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So, in yesterday’s post I outlined why libertarianism and communism can’t and don’t work. Now, I will look at why these failed ideologies are still in any way current. I think the simplest explanation is looking at the “typical” communist or libertarian. A key factor is both individuals tend to be intelligent, and both tend to assume that people will make the right decisions if left to their own devices.
The typical communist is an academic, working at a university or research institution. Now, if you’ve hung out at a college town, you know that for every relatively-well-paid tenured professor, there is a herd of graduate students, adjunct teachers, post-docs, and assorted Very Smart People making Not Much Money. They all work at an institution where the relationship between what they do and what brings financial rewards to the institution is unclear at best. In short, decisions as to who gets tenure, what line of research is followed, etc. are made by what seem like arbitrary processes.
Meanwhile, hang out long enough, and one of your students will show up making several times what you are while working in the private sector, arguably work that’s less “important.” The attraction of a policy that promises to educate people, and reward educated people by needs should be obvious. Communism is a technocrat’s dream.
An added attraction is the promise of social justice. The idea that the poor and downtrodden will get better treatment (guided by the educated, of course), is a powerful plus. And in fact, some things (like health care and baseline social services) simply can’t be provided by the market. There is no market for things people can’t afford to buy.
By contrast, the typical libertarian is a small business owner, independent contractor, or somebody sympathetic to those groups. (This is why you see a lot of IT people in the libertarian ranks.) From my experience in small business, let me assure you that the owner of the business is the person that gets every shitty little job, from unclogging the toilet in the employee bathroom to filling out government forms. Also, frankly, the burden of government regulation falls hardest on the small business. The big corporations can afford to hire a compliance department. Not so the local independent hardware store.
Again, the attraction of libertarianism to this group is obvious. Less regulation, and more freedom to do what they want. Here, social justice is a problem, because libertarianism holds that if you make a bad decision, you have to live (or die) with the consequences. This results in libertarianism’s tendency to minimize the problems of the poor or to be downright heartless about their suffering.
What both libertarians and communists have to do with regards to the social justice issue is ignore history. The communist has to ignore the fact that every communist regime has yielded weak economies with limited goods and services. What the libertarian has to ignore is that during past libertarian eras the non-wealthy were vigorously abused. In fact, this abuse directly led to the development of communism as an ideology.
in short, communism and libertarianism are linked - the failure of libertarianism led to communism. Communism has the ability to be a mass movement, while unless libertarianism hides under “freedom” it can’t. But the supporters of both ideologies are taking something that sounds good to them and ignoring the fact that it doesn’t work.
The typical communist is an academic, working at a university or research institution. Now, if you’ve hung out at a college town, you know that for every relatively-well-paid tenured professor, there is a herd of graduate students, adjunct teachers, post-docs, and assorted Very Smart People making Not Much Money. They all work at an institution where the relationship between what they do and what brings financial rewards to the institution is unclear at best. In short, decisions as to who gets tenure, what line of research is followed, etc. are made by what seem like arbitrary processes.
Meanwhile, hang out long enough, and one of your students will show up making several times what you are while working in the private sector, arguably work that’s less “important.” The attraction of a policy that promises to educate people, and reward educated people by needs should be obvious. Communism is a technocrat’s dream.
An added attraction is the promise of social justice. The idea that the poor and downtrodden will get better treatment (guided by the educated, of course), is a powerful plus. And in fact, some things (like health care and baseline social services) simply can’t be provided by the market. There is no market for things people can’t afford to buy.
By contrast, the typical libertarian is a small business owner, independent contractor, or somebody sympathetic to those groups. (This is why you see a lot of IT people in the libertarian ranks.) From my experience in small business, let me assure you that the owner of the business is the person that gets every shitty little job, from unclogging the toilet in the employee bathroom to filling out government forms. Also, frankly, the burden of government regulation falls hardest on the small business. The big corporations can afford to hire a compliance department. Not so the local independent hardware store.
Again, the attraction of libertarianism to this group is obvious. Less regulation, and more freedom to do what they want. Here, social justice is a problem, because libertarianism holds that if you make a bad decision, you have to live (or die) with the consequences. This results in libertarianism’s tendency to minimize the problems of the poor or to be downright heartless about their suffering.
What both libertarians and communists have to do with regards to the social justice issue is ignore history. The communist has to ignore the fact that every communist regime has yielded weak economies with limited goods and services. What the libertarian has to ignore is that during past libertarian eras the non-wealthy were vigorously abused. In fact, this abuse directly led to the development of communism as an ideology.
in short, communism and libertarianism are linked - the failure of libertarianism led to communism. Communism has the ability to be a mass movement, while unless libertarianism hides under “freedom” it can’t. But the supporters of both ideologies are taking something that sounds good to them and ignoring the fact that it doesn’t work.
