So democracy to you is when a state does SocDem welfare policies?
I would understand if, as a purported socialist, you wanted to tie democracy to communism, as bourgeois democracy democratizes only the superstrucure, and even that one just partially. But that tie-in would clearly be hard to accept if you wanted to argue for USSR being democratic, as it was far from a stateless classless moneyless society.
Still - why social democracy? Why welfare? It’s kinda of a weird choice, unless you tie the idea of democracy to the liberal-fascist “will of the people” concept. But that would imply very bad things about your views, friend.
So democracy to you is when a state does SocDem welfare policies?
A state only does welfare policies when it is compelled to by democratic forces. After WW2, western masses were both militarised, and the threat of the USSR loomed large. This new power balance favoring the labor movement was the only reason they won their welfare states. As soon as the power balance shifted, western governments started dismantling the welfare states. In other words, welfare policies, and the distribution of income are an effective gauge of the level of democratic power in a country.
The USSR, unlike the SocDems went well beyond mere welfare. Rents were capped to 5% of your income, and most people didn’t even pay that, as home ownership rates were well over 90%. Food was subsidized to such a degree that in many socialist countries, it severely distorted the economy (and was likely a contributing factor to their downfalls ironically). Transportation and many forms of entertainment were virtually free (soviet citizens had access to community spas, theaters, an opera house in basically every city, iirc). Income differentials in the socialist states were orders of magnitudes lower than in SocDem states.
Now obviously, these policies aren’t “proof” of democracy, but are certainly a strong indicator. And my statements were never meant to prove anything really, as it was a joke.
But that tie-in would clearly be hard to accept if you wanted to argue for USSR being democratic, as it was far from a stateless classless moneyless society.
Ah, the timeless technique of using a different definition of a word that a community clearly does not use, purely to generate confusion.
unless you tie the idea of democracy to the liberal-fascist “will of the people” concept. But that would imply very bad things about your views, friend.
I don’t remember making any references to “the will of the people”, but even if I did, thinking that would make me a “liberal-fascist” (what I think you are implying) because of that borders on asinine.
A state only does welfare policies when it is compelled to by democratic forces.
Correction: by the need to disarm and pacify the proletariat, when class rule becomes too threatened. German Empire is a good example. Nobody would dare to call Bismarck’s rule “democratic”
And you’re still describing welfare. Most SocDems I know support things like this or similar ones, and food subsidies are done by many liberal governments, irrelevant of the democratic status.
using a different definition of a word that a community clearly does not use
I agree, MLs have long abandoned what communism was supposed to mean.
don’t remember making any references to “the will of the people”
I mean, your schpiel about welfare implying democracy is kinda it. You still haven’t made neither communist ties to mode of production, nor more liberal ties to the electoral structure. You’re only pushing the welfare angle.
Monarchs wanting to keep the populace docile, like in modern Saudi Arabia or in the German Empire would often implement welfare, and it would be ridiculous to call that in any way a democracy. However fascists often define “democracy” as the ruler following the will of the people, which is shown through fulfilling certain needs of the population, like food, healthcare, housing. Your “welfare implies democracy” take runs parallel to that idea, and can be argued to be a slight repackaging of the reactionary concept.
would make me a “liberal-fascist”
That is not how it works. It is possible to believe fascist things while being a liberal and to believe liberal and fascist things while being a socialist. The point is not that you are that shitty thing, but that you should change your position from the wrong one to the right one.
Correction: by the need to disarm and pacify the proletariat, when class rule becomes too threatened. German Empire is a good example. Nobody would dare to call Bismarck’s rule “democratic”
You have managed to miss both the point of the joke and my explanation of it. I was being sarcastic in my comment and not writing a thesis on democracy. The joke was never meant to accurately define democracy. As for my explanation, you have somehow missed the fact that I explicitly say that welfare is an indicator for the strength of democratic forces, and not “proof” that a country is a democracy.
I agree, MLs have long abandoned what communism was supposed to mean.
Are you being purposefully obtuse?
However fascists often define “democracy” as the ruler following the will of the people, which is shown through fulfilling certain needs of the population, like food, healthcare, housing
Oh, was the USSR under Stalin fascist then? Was it simply “placating” and “disarming” the working population? Or was it liberal or monarchist? Because that is the original topic I replied to. Nobody but the most dumbass of ultras can pretend that the USSR under Stalin was not socialist. Certainly did not achieve higher stage communism as it still had a large peasant class.
You have managed to miss both the point of the joke and my explanation of it
I know you were sarcastic in the original comment, which is why I asked you to make an actual point.
They key points of your response were:
A state only does welfare policies when it is compelled to by democratic forces.
The USSR [did a lot of welfare]
these policies … are certainly a strong indicator [of democracy]
The first point you’re wrong on, as I have explained.
The second point I agree on.
The third point you are again wrong on, as examples I’ve provided demonstrate.
Both proofs and indicators serve similar goals rhetorically, I don’t see the point of your distinction here. I also didn’t say “proof” when criticizing your point:
Your “welfare implies democracy” take
Now going further.
Oh, was the USSR under Stalin fascist then?
I have no idea what led you to think I’m saying this, stop being defensive. It did do some things that, if were done by a western liberal government, would’ve lead to accusations of fascism, but that is beside the point.
Was it simply “placating” and “disarming” the working population?
That is correct, however; both figuratively and literally.
The first point you’re wrong on, as I have explained.
No you haven’t. Bismark only implemented his policies to placate a working class as you yourself claim. You only need to placate and disarm a class if they become a threat to your power. Your examples only further reinforce my point that states in general have to be compelled to provide welfare policies. It takes some level of success in class conflict to win concessions.
Both proofs and indicators serve similar goals rhetorically, I don’t see the point of your distinction here. I also didn’t say “proof” when criticizing your point:
They do not at all. If you drank a soda that tasted sweet, that would be an indicator that it had fructose in it. But it would not be proof as the soda could have artificial sweetners like sacharine instead. The implementation of welfare policies are the result of an intermingling of factors, and each country has its own circumstances.
That is correct, however; both figuratively and literally.
So far, you have yet to explain how exactly the USSR under Stalin was not democratic, which was the whole thing I was mocking your views over.
You only need to placate and disarm a class if they become a threat to your power.
Or you want to push them further to achieve your goals.
Or there’s a threat of external forces using internal disorder for their purposes.
Why is this important?
Your original statement - “compelled to by democratic forces” - was implying (maybe accidentally), that those forces have at least partial power in the government. It sounded similar to the social democratic idea of “The workers have a say in the government, so they vote for things they desire”.
Your newer statement - “become a threat to your power” - is then paralleled with “success in class conflict”. Both imply there’s a strong workers’ movement making demands. What I want to point out is that it is not necessarily the case, as there are often other pressures at play which don’t directly involve the labor movement.
USSR had both a need for a compliant workforce to simplify the execution of economic plans and a great threat of external hostile forces leveraging internal strife, both of which made it a very appealing option to keep the working class as non-threatening as possible.
[Proofs and indicators] do not at all [serve similar goal rhetorically]
You don’t need to explain to me how formal proofs work. However, I was talking about rhetoric, not logic.
When you are talking to a person or a group of people and say things like:
“The use of word ‘degeneracy’ implies fascist beliefs”
“The desire for class collaboration is a proof of fascism”
“The obsession with a plotting Other suggest fascist ideology”
All of these serve the same goal in your speech. It tells people around:
“Because of X you should believe that person is a fascist”.
My point is that it doesn’t matter whether you used “proof” or “indication”, that either of them would be there to have a person read about the USSR’s welfare policies and go “Hm, I guess USSR was actually democratic”.
Your original sarcastic comment had other possible interpretations: “democracy is a meaningless term”, or “democracy is secondary to well-being of the populace”, but these are even more reactionary than the welfare-democracy one, and your following response suggested that was the one you intended.
So far, you have yet to explain how exactly the USSR under Stalin was not democratic
I’ve been waiting for you to explain the contrary, as your only point to that so far was the welfare one. You also haven’t yet explained what meaning of “democracy” you subscribe to, as you have suggested you don’t believe the welfare explanation. It would be a waste of time for me to present a refutal, only for you to not believe in its core, thus rendering all the work futile.
Your original statement - “compelled to by democratic forces” - was implying (maybe accidentally), that those forces have at least partial power in the government. It sounded similar to the social democratic idea of “The workers have a say in the government, so they vote for things they desire”.
In the case of the USSR, it was almost entirely workers. Workers (and non-working lower class folk) who voted in representatives for their local soviets, the local soviets who then voted in representatives for higher soviets and so on. The soviet structure, which existed for the workplace as well, although higher level government bodies still had some say in how the workplace was run (necessary to ensure coherence in the economic plan). It was common for people to personally write letters to Stalin or other officials, who would then be required to respond to their requests. I have even heard stories from non-communist eastern europeans who say things like “my grandmother once wrote to Stalin to ask him to transfer her to a new unit because she thought the commander was hot. And that’s how my father was born”. This level of extreme intermingling between the citizenry and the leadership is surely a strong mechanism of democracy. Another democratic mechanism existed in the USSR whereby the 1936 constitution was crafted with suggestions from the populace and had to be approved by a vote from the population. It is in the context of these democratic mechanisms that my comments about welfare become “proof” for the USSR being democratic. If it wasn’t democratic and all of the mechanism I listed above are lies, how would that square with the USSR working to abolish surplus value or having income distributions orders of magnitudes more equal than countries with comparable levels of industrialisation. It wouldn’t.
Your original sarcastic comment had other possible interpretations: “democracy is a meaningless term”, or “democracy is secondary to well-being of the populace”, but these are even more reactionary than the welfare-democracy one, and your following response suggested that was the one you intended.
No it didn’t. It went “In the despotic east, the people are forced to …, in the democratic west, the people choose to starve in the streets”. The idea that in a democracy, a population would choose to impoverish and immiserate itself is the whole joke to begin with. When I was writing that comment, I was operating under the assumption that you were the type who would defend western “democracies”.
Fucking hell, the editor did not save my message again.
TL;DR
Having a referendum to ratify constitutional changes is a thing in a large number of countries. It’s not out of the ordinary.
The Congress of Soviets was removed with the 1936 constitution. Supreme Soviet took its place.
Supreme Soviet was elected directly, but all ballots had only a single candidate. You can try to look up a picture of a ballot - they all have a single name on them. There is one picture of a ballot template with 3 names, but that’s it.
The candidates in the ballots would be nominated on meetings of industrial plant and factory staff. Meetings are not elections. Meetings is when you sit and listen to the management read out their decisions.
There Supreme Soviet would convene a few times per year for a week or less. All other time there would be ~40 guys from the Presidium who would take on its duties.
The single-candidate ballots seem to be a norm, as one of the sessions mentions ~7000 ballots “with crossed out candidate names” out of ~1 million votes. Crossing out is how you vote on those ballots, it’s written above the right column, and you have to cross all but one name. If there are only 0.7% of crossed out ballots, that means all of the ballots had only 1 name on them.
All of the decisions I read through have been accepted, ratified, voted on completely unanimously. No “nays”, no abstentions. This whole thing is just a glorified green stamp.
A lot of time is spent on speeches. None of those speeches show any dissent. E.g. when Molotov is talking about friendly relationships with Nazi Germany and Italy in 1940, there’s zero dissent.
Supreme Soviet was officially the highest legislative authority in the country. It was an undemocratic sham.
No it didn’t [have those other interpretations].
It did, but I don’t want to argue about that. It’s all semantics and sophistry and we’re past that anyway.
So democracy to you is when a state does SocDem welfare policies?
I would understand if, as a purported socialist, you wanted to tie democracy to communism, as bourgeois democracy democratizes only the superstrucure, and even that one just partially. But that tie-in would clearly be hard to accept if you wanted to argue for USSR being democratic, as it was far from a stateless classless moneyless society.
Still - why social democracy? Why welfare? It’s kinda of a weird choice, unless you tie the idea of democracy to the liberal-fascist “will of the people” concept. But that would imply very bad things about your views, friend.
A state only does welfare policies when it is compelled to by democratic forces. After WW2, western masses were both militarised, and the threat of the USSR loomed large. This new power balance favoring the labor movement was the only reason they won their welfare states. As soon as the power balance shifted, western governments started dismantling the welfare states. In other words, welfare policies, and the distribution of income are an effective gauge of the level of democratic power in a country.
The USSR, unlike the SocDems went well beyond mere welfare. Rents were capped to 5% of your income, and most people didn’t even pay that, as home ownership rates were well over 90%. Food was subsidized to such a degree that in many socialist countries, it severely distorted the economy (and was likely a contributing factor to their downfalls ironically). Transportation and many forms of entertainment were virtually free (soviet citizens had access to community spas, theaters, an opera house in basically every city, iirc). Income differentials in the socialist states were orders of magnitudes lower than in SocDem states.
Now obviously, these policies aren’t “proof” of democracy, but are certainly a strong indicator. And my statements were never meant to prove anything really, as it was a joke.
Ah, the timeless technique of using a different definition of a word that a community clearly does not use, purely to generate confusion.
I don’t remember making any references to “the will of the people”, but even if I did, thinking that would make me a “liberal-fascist” (what I think you are implying) because of that borders on asinine.
Correction: by the need to disarm and pacify the proletariat, when class rule becomes too threatened. German Empire is a good example. Nobody would dare to call Bismarck’s rule “democratic”
And you’re still describing welfare. Most SocDems I know support things like this or similar ones, and food subsidies are done by many liberal governments, irrelevant of the democratic status.
I agree, MLs have long abandoned what communism was supposed to mean.
I mean, your schpiel about welfare implying democracy is kinda it. You still haven’t made neither communist ties to mode of production, nor more liberal ties to the electoral structure. You’re only pushing the welfare angle.
Monarchs wanting to keep the populace docile, like in modern Saudi Arabia or in the German Empire would often implement welfare, and it would be ridiculous to call that in any way a democracy. However fascists often define “democracy” as the ruler following the will of the people, which is shown through fulfilling certain needs of the population, like food, healthcare, housing. Your “welfare implies democracy” take runs parallel to that idea, and can be argued to be a slight repackaging of the reactionary concept.
That is not how it works. It is possible to believe fascist things while being a liberal and to believe liberal and fascist things while being a socialist. The point is not that you are that shitty thing, but that you should change your position from the wrong one to the right one.
You have managed to miss both the point of the joke and my explanation of it. I was being sarcastic in my comment and not writing a thesis on democracy. The joke was never meant to accurately define democracy. As for my explanation, you have somehow missed the fact that I explicitly say that welfare is an indicator for the strength of democratic forces, and not “proof” that a country is a democracy.
Are you being purposefully obtuse?
Oh, was the USSR under Stalin fascist then? Was it simply “placating” and “disarming” the working population? Or was it liberal or monarchist? Because that is the original topic I replied to. Nobody but the most dumbass of ultras can pretend that the USSR under Stalin was not socialist. Certainly did not achieve higher stage communism as it still had a large peasant class.
I know you were sarcastic in the original comment, which is why I asked you to make an actual point.
They key points of your response were:
The first point you’re wrong on, as I have explained.
The second point I agree on.
The third point you are again wrong on, as examples I’ve provided demonstrate.
Both proofs and indicators serve similar goals rhetorically, I don’t see the point of your distinction here. I also didn’t say “proof” when criticizing your point:
Now going further.
I have no idea what led you to think I’m saying this, stop being defensive. It did do some things that, if were done by a western liberal government, would’ve lead to accusations of fascism, but that is beside the point.
That is correct, however; both figuratively and literally.
Now you’re just posturing. Please stop.
No you haven’t. Bismark only implemented his policies to placate a working class as you yourself claim. You only need to placate and disarm a class if they become a threat to your power. Your examples only further reinforce my point that states in general have to be compelled to provide welfare policies. It takes some level of success in class conflict to win concessions.
They do not at all. If you drank a soda that tasted sweet, that would be an indicator that it had fructose in it. But it would not be proof as the soda could have artificial sweetners like sacharine instead. The implementation of welfare policies are the result of an intermingling of factors, and each country has its own circumstances.
So far, you have yet to explain how exactly the USSR under Stalin was not democratic, which was the whole thing I was mocking your views over.
deleted by creator
Or you want to push them further to achieve your goals.
Or there’s a threat of external forces using internal disorder for their purposes.
Why is this important?
Your original statement - “compelled to by democratic forces” - was implying (maybe accidentally), that those forces have at least partial power in the government. It sounded similar to the social democratic idea of “The workers have a say in the government, so they vote for things they desire”.
Your newer statement - “become a threat to your power” - is then paralleled with “success in class conflict”. Both imply there’s a strong workers’ movement making demands. What I want to point out is that it is not necessarily the case, as there are often other pressures at play which don’t directly involve the labor movement.
USSR had both a need for a compliant workforce to simplify the execution of economic plans and a great threat of external hostile forces leveraging internal strife, both of which made it a very appealing option to keep the working class as non-threatening as possible.
You don’t need to explain to me how formal proofs work. However, I was talking about rhetoric, not logic.
When you are talking to a person or a group of people and say things like:
All of these serve the same goal in your speech. It tells people around:
“Because of X you should believe that person is a fascist”.
My point is that it doesn’t matter whether you used “proof” or “indication”, that either of them would be there to have a person read about the USSR’s welfare policies and go “Hm, I guess USSR was actually democratic”.
Your original sarcastic comment had other possible interpretations: “democracy is a meaningless term”, or “democracy is secondary to well-being of the populace”, but these are even more reactionary than the welfare-democracy one, and your following response suggested that was the one you intended.
I’ve been waiting for you to explain the contrary, as your only point to that so far was the welfare one. You also haven’t yet explained what meaning of “democracy” you subscribe to, as you have suggested you don’t believe the welfare explanation. It would be a waste of time for me to present a refutal, only for you to not believe in its core, thus rendering all the work futile.
In the case of the USSR, it was almost entirely workers. Workers (and non-working lower class folk) who voted in representatives for their local soviets, the local soviets who then voted in representatives for higher soviets and so on. The soviet structure, which existed for the workplace as well, although higher level government bodies still had some say in how the workplace was run (necessary to ensure coherence in the economic plan). It was common for people to personally write letters to Stalin or other officials, who would then be required to respond to their requests. I have even heard stories from non-communist eastern europeans who say things like “my grandmother once wrote to Stalin to ask him to transfer her to a new unit because she thought the commander was hot. And that’s how my father was born”. This level of extreme intermingling between the citizenry and the leadership is surely a strong mechanism of democracy. Another democratic mechanism existed in the USSR whereby the 1936 constitution was crafted with suggestions from the populace and had to be approved by a vote from the population. It is in the context of these democratic mechanisms that my comments about welfare become “proof” for the USSR being democratic. If it wasn’t democratic and all of the mechanism I listed above are lies, how would that square with the USSR working to abolish surplus value or having income distributions orders of magnitudes more equal than countries with comparable levels of industrialisation. It wouldn’t.
No it didn’t. It went “In the despotic east, the people are forced to …, in the democratic west, the people choose to starve in the streets”. The idea that in a democracy, a population would choose to impoverish and immiserate itself is the whole joke to begin with. When I was writing that comment, I was operating under the assumption that you were the type who would defend western “democracies”.
Fucking hell, the editor did not save my message again.
TL;DR
Having a referendum to ratify constitutional changes is a thing in a large number of countries. It’s not out of the ordinary.
The Congress of Soviets was removed with the 1936 constitution. Supreme Soviet took its place. Supreme Soviet was elected directly, but all ballots had only a single candidate. You can try to look up a picture of a ballot - they all have a single name on them. There is one picture of a ballot template with 3 names, but that’s it.
The candidates in the ballots would be nominated on meetings of industrial plant and factory staff. Meetings are not elections. Meetings is when you sit and listen to the management read out their decisions.
There Supreme Soviet would convene a few times per year for a week or less. All other time there would be ~40 guys from the Presidium who would take on its duties.
There are stenograms of sessions available in Russian.. I can read Russian. What I’m reading is:
Supreme Soviet was officially the highest legislative authority in the country. It was an undemocratic sham.
It did, but I don’t want to argue about that. It’s all semantics and sophistry and we’re past that anyway.
deleted by creator
When you don’t know the difference between communism and socialism
Your username looks particularly funny in the context. I hope you know why.
Your comments look very uninformed in the context of this entire thread.I hope understand why.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1872/10/authority.htm
Lol