z 
Posts: 11
Since: 6/17/2010
71.21.117.27
|  7/23/2010 3:11:59 PM 
Hi Fellow Z's,
I think this article offers an
opportunity to discuss many of the
same issues we see as problematic
in the ideas exposed about the sort
of society we want to build, out of
the ashes of Capitalism currently
in its last legs devouring itself
with the likes of Goldman Sacks
like maggots feeding on the carcass
of the body-politic and the
economy.
Society is convulting in spasms
from the self inflicted attacks by
the ravenous blind agents of
destruction who have given
themselves the power and the
license to secretly and otherwise,
decide over the rest of society, in
a maniac attempt to take into
effect a lunatic world government
mirroring their pathetic little
brains, bathing in lust and greed,
hungry for control and power.
Their psychopath need to fulfill
this plan that reportedly includes
the mass annihilation of more than
two thirds of the current world
population, is the result of the
paranoia which is homed inside
their underdeveloped selves.
What is striking about this article
written in 1949 (one year after I
was born) is how current it still
is!!
The Soviet Union's long experiment
while unsuccessful, it gave us
clear examples of what NOT to do
when we work towards a Resource
Based society and economy.
Please read this article and let's
hear from you.
Why Socialism?
By Albert Einstein
This essay was originally published
in the first issue of Monthly
Review (May 1949).
Is it advisable for one who is not
an expert on economic and social
issues to express views on the
subject of socialism? I believe for
a number of reasons that it is.
Let us first consider the question
from the point of view of
scientific knowledge. It might
appear that there are no essential
methodological differences between
astronomy and economics: scientists
in both fields attempt to discover
laws of general acceptability for a
circumscribed group of phenomena in
order to make the interconnection
of these phenomena as clearly
understandable as possible. But in
reality such methodological
differences do exist. The discovery
of general laws in the field of
economics is made difficult by the
circumstance that observed economic
phenomena are often affected by
many factors which are very hard to
evaluate separately. In addition,
the experience which has
accumulated since the beginning of
the so-called civilized period of
human history has—as is well known—
been largely influenced and limited
by causes which are by no means
exclusively economic in nature. For
example, most of the major states
of history owed their existence to
conquest. The conquering peoples
established themselves, legally and
economically, as the privileged
class of the conquered country.
They seized for themselves a
monopoly of the land ownership and
appointed a priesthood from among
their own ranks. The priests, in
control of education, made the
class division of society into a
permanent institution and created a
system of values by which the
people were thenceforth, to a large
extent unconsciously, guided in
their social behavior.
But historic tradition is, so to
speak, of yesterday; nowhere have
we really overcome what Thorstein
Veblen called "the predatory phase"
of human development. The
observable economic facts belong to
that phase and even such laws as we
can derive from them are not
applicable to other phases. Since
the real purpose of socialism is
precisely to overcome and advance
beyond the predatory phase of human
development, economic science in
its present state can throw little
light on the socialist society of
the future.
Second, socialism is directed
towards a social-ethical end.
Science, however, cannot create
ends and, even less, instill them
in human beings; science, at most,
can supply the means by which to
attain certain ends. But the ends
themselves are conceived by
personalities with lofty ethical
ideals and—if these ends are not
stillborn, but vital and vigorous—
are adopted and carried forward by
those many human beings who, half
unconsciously, determine the slow
evolution of society.
For these reasons, we should be on
our guard not to overestimate
science and scientific methods when
it is a question of human problems;
and we should not assume that
experts are the only ones who have
a right to express themselves on
questions affecting the
organization of society.
Innumerable voices have been
asserting for some time now that
human society is passing through a
crisis, that its stability has been
gravely shattered. It is
characteristic of such a situation
that individuals feel indifferent
or even hostile toward the group,
small or large, to which they
belong. In order to illustrate my
meaning, let me record here a
personal experience. I recently
discussed with an intelligent and
well-disposed man the threat of
another war, which in my opinion
would seriously endanger the
existence of mankind, and I
remarked that only a supra-national
organization would offer protection
from that danger. Thereupon my
visitor, very calmly and coolly,
said to me: "Why are you so deeply
opposed to the disappearance of the
human race?"
I am sure that as little as a
century ago no one would have so
lightly made a statement of this
kind. It is the statement of a man
who has striven in vain to attain
an equilibrium within himself and
has more or less lost hope of
succeeding. It is the expression of
a painful solitude and isolation
from which so many people are
suffering in these days. What is
the cause? Is there a way out?
It is easy to raise such questions,
but difficult to answer them with
any degree of assurance. I must
try, however, as best I can,
although I am very conscious of the
fact that our feelings and
strivings are often contradictory
and obscure and that they cannot be
expressed in easy and simple
formulas.
Man is, at one and the same time, a
solitary being and a social being.
As a solitary being, he attempts to
protect his own existence and that
of those who are closest to him, to
satisfy his personal desires, and
to develop his innate abilities. As
a social being, he seeks to gain
the recognition and affection of
his fellow human beings, to share
in their pleasures, to comfort them
in their sorrows, and to improve
their conditions of life. Only the
existence of these varied,
frequently conflicting, strivings
accounts for the special character
of a man, and their specific
combination determines the extent
to which an individual can achieve
an inner equilibrium and can
contribute to the well-being of
society. It is quite possible that
the relative strength of these two
drives is, in the main, fixed by
inheritance. But the personality
that finally emerges is largely
formed by the environment in which
a man happens to find himself
during his development, by the
structure of the society in which
he grows up, by the tradition of
that society, and by its appraisal
of particular types of behavior.
The abstract concept "society"
means to the individual human being
the sum total of his direct and
indirect relations to his
contemporaries and to all the
people of earlier generations. The
individual is able to think, feel,
strive, and work by himself; but he
depends so much upon society—in his
physical, intellectual, and
emotional existence—that it is
impossible to think of him, or to
understand him, outside the
framework of society. It is
"society" which provides man with
food, clothing, a home, the tools
of work, language, the forms of
thought, and most of the content of
thought; his life is made possible
through the labor and the
accomplishments of the many
millions past and present who are
all hidden behind the small word
“society.”
It is evident, therefore, that the
dependence of the individual upon
society is a fact of nature which
cannot be abolished—just as in the
case of ants and bees. However,
while the whole life process of
ants and bees is fixed down to the
smallest detail by rigid,
hereditary instincts, the social
pattern and interrelationships of
human beings are very variable and
susceptible to change. Memory, the
capacity to make new combinations,
the gift of oral communication have
made possible developments among
human being which are not dictated
by biological necessities. Such
developments manifest themselves in
traditions, institutions, and
organizations; in literature; in
scientific and engineering
accomplishments; in works of art.
This explains how it happens that,
in a certain sense, man can
influence his life through his own
conduct, and that in this process
conscious thinking and wanting can
play a part.
Man acquires at birth, through
heredity, a biological constitution
which we must consider fixed and
unalterable, including the natural
urges which are characteristic of
the human species. In addition,
during his lifetime, he acquires a
cultural constitution which he
adopts from society through
communication and through many
other types of influences. It is
this cultural constitution which,
with the passage of time, is
subject to change and which
determines to a very large extent
the relationship between the
individual and society. Modern
anthropology has taught us, through
comparative investigation of so-
called primitive cultures, that the
social behavior of human beings may
differ greatly, depending upon
prevailing cultural patterns and
the types of organization which
predominate in society. It is on
this that those who are striving to
improve the lot of man may ground
their hopes: human beings are not
condemned, because of their
biological constitution, to
annihilate each other or to be at
the mercy of a cruel, self-
inflicted fate.
If we ask ourselves how the
structure of society and the
cultural attitude of man should be
changed in order to make human life
as satisfying as possible, we
should constantly be conscious of
the fact that there are certain
conditions which we are unable to
modify. As mentioned before, the
biological nature of man is, for
all practical purposes, not subject
to change. Furthermore,
technological and demographic
developments of the last few
centuries have created conditions
which are here to stay. In
relatively densely settled
populations with the goods which
are indispensable to their
continued existence, an extreme
division of labor and a highly-
centralized productive apparatus
are absolutely necessary. The time—
which, looking back, seems so
idyllic—is gone forever when
individuals or relatively small
groups could be completely self-
sufficient. It is only a slight
exaggeration to say that mankind
constitutes even now a planetary
community of production and
consumption.
I have now reached the point where
I may indicate briefly what to me
constitutes the essence of the
crisis of our time. It concerns the
relationship of the individual to
society. The individual has become
more conscious than ever of his
dependence upon society. But he
does not experience this dependence
as a positive asset, as an organic
tie, as a protective force, but
rather as a threat to his natural
rights, or even to his economic
existence. Moreover, his position
in society is such that the
egotistical drives of his make-up
are constantly being accentuated,
while his social drives, which are
by nature weaker, progressively
deteriorate. All human beings,
whatever their position in society,
are suffering from this process of
deterioration. Unknowingly
prisoners of their own egotism,
they feel insecure, lonely, and
deprived of the naive, simple, and
unsophisticated enjoyment of life.
Man can find meaning in life, short
and perilous as it is, only through
devoting himself to society.
The economic anarchy of capitalist
society as it exists today is, in
my opinion, the real source of the
evil. We see before us a huge
community of producers the members
of which are unceasingly striving
to deprive each other of the fruits
of their collective labor—not by
force, but on the whole in faithful
compliance with legally established
rules. In this respect, it is
important to realize that the means
of production—that is to say, the
entire productive capacity that is
needed for producing consumer goods
as well as additional capital goods
—may legally be, and for the most
part are, the private property of
individuals.
For the sake of simplicity, in the
discussion that follows I shall
call “workers” all those who do not
share in the ownership of the means
of production—although this does
not quite correspond to the
customary use of the term. The
owner of the means of production is
in a position to purchase the labor
power of the worker. By using the
means of production, the worker
produces new goods which become the
property of the capitalist. The
essential point about this process
is the relation between what the
worker produces and what he is
paid, both measured in terms of
real value. Insofar as the labor
contract is “free,” what the worker
receives is determined not by the
real value of the goods he
produces, but by his minimum needs
and by the capitalists'
requirements for labor power in
relation to the number of workers
competing for jobs. It is important
to understand that even in theory
the payment of the worker is not
determined by the value of his
product.
Private capital tends to become
concentrated in few hands, partly
because of competition among the
capitalists, and partly because
technological development and the
increasing division of labor
encourage the formation of larger
units of production at the expense
of smaller ones. The result of
these developments is an oligarchy
of private capital the enormous
power of which cannot be
effectively checked even by a
democratically organized political
society. This is true since the
members of legislative bodies are
selected by political parties,
largely financed or otherwise
influenced by private capitalists
who, for all practical purposes,
separate the electorate from the
legislature. The consequence is
that the representatives of the
people do not in fact sufficiently
protect the interests of the
underprivileged sections of the
population. Moreover, under
existing conditions, private
capitalists inevitably control,
directly or indirectly, the main
sources of information (press,
radio, education). It is thus
extremely difficult, and indeed in
most cases quite impossible, for
the individual citizen to come to
objective conclusions and to make
intelligent use of his political
rights.
The situation prevailing in an
economy based on the private
ownership of capital is thus
characterized by two main
principles: first, means of
production (capital) are privately
owned and the owners dispose of
them as they see fit; second, the
labor contract is free. Of course,
there is no such thing as a pure
capitalist society in this sense.
In particular, it should be noted
that the workers, through long and
bitter political struggles, have
succeeded in securing a somewhat
improved form of the “free labor
contract” for certain categories of
workers. But taken as a whole, the
present day economy does not differ
much from “pure” capitalism.
Production is carried on for
profit, not for use. There is no
provision that all those able and
willing to work will always be in a
position to find employment; an
“army of unemployed” almost always
exists. The worker is constantly in
fear of losing his job. Since
unemployed and poorly paid workers
do not provide a profitable market,
the production of consumers' goods
is restricted, and great hardship
is the consequence. Technological
progress frequently results in more
unemployment rather than in an
easing of the burden of work for
all. The profit motive, in
conjunction with competition among
capitalists, is responsible for an
instability in the accumulation and
utilization of capital which leads
to increasingly severe depressions.
Unlimited competition leads to a
huge waste of labor, and to that
crippling of the social
consciousness of individuals which
I mentioned before.
This crippling of individuals I
consider the worst evil of
capitalism. Our whole educational
system suffers from this evil. An
exaggerated competitive attitude is
inculcated into the student, who is
trained to worship acquisitive
success as a preparation for his
future career.
I am convinced there is only one
way to eliminate these grave evils,
namely through the establishment of
a socialist economy, accompanied by
an educational system which would
be oriented toward social goals. In
such an economy, the means of
production are owned by society
itself and are utilized in a
planned fashion. A planned economy,
which adjusts production to the
needs of the community, would
distribute the work to be done
among all those able to work and
would guarantee a livelihood to
every man, woman, and child. The
education of the individual, in
addition to promoting his own
innate abilities, would attempt to
develop in him a sense of
responsibility for his fellow men
in place of the glorification of
power and success in our present
society.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to
remember that a planned economy is
not yet socialism. A planned
economy as such may be accompanied
by the complete enslavement of the
individual. The achievement of
socialism requires the solution of
some extremely difficult socio-
political problems: how is it
possible, in view of the far-
reaching centralization of
political and economic power, to
prevent bureaucracy from becoming
all-powerful and overweening? How
can the rights of the individual be
protected and therewith a
democratic counterweight to the
power of bureaucracy be assured?
Clarity about the aims and problems
of socialism is of greatest
significance in our age of
transition. Since, under present
circumstances, free and unhindered
discussion of these problems has
come under a powerful taboo, I
consider the foundation of this
magazine to be an important public
service.
http://www.informationclearinghouse
.info/article25996.htm
--
"Only the small secrets need to be
protected,
the big ones are kept secret by
public incredulity"
Marshall McLuhan
Last Edited 1/16/2013 6:21:37 PM
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