Why is socialism such a dirty word in the US?

[butchersapron]

Collective ownership of the means of production presupposes that property ownership isn't a right, and since most models of socialism delegate ownership to the state, feudalism is a fair description.

We'll disagree, of course. I'm simply offering a fear of over-mighty government as an alternative to selfishness or corporate indoctrination.

It actually presupposes that property ownership of a certain form is an absolute right, it's based on collective owenership of social property not actual dispossesion of the MOP by the vast majority of the population as capitalism is.

And your definition of feudalism as collective ownership of the MOP is wildly inaccurate, in fact, basically not feudalism at all - eccept possibly in the hysterical Hayekian sense.

 

[butchersapron]

I do hope butchers comes back with a more comprehensive account than I have the energy to post.

Certainly try to! Very important subject IMO

 

[nino_savatte]

McCarthy.

Not just McCarthy, the process began in earnest under McKinley (it was an anarchist by the name of Leon Czolgosz who assassinated him but some reckon he was a Republican stooge) and was accelerated thereafter. Consider the early Red Scare of 1917 - 1920; this was the culmination of years of industrial strife and the state's use of force against striking workers.

In the 1930's the CPUSA and the SWP both enjoyed huge popularity. Some communists were elected at local level (NYC Council had one or two). The City of Minneapolis had two socialist mayors (one held office right up till the early 60's iirc). However, by the time of 1938, the anti-New Dealers began to look for ways to scupper the New Deal: they attacked Hollywood and the universities - as these were easy targets. the Dies Committee was set up to investigate subversive or "unAmerican activities" and could be considered the forerunner of the HUAC.

 

[nino_savatte]

The effective anti-socialism propaganda in the USA probably predates the cold war, the corporate fightback against the New Deal back in the 30's, the birth of 'public relations' played their part. I dont think the sheer scale of the USA helps either, the anti-fed stuff that we only get a mild sense of with our anti-EU equivalent.

Yes, it started at around the the time of William McKinley. His assassination had a galvinising effect on the nascent anti-communists/socialists. Socialism, communism and anarchism were all deemed "foreign" and therefore "unAmerican". All were seen as "contaminants" that had to be purged from the US body politic. It is interesting to note that the Pledge of Allegiance was written around this time by a...Christian Socialist.

 

[butchersapron]

Don't get angry nino, i'm not having a pop, but your post is almost wholly correct and i wouldn;'t argue with it's point, except that the SWP were pretty irrelavent in the 1930s - membership at it's height was around 1000 - and it was only set up in 1938. It's individual members were influential in some industral disputes for sure though - the teamsters in Minneanapolis most notably, but even that wasn't the SWP, it was the forerunners in a group with just over a 100 members.

 

[butchersapron]

Yes, it started at around the the time of William McKinley. His assassination had a galvinising effect on the nascent anti-communists/socialists. Socialism, communism and anarchism were all deemed "foreign" and therefore "unAmerican". All were seen as "contaminants" that had to be purged from the US body politic. It is interesting to note that the Pledge of Allegiance was written around this time by a...Christian Socialist.

It goes back ever further to the attempts to demonise the foreign born radicals involved in the massive class conflicts of the 1860s and 70s - and the murders and so on of activists ans strikers by hired goons and private armies. It intensified publically in the wake of the Russian Revolution though - hence the 'first' Red Scare.

 

[nino_savatte]

I'm not going to get "angry" but I would like to say this: the leaders of the SWP were imprisoned under the Smith Act (a forerunner of later Acts of Congress such as the McCarran Internal Security Act). I am going by memory btw. I also recall that Paul Robeson was no fan of theirs either.

 

[nino_savatte]

It goes back ever further to the attempts to demonise the foreign born radicals involved in the massive class conflicts of the 1860s and 70s - and the murders and so on of activists ans strikers by hired goons and private armies. It intensified publically in the wake of the Russian Revolution though - hence the 'first' Red Scare.

The assassination of McKinley provided the perfect excuse for a proper crackdown. Wasn't Emma Goldman imprisoned shortly after?

 

[butchersapron]

They were, there was a famous trial where they were indicted for opposing the war and urging wartime strikes,

 

[butchersapron]

The assassination of McKinley provided the perfect excuse for a proper crackdown. Wasn't Emma Goldman imprisoned shortly after?

She's was in and out for some years after that, before her deportation, but IIRC never formally related to the Czolgosz action - though she was clearly persecuted for supporting him and so i wouldn't doubt there was a covert connection.

 

[camouflage]

??

Decades of propaganda.

 

[nino_savatte]

She's was in and out for some years after that, before her deportation, but IIRC never formally related to the Czolgosz action - though she was clearly persecuted for supporting him and so i wouldn't doubt there was a covert connection.

For sure. The link with Czolgosz was tenuous to say the least.

 

[Azrael]

It actually presupposes that property ownership of a certain form is an absolute right, it's based on collective owenership of social property not actual dispossesion of the MOP by the vast majority of the population as capitalism is.

And your definition of feudalism as collective ownership of the MOP is wildly inaccurate, in fact, basically not feudalism at all - eccept possibly in the hysterical Hayekian sense.

This collective ownership is incompatible with individual ownership, without which no individual's property is safe from the powerful. Feudalism presupposes that property ultimately belongs to the state (or king, or whoever the big cheese is) to be leased to the population for services rendered. As government operates the MoP on "our behalf", in practise this is what "collective ownership" boils down to.

I wouldn't call Hayek "hysterical". The Road to Serfdom is a pretty dry read that makes its ponts slowly and methodically. The definition of arbitary power is particularly good and relevant.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Feudalism is not collective ownership. It is very precisely the ownership of a narrow elite.

'Without individual ownership, no individual's property is safe from the powerful.'

You appear to be referring to an extreme example of communism that does not allow any private property. Most socialists don't go that far - they merely wish the means of production to be owned collectively. In the current system, most of the means of production is owned by the powerful - are you saying that the powerful need to be able to own things in order protect their property from themselves?

 

[Fedayn]

There's a long tradition of real socialism in the US (from violent revolutionary to social democratic). The story of how these were largely destroyed by a combination of full frontal aattack and covert acitons (both unconstituionally) is one of the great forgotten strories of US history - hidden on pupose of course.

I've got no time tonight, but this is a really interesting area. The split between the utterly militant unions fighting on an economic basis and political parties fighting politically is very important. Other thing that have been suggested (most famously in the sombart thesis) is the influence of religion, land in the west for people to move into, the lack of a trad aristocracy for a rising bourgeois to fight against with the w/c etc

Hope this thread is still alive tommorow.

Absolutely BA, there's a massive hidden story about american socialist/working class politics. And it senaks ouit in the weirdest of places. Anyone remember the scene in Waynes World where Alice Cooper mentions how Milwaukee is unique as a US city because it has had 3 elected Socialist mayors? Or how many know the fuller story of the Teamsters (especially in Minneapolis where they were 'led' by Trotskyists and wona major battles) above and beyond hoary tales about Jimmy Hoffa, or the rise of the Wobblies, the Knights of Labour, the politics of Eugene Debs and his candidacy for US presidency, James P Cannons (still one of my favourite ever political books) 'Socialism on Trial'. The real story behind the film Matewan, the life of Paul Robeson, The real story of John Reed..... A massive all too often hidden history.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Is this book any good?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Didnt-Happe...=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226072542&sr=8-2

It Didn't Happen Here: Why Socialism Failed in the United States (Norton Paperback) by SM Lipset (Author)

 

[Azrael]

Feudalism is not collective ownership. It is very precisely the ownership of a narrow elite.

I never claimed otherwise: I said that as government owns the means of production for us, in practise collective ownership becomes ownership by a narrow elite. (The state.) Ironically, one robber baron replaces thousands.

'Without individual ownership, no individual's property is safe from the powerful.'

You appear to be referring to an extreme example of communism that does not allow any private property. Most socialists don't go that far - they merely wish the means of production to be owned collectively. In the current system, most of the means of production is owned by the powerful - are you saying that the powerful need to be able to own things in order protect their property from themselves?

No, I'm saying that you can't seperate the individual rights protecting the powerful from those that protect the poor. And the means of production don't appear from thin air: they're built on individual risk and investment.

But that's by the by, I'm not trying to turn this thread into a debate about socialism as an abstract theory. I'm simply offering an alternative explanation (fear of a massive, robber baron state) for America's fear of it. Of course socialism's a matter of degree, but the underlying theory (collective ownership) is potentially very dangerous. (Lenin: "Commumism's just socialism in a hurry.") I imagine this is a big part of what scares Americans.

 

[danny la rouge]

Not just McCarthy

No, indeed. It was intended as a humorously flippant remark.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I never claimed otherwise: I said that as government owns the means of production for us, in practise collective ownership becomes ownership by a narrow elite. (The state.) Ironically, one robber baron replaces thousands.

How is the state a 'narrow elite'? Is the UK's NHS owned by a narrow elite? Or is it owned by everyone, run on our behalf by officials who can be booted out of office at periodic elections? What about building societies - is the Nationwide owned by a narrow elite? Or John Lewis?

 

[butchersapron]

I never claimed otherwise: I said that as government owns the means of production for us, in practise collective ownership becomes ownership by a narrow elite. (The state.) Ironically, one robber baron replaces thousands.

No, I'm saying that you can't seperate the individual rights protecting the powerful from those that protect the poor. And the means of production don't appear from thin air: they're built on individual risk and investment.

But that's by the by, I'm not trying to turn this thread into a debate about socialism as an abstract theory. I'm simply offering an alternative explanation (fear of a massive, robber baron state) for America's fear of it. Of course socialism's a matter of degree, but the underlying theory (collective ownership) is potentially very dangerous. (Lenin: "Commumism's just socialism in a hurry.") I imagine this is a big part of what scares Americans.

I'll come back on more on this later, but socialism in the united states developed precisely out of the resistance to...Robber Barons in the last quarter of the 19th century. Therefore there no logically following narrative that says resistance to robber barons means rejecting socialism and embracing capitalism. It can, and did in the formative period of american socialism, mean rejecting capitalism and embracing socialism.

 

[butchersapron]

Is this book any good?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Didnt-Happe...=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226072542&sr=8-2

It Didn't Happen Here: Why Socialism Failed in the United States (Norton Paperback) by SM Lipset (Author)

Flicked through it but not yet read it. Author is old style social democrat sociologist. 4 main arguments of book seem to be:

1) The failure of the American working class to develop large inclusive
industrial or general unions in the years before the Great War that could have provided the stable mass base for such a [labour/SPD type] party.

2) A Weberian cultural-determinist argument that the American working
class was too deeply imbued with both individualism and antistatism to embrace socialism

3) The ethnic fragmentation of the working class

4) Poltical sectarianism

 

[Gromit]

There is a great piece on fear of socialism on Michael Moore's 'Sicko' film.

They play a record which has Ronald Regan warning about the dangers of Socialised Medicine and how its just a step to some sort of government controled big brother nightmare.

And yet installing a medical system which deliberately encourages that less medical care is provided to their nation is not seen as evil perpeptrated by the government. Americans are idiots. No truly they are.

 

[turing test]

Therefore there no logically following narrative that says resistance to robber barons means rejecting socialism and embracing capitalism.

However, Azrael is right to say that part of the fear of Socialism in the US is fear of a large government. One of the planks of the modern Republican Party is small government, which is seen in the US as the antithesis of Socialism.

 

[Azrael]

How is the state a 'narrow elite'? Is the UK's NHS owned by a narrow elite? Or is it owned by everyone, run on our behalf by officials who can be booted out of office at periodic elections? What about building societies - is the Nationwide owned by a narrow elite? Or John Lewis?

The governing class is a narrow, largely metropolitan elite, which rests on coerced votes in the Commons made by career politicians. (With notable, but few, exceptions.) When, for example, the government gutted the railways on the advice of Beeching, how much say did ordinary people have?

Unless they were bought out when I wasn't looking, John Lewis isn't owned by the state. It has a worker-shareholder policy I greatly admire, which is far closer to socialist ideals than state industries.

I'll come back on more on this later, but socialism in the united states developed precisely out of the resistance to...Robber Barons in the last quarter of the 19th century. Therefore there no logically following narrative that says resistance to robber barons means rejecting socialism and embracing capitalism. It can, and did in the formative period of american socialism, mean rejecting capitalism and embracing socialism.

You're right, there is no such narrative, as other countries show. I'm suggesting that cultural and legal factors such as self-reliance and the Constitution create a variable not found elsewhere, at least in the same way. As, for that matter, does President Johnson's "great society" agenda being eclipsed and tarnished by race riots and Vietnam.

Browsing over US boards, another objection to socialism is that redistribution means, in practise, the product of hard work being taken in taxes and used to fund welfare cheats. Selfishness, or a belief that governments are flawed and tax money will be used in the wrong way?

 

[butchersapron]

However, Azrael is right to say that part of the fear of Socialism in the US is fear of a large government. One of the planks of the modern Republican Party is small government, which is seen in the US as the antithesis of Socialism.

But how/why did this fear develop in the US and not in other countries with similiar backgrounds (Canada for example) especially considering the fact that Socialism was very polular at key stages in US history (that last 25 years of the 19th century again) - and why did it not appear in populist agitation against things like the new deal in the 1930s?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

The governing class is a narrow, largely metropolitan elite, which rests on coerced votes in the Commons made by career politicians. (With notable, but few, exceptions.) When, for example, the government gutted the railways on the advice of Beeching, how much say did ordinary people have?

As I understand it, the small lines were closed on the advice of Beeching because they were uneconomical. I agree that it was a mistake, but how would a privately owned railway system have done better?

And the NHS - is it owned by a narrow elite?

 

[Azrael]

But how/why did this fear develop in the US and not in other countries with similiar backgrounds (Canada for example) especially considering the fact that Socialism was very polular at key stages in US history (that last 25 years of the 19th century again) - and why did it not appear in populist agitation against things like the new deal in the 1930s?

Because the Great Depression was an extreme situation. The Supreme Court struck down President Roosevelt's most radical innovations, which backs up my theory that the Constitution, designed to enforce limited government, played a part.

The American fear of big government has always been there: it began with pilgrims fleeing persecution by Charles I, and was cemented by the creation myth of rebellion against tyrannical Britain. Most who fought in the US Civil War had never owned a slave, some didn't even believe in slavery, but wanted to protect States' Rights.

Perhaps the late 19th century Union movement was strong amongst immigrants, and when they were assimilated, it waned? (A genuine question, I'm not pretending to be up on US industrial history.)

 

[Azrael]

As I understand it, the small lines were closed on the advice of Beeching because they were uneconomical. I agree that it was a mistake, but how would a privately owned railway system have done better?

And the NHS - is it owned by a narrow elite?

A private system wouldn't have had a co-ordinated national shut down. The piecemeal closures before WWII bear this out. And the uneconomical argument backs my case: if government was basing closure on economics and not "social need", then socialist ideals weren't at the forefront of its mind!

The NHS is a monster I'll not get into in detail, except to say that the move towards NHS Trusts and foundation hospitals are an admission that centralised control didn't work too well.

I'm not against nationalisation in principle, but I am against employing it where it isn't necessary, or using it as a tool to redistribute wealth.

 

[butchersapron]

Because the Great Depression was an extreme situation. The Supreme Court struck down President Roosevelt's most radical innovations, which backs up my theory that the Constitution, designed to enforce limited government, played a part.

The American fear of big government has always been there: it began with pilgrims fleeing persecution by Charles I, and was cemented by the creation myth of rebellion against tyrannical Britain. Most who fought in the US Civil War had never owned a slave, some didn't even believe in slavery, but wanted to protect States' Rights.

Perhaps the late 19th century Union movement was strong amongst immigrants, and when they were assimilated, it waned? (A genuine question, I'm not pretending to be up on US industrial history.)

But the depression etc happened in Canada too, and they alos share similiat backgounds in terms of emigration and pineer myths. And i meant populist ground up rejection of the new deal, not that of top down elites.

On immigration, yes that's one of the standard arguments and i have some sympathy for it - but the socialism of the union movements in the 19th century wasn't one limited to immigrant populations.

 

[bluestreak]

Fascinating thread. Going to do some research on some of the books mentioned.