Letter: Socialism's Economics (1977)

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

Socialism's Economics

The article on socialism in September’s SS (p. 166-7) went beyond the evidence on human desires in the hypothetical new society. But it clearly declared that many wants may have to go unsatisfied. It did not indicate how such decisions would be reached. It pointed out that Socialism would be similar to capitalism in being a system of co-operation and social production, but it did not show what we could put in place of the price system as a means of economic communication. People would have to work, but how would they know when enough is enough? In short, where is the socialist economics that will make an economy based on common ownership viable?

“RAW" tells us (1) that it must be technically possible to keep people free of deprivation and (2) people need to have socialist understanding. He tells us that the first requirement has been met even though people like the Hyde Park questioner may feel deprived. The second is a different matter. Capitalism did not have to solve this, RAW says. Perhaps he thinks the knowledge that even children have mastered to buy sweets should not count as knowledge. On this I do not agree. However, what about the knowledge we will use to economize our wants in the new society? This seems to have been ignored by RAW.

Workers are only “forced” to work in capitalism because they want to live. The same “force" would exist in any society that depended upon effort to supply needs. The two obstacles facing the SPGB are different from the ones RAW mentioned. They are: (1) A viable socialist economics that would theoretically expound the new society as modern economics expounds capitalism. (2) A political theory of how to manage law and order in the new society. I think it is fair to say that while they remain unsolved Socialism remains a half-baked idea.

David McDonagh 

Birmingham

Reply:

We are afraid that the trouble is that like many people, you feel that a harmonious system like Socialism is really too good to be true and therefore spend your time looking for all possible faults (which is fine) but find problems which won’t exist (which is unnecessary). You bring up the old difficulty: "What if everyone wants a Rolls Royce etc? Chaos must reign!” Under capitalism though, most people know they will never even ride in a Rolls, let alone own one, so that’s fine! The rich who rule the earth, can drive the Rolls Royces, and the people who build them can wait for the bus, and so that's fine! What you don’t grasp is that we will only have Socialism when the majority of people are socialists; that is people who know what Socialism is, and are determined to get it. Such people will not wreck Socialism because society may not be able to afford to produce Rolls Royces. The “economics” that you seem to require is in part a result of looking at the future. Socialism, with the conditioned eyes of the present, capitalism. Socialists who go through the revolutionary process of establishing Socialism will work in their own interests sorting out their material requirements. It may sound simple, but it is not only the SPGB that says it is possible to solve all the material problems i.e. it is technically possible to do so. It is only socialists though who have suggested the practical way of doing so. Why not spend your time thinking about the real problems that afflict us now, and not the imagined ones of the future? And join with us in getting rid of the cause of these problems?

So far as your question of law and order is concerned, there is not space to go into that here. We would refer you in particular to The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State by Engels, which shows that law is a product (and therefore a problem) of property society, and will be of no relevance to property less society, i.e. Socialism.

Editors.

Letter: What Makes us Different ? (1978)

Letter to the Editors from the March 1978 issue of the Socialist Standard

What Makes us Different ?

I would like you to consider the difference between the SPGB and other organizations that call themselves Socialist. What is it that makes up the difference? I suggest that it is theoretical knowledge. This has been developed by facing up to hypothetical problems that may have to be faced on the way to, and also within, the new society. It seems to me that this task is not even half-done, hence I called Socialism a half-baked idea. The vast majority of SPGBers seem to think that this task is over, but in fact there is no Socialist politics nor any Socialist economics. In fact the SPGB is not so very far ahead of the mindless SWP in being able to explain what Socialism is. I think we would agree on their theoretical merits.

Anyway, the problems of Socialism will certainly not be solved by wishing them away as Engels did. It is not a fact that all conflict is due to private property. People are likely to clash over other things like temperament, sex and even philosophy and taste. But even if Engels was right, we would still need Socialist law and order until the “new man” emerged. As it is I would drop Engels’ brand of Owenism and attempt to work a theoretical system of politics that will enable you to explain what Socialism is today, and will, perhaps, develop into a body of theory that will give the revolutionaries some idea of how to go about things in the new society.

Of course the majority of revolutionaries will cooperate, but then the vast majority of people always do; in any society. Law and order is a minority problem but this minority is unlikely to be uniform or static. It is likely to be continually changing as people go through phases of development.

A general framework of Socialist economics needs to be added to the politics mentioned above. No matter how much technology improves our standard of living, it will never do so at a uniform rate. Economic choices will have to be made as to what to produce, and of how much as well as the allocation of scarce consumer goods and the effective use of producer goods. As those problems of investment and consumption will remain in the new society, a Socialist solution to them is required. The price system gives us the sort of information we need in capitalism. What is going to replace it in Socialism?

David McDonagh, 

Birmingham

Reply:

Unfortunately we can’t deal with all the points you raise in a short reply. Some of the questions you mention will have to be left to an article.

However, the main point you raise relates to “socialist economics”. In our view “economics” would be a very much simpler question in socialism than it is under capitalism. You require some “socialist economics” to explain socialism in the same way that modern economics explains capitalism. First, modern economics does not explain capitalism, far from it. Second, socialism will not have the need to “justify” itself in the same way that capitalism uses “economics” to justify itself. The theoretical exposition of socialism is the description of the way socialist society will be organised; i.e. common ownership and free access to wealth based on the technological possibilities that capitalism has created. This needs explaining; it does not (cannot) involve the equivalent presentation that those who (attempt) to explain modern capitalism indulge in.

How will socialist society know what to produce when money no longer acts as a guide? The answer may be this: in socialist society people will take freely from what is produced. But when goods are taken there is no reason for them not to be numbered and checked. So for example, the local store supplying product x to the locality could keep a record of the number of “takes” (there would of course be no sales) of product x. It would know how much of product x had to be kept in stock to cover the time between the requisitioning of x and its arrival at the store. Computers could be used to monitor the “take up” of all products as part of the world system, and this information would be relayed to the producers. This system would of course be far more efficient than the present system.

The above outline does of course depend on society being able to produce sufficient of the things people require for no one to go without. But it is possible that society as a whole will decide that one particular product (an example given in the September ss was a Rolls Royce) will not be produced. How society would decide which products to do without would of course in part depend on the product in question. At this stage, all we can indicate is that no human being would be without any “need” and anything over and above that which might be required but not be socially possible will be decided on by society, democratically.

So far as your question on Law and order is concerned, there is no space to go into that here. We would refer you in particular to The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State by Engels, which shows that law is a product (and therefore a problem) of property society, and will be of no relevance to propertyless society.

Editors.