#state communism

[pumpacti0n]

The disgraceful weakness of the social democracy and the labour unions, their [line missing here] of the “lesser evil” made things easier for the counter-revolutionaries and smoothed the way for fascism. The same goes for Communist Party policy, with its endless contradictions and utter hostility to freedom and its perilous “dictatorship of the proletariat”. All of which simply helped the success of counter-revolution in Germany, by softening up the people mentally. Here let us fully expose the fact that the Bolsheviks’ victory over the Russian revolution has been an overture to fascist counter-revolution in Europe. Because the very idea of dictatorship is, by itself, a counter-revolutionary idea and represents the main obstacle to all creative activity undertaken in a spirit of freedom and justice.

Rudolph Rocker, "The Communist Party and the Idea of Dictatorship"

[ultraviolet-techno-ecology]

My opinion on authoritarian / state communism is simple - I’m interested in whatever works. Any commune anarchist, authoritarian, or otherwise must be subject to inspection, analysis, and criticism. A genuinely successful revolution will have certain material implications. Reduction in hunger, work hours, homelessness, poverty and so on. There must be observable evidence that the people have in fact moved away from an alienated organization of labour. People must have demonstrably more power over their lives - and an associated higher quality of life.  If a revolution fails to achieve these things - it has failed. Although some may call me idealistic, to me this is simply a statement that any real communist revolution must actually produce a communist result.  If a “Communist State” is capable of manifesting this - than I will no longer find the state offensive. Should an Anarchist Commune manifest this - then I will have only congratulations to award. 

[howieabel]

What is the true basis of the differences between anarchists and State communists? We are for freedom, for the widest and most complete freedom of thought, organisation, and action. We are for the freedom of all, and it is therefore obvious, and not necessary to continually say so, that everyone in exercising his right to freedom must respect the equal freedom of everybody else: otherwise there is oppression on one side and the right to resist and to rebel on the other. 
But State communists, to an even greater extent than all other authoritarians, are incapable of conceiving freedom and of respecting for all human beings the dignity that they expect, or should expect, from others. If one speaks to them of freedom they immediately accuse one of wanting to respect, or at least tolerate, the freedom to oppress and exploit one’s fellow beings. And if you say that you reject violence when it exceeds the limits imposed by the needs of defence, they accuse you of…pacifism, without understanding that violence is the whole essence of authoritarianism, just as the repudiation of violence is the whole essence of anarchism.

Errico Malatesta (Fede!, October 1923)

[fuckyeahanarchistposters]

via: Anti-Tankie Action Meme Caucus

[forbidden-sorcery]

What is the true basis of the differences between anarchists and State communists? We are for freedom, for the widest and most complete freedom of thought, organisation, and action. We are for the freedom of all, and it is therefore obvious, and not necessary to continually say so, that everyone in exercising his right to freedom must respect the equal freedom of everybody else: otherwise there is oppression on one side and the right to resist and to rebel on the other. But State communists, to an even greater extent than all other authoritarians, are incapable of conceiving freedom and of respecting for all human beings the dignity that they expect, or should expect, from others. If one speaks to them of freedom they immediately accuse one of wanting to respect, or at least tolerate, the freedom to oppress and exploit one's fellow beings. And if you say that you reject violence when it exceeds the limits imposed by the needs of defence, they accuse you of...pacifism, without understanding that violence is the whole essence of authoritarianism, just as the repudiation of violence is the whole essence of anarchism.

Errico Malatesta (Fede!, October 1923)

[howieabel]

"Socialists want power … and once in power wish to impose their programme on the people… Anarchists instead maintain, that government cannot be other than harmful, and by its very nature it defends either an existing privileged class or creates a new one; and instead of inspiring to take the place of the existing government anarchists seek to destroy every organism which empowers some to impose their own ideas and interests on others, for they want to free the way for development towards better forms of human fellowship which will emerge from experience, by everyone being free and, having, of course, the economic means to make freedom possible as well as a reality." - Errico Malatesta

[trans-kafka]

Today the Soviet Union and the United States each predicts and anticipates the economic decline of the other. Neither will be disappointed.

Jane Jacobs, Cities and the Wealth of Nations: Principles of Economic Life pp. 200, Vintage Books 1985

This book starts with the question “Why is stagflation (the concurrent rising of both prices and unemployment) even a thing?” and goes through history to first explain why previous economic theories failed to account for it, and then why previous attempts to fix it have failed to alleviate it, and finally examines the causes of how it comes about in the first place.

In the process, Jacobs lays bare the entire root system of the economy of the trading world examining in detail examples as disparate as the Roman empire, the current Pacific Rim, ancient China, modern Urugay, and of course the US and Russia.

Without setting out to justify or refute a particular ideological position, this book is able to dispassionately evaluate the economic ramifications of things like military spending, welfare and subsidies, national currencies, and international loans.

tl;dr: This book is really good and you should read it.