gulags ended? You guys talked a bit about them during the Stalin period in the first video, but you also bring up and rehash some of this again when discussing Khruschev and de-Stalinization. Were the quotas and gulags being used throughout both the Stalin and Khruschev eras?
1Dime's interventions were reeking of liberalism some times. I mean, when he began talking about "totalitarianism" referring to the USSR and gave an implicit defense of George Orwell, it was really showing his liberal tendencies lmao
The fact that the USSR had a glaring problem with civil liberties is an undeniable fact. Even some MLs admit it, such as Paul Cockshott in Towards a New Socialism, who explains why excessive state censorship and lack of meaningful democracy inhibited technological innovations (such as OGAS) and intellectual pluralism. I would highly suggest reading it if you want a critical ML perspective on the Soviet Union (or check out The Road to Terror by J. Arch Getty and The Soviet Century by Moshe Lewin if you want a non-ML but more objective analysis of repression in the USSR). The response to exaggerated anti-communist propaganda is not to go in the complete opposite direction and deny all the uncomfortable realities of Soviet history.
@@1DimeRadio A dictatorship of the proletariat isn't going to have the same bourgeois democratic freedoms as the European countries today. Totalitarianism is a meaningless word and it definitely isn't a good way to describe the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union also had democracy, so did the People's Republics in the Eastern Bloc. You could read "Soviet Democracy" by Pat Sloan. Soviet democracy worked from bottom to the top, whatever it was, it definitely wasn't "totalitarian". Also J. Arch Getty isn't an ML, he's an anti-communist that has a more objective view on Soviet history compared to his contemporaries.
I used to think that 1dime was worth list to, but the reality is he is just another naval gazing spohistic liberal that pretends to be much better read and informed on socialist history, then he actually is
@@thechekist2044 The book, Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan is a must read as it very well describes what the dictatorship by the proletariat looked like in practice during the Stalin era - i.e. the bottom up democracy by the working class and the relationship between democracy and dictatorship. I believe it is still in print.
Price is determined by value. Value is determined by the level of difficult of labor. The more difficult the problem and the more scarce the skill to solve the problem, the worker with the right skill can command higher price (money).
There is an alternative and far more convincing explanation of what went wrong in the Brezhnev period onwards especially if viewed by the Chinese experience. It can be argued that if Kruschev had followed a better reform path that had integrated the Soviet Bloc into the world market and used experimentation rather imposing changes across the board, then the Soviet model could have had similar success to China but at a much earlier stage. Brezhnev's coup against Kruschev led to a period of two lost decades. This delay in much needed reforms calcified and entrenched the power centres that rested on inefficient systems such as in agriculture, heavy industry, in institutions like the Party, the army etc. This made Gorbachev's attempt to introduce reforms based very much on China's successful examples, much more difficult to achieve.
15:08 it’s all about perspective too, the soviets and other eastern bloc countries had some genuinely interesting architecture post war just like many western nations do and western nations especially America have these cookie cutter houses that all look the same. I’ll tell you just from someone who has been in unstable and expensive rental home situations I’d much rather live in a “free” concrete block than any paid apartment in America
The industrial Agricultural movement that decreased Rural Populations in the USA were demonstrated in Russia as well as in the late 1800's in the USA with Bonanza Farms. The Construction Industry promoting their ability to profit from destroying old buildings and finding profits in making new ones, has made the USA into some temporary landscape of Ticky Tacky Houses that no ordinary Human can ever afford. The Move to the City is capable of creating new and sexy buildings and profits to give to developers. The agricultural Based form of social standards that endured for centuries until the 1970's seemed to offer stability as well as an ability for Citizens to be able to understand where their food originated. Old Farmhouses are still standing in areas that may not offer massive profits. The ability to promote agricultural and rural lifestyles do not deliver the profits that City Life appears to create. There is one part of the housing crisis that appears to be overlooked.....
Incentivize the Consumer proletarians on sharing their weekly food consumption plans through Electronic Surveys by giving them discounts when they participate on such surveys.
There is a mistake at the very start of the video. The shape of the Soviet Union is off. It's Tsarist Russia. You can tell because of Finland and Poland.
The discussion about consumerism deserves its own talk. Consumer products are the reason why you have an economy in the first place. Decrying "over inflated consumerism" is just literally saying "stop being greedy and just accept less." Yeah... thats a winning message. "Work for less!" The entire point of building an economy in the first place is to produce things for its own people. Ie consumer goods. Yet you two talking seem to be hostile to the idea. "Well I should give the people some joy in their lives so they don't rebell." Its not about treating people as people at that point, you're treating people as capital machines that require certain inputs that you just have to accept is the price. Nowhere in this conversation is saying "the point of an economy is to produce things for its people."
Producing the means to live is the point of the economy. Producing goods just to be sold on a market, for pure abstract value, is consumerism for the sake of consumerism,and it's literally killing the planet.
I disagree, consumerism is not good for its own sake. It can actually be quite negative in excess, like ecologically destructive fast fashion and junk food that hurts people's health.
@@thomasallister3446 "how dare you like potato chips comrade! For your sake we are removing them from the market!" 🤭 literally acting how the average person is afraid communists will act if they gained power.
I think the point of an economy should be to improve people's lives and give them the choice of what to do with their time. If they want to consume, we should let them, but with a very important caveat that externalities must be accounted for. Or alternatively some people might choose to work less, live more minimalist lifestyles and pursue something less material such as arts or whatever. But an economy should not be geared towards manipulating people into buying as much shit as possible.
@@E1Luch one of the most demeaning and dehumanizing ideas to come out is the idea that people are so absent of any mind of their own that their very tastes and desires can be manipulated by a photo ad in a magazine or a crappy tv ad that is so boring people skip by switching channels. Underlying that assertion is the thesis that my tastes and desires are not my own. No I am not a homosexual man because that is part of me. I like men because some gay agenda manipulated me. " That's not what I argued! " you say but it's the same damn thing. If they can manipulate me into desiring some ugly product thinking it's now beautiful why couldn't they manipulate my sexuality. This conspiracism around advertising and consumer culture denies the existence of our fundamental humanity
1Dime, though very great in the economic aspects of socialism, has stuff to work on in terms of the theoretical concepts. The part where he says that socialism is classless is just plain wrong. Class struggle still persists and becomes even more intense. Also some of his historical opinions seem kind of misled, but overall he's a great partner to have in such a podcast.
Thats not true. Socialism in the marxist sense (Low phase communism) is classless. Lenin says so in state and revolution and Marx says that explicitly in Critique of the Gotha program. Low phase communism is classless. High phase Communism is classless, moneyless, AND stateless. Dictatorship of the proletariat does not = socialism (low phase communism). You are operating on a very Maoist notion of socialism. If class struggle still persists once socialism (low phase communism) is achieved, then the term socialism is basically meaningless. Modern china could be considered socialist under your definition. Marx and Lenin were much more specific about low and high phase communism
@@Theorychad99 This is an extremely complex conversation which actually, does not have an answer until we reach that bridge. Whether the Class Relationship still exists post revolution is largely an unknown factor of which we only have AES to reference from regarding the truth of. As far as my readings are concerned, Class Struggle will ALWAYS exist in one form or another, as outlined in even Marx's early work on Dialectics. By Marxist principle alone, class struggle cant dissipate but only be subsumed by a more developed relationship of which it is a smaller part of. Now as for Class SOCIETY, that is more of what youre referencing. Class SOCIETY was arguably abolished even in the USSR(for awhile anyway). But Class Society existing is more of a question of hard-policy and legislature effectively dismantling the capitalist status quo of social ownership both abstracted and in material legalities. I would highly, highly advise not reciting theory in a deterministic manner. Since many things Marxist writers have ended up largely wrong or somewhat off base on when regarding prediction, and calculations. As good as alot of the analytical theoreticians(meaning all writers post-Marx/Engels) are, there are just as many things to reconsider/recontextualize as there are things to internalize and shout from the rooftops as gospel. Studying history makes our understanding of Marxist theory more acute and refined as a weapon to disarm and disembowel the Bourgeoise.
@@ivecaughtfire7431 I agree that we shouldn't be dogmatic, but whether classes continue to clash or form a unity (like the workers and peasantry), and whether the old bourgeois class would continue to sabotage and fight from within are just different /forms/ and expressions of the same essence - class society. It's contradictions continue to play a role and it's up to the newfound DoTP to find a way to resolve it.
@@Theorychad99 You're just wrong. DoTP is not an economic system, but a way of governance, yet you place it as some kind of a transitional period between modes of production. Also it seem that you don't understand that you can't just impose your idea of what socialism "should be" onto reality. You must work from reality itself and apply the dialectical method of analysis. Is there a pure form of any economic system? Certain aspects of the old system always persist for a long time and it's not about their abolition, but /sublation/. For example, under the capitalist mode of production that we perceive in reality, we can see certain aspects of the old feudal economy still playing some role in it, like landlordism. In the same way under feudalism there was a portion of the economy that operated on slavery. What defines these phases of development as "capitalism", "socialism" etc. is not their purity in content, but the DOMINANT ASPECT of that content. Simply put, the "old" and the "new" are in a relationship of contradiction and when one of them becomes the dominant part of that content, it changes the form of (in this example) society. You can say that China is socialist and simultaneously acknowledge that they have contradictions that they should resolve as time goes on.
Interesting history. Hope you cover revolutionary potential in present day. Gaza is engaging in armed struggle against occupation and battle against global capitalism since Israel is backed by NATO
Culture and tradition maybe I don't see many eastern cultures make huge renovations to their family homes as sporadic and casually as in the West but I could be wrong.
I think there was no production of paint. But, as I pointed out in other comment, most of the paint in those times where lead-base, which is toxic. I guess depressing is better than deadly.
The economy wasn't a problem,the soviet state grew without ending class realtion in new generation and therefore new generation demanded plans of Gorbachev and Yelstein
Yeah the architect of "glasnost" Alexander Yakovlev admitted that he was doing deliberate sabotage to the Ussr in the Russian edition of "The black book of communism" he said "The soviet totalitarian regime can only be destroyed though "glasnost" and totalitarian party discipline, while hiding behind the interests of improving socialism." like having a anti communist be head of agitprop sounds very "necessary" but seriously there is no actual analysis of "glasnost" as it existed in this video
Semi full quote of the wrecker "After the XX Congress, in an ultra-narrow circle of our closest friends and associates, we often discussed the problems of democratization of the country and society. We chose a simple - like a sledgehammer - method of propagating the "ideas" of late Lenin. A group of true, not imaginary reformers developed (of course, orally) the following plan: to strike with the authority of Lenin at Stalin, at Stalinism. And then, if successful, - to strike with Plekhanov and Social Democracy - at Lenin, and then - with liberalism and "moral socialism" - at revolutionarism in general... The Soviet totalitarian regime could be destroyed only through glasnost and totalitarian party discipline, while hiding behind the interests of improving socialism. [...] Looking back, I can proudly say that a clever, but very simple tactic - the mechanisms of totalitarianism against the system of totalitarianism - has worked." - Alexander Nikolayevich Yakovlev, in the introduction to the Russian edition of "The Black Book of Communism"
Always appreciate the content but this dude is desperately trying to defend Trotsky without ever saying it. Then reference liberal authors but mask it by saying “cited by MLs”
I am glad we're having this discussions because with all of the factions of Marxist out there all we do is split the working class where our goal is to united.
MalekMagicianPR: You can not just say: let's all unite when there's such ideological difference. The only unity that really matters is the unity of Marxism with the working class because Marxism will only become a material force for changing the world when Marxism is gripped by the majority of the masses. Although Marxism is a science it's an art form when it comes to presenting it to the working class in a way that they can relate to it.
@@anglo-irishbolshevik3425 Marx was interested in redistribution of wealth. What if we simply abandon the concept of Capital as a measure of value? Would Humans continue to produce Food and Housing for those around them? The Amish and a few other Sects appear to thrive using the Rural Concepts of production. Intentional Communities appear across the landscape in different areas. The concept of Capital as the measure of Value is simply a socially accepted concept that could be abandoned. That discussion appears to be overlooked..... Simply restricting the economic conversation to two forms of social interaction are never going to make any significant change in the problems the Planet now faces. Are Humans capable of adapting to changing conditions to survive?
Jesus Christ, now that I'm an hour into this video I remember that this video was the reason I stopped watching 1 dime's stuff for a while. If I was just going off of this conversation I would believe he's completely incapable of having any form of collaborative discussion
Aside from Marxist, what sort of ideology do these two guys come from? Like is there a specific type of Marxism, which I could plug into Google, and search for more from this viewpoint? I'm asking because I really appreciated the nuance. And I don't really hear this kind of nuance from most leftists or ML's. Thanks
Pretty sure Marxist project is just ML, depends who u listen to. There are definetly a lot of loudmouth morons out there. But some of the most intelligent people I know are ML. Marxist Projekt gives books as sources in his video description and if you look up the RUclipser Hakim, he gives book recommendation videos that align with Marxist project
@@theobaldbergamelli9638 thanks. I'll check the video descriptions of M Project's videos. I've seen Hakim. But I find him to be less nuanced than 1Dime. He has a clear agenda, which is capitalism bad, socialism good. Which I should obviously expect from Marxists lol. But I guess it's no longer an argument I vibe with 🤷🏼♂️
@@theobaldbergamelli9638 his main flaw, from my point of view, is that he doesn't realize that people are stupid when it comes to politics. So that any nation outside the western clique (the British/western clique has been in the dominant position for centuries) allowing full freedom of speech and press, would simply result in a western backed coup. So his strategy for the future, simply ignores geopolitics. But when he looks at Soviet history, I appreciate his grasp of things.
hello comrades, i'm kinda new to both of your channels so i can't tell your voices apart so can you tell me which one is more centrist and liberal-sounding (talking about how you can't ban things and k?ll people) so i can lay off his content and be more critical? thanks!
Your claim that"in socialist society people had more free time and could pursue their interests" is such a BS, I'll tell you what my parents did in their free time - they waited for hours in a line to buy a piece of meat. People were starting to queue on the day before the meat was to be delivered, they waited all thought the night until the shops opende the next day. Usually I would stand in a line in the evening, my father would stand though the night, and finally my mother would come in the moring to buy some piece of half fresh meat.
1:08:00 this discussion gets a lot of things wrong but the full employment thing is just regurgitated libertarian talking points. It's not the reason for stagnation.
This video was a real let down. 3 hours and there was very little in-depth discussion to anything. It was all rhetoric and opinions. And a lot of bad opinions at that. I found 1Dimes opinions most concerning of all. I'm not sure what kind of a Marxist label he applies to himself, but to me, he comes off as an opportunist. Whether he is best labeled as a Trotskist, a Bukharinist, a revisionists, or whatever I don't know. But I wouldn't recommend this video to anyone interested in leaning about the USSR.
Why can’t it be this is government that’s business these are consumers/workers. Here are the rules for you don’t break them because it’ll fuck the whole system. Government is here for the people business exist because of the people and the people are the number one asset. Government exists to create an environment to make your life easier food shelter education transportation and infrastructure. business helps in that but dosnt get to interfere with the consumer or government only create for it because it was created and fueled by the consumer and sometimes the government.
@@Alicegoulding Many of the talking points. I'd have to relisten to the pod. But I'll pass, since the last time I tried to have a reasonable conversation with trots on YT - it muted all my responses when we got to the meat of it. This platform just isn't condoning intelligent discussion.
1:10:00 Socialism in one country is a Leninist idea for the conditions of the USSR at that time and your comment about Kruschev's revisionism not being the source of the problem does not make any sense. If a revisionist comes up with policies that prove to be harmful does this not reflect badly on revisionism? If it doesn't then what does?
2:90 There was almost nothing on the Lenin period. It was pretty much all Stalin onward. I was disappointed in the other discussion. Anyone who points to North Korea as socialist makes me wonder exactly why they think statism (whether it be pro-social or hardcore oppressive and totalitarian) is the same thing as socialism...and makes me dread responding to anti-socialists who say "see? They agree that that's socialism, so they proved my point for me! You socialists can't agree on anything, so why should you be believed at all?" Ditto with the USSR and Stalinism; that's not socialism. If either of those examples are socialism, as 1Dime said, then I want absolutely nothing to do with the movement, and that's with understanding/knowing the conditions that they had to overcome, and all of the benefits to society that they provided. Because: 1) I have no interest in convincing people that socialism is bottom-up democracy (of the sort that 1Dime said was good, namely active participation in discussion and political action, but also that "nationalization" and "state ownership" means nothing more or less than the public being directly in control of things through that same democracy), only to then say "I thought that's what it was, but it turns out it's the complete opposite. My bad. I guess you should never trust socialists and communists, because they are lying about who will really be in charge." and 2) I know that it's much easier to have a corrupt system that becomes oppressive and self-serving when it is controlled by a few than when it is controlled by everyone, if for no other reason than that more people actively participating will make it harder for corruption to become a problem. Seriously. If you take the position that state ownership of everything is socialism, without also qualifying it with what Marx/Lenin/everyone else said about what the state *MUST* be for it to be socialist (because, as you should recall, the state *must* be withered away, and that's notoriously hard to do when the state anything else), then the rest is meaningless. You're a statist who just wants pro-social things. Hopefully this discussion will be less disappointing. 29:14 "Socialism asterisk." It's great that you finally, after all this time (2.5 hours last conversation, 30 min this one), explained that you don't think socialism is when the state does stuff. You should have been reiterating this throughout, because it's REALLY easy interpret your position as being statist rather than socialist. Especially when you talk about "actually existing socialism." It's not a cop-out to say "that's not socialism." It's sticking to the notion that socialism isn't just the overthrow of feudalism/capitalism and creation of a statist system, but instead is bottom-up democracy in the economic and political spheres. It's nothing more or less than being consistent. Socialism cannot be declared just because one step was taken towards it. Not even two steps. Not even 3 steps. Socialism cannot be declared until socialism has been *MOSTLY* reached, which means that, at a minimum, 1) the economy, especially the workplaces, must be democratically controlled by the workers themselves (and not the state dictating it to them, as in state capitalism, where the state has merely taken the place of the private capitalist while retaining the top-down structure), and 2) the state must be nothing less than the fullest revolutionary democracy (meaning active civilian governance via democratic processes [discussion and decision-making], as well as social accountability regarding upholding those decisions). Neither the USSR, nor Cuba, nor North Korea, nor any other country has achieved EVEN ONE of those two minimal conditions, much less both of them. Both parts of this discussion went through as much. The problem is that you are pointing to countries taking a few steps towards socialism, AND THEN STOPPING and sometimes even taking more steps away from it, and saying "that's socialism, and saying it isn't is a cop-out." By doing that, you conflate a long-stalled and back-sliding movement with actually having achieved anything but "better than what existed before." And it's a conflation, not a reasonable association. How long did people in the USSR have to wait until their state turned power over to them and let them build socialism for themselves? Same with North Korea today. Same with any country you call "actually existing socialism." Should they have to wait until the state does all of the work for them, whether they like it or not? Or perhaps they should have to wait until the capitalist world stops persecuting them? Maybe that's it. Maybe they should have to wait until the United States no longer sanctions them so that they can pick up the movement again. Because here's the problem with your "cop-out" argument: socialism isn't merely "better than what existed before." It isn't even improving conditions constantly. That's just a basic trend in human history, where we strive to improve our lives over time. Socialism isn't the fact that things have changed for the better, but HOW they have changed and WHO did the changing. Socialism is SOCIAL (public) control over the economy and political system. Not state control. Not private capitalist control. Social control. It's workplace democracy. It's everyone having an equal say in the things that affect their lives, including what "better than before" even means. The REAL problem is people who point to stalled/backslid movements with socialist goals as "actually existing socialism," because you're deluding yourself into believing that any effort that brings about "better than before" results is the same thing as "socialism achieved," JUST so that you can feel vindicated. Movements gain ground, and that's a win...but when they stall or backslide, as all examples you point to as "actually existing socialism" have done, you shouldn't say "that's socialism, but it's not perfect." Rather, you should say "they got the movement going, but this is where they had trouble keeping it going, and this is what they should have done to ensure that it was faithful to the movement." And THAT, as I've said here and in response to the other half of the discussion, is where you make convincing other people that socialism REALLY ISN'T totalitarian and oppressive statism really hard. You give anti-socialists fodder that you don't need to give them, all to say that it was achieved so that you can then do what you should have done without declaring it achieved: critique the movement and what it could do to advance towards socialism again, without saying "they already have socialism, actually, because things are better than they used to be since the state owns/controls everything." This half of the discussion, 36 minutes into it, has already been a big disappointment. Talk about statism as "actually existing socialism," then "socialism asterisk because socialism isn't statism," then statism as "actually exist socialism, and anyone who says otherwise is copping-out." I don't want to imagine what the rest of the 2 hours and 20 minutes will be, so I'll leave it here and question whether I should even call myself a socialist if the given examples of "actually existing socialism" are what I should be telling people socialism is about. Not democracy from below. Not democratic workplaces, mutualism and the rest. But statism that's "better than before."
Did he really just say that he felt the USSR was genuinely utilitarian under Stalin?? 😂 Except for the 3.5 million people who starved in Ukraine, anyone suspected of political opposition who was executed without a trial, and all the people who died in a war that he helped to start with Hitler by invading and partitioning Poland.
@@RememberingWW2 you’re aware Ukraine had a population of around 35 million in the 30s right? then 5 millions Ukrainians survived during WWII, so either you believe 80% of the Ukrainian population died in the 30s then the remaining 5 million ALL served in WWII, or you’re talking out of you’re arse(properly both honestly). Also 80-90 percent of prisoners in gulags were regular criminals, Also the VAST majority of prisoners in gulags only served a few years.
Whatta? Organize your positions and study them or gettouta here. Don't just puck all the information you barely know. If you want us to give shield and cross about what you say, please remember to point out more specific events or processes.
Disagree with the production at gunpoint statement. The Soviets did use prison labor but many people were actually criminals. They were leftovers from the civil war, Nazi spies or allies, sabatours, and grain hoarders from the country side. The Stalin economy worked because they directed all productive forces to meet the needs of growing the USSR. They also expanded the role of foreign advisors to copy models of the already industrialized world. They also stole technology from the industrial nations. One downside to this economy was that consumer goods production lacked. But when your country has nothing to start with, you don't build tvs, you build industry and infrastructure.
If you don't know that KGB was allowed to trade oil during the OPEC Crisis and amassed vast riches outside of Party Control and that the Party was outside of the reach of KGB and had its own secret police, you should leave this topic alone.
Planning worked well up until the late 50s when it came to heavy industry but obviously when it's time to plan the production of millions of light industry products, planning didn't work. The common Marxist objection to this is modern computing, Paul Cockshott and his simulations that can make 5 year plans for millions of products in a few minutes, but this fails to understand the core problem of economic planning: the issue isn't that you can't plan because you have no time: it's that you SHOULDN'T plan because you ultimately don't WHAT to produce, who needs it when why and what for. In an attempt to make sure everyone's needs and desires are met fairly, communists always ironically end up falling short of people's needs and behind the cruel efficiency and creative destruction of markets.
Planning did not work cause yes for one computing wasn’t used and two cause it wasn’t the goal,planning worked perfectly in the military and heavy industry and space all the way to end of Soviet Union one only need to look at Buran and other late stage Soviet projects but as to what to produce that’s a question easily answered by Paul Cockshott if you actually had read his work the way this is solved is same way capitalist industries do today in advanced capitalist countries,by tracking consumer demand it’s really not very hard.And yes you should plan,capitalist in fact plan at a local company level and even plan at societal levels for things like military and war.Communist fall behind nothing,USSR was poorer than Latin America and Africa before 1930 and surpassed both after the transition to communism.Needs were met compared to what existed before,people in 1930’s Russia were living in squalor with no modern plumbing,tv’s,healthcare,adécuate modern housing to speak of.By 1980 the average Soviet citizen was living better than the average modern African in any modern capitalist African country today and modern Latin Americans today.And after when markets were restored the so called efficiency of markets proved its folly when the post transition lead to economic collapsed never prior to experienced during the Soviet era.Russia saw 50% of its gdp wiped out,industrial output did not recover until 2006 and the entire economy turned into a pure pétre state compared to the previous diversified economy of USSR.
@@mauricio9564 yep. Planning was crap in USSR and yet modern Russia struggles to reach 70s industry level of the Soviet Russia. I haven't finish the video yet. But I bet they dont discuss that Gosplan lost its meaning and has zero to none decision powers.
That "managers are workers too because socialism is a classless society" thing is kinda disingenuous semantics. As is the "you'll run out of workers" follow up (not to mention cynical). Not that one needs to examine this history with "purity of thought", or whatever. But, for example, it's equally true that if you expand punitive measures such as those discussed to the general population, you find yourself confronting the reality of a slave society. I generally think this would have been a greater concern to Soviet authorities than the risk of "running out of workers". Also, on the question of "socialism in one country" being revisionist because it's "not Marxist", isn't really valid. The whole Soviet project was kinda "not Marxist" given that Socialist revolution was presumably supposed to originate in the western imperialist powers before someplace like Russia. So, revisionist? Or simply a pragmatic application of Marxism to the particular material circumstances (theory vs praxis)?
Definitely enjoying the discussion, though. I've never had opportunity to study this stuff in depth so it's great that you guys aren't just making the effort, but sharing it with the rest of us
The whole argument made around 11:00 that the USSR was destined to fail because it had a "century lag" behind the west is ridiculous because capitalist countries also had centuries of lag behind each other and many of them very quickly surpassed one another: for example Japan and South Korea very quickly overtook many western countries that were very far ahead of them. And recovered extremely fast from ww2. The Baltic countries also caught up with/surpassed many South European countries right after the fall of the USSR. Capitalism beat feudalism so if communism can't beat capitalism, it's not going anywhere.
Japan and South Korea are exceptions to the rule and both used economic planning search Japan Window Guidance and South Koreas 5 year plans and nationalizations under Park Chun Hee also got tons of loans from western countries and were not sanctioned.They are the exception to the rule,but why is Africa so behind or Latin America?And if capitalism is superior why was Eastern Europe behind both Latin America and Africa and 1930? And surpass both after the transition to socialism even after being aflicted by WW2? The Baltics actually became rich under socialism not after this is a popular pro capitalist myth,it was well known that the Baltic countries were the richest parts of USSR and had gdp per capita richer than most western countries when they were a part of USSR. estonianworld.com/business/a-hundred-years-of-the-estonian-economy/ upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/GDP_per_capita_Baltics.svg
Because you are wrong. In modern times, capital uses countries not the other way around. Japan and SK were let in the worlds market for political reasons. SK was waaay behind NK for a long time. The Baltic countries were the fresh market, now they are back in the back of the line. TLDR Country cannot choose to be on top of the Capitalism chain, you need at least 11 aircraft carriers for that :-D
@@supercobra1746 Also Japan and South Korea both used socialist cheat codes if you will,Japan used window guidance which is literally a weak form of economic planning similar to modern China where the government told companies what to make at a broad level and in South Korea they used literal 5 year plans all the way to 1996 the 5 year plans were modeled from the North Korean ones cause North Korea was far surpassing the south and to compete they had to copy them.
The big problem here is ultimately that comparative analysis in general is dicey. Take your example of the Asian miracles: export-led growth in capitalism, *especially* in Japan and Korea, was the result of extremely dirigiste policies. You can hardly coordinate nation-wide export orientation towards development without a very strong state (Japan literally had a planning agency). Japan and Korea were capitalist mixed economies whose success was also largely contingent on their relationship to the US. The Baltic countries were the most developed of the former republics upon leaving the union, and by many accounts were also the most developed republics before entering the union. That's why the comparison of the USSR to Latin America, while somewhat reasonable, is still limited in its utility because obviously the two places had distinct historical circumstances and existed in different geopolitical spaces. For one, the Monroe Doctrine and US imperialism have played huge roles in the underdevelopment of Latin American countries. Conversely, the sheer force of destruction of WW2 was hardly felt by the Latin American world -- at least compared to how devastating it was in the USSR. That's why holding the USSR to the standard of the US or Western Europe is pointless. The objectives and capabilities of the USSR were different from the West. I think the reason why Robert Allen does this in Farm to Factory is to 1) demonstrate the relatively well-established fact that rich countries stay rich and poor countries stay (comparatively) poor and 2) frame the USSR's economic growth in the context of capitalist countries of "similar" development levels. Allen even notes that Japan is a major exception to the first point. But as I've already stated, it's not agreed upon to what degree "capitalism" drove Japan's success.
Interesting again. As an aside, DPRK is not a socialist state except in decoration. It's a hereditary feudal monarchy. The current ruler inherited it from his father, who had it from his father before him. With regard to not comparing itself against the US, the point is well made. But could any soviet leader have taken that road? You're number 2 military in the world, seat on the Security Council, nuclear armageddon at your command. And you're going to say you're better than Brazil? It's the economy though. I was interested to hear about the Walmart model, because of course, they plan! Something could be worked, bearing that they review and chane the plan a lot. Cybernetics / IT - fine, but the incentives and motivations must be aligned otherwise - bullshit in => bullshit out.
1:15:43 another mistake by Khrushchev is copying a computer. ruclips.net/video/IO4-YwhyvrM/видео.htmlsi=qU7hQl-21LUsX7Bg&t=1640 1:59:59 “hidden inflation” was that, for example, machine builders promise to develop a machine or combine, the performance of which will be 10 times better than old equipment, and in the end its productivity will be twice as high... (and for this they received money for development as if in the 10th) this is how a situation arose when the population had a lot of money, but few goods... 🧐🤔😎
I always searched for video like that 🥲 , after reading about the history of tsarist russia and the bolshevicks immediately realised how i was brainwashed by right wing's media academics and followers .. now i would love to study the entire history of the soviet union and the real reasons for its collapse and how we can learn from previous experimemts
Rock music is bourgeois and life in the USSR wasn’t grey and drab, especially after the 1950’s. There was a ton of color in Soviet fashion, products, and daily life. It has only become greyer in the minds of everyone because it’s framed against the West which became very obnoxiously colorful after the 1950’s thanks to the hippies and their impact on counterculture which became the main driver of the culture industry from the 1970s to today. You seem to have trouble differentiating bourgeois individualism and socialist cultural creativity as seen in its art and fashion.
1:00:55 "... debated before Stalin was even very important in the Party." "When was that?" "In the twenties, in the mid twenties..." Ouch. Honestly, as soon as Stalin was Lenin's shadow he was important. Try not to misremember, or if you do, do it more plausibly.
I like one dime's stuff a lot of the time, but sometimes this guy gets a little loopy and this was one of them. It was really grating to watch him interrupt The Marxist project continuously with winding and aimless diatribes. Specifically at the point I'm writing this comment, 30:00, he interrupts to counter the Marxist projects point that there was a lot of non-material production in order to say that it's possible to have consumer goods and Self-Development and exploration using the example of social democracies. First off, with that statement you are not proving that the Soviet Union could have had both by referencing capitalist states that were integrated into a global neocolonial market system, which is not at all comparable to the system the Soviet Union had, and second he's contradicting his own stance from earlier in the video that the Soviet Union should not have pursued consumption to the degree it did. Anyway, overall, though I enjoy a lot of what one dime has to say, I wish he would shut the hell up every once in awhile.
I enjoyed this a lot. Generally very balanced and intelligent takes. However, I think you went a bit too quickly over the anarchist critique of 'the USSR wasn't even socialist'. As you probably know, the underlying sentiment predates the october revolution by several decades (Bakunin, 'the people's stick'). To me, workplace democracy is the central pillar of socialism. In my (admittedly superficial) understanding, the USSR had only very limited workplace democracy, and basically no democracy to speak of beyond the local level. Central planning dictated what should be produced and party representatives, as well as managers loyal to the party had the most say in how it should be produced. In theory, every decision was made for the good of the people as a whole, but in practice, most workers had very little say in the matter and bureaucrats tended to stuff their pockets. Is that a mischaracterization? If not, do we have different definitions of socialism?
Complex questions don't have easy answers. History is full of contradictions and a truly dialectical approach tries to take these contradictions into consideration rather than parroting One Dimensional coping narratives about history. As far as podcasts go, I think we did a pretty decent job of giving a nuanced analysis of the USSR's economic and political problems. Of course we didn't have enough time to talk about all of them (as there were MANY). Was a pleasure to have this discussion with you!
I love your work on YT 1Dime, but I think you're letting some internet demagogues cloud your perspective on the modern West's left-wing movements. Often times, the loudest people in the room have the fewest listeners. Just because someone gets alot of RT's and likes on Twitter for instance, does not mean even half of those people internalize or believe that Tweet wholly or in its greater implications/conclusions. Theres lots of "Tankies"(My word for apologists of: Assad, Taliban, Kim fam, Putin, Xi, large public figures representing non-western govt, nobody uses Tankie accurately online anyway) whom have little to no understanding or useful application of Marxist theory(when theyve actually read it that is lol) yet loudly proclaim to have the answers to skeptical yet curious onlookers. Otherwise I think you did, mostly good here with TMP(probably my fav Marxist channel outside of SocialismForAll).
My main criticism, as trivial as my opinion may be to you, is that at times you really came off in these 2 conversations as an "Ultra-Left" critic that Lenin himself mentioned. I understand how youre attempting to provide a constructive contrary narrative to the broader Marxist space online, but at the same time I find myself thinking while listening that "these arent new criticisms, even Soviet writers have said this, its all historically contextualized." and also this too "what else could they pragmatically have done? A key trait of Soviet policies were legislating from the same corner youve been backed into". This is not to say things like "MAO CALLING ROCK MUSIC BOUJEE IS HISTORICALLY CONTEXTUALIZED AND YOURE A LIB" no, but theres a limit to whats constructive and to whats just wishful thinking. Do you think there wont be massive coloumns of "Ultra-Left" professional complainers sighting every single thing wrong with your personally designed socialist republic? And that you could solve it's problems with just good morals and ethics? I highly doubt so. I dont mean to sound so critical, but a little perspective goes a long way in our most critical moments. Good work though, we need you in this space. I dont think youre a liberal or soc-dem or wtf else these donkey brained boozos in the comments are saying.
Subbed to both of you - really appreciated these two videos
1Dime, do you have ADHD?
@@neebomb2511 yup
@@1Dimee Me too.
It is possible to get over that habit of talking over people, you know?
41:15 when they start talking about how capitalism doesn't actually reward "hard work" and productivity in service and entry level office jobs:
SO. FUCKING. TRUE. My current and prior employers all had me as a top/best performer on the team or in the department and yet I and other top performers consistently got fucked out of promotions, got the exact same pay raises as everyone else, and this is not an uncommon complaint about capitalism.
Why would it? There always has to be jobless people ready to take any job they can get, so if you arent’t happy and want a raise, you can just easily be replaced
Remember the scene from Catch-22 when his CO wanted to "be his pal.."? That's the problem I run into all the time. You can do a complete shit job every day, but if the boss likes you, that's far more important for your success.
Lower stage socialism is about rewarding hard work (capitalism rewards good luck and amoral behaviour). But the ultimate goal is to abolish hard work. I'm a manual worker, and believe me, the whole point of technology out to be to get rid of drudgery. No amount of money is worth destroying my body for.
The problem with this claim is that, such real life examples are not necessarily valid against capitalism, since we don't exactly have capitalism... Just like the paradox of tolerant state is that it must be intolerant towards radical intolerants to protect itself from them, the capitalism, in order to protect free market, must have corporate business banned, to prevent existence of entities powerful enough to shape law and thus market regulations in their favour.
The current state of things, with transnational corporations which are not one with any actual living person and have numerous legal (and fiscal) priviledges is a condition that was once considered to be a sworn enemy of free market and something deeply pathological. To connect it with your case; if you're working for a large corportation like let's say AT&T, in true free market there should be like a hundred smaller competing companies instead of this one. Even if you don't work for a corporation yourself, having thousands more companies to choose from would have likely improved your position.
@@piotrmalewski8178To protect the "Free market" we must regulate the market, Doesn't sound very free, It's obvious that monopolies and the centralization of capital are a natural occurrence under said systems. The free market you talk about Doesn't exist.
The working class of the eastern block wanted the luxury of the USA. Only thed didn't know how their comrades on the other side of the atlantic lived. 90s were big shock because it turned out socialism allowed for the working class to live as middle class
Note: class here is used in coloquial, not in Marxiat sence
yes. because everyone in america is middle class
@@woahnerd5681 I know they aren't. That's what my second sentence is about. Eastern block was servediddle class lifestile as if it was working class
Servediddle: is that even a word? What do you mean?
@@woahnerd5681Such drivile!
Well, I think that was the most mention of cybernetics I've heard on RUclips *not* in a Paul Cockshott video. I remember the first time I heard of cybernetics it was in a Soviet movie I watched, a slapstick comedy directed by Leonid Gaidai and it was just this very strange futuristic sounding work just sort of name dropped in this very rustic peasant setting and I remember thinking "what the fuck is that?" It's unreal how close we came and yet how far short we fell from what we could have achieved.
Provided nothing changes in my plans, I will release a dedicated video on Soviet cybernetics in the coming months.
@@themarxistproject Can't wait for that video! very interesting topic that of cybernetics.
Another thing, have you ever considered making a video about Unequal Exchange? given the fact that your channel is one of the most centered on marxist theory, it would be quite ad hoc for you to do it
This is great. Totally fair and balanced criticisms. I wish everyone could hear what modern socialists think about the USSR, it might open them up to the core concepts.
1 minute in and I already heard the Soviet cosmonaut anthem. Truly visionary. One can only wonder what could the Soviet Union achieve if they have the technology of our modern world.
The map here is not of the USSR but of the Russian Empire (Finland and Poland)
Ha, I think you're right. I must've swapped out the graphics by accident.
@Grand Duke of the North They joined under dubious circumstances. For all intents and purposes. They were legally part of the Soviet Union
On your question on pre-war Japan. That entailed brutal colonial exploitation of Korea.
I get that Japan did some nasty shit late in their brief colonial empire, but until around 1936, Korean QoL, education and wealth drastically increased under Japan. They were a poverty stricken shithole prior and had similar perceptions in Asia as Ireland and Africa at the time.
Hell, even the cultural genocide they were known for pretty much has no basis prior to 1936, since Japan is the ones that popularized the modern Korean written language and heavily encouraged Korean culture (since they were trying to promote Korea as a core part of the Japanese Empire, rather than a subject of it.
The idea that Korea under Japan was even remotely similar to something like India under Britain is basically propaganda. There was no 'brutal exploitation' per sae and moreso 'the god damn fascists once again'.
@@fearedjames that definitely sounds like colonial apologia. With all due respect. People claim the same thing about British imperialism in Africa which I also don't buy. It's more likely it was just as brutal as any other form of the same thing elsewhere. Their occupation of Northern China started in 1931.
@@fearedjames nothing about what you said is convincing; it sounds like you’re caping for imperialists
@@sky_professor3051 Except there is no basis for the British improving any part of Africa except nice ports to ship resources. The only evidence of Japanese exploiting Korea prior to 1936 is progressive dominance over Korean farmland by Japanese businessmen, an expected result with the vast economic superiority of Japan at the time.
Japan spent half their tax revenue on developing Korea, widely expanded the number of schools. Ran programs for Japanese university students to learn Korean and work in Korea and vice versa. Spread the modern Korean writing system in order to improve literacy rates after centuries of Korean rulers suppressing it.
By the 1930s, Korea had gone from its cities looking like the worst shitholes you'd see in Africa to being comparable to Japanese cities.
When you read literally anything about horrible shit the Japanese did in Korea, you will find that 100% of the time, the policy started in 1936 or later.
The change in policy post 1936 is honestly a fucking shame. Pretty much the inverse of Japan of prior.
@@fearedjames again, it really sounds like you're just singing the praises of imperialist propaganda.
Let's go!!!! I'm excited to watch this. I appreciate both of your content and I know this is going to be a hearty analysis from principled comrades.
Paying people the same for the same labor time is criticized by Marx in the Poverty of Philosophy. In general I think that book can be thought of as a Marxist critique of the (late) Soviet economy.
Ох, два часа экономического анализа конца СССР на английском, да это именно то, что мне нужно перед сессией.
Действительно спасибо, тяжело найти "нейтральную" оценку чего-нибудь касаемо экономики СССР.
30:50 The commenter who claimed "social-democracy did better than the Soviet Union", are you taking into account that these bourgeois dictatorships can only adopt this "successful social-democracy" by imperializing poor countries? The bourgeoisie can only continue earning profits while at the same time maintaining a labor aristocracy by exploiting the workers of the dependent peripherical countries
This is pure cope. Norway, Finland, and Denmark were not “imperializing poor countries” nor did they have any colonies at the time they had their robust welfare states.
@@Theorychad99 Finland dismantled their social democracies nowadays and they were attacking Roma people, horrifying treatment of people from those who scream human rights towards the USSR
@@Theorychad99 also they aid Nazism against communism like all of fascist Europe in the 30s to 40s
@@rimaq_ yes. That is true. This has nothing to do with the argument In discussion here
@@Theorychad99 read “Riding the Wave” by Torkil Lauesen. Although it talks mostly about Sweden, it shows in which ways the nordic countries indeed can sustain their level of development due to the exploitation of the third world
I'll highlight some problems that I think I found in this very productive discussion:
at 1:42:09 1dime talks about Allende and how he tried to move away from soviet style bureaucracy; that is good, but when a marxist talks about the chilean experience he cannot forget to add that Allende moved away from the USSR in the right wing direction, not the left one. He was a reformist, not a revolutionary, and instead of using a revolutionary system he tried to implement socialism using capitalism and the bourgeios state, and this eventually led to his demise.
Also at 1:46:14 1dime makes a HUGEEE mistake by praising eurocommunism as a valid alternative to soviet style socialism. In fact, eurocommunism was basically just democratic socialism and led to today social democrats and neoliberals. Eurocommunists did talk about the undemocratic aspects of the USSR but from a liberal and right wing stand point: "In the east they're not democratic like us, they don't have more parties like us!!!". The class aspect is gone. Taking Italy as an example, eurocommunism was the final result of a revisionist process started with Togliatti and his "italian road to socialism" that distanced itself from the eastern bloc from a liberal right wing perspective. It's no surprise so that in 1991 most of the euro"communists" dissolved the italian communist party and became social democrats and liberals! And, PLEASE, don't associate Gramsci with eurocommunism! Gramsci was exploited by Togliatti for his reformist purposes, but he was no reformist or eurocommunist! He was, in fact, a revolutionary who tried to follow Lenin's path (in the dispute in the soviet party he tried to reconcile between the parts but at the same time he preferred Stalin's side to the opposition). The image of Gramsci as a "civil" eurocommunist is dear to the ruling class because it makes him a harmless liberal intellectual, and he wasn't. Other than this, I agree that marxist-leninists and all other socialists should read him more
1Dime was talking about Project CyberSyn ruclips.net/video/RJLA2_Ho7X0/видео.html
An interesting summary, thank-you for posting.
Most certainly projection.
1) I have criticized Allende many times for rejecting the DOTP and have repeatedly emphasized the failures of reformism.
2)I don’t praise Eurocommunist anywhere. Also there was not one form of Eurocommunism. There was a right reformist wing and a left revolutionary wing. I only said that their criticism of the USSR was more valid than the left liberal/Socdem criticisms of it.
@@1Dimee Regarding Allende, I'm not saying that you prefer social democracy to the dotp, I'm saying that you should have made that clearer. But I do think that in general you do sometimes show some small liberal perspectives on democracy. Like, after the Allende point you talk about the lack of liberal democracy civil liberties in the USSR, which there surely was, but the argument must be put in a complex manner, 'cause I can think of many ways in which the Soviet Union had more liberal civil liberties than the liberal West itself. The use of the world totalitarianism also is a big no. And in the wonderful videos you made about Putin's Russia you seem to make the argument,correct me if I'm wrong, that it was Gorbachev who brought democracy to the Soviet Union. That seems to me a dangerous way of thinking, because it conflates liberal democracy with democracy. Although some of Gorbachev's reforms were good, I don't see how for example jewish soviets started living in a more "democratic" society when antisemitism was de facto rendered legal again through Gorbachev's implementation of "freedom of thought". For the eurocommunism thing, I guess that we'll have to define the term, because for all I know it refers to the Berlinguer-Carrillo-Marchais line which also influenced other communist parties such as the british one and the finnish one, and it definitely not had a "left revolutionary" line. On the contrary, the whole problem of eurocommunism is that it's a buzzword which masquerades the abandonment of communism in favor of democratic socialism/social democracy through a dubious "third way" between reformists and revolutionaries/USSR supporters. I don't know if there are other usages of the term (in my native language certainly there aren't), but if not Gramsci is not on the same side of eurocommunism ( you mistakenly say "Gramsci and eurocommunism" as if they stand on somewhat similar grounds). Eurocommunists and Gramsci differ in many ways; for instance eurocommunists were reformists, Gramsci was a revolutionary; they were anti soviet while Gramsci was a leninist etc.
@suabalzanita1598 Thank-you, you make interesting points.
One big criticism I have to Dime I believe was the one making this point on the "barriers of innovation" section.
The thing about it, at least in cinematography (I'm sure it would be at the least similiar for other fields), is that restrictions on what you could NOT do in your art were very clear to the point that the general public knew about this restrictions. But things weren't hunky-dory in the west, creative control was (and still is) actually more repressive and limiting than what the USSR had, their methods were just more covert and indirect than those of the USSR.
George Lucas actually talked about this in one interview (ruclips.net/video/SWqvaMEFIdI/видео.html), he was very critical of the film industry in the west and claimed soviet cinematographers had more creative freedom.
I don’t think 1D’s point was that the Socialism itself is not innovative, but rather the state’s hostility to transparency and pluralistic thinking prevented the adoption of innovations that could have allowed the USSR to surpass the USA (Such as OGAS). The USSR was definitely more innovative in some ways (such as art and science) but also less innovative in other ways. For example, the soviet bureaucracy was against pursuing OGAS because they were afraid of transparency and didn’t want to lose the state’s tight grip on information. The state’s grip on information was so big that they even banned photocopiers in the Brezhnev era. I highly recommend you read People’s Republic of Walmart by Leigh Philips and Towards A New Socialism by Paul Cockshott. They talk a lot about how The Bureaucracy and lack of transparency/openness impaired socialism’s ability to develop.
@@Theorychad99 Well you didn't attack or address at all my point with your comment.
I wasn't even talking about the innovation of X or Y system. What whas even the point of your comment if you're not even going to address mine?
I've read both of the books you've recommended me, but then again, they are almost completely irrelevant to my point.
Did you reply to my comment by accident?
I talked exclusively about the freedoms or lack of freedoms in the art domains, and assert that being an artist in the Soviet Union was less restrictive than being one in the west.
@@Theorychad99 Whatever his point was, Socialism is not innovative. In centrally planned economy the question is always; 'do we need something?', while on free market the question is 'can we make something new that people maybe will like?' This makes free market to spend a lot on development by speculation. Even if it's something silly, like a new kind of candy, chances are as a result something useful will be invented. The great development of electronics in the West was largely a result of speculation over potential demand for consumer electronics.
@@piotrmalewski8178 What???
@@piotrmalewski8178Rubbish, you don't know what you're talking about.
Just four things:
1.- What's the name of the intro song? it's awesome
2.- If you don't like soviet music you're a psychopath
3.- Good reading list, but I would add 2 more: First, "How the World Works" by Paul Cockshott. Is even better than "Towards a New Socialism", and I think it makes clear that socialism, taking all into consideration, has worked better than capitalism. Second, Albert Szymanski's books, both "Is the Red Flag still Flying?" and "Human Rights in the USSR". He isn't like those writers that explain how AES should work or are supposed to work, but rather how they work in practice, with a lot of sources and empirical evidence. He's quite balanced, dispelling myth propagated by liberals, contextualizing controversial aspects and criticizing where is due. Actually, I was a little bit surprised that none of you mentioned him.
4.- Finally, and in utter good faith of course (I already flattered this discussion in Twtiter from my account named "Cybersyn"), I have a big critique to you 2: I think, in general but not always, when comparing AES with capitalists countries, you center the discussion too much on 1st world countries. Maybe the exception was at the beginning when The Marxist Project compared the USSR with Latin America (where I'm from). But the rule for capitalism is the third world in general. Actually, living standars in mid 19th century Europe were like those in the 3rd world today, and that began to change at the end of that century, when imperialism became more a thing. That's why, for example, Cockshott states in "How the World Works" that, if you compare the standars of living in the Eastern Bloc in the 70's and 80's, they would qualify as "abundance" compared to the times when both Marx and Engels were writing, but of course the concept of "abundance" has changed through time. For example, now it would probably include access to internet.
This is also important regarding civil liberties. The main reason why Western Europe and other Western Ofshoots have more of those, is because workers there can afford a more decent standard of living because of imperialism. Therefore, they're less likely to revolt (that's why successful revolution have happened in the 3rd world), along with a much more effective ideological hegemony. Perú and Brazil, for example, despite being formally liberal democracies, are much more repressive than countries of the Eastern Bloc where. Unions are very harrassed, enviromental defenders are killed, censorship, while veiled under a liberal "freedom of expression", is much more exclusive, police is more brutal, connection between money and politics is more blatant, etc. Maybe the GDR would be more "authoritarian" (I hate that word) compared to Sweden, but not if you compare it with Mexico or India, trust me.
That's why I like so much Dependency Theory, and also World System Theory. Every comparisson with the 1st world must take into account the reality that its high standar of living is deeply interconnected with the super exploitation of the 3rd world. That's why I'm so sure that, despite all the shortcomings mentioned in the discussion that I agree on, socialism is superior to capitalism if we take "superiority" as providing a better standar of living.
Finally, I think that facade of more "liberty" in the 1st world is going to fade even more as neoliberalism is prevaling more each day, mainly because of the falling rate of profit. You can see it now: Assange was imprisoned by the europeans, and is being treated much worst than that piece of shit of Solzhenitsyn in the USSR. Also, you have all the censorship of russian media like RT and Sputnik. That's because, at least in the media, there is no longer western monopoly, you have RT, TeleSur, Sputnik, CGTN, PressTV, among others, which are wide spread throughout the world. RT in spanish is the most popular news network in Latin America.
I don’t think once can discount the liberty critique so easily. To put it simply, if you can’t leave the country or enter the country without a state sanctioned tour, then it is a totalitarian society plain and simple. It is an important category and difference between socialist countries like Cuba versus North Korea, the DDR, and modern China.
In Cuba you can enter and leave the country pretty easily and they don’t censor the internet. In North Korea they censor the internet and people who try to escape the border get shot. Also you can’t visit the DPRK without a state sanctioned tour, which is all the evidence you need that they have a lot to hide…
- This isn't in order to "discount" the liberty critique, not at all. This is about analyzing things dialectically, not falling into a binary logic of "Good" or "Bad".
- I do agree that there was unnecessary repression, we could only argue the degree of it.
- My point is, when we analyze the level of repression inside the Eastern Bloc, and categorize it as "authoritarian" or not, you need a scale or criteria, something to compare it with. You don't say if it is authoritarian or not in a vacuum. The thing is, they main comparisson in the discussion is against western europe and western offshoots like Canada, Australia and New Zealand. What I say, is that comparison isn't fair at all. The west countries are not the whole capitalist world, all the third world is capitalist too. So, If we're going to assess the degree of the Eastern Bloc it should be against the whole capitalist world.
- I said that, in my opinion, the level of repression in countries like Brazil, India or Nigeria, formally liberal democracies, is far worst than in the USSR or in socialist Bulgaria. But of course, I agree that Canada or Belgium were even less repressive.
- Why is this important? because, in order to make an assesment of civil liberties in the Eastern Bloc, we have to compare it with what existed at that time, not with an ideal society. We can conclude that it tested poorly against the West but not bad against the periphery or third world. Also, I would add that the degree of civil liberties present in the west is mostly possible due to imperialism. But, like in the other comment, I know you think this is nonesense, despite the fact that there is massive evidence for this and several authorts who have written entire books about it. Give it a read if you want to know more.
- There is massive evidence to conclude that with more exploitation you need more repression. That's why I say that the lesser degree of repression you have on Western Europe it's thanks in no minor part to imperialism in the periphery. Actually, that degree of civil liberties in the west is something relatively new, from the 20th century onwards. Before that, when imperialism wasn't much of a thing yet, the west used to be much more repressive. So, taking into account the geographical factor (all the third world too instead of just the West) and the chronological factor (that capitalist countries have been repressive as fuck unitl the 20th century and are becoming increasingly less free since the advent of neoliberalism) we can conclude that, for capitalism, a high level of repression has been more the rule than the exception. Therefore, to assess the socialists experiments just against the exception isn't fair at all don't you think?
- Actually, despite having a higher degree of civil liberties, Cuba isn't as you put it. There is some censorship on the internet, although is rare, and despite you can get out of the country it isn't that easy, for several reasons. This video explains it a little bit ruclips.net/video/DXBYlC4-0bQ/видео.html
- I don't consider the term "Totalitarian" accurate, it isn't useful if you want to analyze reality scientifically. Domenico Losurdo wrote a good essay about this awm.or.kr/bbs/data/document/1/Losurdo___Critique_of_Totalitarianism_(2004).pdf (is very short btw).
- I think you have a very cartoonish view of the DPRK. Actually, you can leave the country, despite not being as easy as it should be, there are many north koreans in China or even in Russia. But I think it's a lost battle to recommend you good material about it, you simply won't believe me.
I’m gonna be honest only the soviet anthem is good, the rest of the music is super boring, I mainly listen to rock, metal and rap so it makes sense why I wouldn’t like orchestras with singing in Russian
23:51 There was a time when there were no jeans in Yugoslavia and smugglers were getting clothes from Italy and re-sold them in Croatia, at least this was in the early 60s i don't think that was a thing later. For cars there were long waiting lists, if you order from Zastava. My dad used to tell me how people were smuggling chewing gums and pantyhose to Bulgaria and they were bringing back to Yugoslavia some of their processed food like compote. In Yugoslavia there were sometimes milk shortages where my parents grew up, idk if it was because of some cow disease because it wasn't something that occured very often (in a capitalist economy you might find milk on the shelves but priced very high to lower the demand and look like the milk production is sufficient to satisfy everyone).
Also have to be noted that even the USSR wasn't like monolith, i'm pretty sure Belarus had better consumer choice than Tajikistan. Every socialist state had it's own challenges.
Yup, it was very different. My grandparents told me stories how the USSR was a lot poorer than and they had to have a run for their clothes as they arrived in Soviet village in cars and dressed in jeans (those were produced in Poland by early 70s).
Private trade eg. with Turkey was quite popular. I saw a documentary about a guy who bought 3 identical Fiat 128s in a row so he wouldn't attract so much attention as he was constatly driving between Poland and Turkey to trade and he was wearing those cars so quickly he had to buy 3.
Shortages were frequent. My grandpa said he almost had a heart attack when Militia was giving him a push, and he had half a pig from then illegal production in the trunk. On another occasion my grandma drove through half of Poland without a battery in the car, because none were available, so she couldn't turn the engine off.
Meat was always in short supply, so often payments eg. for reparing a car were made in hams and other meat products instead of money.
Didn't Poland never collectivized agriculture? People could work on their land and raise animals. I know that there were shortages in the 70s.@@piotrmalewski8178
SLAVA USSR!
No
@@Qazaqpyn_get ratio'd
Enjoyed Marxist Projects analysis very much.
the soviet union housing style cant be understood outside of the gistorical conditions , the same designs were due to the plan to give hoise to everyone in a transitional period ..that is why they used the same designs but that can be solved by hiring designers to plan for many designs , these designs will be divided into categories based on the price of every design with different features .
the people of every salary category will vote on the designs of each category and now we know which designs people like and which not .
every product has the aspect of personal favor , must be planned based on voting
Glad you took this problem up George. The fundamental reason for the uniform design of soviet housing was not lack of time or money. It was about the lack of democratic input from the people who were going to be living there. This problem was not unique to the USSR. We had exactly the same problem with the local government constructed tower blocks in Britain and many other countries. And for the same reason - lack of democratic participation by those affected by decisions.
It was even more simple than that
They were lacking highly educated people untill the 60s
@@patbyrneme007 It wasn't even lack of input, it was unnecessary oppresion. Just like today, there was enough people with formal qualifications to approve a certain design as being safe etc. The law just didn't allow this. You had just a few designs to choose from and that was it. In their defence they were efficient but whoever had money would alter the look of their house later on anyway, sometimes in very radical manner.
While I disagree with a lot mentioned here, I don't think Stalin was a revisionist for suggesting socilaism and one country. I also do not think that Deng Xiao Ping was reviosionist for intriducing market elements as those reforms were based on material conditions of the USSR and China. However, I find this podcast great as it is really great for shaking off hauntology. For me, variation of Marxism based on materlaist analysis and dialectics are not revisionist.
Personally, my stance on the Soviet Union was that it was a great sucess if you put the context where it came from. A backwards feudal empire, being attempt 1 in lasting socialism, a brutal civil war, a founder that died too early, a violent powerstruggle that Stalin won, the gold blockade and other sanctions, sabotage from outside and from within, the great patriotic war and many more.
Exactly, though I think this discussion focused a lot on the counter arguments against the very dogmatic branch of ML and that's why it came out quite negative towards the USSR. I mean all things considered, had the whites won the civil war, it would've never reached such a position of power. Like we can just see Russia now really. Furthermore, I believe the USSR leaved behind a lot of valuable experimenting to in part guide our future projects.
Intro song "glory to those who look forward"
57:06 Animal Farm was definitely about Stalinist era of the USSR. Orwell went to Spain in 1936 to fight fascism. When he gets there he joined the POUM because of their close ties at the time to the ILP, who had helped him travel to Spain. The Communist Party of Spain, in a bid to postpone the revolution until after the fascists were defeated, allied with the bourgeouise against the POUM and the CNT. In the process the Communist press label the POUM as fascists. He left one week before he was to stand trial for espionage and treason. One of the precursors to the POUM was Trotskyist party with close ties to Trotsky. So the sentiment that the USSR of the 1930s had strayed from the 1917 Revolution would have been common in the group with which Orwell served.
Or, just read what Orwell said in the Preface of the Ukrainian edition of Animal Farm (1947):
"But on the other hand it was of the utmost importance to me that people
in western Europe should see the Soviet regime for what it really was.
Since 1930 I had seen little evidence that the USSR was progressing
towards anything that one could truly call Socialism. On the contrary, I
was struck by clear signs of its transformation into a hierarchical
society, in which the rulers have no more reason to give up their power
than any other ruling class. Moreover, the workers and intelligentsia in
a country like England cannot understand that the USSR of today is
altogether different from what it was in 1917. It is partly that they do
not want to understand (i.e. they want to believe that, somewhere, a
really Socialist country does actually exist), and partly that, being
accustomed to comparative freedom and moderation in public life,
totalitarianism is completely incomprehensible to them."
www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/books-by-orwell/animal-farm/preface-to-the-ukrainian-edition-of-animal-farm-by-george-orwell/
⛏️
Orwell was a 5th column sc um and you are payed by his foundation to post this
Just FYI, 1975 state of the art supercomputer, CRAY-1 is about 10-15x slower than your basic smartphone CPU from 2015(in this is in many way just thermal thing). Mid-range desktop CPU from 2015, 2000x faster than CRAY-1. Modern iPhone chip capability, 10000x Cray-1.
A nuanced discussion of the relative successes and failures of Marxism in its historical practical applications? I wasn't aware that was allowed on the internet.
Please see Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel’s theory of Participatory Economics, the best thought-out vision of a decentralized planning. And Albert’s left-wing economic insights about 20th century socialism and rejection of market planning (and distribution at the scale of the economy) in principle
The smarmyness in the final part really fucks this up guys
15:06 I would like to add that around those years, most paint still had lead, so, I guess it was unexpectedly better to not paint them.
Socialism is not a classless society. That is a key part of a communist society.
Socialism is communism. For a long while, including under Stalin, it was conceptually impossible to think of classes under socialism because of that.
Yes and no.
1. It depends on who you ask/read. Specially after the SocialDemocrats - Communists split.
2. I think we need to improve the distinguishing characteristics between classes in society. There is _still_ people calling burgeoise and proletariat the wrong ones due to missunderstandings and omisions.
@@KozelPraiseGOELROeh, people forget bureaucratic capture. Although I don’t respect anarchists Bakunin was right when he talked about the representatives of the Proletariat becoming a new ruling class separate from the proletariat in his critique of Marx
Florence definitely wasn't the first. They had merchants but they didn't have any production and that's kinda the root. The class contradiction between the worker and the capitalist didn't really exist in Florence since nothing was made lol
The idea that the Italian city states were the first proto capitalist societies was an argument made in the book called “The Long Twentieth Century”
@@Theorychad99 ye ik
1Dime really talked over Marxist Project a bit too much. It was kinda getting cringey as things went on and he kept pausing then restarting right when MP was going to respond.
Still, a good repository of info. Just be more wary next time. I could almost feel MP's frustration at getting cut off SO OFTEN 😬
"Socialism in one country is a revisionist idea"- Average Trotskyite
Im pretty sure 1D is not a Trotskyist
@@Theorychad99 Given that 1Dime promoted several Trotskist talking points and that he also criticized nearly every "Marxist" camp except for Trotskyism, leads me to believe that he is in fact a Trotskyist.
@@DiseasedElephant they criticized Trotsky in Part 1 of the podcast
@@Theorychad99 Interesting. Maybe he's just a contrarian.
""Socialism in one country is a revisionist idea"- Average Trotskyite"
Friggin' Trotskyites, socialism was never in just one country! The Soviet Union consisted of fifteen Soviet Socialist Republics-Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Belorussia, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. There were also half a dozen satellite states as well-Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and East Germany.
And of course Yugoslavia who broke decisively with Stalin on a few issues, making it an independent socialist state.
I really love this series of videos--highly informative. One thing that I'm hazy about after listening is when the quotas and the gulags ended? You guys talked a bit about them during the Stalin period in the first video, but you also bring up and rehash some of this again when discussing Khruschev and de-Stalinization. Were the quotas and gulags being used throughout both the Stalin and Khruschev eras?
No khruschev was the one who got rid of the gulags, I think the quotas also.
I watched the all way through... 👍🏻
Never been happier to face a 3 hr video
1Dime's interventions were reeking of liberalism some times. I mean, when he began talking about "totalitarianism" referring to the USSR and gave an implicit defense of George Orwell, it was really showing his liberal tendencies lmao
The fact that the USSR had a glaring problem with civil liberties is an undeniable fact. Even some MLs admit it, such as Paul Cockshott in Towards a New Socialism, who explains why excessive state censorship and lack of meaningful democracy inhibited technological innovations (such as OGAS) and intellectual pluralism. I would highly suggest reading it if you want a critical ML perspective on the Soviet Union (or check out The Road to Terror by J. Arch Getty and The Soviet Century by Moshe Lewin if you want a non-ML but more objective analysis of repression in the USSR).
The response to exaggerated anti-communist propaganda is not to go in the complete opposite direction and deny all the uncomfortable realities of Soviet history.
@@1DimeRadio ok social democrat
@@1DimeRadio A dictatorship of the proletariat isn't going to have the same bourgeois democratic freedoms as the European countries today. Totalitarianism is a meaningless word and it definitely isn't a good way to describe the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union also had democracy, so did the People's Republics in the Eastern Bloc. You could read "Soviet Democracy" by Pat Sloan. Soviet democracy worked from bottom to the top, whatever it was, it definitely wasn't "totalitarian".
Also J. Arch Getty isn't an ML, he's an anti-communist that has a more objective view on Soviet history compared to his contemporaries.
I used to think that 1dime was worth list to, but the reality is he is just another naval gazing spohistic liberal that pretends to be much better read and informed on socialist history, then he actually is
@@thechekist2044 The book, Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan is a must read as it very well describes what the dictatorship by the proletariat looked like in practice during the Stalin era - i.e. the bottom up democracy by the working class and the relationship between democracy and dictatorship. I believe it is still in print.
Price is determined by value. Value is determined by the level of difficult of labor. The more difficult the problem and the more scarce the skill to solve the problem, the worker with the right skill can command higher price (money).
There is an alternative and far more convincing explanation of what went wrong in the Brezhnev period onwards especially if viewed by the Chinese experience. It can be argued that if Kruschev had followed a better reform path that had integrated the Soviet Bloc into the world market and used experimentation rather imposing changes across the board, then the Soviet model could have had similar success to China but at a much earlier stage. Brezhnev's coup against Kruschev led to a period of two lost decades. This delay in much needed reforms calcified and entrenched the power centres that rested on inefficient systems such as in agriculture, heavy industry, in institutions like the Party, the army etc. This made Gorbachev's attempt to introduce reforms based very much on China's successful examples, much more difficult to achieve.
15:08 it’s all about perspective too, the soviets and other eastern bloc countries had some genuinely interesting architecture post war just like many western nations do and western nations especially America have these cookie cutter houses that all look the same. I’ll tell you just from someone who has been in unstable and expensive rental home situations I’d much rather live in a “free” concrete block than any paid apartment in America
The industrial Agricultural movement that decreased Rural Populations in the USA were demonstrated in Russia as well as in the late 1800's in the USA with Bonanza Farms.
The Construction Industry promoting their ability to profit from destroying old buildings and finding profits in making new ones, has made the USA into some temporary landscape of Ticky Tacky Houses that no ordinary Human can ever afford.
The Move to the City is capable of creating new and sexy buildings and profits to give to developers.
The agricultural Based form of social standards that endured for centuries until the 1970's seemed to offer stability as well as an ability for Citizens to be able to understand where their food originated.
Old Farmhouses are still standing in areas that may not offer massive profits.
The ability to promote agricultural and rural lifestyles do not deliver the profits that City Life appears to create.
There is one part of the housing crisis that appears to be overlooked.....
Saving for later
Incentivize the Consumer proletarians on sharing their weekly food consumption plans through Electronic Surveys by giving them discounts when they participate on such surveys.
What do you guys think of William Z Foster?
There is a mistake at the very start of the video. The shape of the Soviet Union is off. It's Tsarist Russia. You can tell because of Finland and Poland.
With regard to bureaucracy and bullshit jobs in capitalism today, see Michael Graeber
The discussion about consumerism deserves its own talk. Consumer products are the reason why you have an economy in the first place. Decrying "over inflated consumerism" is just literally saying "stop being greedy and just accept less." Yeah... thats a winning message. "Work for less!"
The entire point of building an economy in the first place is to produce things for its own people. Ie consumer goods. Yet you two talking seem to be hostile to the idea. "Well I should give the people some joy in their lives so they don't rebell." Its not about treating people as people at that point, you're treating people as capital machines that require certain inputs that you just have to accept is the price. Nowhere in this conversation is saying "the point of an economy is to produce things for its people."
Producing the means to live is the point of the economy. Producing goods just to be sold on a market, for pure abstract value, is consumerism for the sake of consumerism,and it's literally killing the planet.
I disagree, consumerism is not good for its own sake. It can actually be quite negative in excess, like ecologically destructive fast fashion and junk food that hurts people's health.
@@thomasallister3446 "how dare you like potato chips comrade! For your sake we are removing them from the market!" 🤭 literally acting how the average person is afraid communists will act if they gained power.
I think the point of an economy should be to improve people's lives and give them the choice of what to do with their time. If they want to consume, we should let them, but with a very important caveat that externalities must be accounted for. Or alternatively some people might choose to work less, live more minimalist lifestyles and pursue something less material such as arts or whatever. But an economy should not be geared towards manipulating people into buying as much shit as possible.
@@E1Luch one of the most demeaning and dehumanizing ideas to come out is the idea that people are so absent of any mind of their own that their very tastes and desires can be manipulated by a photo ad in a magazine or a crappy tv ad that is so boring people skip by switching channels.
Underlying that assertion is the thesis that my tastes and desires are not my own. No I am not a homosexual man because that is part of me. I like men because some gay agenda manipulated me. " That's not what I argued! " you say but it's the same damn thing. If they can manipulate me into desiring some ugly product thinking it's now beautiful why couldn't they manipulate my sexuality.
This conspiracism around advertising and consumer culture denies the existence of our fundamental humanity
1Dime, though very great in the economic aspects of socialism, has stuff to work on in terms of the theoretical concepts. The part where he says that socialism is classless is just plain wrong. Class struggle still persists and becomes even more intense. Also some of his historical opinions seem kind of misled, but overall he's a great partner to have in such a podcast.
Thats not true. Socialism in the marxist sense (Low phase communism) is classless. Lenin says so in state and revolution and Marx says that explicitly in Critique of the Gotha program. Low phase communism is classless. High phase Communism is classless, moneyless, AND stateless.
Dictatorship of the proletariat does not = socialism (low phase communism).
You are operating on a very Maoist notion of socialism. If class struggle still persists once socialism (low phase communism) is achieved, then the term socialism is basically meaningless. Modern china could be considered socialist under your definition.
Marx and Lenin were much more specific about low and high phase communism
@@Theorychad99 This is an extremely complex conversation which actually, does not have an answer until we reach that bridge. Whether the Class Relationship still exists post revolution is largely an unknown factor of which we only have AES to reference from regarding the truth of. As far as my readings are concerned, Class Struggle will ALWAYS exist in one form or another, as outlined in even Marx's early work on Dialectics. By Marxist principle alone, class struggle cant dissipate but only be subsumed by a more developed relationship of which it is a smaller part of. Now as for Class SOCIETY, that is more of what youre referencing. Class SOCIETY was arguably abolished even in the USSR(for awhile anyway). But Class Society existing is more of a question of hard-policy and legislature effectively dismantling the capitalist status quo of social ownership both abstracted and in material legalities.
I would highly, highly advise not reciting theory in a deterministic manner. Since many things Marxist writers have ended up largely wrong or somewhat off base on when regarding prediction, and calculations. As good as alot of the analytical theoreticians(meaning all writers post-Marx/Engels) are, there are just as many things to reconsider/recontextualize as there are things to internalize and shout from the rooftops as gospel. Studying history makes our understanding of Marxist theory more acute and refined as a weapon to disarm and disembowel the Bourgeoise.
@@ivecaughtfire7431 I agree that we shouldn't be dogmatic, but whether classes continue to clash or form a unity (like the workers and peasantry), and whether the old bourgeois class would continue to sabotage and fight from within are just different /forms/ and expressions of the same essence - class society. It's contradictions continue to play a role and it's up to the newfound DoTP to find a way to resolve it.
@@Theorychad99 You're just wrong. DoTP is not an economic system, but a way of governance, yet you place it as some kind of a transitional period between modes of production.
Also it seem that you don't understand that you can't just impose your idea of what socialism "should be" onto reality. You must work from reality itself and apply the dialectical method of analysis. Is there a pure form of any economic system? Certain aspects of the old system always persist for a long time and it's not about their abolition, but /sublation/.
For example, under the capitalist mode of production that we perceive in reality, we can see certain aspects of the old feudal economy still playing some role in it, like landlordism. In the same way under feudalism there was a portion of the economy that operated on slavery.
What defines these phases of development as "capitalism", "socialism" etc. is not their purity in content, but the DOMINANT ASPECT of that content. Simply put, the "old" and the "new" are in a relationship of contradiction and when one of them becomes the dominant part of that content, it changes the form of (in this example) society.
You can say that China is socialist and simultaneously acknowledge that they have contradictions that they should resolve as time goes on.
Interesting history. Hope you cover revolutionary potential in present day. Gaza is engaging in armed struggle against occupation and battle against global capitalism since Israel is backed by NATO
That’s a holy and ethnic war. Economics are secondary to the hatred integral to the ethnic identities of the parties involved.
Wait, that’s a map of the Russian Empire with a hammer and sickle on it at the beginning…
You should've paid more attention to Kosygin reform
Oops, i am halfway through and havent watched the first part. Should I stop and watch it first?
Yes!
15:15 'you could just paint the damn houses' but no one did. Why?
Culture and tradition maybe I don't see many eastern cultures make huge renovations to their family homes as sporadic and casually as in the West but I could be wrong.
I think there was no production of paint.
But, as I pointed out in other comment, most of the paint in those times where lead-base, which is toxic.
I guess depressing is better than deadly.
Stalin's personal handwritten annotations are on many of the execution lists during the purge. So how can it be argued that it was the NKVD.
Small minority of them. He's still largely responsible tho
@@pompom8315 He just signed off, he didn't make the list
The economy wasn't a problem,the soviet state grew without ending class realtion in new generation and therefore new generation demanded plans of Gorbachev and Yelstein
glasnost was an absolute disaster... in fact just as bad if not worse than perestroika
Yeah the architect of "glasnost" Alexander Yakovlev admitted that he was doing deliberate sabotage to the Ussr in the Russian edition of "The black book of communism" he said "The soviet totalitarian regime can only be destroyed though "glasnost" and totalitarian party discipline, while hiding behind the interests of improving socialism." like having a anti communist be head of agitprop sounds very "necessary" but seriously there is no actual analysis of "glasnost" as it existed in this video
Semi full quote of the wrecker
"After the XX Congress, in an ultra-narrow circle of our closest friends and associates, we often discussed the problems of democratization of the country and society. We chose a simple - like a sledgehammer - method of propagating the "ideas" of late Lenin. A group of true, not imaginary reformers developed (of course, orally) the following plan: to strike with the authority of Lenin at Stalin, at Stalinism. And then, if successful, - to strike with Plekhanov and Social Democracy - at Lenin, and then - with liberalism and "moral socialism" - at revolutionarism in general... The Soviet totalitarian regime could be destroyed only through glasnost and totalitarian party discipline, while hiding behind the interests of improving socialism. [...] Looking back, I can proudly say that a clever, but very simple tactic - the mechanisms of totalitarianism against the system of totalitarianism - has worked."
- Alexander Nikolayevich Yakovlev, in the introduction to the Russian edition of "The Black Book of Communism"
Always appreciate the content but this dude is desperately trying to defend Trotsky without ever saying it. Then reference liberal authors but mask it by saying “cited by MLs”
Nice.
I am glad we're having this discussions because with all of the factions of Marxist out there all we do is split the working class where our goal is to united.
MalekMagicianPR: You can not just say: let's all unite when there's such ideological difference. The only unity that really matters is the unity of Marxism with the working class because Marxism will only become a material force for changing the world when Marxism is gripped by the majority of the masses. Although Marxism is a science it's an art form when it comes to presenting it to the working class in a way that they can relate to it.
@@anglo-irishbolshevik3425 Marx was interested in redistribution of wealth.
What if we simply abandon the concept of Capital as a measure of value?
Would Humans continue to produce Food and Housing for those around them?
The Amish and a few other Sects appear to thrive using the Rural Concepts of production.
Intentional Communities appear across the landscape in different areas.
The concept of Capital as the measure of Value is simply a socially accepted concept that could be abandoned.
That discussion appears to be overlooked.....
Simply restricting the economic conversation to two forms of social interaction are never going to make any significant change in the problems the Planet now faces.
Are Humans capable of adapting to changing conditions to survive?
did you actually say the glasnost was a net positive?
Not a Maoist, but the tenor of this conversation tells me that Mao was right about the Soviet Union.
Jesus Christ, now that I'm an hour into this video I remember that this video was the reason I stopped watching 1 dime's stuff for a while. If I was just going off of this conversation I would believe he's completely incapable of having any form of collaborative discussion
Aside from Marxist, what sort of ideology do these two guys come from? Like is there a specific type of Marxism, which I could plug into Google, and search for more from this viewpoint?
I'm asking because I really appreciated the nuance. And I don't really hear this kind of nuance from most leftists or ML's.
Thanks
Pretty sure Marxist project is just ML, depends who u listen to. There are definetly a lot of loudmouth morons out there. But some of the most intelligent people I know are ML. Marxist Projekt gives books as sources in his video description and if you look up the RUclipser Hakim, he gives book recommendation videos that align with Marxist project
@@theobaldbergamelli9638 thanks. I'll check the video descriptions of M Project's videos.
I've seen Hakim. But I find him to be less nuanced than 1Dime. He has a clear agenda, which is capitalism bad, socialism good. Which I should obviously expect from Marxists lol. But I guess it's no longer an argument I vibe with 🤷🏼♂️
@@js_guyman the thing is that one dime often comes off as more nuanced but some of his positions contradict each other.
@@theobaldbergamelli9638 his main flaw, from my point of view, is that he doesn't realize that people are stupid when it comes to politics. So that any nation outside the western clique (the British/western clique has been in the dominant position for centuries) allowing full freedom of speech and press, would simply result in a western backed coup.
So his strategy for the future, simply ignores geopolitics. But when he looks at Soviet history, I appreciate his grasp of things.
@@theobaldbergamelli9638 Hakim isn't actually that nuanced. I would discourage every ML from taking Hakim seriously.
Big boi video
hello comrades, i'm kinda new to both of your channels so i can't tell your voices apart so can you tell me which one is more centrist and liberal-sounding (talking about how you can't ban things and k?ll people) so i can lay off his content and be more critical? thanks!
I think one dime is the more liberal-sounding one
I appreciate the honest discussion but I find it ironic how they keep advocating for communism and then postulate why it doesn't work or didn't work.
Sorry, but I don't understand what are you reffering to, could you give me directions?
Your claim that"in socialist society people had more free time and could pursue their interests" is such a BS, I'll tell you what my parents did in their free time - they waited for hours in a line to buy a piece of meat. People were starting to queue on the day before the meat was to be delivered, they waited all thought the night until the shops opende the next day. Usually I would stand in a line in the evening, my father would stand though the night, and finally my mother would come in the moring to buy some piece of half fresh meat.
1:08:00 this discussion gets a lot of things wrong but the full employment thing is just regurgitated libertarian talking points. It's not the reason for stagnation.
Thats map of imperial russia with sickle and hammer
Fascinating topic but one of the speakers cannot speak two sentences on the same topic and keeps interrupting, even himself
These two guys advocating communism for 3 hours has been the best argument against communism that I've ever heard. Well done.
Too many "like" and other matterless words
57:57 "I won't make a comment on that"
LOL.. how sad.
This video was a real let down. 3 hours and there was very little in-depth discussion to anything. It was all rhetoric and opinions. And a lot of bad opinions at that.
I found 1Dimes opinions most concerning of all. I'm not sure what kind of a Marxist label he applies to himself, but to me, he comes off as an opportunist. Whether he is best labeled as a Trotskist, a Bukharinist, a revisionists, or whatever I don't know. But I wouldn't recommend this video to anyone interested in leaning about the USSR.
This is the most schizophrenic conversation I've ever heard lol
Why can’t it be this is government that’s business these are consumers/workers. Here are the rules for you don’t break them because it’ll fuck the whole system. Government is here for the people business exist because of the people and the people are the number one asset. Government exists to create an environment to make your life easier food shelter education transportation and infrastructure. business helps in that but dosnt get to interfere with the consumer or government only create for it because it was created and fueled by the consumer and sometimes the government.
The consumerism should be based more on upgrades fully new stuff should be an anomaly not the norm.
Gonzalez Michael Lopez Carol Wilson Jason
this man is speaking like a social democrat, not opposed to markets? how can markets exist in socialism?
You're talking to a trot. My trot talking points bingo card is dripping with ink.
1Dime is a trot?
@@Alicegoulding That is whom I was referring to indeed.
@@MuradBeybalaev What exactly had you believe that he is a trot?
Not debating with you btw. I'm just not all too familiar with Trotsky talking points.
@@Alicegoulding Many of the talking points. I'd have to relisten to the pod. But I'll pass, since the last time I tried to have a reasonable conversation with trots on YT - it muted all my responses when we got to the meat of it. This platform just isn't condoning intelligent discussion.
1:10:00 Socialism in one country is a Leninist idea for the conditions of the USSR at that time and your comment about Kruschev's revisionism not being the source of the problem does not make any sense. If a revisionist comes up with policies that prove to be harmful does this not reflect badly on revisionism? If it doesn't then what does?
2:90 There was almost nothing on the Lenin period. It was pretty much all Stalin onward.
I was disappointed in the other discussion. Anyone who points to North Korea as socialist makes me wonder exactly why they think statism (whether it be pro-social or hardcore oppressive and totalitarian) is the same thing as socialism...and makes me dread responding to anti-socialists who say "see? They agree that that's socialism, so they proved my point for me! You socialists can't agree on anything, so why should you be believed at all?" Ditto with the USSR and Stalinism; that's not socialism.
If either of those examples are socialism, as 1Dime said, then I want absolutely nothing to do with the movement, and that's with understanding/knowing the conditions that they had to overcome, and all of the benefits to society that they provided. Because:
1) I have no interest in convincing people that socialism is bottom-up democracy (of the sort that 1Dime said was good, namely active participation in discussion and political action, but also that "nationalization" and "state ownership" means nothing more or less than the public being directly in control of things through that same democracy), only to then say "I thought that's what it was, but it turns out it's the complete opposite. My bad. I guess you should never trust socialists and communists, because they are lying about who will really be in charge."
and
2) I know that it's much easier to have a corrupt system that becomes oppressive and self-serving when it is controlled by a few than when it is controlled by everyone, if for no other reason than that more people actively participating will make it harder for corruption to become a problem.
Seriously. If you take the position that state ownership of everything is socialism, without also qualifying it with what Marx/Lenin/everyone else said about what the state *MUST* be for it to be socialist (because, as you should recall, the state *must* be withered away, and that's notoriously hard to do when the state anything else), then the rest is meaningless. You're a statist who just wants pro-social things.
Hopefully this discussion will be less disappointing.
29:14 "Socialism asterisk." It's great that you finally, after all this time (2.5 hours last conversation, 30 min this one), explained that you don't think socialism is when the state does stuff. You should have been reiterating this throughout, because it's REALLY easy interpret your position as being statist rather than socialist. Especially when you talk about "actually existing socialism."
It's not a cop-out to say "that's not socialism." It's sticking to the notion that socialism isn't just the overthrow of feudalism/capitalism and creation of a statist system, but instead is bottom-up democracy in the economic and political spheres. It's nothing more or less than being consistent. Socialism cannot be declared just because one step was taken towards it. Not even two steps. Not even 3 steps. Socialism cannot be declared until socialism has been *MOSTLY* reached, which means that, at a minimum, 1) the economy, especially the workplaces, must be democratically controlled by the workers themselves (and not the state dictating it to them, as in state capitalism, where the state has merely taken the place of the private capitalist while retaining the top-down structure), and 2) the state must be nothing less than the fullest revolutionary democracy (meaning active civilian governance via democratic processes [discussion and decision-making], as well as social accountability regarding upholding those decisions). Neither the USSR, nor Cuba, nor North Korea, nor any other country has achieved EVEN ONE of those two minimal conditions, much less both of them. Both parts of this discussion went through as much.
The problem is that you are pointing to countries taking a few steps towards socialism, AND THEN STOPPING and sometimes even taking more steps away from it, and saying "that's socialism, and saying it isn't is a cop-out." By doing that, you conflate a long-stalled and back-sliding movement with actually having achieved anything but "better than what existed before."
And it's a conflation, not a reasonable association. How long did people in the USSR have to wait until their state turned power over to them and let them build socialism for themselves? Same with North Korea today. Same with any country you call "actually existing socialism." Should they have to wait until the state does all of the work for them, whether they like it or not? Or perhaps they should have to wait until the capitalist world stops persecuting them? Maybe that's it. Maybe they should have to wait until the United States no longer sanctions them so that they can pick up the movement again.
Because here's the problem with your "cop-out" argument: socialism isn't merely "better than what existed before." It isn't even improving conditions constantly. That's just a basic trend in human history, where we strive to improve our lives over time. Socialism isn't the fact that things have changed for the better, but HOW they have changed and WHO did the changing. Socialism is SOCIAL (public) control over the economy and political system. Not state control. Not private capitalist control. Social control. It's workplace democracy. It's everyone having an equal say in the things that affect their lives, including what "better than before" even means.
The REAL problem is people who point to stalled/backslid movements with socialist goals as "actually existing socialism," because you're deluding yourself into believing that any effort that brings about "better than before" results is the same thing as "socialism achieved," JUST so that you can feel vindicated. Movements gain ground, and that's a win...but when they stall or backslide, as all examples you point to as "actually existing socialism" have done, you shouldn't say "that's socialism, but it's not perfect." Rather, you should say "they got the movement going, but this is where they had trouble keeping it going, and this is what they should have done to ensure that it was faithful to the movement."
And THAT, as I've said here and in response to the other half of the discussion, is where you make convincing other people that socialism REALLY ISN'T totalitarian and oppressive statism really hard. You give anti-socialists fodder that you don't need to give them, all to say that it was achieved so that you can then do what you should have done without declaring it achieved: critique the movement and what it could do to advance towards socialism again, without saying "they already have socialism, actually, because things are better than they used to be since the state owns/controls everything."
This half of the discussion, 36 minutes into it, has already been a big disappointment. Talk about statism as "actually existing socialism," then "socialism asterisk because socialism isn't statism," then statism as "actually exist socialism, and anyone who says otherwise is copping-out." I don't want to imagine what the rest of the 2 hours and 20 minutes will be, so I'll leave it here and question whether I should even call myself a socialist if the given examples of "actually existing socialism" are what I should be telling people socialism is about. Not democracy from below. Not democratic workplaces, mutualism and the rest. But statism that's "better than before."
The map of the USSR is wrong, lmao. Put in some effort, man )). These are 1914 borders, and you're talking about 1960s and 1991s.
Christ, I didn't even notice until you pointed it out. Very pretty graphic, but absolutely incorrect borders for the USSR.
Did he really just say that he felt the USSR was genuinely utilitarian under Stalin?? 😂 Except for the 3.5 million people who starved in Ukraine, anyone suspected of political opposition who was executed without a trial, and all the people who died in a war that he helped to start with Hitler by invading and partitioning Poland.
35 million? the fuck are you on about?
@DiogoSpenassato-fe2fj What am I missing? The Gulags?
@@RememberingWW2 you’re aware Ukraine had a population of around 35 million in the 30s right? then 5 millions Ukrainians survived during WWII, so either you believe 80% of the Ukrainian population died in the 30s then the remaining 5 million ALL served in WWII, or you’re talking out of you’re arse(properly both honestly). Also 80-90 percent of prisoners in gulags were regular criminals, Also the VAST majority of prisoners in gulags only served a few years.
@@bennybennerson7728 I meant to type 3.5
Whatta?
Organize your positions and study them or gettouta here. Don't just puck all the information you barely know.
If you want us to give shield and cross about what you say, please remember to point out more specific events or processes.
Disagree with the production at gunpoint statement. The Soviets did use prison labor but many people were actually criminals. They were leftovers from the civil war, Nazi spies or allies, sabatours, and grain hoarders from the country side. The Stalin economy worked because they directed all productive forces to meet the needs of growing the USSR. They also expanded the role of foreign advisors to copy models of the already industrialized world. They also stole technology from the industrial nations. One downside to this economy was that consumer goods production lacked. But when your country has nothing to start with, you don't build tvs, you build industry and infrastructure.
If you don't know that KGB was allowed to trade oil during the OPEC Crisis and amassed vast riches outside of Party Control and that the Party was outside of the reach of KGB and had its own secret police, you should leave this topic alone.
Alot of reckless talking in this one fellas
Planning worked well up until the late 50s when it came to heavy industry but obviously when it's time to plan the production of millions of light industry products, planning didn't work.
The common Marxist objection to this is modern computing, Paul Cockshott and his simulations that can make 5 year plans for millions of products in a few minutes, but this fails to understand the core problem of economic planning: the issue isn't that you can't plan because you have no time: it's that you SHOULDN'T plan because you ultimately don't WHAT to produce, who needs it when why and what for. In an attempt to make sure everyone's needs and desires are met fairly, communists always ironically end up falling short of people's needs and behind the cruel efficiency and creative destruction of markets.
Planning did not work cause yes for one computing wasn’t used and two cause it wasn’t the goal,planning worked perfectly in the military and heavy industry and space all the way to end of Soviet Union one only need to look at Buran and other late stage Soviet projects but as to what to produce that’s a question easily answered by Paul Cockshott if you actually had read his work the way this is solved is same way capitalist industries do today in advanced capitalist countries,by tracking consumer demand it’s really not very hard.And yes you should plan,capitalist in fact plan at a local company level and even plan at societal levels for things like military and war.Communist fall behind nothing,USSR was poorer than Latin America and Africa before 1930 and surpassed both after the transition to communism.Needs were met compared to what existed before,people in 1930’s Russia were living in squalor with no modern plumbing,tv’s,healthcare,adécuate modern housing to speak of.By 1980 the average Soviet citizen was living better than the average modern African in any modern capitalist African country today and modern Latin Americans today.And after when markets were restored the so called efficiency of markets proved its folly when the post transition lead to economic collapsed never prior to experienced during the Soviet era.Russia saw 50% of its gdp wiped out,industrial output did not recover until 2006 and the entire economy turned into a pure pétre state compared to the previous diversified economy of USSR.
@@mauricio9564 yep. Planning was crap in USSR and yet modern Russia struggles to reach 70s industry level of the Soviet Russia.
I haven't finish the video yet. But I bet they dont discuss that Gosplan lost its meaning and has zero to none decision powers.
@@supercobra1746 yeah
Corporate planning seems to work. Familiar with this angle ?
@@distortiontildeafness all economies are based on planning, the only question is who that planning benefits?
That "managers are workers too because socialism is a classless society" thing is kinda disingenuous semantics. As is the "you'll run out of workers" follow up (not to mention cynical).
Not that one needs to examine this history with "purity of thought", or whatever. But, for example, it's equally true that if you expand punitive measures such as those discussed to the general population, you find yourself confronting the reality of a slave society. I generally think this would have been a greater concern to Soviet authorities than the risk of "running out of workers".
Also, on the question of "socialism in one country" being revisionist because it's "not Marxist", isn't really valid. The whole Soviet project was kinda "not Marxist" given that Socialist revolution was presumably supposed to originate in the western imperialist powers before someplace like Russia. So, revisionist? Or simply a pragmatic application of Marxism to the particular material circumstances (theory vs praxis)?
Definitely enjoying the discussion, though. I've never had opportunity to study this stuff in depth so it's great that you guys aren't just making the effort, but sharing it with the rest of us
They both did agree that socialism in one country (russia) could have been possible. Just that it was not Marx’s idea
That wasn't my criticism.
Why can't this 1Dime guy just shut up for a minute? Omg!
The whole argument made around 11:00 that the USSR was destined to fail because it had a "century lag" behind the west is ridiculous because capitalist countries also had centuries of lag behind each other and many of them very quickly surpassed one another: for example Japan and South Korea very quickly overtook many western countries that were very far ahead of them. And recovered extremely fast from ww2. The Baltic countries also caught up with/surpassed many South European countries right after the fall of the USSR. Capitalism beat feudalism so if communism can't beat capitalism, it's not going anywhere.
Japan and South Korea are exceptions to the rule and both used economic planning search Japan Window Guidance and South Koreas 5 year plans and nationalizations under Park Chun Hee also got tons of loans from western countries and were not sanctioned.They are the exception to the rule,but why is Africa so behind or Latin America?And if capitalism is superior why was Eastern Europe behind both Latin America and Africa and 1930? And surpass both after the transition to socialism even after being aflicted by WW2? The Baltics actually became rich under socialism not after this is a popular pro capitalist myth,it was well known that the Baltic countries were the richest parts of USSR and had gdp per capita richer than most western countries when they were a part of USSR.
estonianworld.com/business/a-hundred-years-of-the-estonian-economy/
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/GDP_per_capita_Baltics.svg
Because you are wrong. In modern times, capital uses countries not the other way around. Japan and SK were let in the worlds market for political reasons. SK was waaay behind NK for a long time. The Baltic countries were the fresh market, now they are back in the back of the line.
TLDR Country cannot choose to be on top of the Capitalism chain, you need at least 11 aircraft carriers for that :-D
@@supercobra1746 Also Japan and South Korea both used socialist cheat codes if you will,Japan used window guidance which is literally a weak form of economic planning similar to modern China where the government told companies what to make at a broad level and in South Korea they used literal 5 year plans all the way to 1996 the 5 year plans were modeled from the North Korean ones cause North Korea was far surpassing the south and to compete they had to copy them.
The big problem here is ultimately that comparative analysis in general is dicey. Take your example of the Asian miracles: export-led growth in capitalism, *especially* in Japan and Korea, was the result of extremely dirigiste policies. You can hardly coordinate nation-wide export orientation towards development without a very strong state (Japan literally had a planning agency). Japan and Korea were capitalist mixed economies whose success was also largely contingent on their relationship to the US.
The Baltic countries were the most developed of the former republics upon leaving the union, and by many accounts were also the most developed republics before entering the union.
That's why the comparison of the USSR to Latin America, while somewhat reasonable, is still limited in its utility because obviously the two places had distinct historical circumstances and existed in different geopolitical spaces. For one, the Monroe Doctrine and US imperialism have played huge roles in the underdevelopment of Latin American countries. Conversely, the sheer force of destruction of WW2 was hardly felt by the Latin American world -- at least compared to how devastating it was in the USSR.
That's why holding the USSR to the standard of the US or Western Europe is pointless. The objectives and capabilities of the USSR were different from the West.
I think the reason why Robert Allen does this in Farm to Factory is to 1) demonstrate the relatively well-established fact that rich countries stay rich and poor countries stay (comparatively) poor and 2) frame the USSR's economic growth in the context of capitalist countries of "similar" development levels. Allen even notes that Japan is a major exception to the first point. But as I've already stated, it's not agreed upon to what degree "capitalism" drove Japan's success.
Ah you and Super Cobra beat me to it!
Interesting again. As an aside, DPRK is not a socialist state except in decoration. It's a hereditary feudal monarchy. The current ruler inherited it from his father, who had it from his father before him.
With regard to not comparing itself against the US, the point is well made. But could any soviet leader have taken that road? You're number 2 military in the world, seat on the Security Council, nuclear armageddon at your command. And you're going to say you're better than Brazil?
It's the economy though. I was interested to hear about the Walmart model, because of course, they plan! Something could be worked, bearing that they review and chane the plan a lot.
Cybernetics / IT - fine, but the incentives and motivations must be aligned otherwise - bullshit in => bullshit out.
If Russia ever should come to rise again the I hope Ukraine will push them eastwards!... #hambone
1:15:43 another mistake by Khrushchev is copying a computer. ruclips.net/video/IO4-YwhyvrM/видео.htmlsi=qU7hQl-21LUsX7Bg&t=1640
1:59:59 “hidden inflation” was that, for example, machine builders promise to develop a machine or combine, the performance of which will be 10 times better than old equipment, and in the end its productivity will be twice as high... (and for this they received money for development as if in the 10th) this is how a situation arose when the population had a lot of money, but few goods... 🧐🤔😎
I always searched for video like that 🥲 , after reading about the history of tsarist russia and the bolshevicks immediately realised how i was brainwashed by right wing's media academics and followers .. now i would love to study the entire history of the soviet union and the real reasons for its collapse and how we can learn from previous experimemts
Rock music is bourgeois and life in the USSR wasn’t grey and drab, especially after the 1950’s. There was a ton of color in Soviet fashion, products, and daily life. It has only become greyer in the minds of everyone because it’s framed against the West which became very obnoxiously colorful after the 1950’s thanks to the hippies and their impact on counterculture which became the main driver of the culture industry from the 1970s to today. You seem to have trouble differentiating bourgeois individualism and socialist cultural creativity as seen in its art and fashion.
1:00:55 "... debated before Stalin was even very important in the Party." "When was that?" "In the twenties, in the mid twenties..."
Ouch. Honestly, as soon as Stalin was Lenin's shadow he was important. Try not to misremember, or if you do, do it more plausibly.
I like one dime's stuff a lot of the time, but sometimes this guy gets a little loopy and this was one of them. It was really grating to watch him interrupt The Marxist project continuously with winding and aimless diatribes. Specifically at the point I'm writing this comment, 30:00, he interrupts to counter the Marxist projects point that there was a lot of non-material production in order to say that it's possible to have consumer goods and Self-Development and exploration using the example of social democracies. First off, with that statement you are not proving that the Soviet Union could have had both by referencing capitalist states that were integrated into a global neocolonial market system, which is not at all comparable to the system the Soviet Union had, and second he's contradicting his own stance from earlier in the video that the Soviet Union should not have pursued consumption to the degree it did. Anyway, overall, though I enjoy a lot of what one dime has to say, I wish he would shut the hell up every once in awhile.
23:00 when did Mao say rock was bourgeois? And Mao wasn't a Maoist, he was a ML, with MZT thought
I enjoyed this a lot. Generally very balanced and intelligent takes. However, I think you went a bit too quickly over the anarchist critique of 'the USSR wasn't even socialist'. As you probably know, the underlying sentiment predates the october revolution by several decades (Bakunin, 'the people's stick'). To me, workplace democracy is the central pillar of socialism. In my (admittedly superficial) understanding, the USSR had only very limited workplace democracy, and basically no democracy to speak of beyond the local level. Central planning dictated what should be produced and party representatives, as well as managers loyal to the party had the most say in how it should be produced. In theory, every decision was made for the good of the people as a whole, but in practice, most workers had very little say in the matter and bureaucrats tended to stuff their pockets. Is that a mischaracterization? If not, do we have different definitions of socialism?