Letter: Individual liberty (1977)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

Individual liberty

Replying to W. J. Street (September Socialist Standard), you reject Kropotkin’s vision of a society where “the liberty of the individual will not be limited by laws or bonds”. Does this then imply that there will be such laws or bonds with Socialism?

Does the "democratic social organisation" necessitate compulsory majority decisions? If so, as the State "has withered away”, how will such decisions be enforced?

Are we referring to Socialism or to a controversial intermediate society?

Finally, with the material needs no longer at risk, will the individual and society continue to be in conflict?

After all, people do not shoot one another because of divergent views on art or would not do so in a civilised society.

F. Ball

Wokingham

Reply:

We reject Kropotkin’s view of society because in common with all anarchists he places the liberty of the individual above the needs of society. This is a utopian conception; society is not just a collection of individuals. The wants and needs of the individual are inseparable from the organization of socialist society.

The duties and the relationships of those living in Socialism will be established by social custom, as it was in the period of man’s early history before the advent of private property. Society, which will be democratically controlled, will have a responsibility towards all its members and vice versa. The keynote is social co-operation at every level.

It would be wrong to claim that there will always be total agreement, but there would not nor could not be any coercion against any individual or minority who did not agree with majority decisions. Matters in dispute would have to be thrashed out, and any decision taken would put the interest of the community first, and a dissenting minority would be expected to go along with it. The fact that all available information and facilities will be at the disposal of minorities or individuals, and discussion unrestricted, will help them to see the reasons for the majority decision, even though they may not accept it. Few people will not bow to reason if they have had a fair hearing. As you do not give a specific example we cannot develop this point further.

Socialism is not an intermediate society. There is no half-way stage or transition between socialism and capitalism—we move from one into the other.

We generally agree with your last point. However, we do not divorce the individual’s needs, including his cultural and intellectual needs, from those of society. The individual is a social product and his thinking powers are born out of social conditions. He is not above society but of it. His ideas arise from and must relate to the material circumstances of his social existence.