Socialism in Ireland

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Originally Posted by Partizan

Its absolutley hilarious to see the ******* right-wingers get put in thir place every time by Bohs Partisan. :D

Jebus using the SWP website to argue with Bohs Partisan (a member of the SP) about socialism and the policies of the Socialist Party...:rolleyes:

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I think the only thing absolutely hilarious in this whole thing is how socialists back slap each other and say they have won an argument without any evidence to prove they have, so lets nail this right now.

How can anything I have said in this thread be construed as being right wing? My first post question the issues put across on the SWP website, those questions were never answered by the way, and my second post answered BohsPartisan question as to why I used that website whilst re-stating the questions from the first post, which again went unanswered, so where in this have I a) lost an argument and b) been a ****ing right-winger?

Partizan until you have something other than an idiotic rant to post please don't embarass yourself any further.

BohsPartisan, to answer your question about why I didn't use your preferred choice of Socialist website, well believe it or not I don't log everything you say for future reference, so I couldn't recall what website address you had posted, hence me typing 'Socialism Ireland' into google and taking the SWP as the Socialist Party webpage (honestly it surprises me that ye have two websites for the one party). Again I'll ask where at any point of my first two posts did I put across any right wing ideas? I may have said Socialists are seen as a bunch of neo-liberal loudmouths, but honestly I know quite a few moderate liberals and centerists who think the same, Partizan proving that he is the stereotype in this thread.

But again I'd like you to read through my first post and actually answer the questions that I put to you please, lets cut the crap and pettiness out and either answer the questions or explain the SWPs relation to your party (again it confuses me, are they an element of your party, or some offspring) because really, looking at that webpage validates my first post questions

SWP are a completely different party to us. We have some things in common but we also have our differences. Put it this way I'd say there is more distance between us than there is between FF and FG. Look at our website and it proves you were wrong on the point you made. All the main stories are of Irish interest. You have to scroll down some way to find one that isn't.

Socialist Party

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Originally Posted by BohsPartisan

SWP are a completely different party to us. We have some things in common but we also have our differences. Put it this way I'd say there is more distance between us than there is between FF and FG. Look at our website and it proves you were wrong on the point you made. All the main stories are of Irish interest. You have to scroll down some way to find one that isn't.

Socialist Party

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Grand, sorted, now wasn't it easier to say that there are differences between your party and the Socialist Workers than to attack me for being a right winger? Jesus and some people call you lot loudmouths (:p )

Further info for clarification:
Left wing parties in Ireland
Socialist Party on Wiki

SWP on Wiki

The Workers Party on wiki

IRSP on wiki

There are a couple of other small groups but they are pretty insignificant.
Of these the Spartacist League are completely loopy. They spend more time criticising the rest of the left than criticising capitalism. The Irish Socialist Network are a small splinter group of the Workers Party. There is also Socialist Democracy who have a few people in Roscommon and the North and finally (I think) there is Workers Power Ireland. They are a bit mad too and only have 2 or three members.

Also check out Leftist Parties of the World which is a handy little directory, though I wouldn't class all the parties on it as left wing.
For the Committee for a Workers' International (the international socialist organisation the SP are affiliated to) see the link in my signature.
For some classic marxist texts on line go to
The Marxist Internet Archive.

Hope all this was of some help.

Read a little bit of Party Website & while certain polcies are worthy there is no mention whatsoever how any of the policies could be funded. We can all come with great giveaway policies without costing.

How much work free education, health & housing cost?

Does job security = job for life? Job for life = lazy employees.

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All publicly owned services and companies to be run under democratic working class control.

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What does that mean? Surely you need someone to manage & someone to work even in socialism?

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- Take all major industry, banks and financial institutions into public ownership and place them under the democratic control and management of working class people.

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The very next day every major multinational in Ireland would announce its closure. Before multinationals came into Ireland in force in the IT, Pharmaceutical & Medical supply industries we had 25% unemployment, 60% PAYE tax & thousands emigranting every week. No one will vote for the return to the 80s.

:eek:

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Originally Posted by pete

I would truely hate to work in a unionised company where everyone on the same grade gets the same pay & raise. I could not stand to sit by while some workers worked their asses off while others sat on their ass but all rewarded the same way.

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The companys' called the Civil Service:D

Interesting that the right in this thread is represented by the corkies - obviously that extremely annoying T- shirt should read 'The People's Republic of (everywhere in Ireland except) Cork'

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Originally Posted by pete

Read a little bit of Party Website & while certain polcies are worthy there is no mention whatsoever how any of the policies could be funded. We can all come with great giveaway policies without costing.

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The FAQ would have some explanations on that but if you don't have time for that I'll be brief. To provide free Primary education to the entire child population of the world would take a tiny fraction of the wealth of the wealthiest two hundered people in the world.

[quoteDoes job security = job for life? Job for life = lazy employees.[/quote]

Thats a good question. Maybe the best question you've asked so far. Actually I'm glad you are asking questions now rather than making statements. Job security would be conditional on you actually doing your job. If the workplace was democraticaly controlled, do you think the majority would tolerate slacking by someone when they would have to pick up the slack?

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What does that mean? Surely you need someone to manage & someone to work even in socialism?

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There are many examples of worker managed factories and industries in the world. In Venezuala now there are quite a few. The task is to link them on a national scale to plan production.

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The very next day every major multinational in Ireland would announce its closure.

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Without workers expertise and raw materials multinationals are nothing. They are only necessary under Capitalism because that is how the sytem works. If say Labour returned to their old policies of Tax high to spend more and were in power then yes, there would be a flight of Capital. This is why reformism doesn't work. This is why you can't make Capitalism nice.
At anyrate the multinationals have begun the process of relocating. Over the course of the next decade, if Irish workers don't dramatically lower their wage demands then they will head off to India or bangladesh or wherever. Its Catch 22 for Irish workers - Can't afford to live on lower wages, can't afford to have no job. One of the many reasons why Socialism is an absolute necessity. Saying that if we didn't have multinationals there'd be no jobs is like saying if we had no developers there's be no houses. The men who build houses would still be there. The bricks and Mortar would still be there. It would be up to a democratic workers state to assemble the expertise to build the houses. That goes for any industry. I can understand that if you are new to these ideas they can be hard to grasp. Marx did say after all that "The Communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional property relations; no wonder that its development invloves the most radical rupture with traditional ideas".

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Originally Posted by BohsPartisan

Thats a good question. Maybe the best question you've asked so far. Actually I'm glad you are asking questions now rather than making statements. Job security would be conditional on you actually doing your job. If the workplace was democraticaly controlled, do you think the majority would tolerate slacking by someone when they would have to pick up the slack?

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BP, I can only offer anecdotal and first hand views on this but of the large time I've spent in Slovenia I feel that worker self management was a failure. There are a lot of people who had it easy under the old system and were used to slacking and doing very little work and now are highly resentful under the capitalist system which will not provide the same security for slackers. What if the majority are slackers? What if the majority would slack off without a whip being cracked at them? That's what worker self management seemed to lead to from a lot of the evidence I've come across.

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Originally Posted by BohsPartisan

Actually I'm glad you are asking questions now rather than making statements.

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I am just curious & previously had nowhere to get the info.

Free housing for all would just mean people abusing the system. Irish people in particular have no respect for anything they don't own themselves.

Interestingly the most capitalist country of them all USA has the biggest charitable donations by individuals. The Clinton & Gates foundations dwaft any contributions governments have made in the 3rd world.

I think there nothing wrong with arguing for fairer distribution of wealth but there will always be bosses & workers. The state should provide the support & infrastruture for people to create & find jobs. The less employees the state has itself the better as state companies by their nature are not good at creating profit.

You need to motivate people to achieve & produce & equality in the workplace kills that. How else to explain the productivity gains when state farms split up & distributed to the workers individually.

The Republic of Ireland is a mixed economy and has been for many decades and it is what the majority of the people would wish for. In theory it provides a certain amount of a market economy and then provides for the less well off in society through State intervention. However government policies have in recent years created a quandry.

In order to properly provide for the less fortunate in society, you need to generate sufficient revenues for the State Exchequer, to abolish homelessness and provide everyone with a basic payment to keep them out of destitution. The problem arises when the majority of the population vote for lower personal taxation and lower company taxation , at times of lesser economic growth than at present , there is less money in the State coffers to seriously address the problems of those members of society who are the casualties of capitalism.

And if you increase taxation to the sort of rates that many Socialist advocate, the costs of production here in Ireland rise, jobs are lost, and if corporate taxes are raised, and many foreign companies will bail out leaving massive unemployment and the sort of economy Ireland had in the 1980's when Labour were in power with Fine Gael under Garret Fitzgerald, which was without doubt the worst performing government in Irish history.... economically speaking. 300,000 plus out of work and massive emigration.

Currently we are a country which is IMPORTING labour , yes we have unemployment, but it is possible to get jobs if you are prepared to be a bit flexible.

The one plank of socialist policies that I would endorse would be nationalising at least one of the major Banks. AIB stiffed the State when a major insurance company they partly owned went belly up and the State had to pay for the collapse of it. That was the perfect time for the government to Nationalise AIB. This would have had two effects 1) generated revenue for the State 2) put manners on other Banking institutions in this country and businesses in general and we might have avoided many of these Banking and other scandals which have plagued this country in the past few decades.

Remember folks we are a mixed economy, a little bit of socialism and mix that with capitalism and it's what we do here very well. Yes there are problems but a lot of those could be solved with improvements in efficiency especially in the Health sector where the administration requires a complete overhaul and millions are wasted annually.

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Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

Currently we are a country which is IMPORTING labour , yes we have unemployment, but it is possible to get jobs if you are prepared to be a bit flexible.

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Yes we have more or less full employment now. This race to the bottom crap the unions come with is rubbish. Irish people are moving into more qualified & better paid jobs while immigrants working in lower paid for a few years before moving onwards.

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Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

The one plank of socialist policies that I would endorse would be nationalising at least one of the major Banks.

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The AIB decision in the past was a bad one but can't go back now.
Proper state regulation is the necessary penalties for those that offend is the solution to stopping banking scandals.

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Originally Posted by CollegeTillIDie

Remember folks we are a mixed economy, a little bit of socialism and mix that with capitalism and it's what we do here very well. Yes there are problems but a lot of those could be solved with improvements in efficiency especially in the Health sector where the administration requires a complete overhaul and millions are wasted annually.

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The Health Service will alwasy be ineffecient so just get used to it. It would require increased taxes to have full public system which i don't see people voting for. We have unusual semi public semi private system. I suppose the state subsidies privatre health insurance as a sort of tax on those who afford it. Apparently public patients are now getting treated first which will result in less people taking out private insurance so more cost to the state. The US system however would be the wrong way to go.

A lot of this debate revolves around what view you take of human nature.

Some people seem to automatically assume the worst - that people are somehow born with a gene for selfishness / laziness and that socialism would simply give free rein to the dark side in people. But those who argue that human nature is a barrier to progress also conveniently ignore the fact that even under capitalism, there are very different expressions of what are supposed to be universal human traits.

I'd argue that capitalism forces people to compete for jobs, resources, market share, whatever, and that the whole ethos it instils is "againstness" - it's me against my neighbour, it's Ireland against India / Bangladesh / etc.

Add to that a general sense of demotivation due to not being let participate in deciding how things are run, and you get a very different explanation for what's written off as "human nature" - far from being a genetic starting point, it's actually the end product of how we're forced to live.

The socialist view of human nature is a whole lot more positive. Even under the pressures of capitalism, there are countless examples of people co-operating for their common benefit rather than being at each others' throats. The very fact that we live in organised socieities rather than every caveman off doing his own thing points to the fact that mutual co-operation simply makes more sense than total mé-féinism.

Add in the sense of empowerment and energy coming from the kind of participatory democracy I described in an earlier post and you start getting to a point where you start to see "human nature" as a source of hope, not despair. Put simply, if people can act to improve each other's lot as well as their own, and they're involved in deciding how things are gonna be, then they're not gonna let a few slackers ruin it all for them.

Socialism rests on believing in people's potential and the scraps of evidence from history suggest that in times of radical change in the direction of a very different society, then the very best does come out in people. Go read John Reed's or Victor Serge's accounts of Russia in 1917, or George Orwell's portait of Barcelona in 1936. Yes, the authors were socialists, so for a slightly different take on the positive potential of human nature, try Aldous Huxley's "The Island", his counterpoint to "Brave New World".

The argument about "what people are like" is hugely important to the debate about socialism and in one sense, it's one that socialists can't lose at the moment. For every example given of how people are basically sh1theads, we can always turn around and say "capitalism makes people like that" - if you like, that selfishness and laziness are down to nurture, rather than nature. On the other hand, if scientists can somehow prove that people are naturally inclined to some behavioural trait, then we're f*cked.

Why do you think the Nazis put so much weight on genetics and put so effort into genetic research? If you can prove that "people are naturally X" or "people are naturally Y" and that it's all down to some globs of DNA, then you kill the possibility of change, either on an individual or social level.

Personally, I'd rather not be pre-programmed or wired to be a scumbag and trust in the capacity of people to improve things if they're given a chance.

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Originally Posted by pete

The Health Service will alwasy be ineffecient so just get used to it.

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Cuba seems to do pretty outstandingly, even to the point of developing "health tourism", so it's not true that health services per se are inherently, of themselves, inefficient. It depends how they're run and what the underlying rationale is - whether you primary motivation is to avoid spending government money or if it's to help sick people get better.

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Originally Posted by pete

Free housing for all would just mean people abusing the system. Irish people in particular have no respect for anything they don't own themselves.

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The answer to that largely rests on the idea of "From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs". There's two parts to that phrase and each is equally important.

It's wrong to view socialism as simply being an invitation to sign up for a gravy train. Sorry if this appears to be oversimplifying but the first part is no more involved than the concept of teamwork at a football club - you put in the effort and expect no less from others because it's for your mutual good. Do a Georgie on it and you get dropped! ;)

The second part is also critical. In the context of housing, how many houses does anyone actually need? Note, I'm not saying "need to own?" If you have a roof over your head, with sufficient space that you don't have to have three or four kids to a bedroom, can do it up the way you want to, then does it really matter whether you own it or someone else does? On the continent, people certainly seem perfectly happy with the concept of secure long-term tenancy. If your landlord was the govenrment that we all run, would that be so difficult to live with?

The same principle of need applies elsewhere. How many cars can you drive at once? Is it right that some parts of the world go hungry while others are trying to stem the problems associated with obesity? Going back to health services, should we be spending huge amounts on cosmetic surgery when people need hip replacements? I could go on and on, but the crucial part is: what's needed most? Not what I need personally, but what we collectively decide we need most. Let's make sure everyone has a decent home, then we can start worrying about providing holiday cottages for all.

The bit of your comment that I would highlight is the one relating to ownership. If we collectively owned everything, why would we abuse it?

Dr. Nightdub, you are correct. Human nature or one's perceptions of it are always at the crux of this debate. While you talk about people still showing their best "against the pressures of capitalism" I have seen people showing their worst in the freedom of socialism. While you may argue that Stalinist or Titoist models do not represent socialism in its proper form, at the lowest level, that of worker self managment which was resonably implemented at the micro level, I've seen a lot of evidence of work ethic totally destroyed by people seizing the advantage to become lazy. I think socialism is equally capable of bringing out poor human behaviour in other forms.

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Originally Posted by Dr.Nightdub

The bit of your comment that I would highlight is the one relating to ownership. If we collectively owned everything, why would we abuse it?

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We already collectively "own" many of our public amenities & services. People in Ireland still litter & vandalise probably as much & probably more than any other.

Maybe this discussion is confused. What is the difference between communism & socialism? Are not all countries capitalist i.e. variety of different forms of free market?

:confused:

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Originally Posted by jebus

Partizan until you have something other than an idiotic rant to post please don't embarass yourself any further.

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For God's sake take a step back and take a good look at yourself. You are the one making a right clown of yourself here. There you were using SWP policies to argue with BP who is a member of a completely different party with totally different policies. By doing that 1) you have shown your complete ignorance of socialism and 2) your total lack of discourse. I have simply pointed that out that to you. Think before you argue. Dont get into a debate with someone until you have cleared those two hurdles. What you have just done is laughable at the extreme. Its like using PD policies to argue with a Green.

I'm p1ssing myself here.

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Originally Posted by Partizan

For God's sake take a step back and take a good look at yourself. You are the one making a right clown of yourself here. There you were using SWP policies to argue with BP who is a member of a completely different party with totally different policies. By doing that 1) you have shown your complete ignorance of socialism and 2) your total lack of discourse. I have simply pointed that out that to you. Think before you argue. Dont get into a debate with someone until you have cleared those two hurdles. What you have just done is laughable at the extreme. Its like using PD policies to argue with a Green.

I'm p1ssing myself here.

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Better get yourself a new colostomy bag then hadn't you.

Fair enough I was ignorant to the fact that there are two Socialist parties calling themselves that in Ireland, but I think this thread is titled Socialism in Ireland, so if BohsPartisan wants to argue about Socialism I am going to use what I have available to hand in my arguments against Socialism, i.e the SWP site. As has been said earlier, all was needed to be said was that BohsPartisan had no affiliation with the SWP and hey presto it's all over. Yet you in your infinite wisdom come on here, call people right wingers, throw out the old 'we won the argument cause I've just called it that we won', get a warning for insulting people and then come back and talk about simply pointing out things' and give lectures on how to debate. Thats whats truly laughable about all this :D :D :D

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Originally Posted by pete

I am just curious & previously had nowhere to get the info.

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I'm drunk at the moment so I'm going to leave the other stuff untill tomorrow but just to say I wasn't being smart when I said that and I realised that this is a subject a lot of people hadn't really considered in great detail before. I'm just glad that this thread is turning into a source of some genuine debate rather than pantomime o yes he is o no he's not stuff.
See y'all tomorrow.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

BP, I can only offer anecdotal and first hand views on this but of the large time I've spent in Slovenia I feel that worker self management was a failure. There are a lot of people who had it easy under the old system and were used to slacking and doing very little work and now are highly resentful under the capitalist system which will not provide the same security for slackers. What if the majority are slackers? What if the majority would slack off without a whip being cracked at them? That's what worker self management seemed to lead to from a lot of the evidence I've come across.

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In the former Yugoslavia, worker self management was at variance with the way the economy was planned. Planning was still carried out by a Stalinist beuraucratic cast. They set the targets of what needed to be made and in what quantity so that the self management carried out was in effect meaningless. Under real Socialism delegates would be elected from each industry to the national government to conduct the plan. Planning would be so much easier now than it was in the past. Technology currently in existance like the internet and supermarket loyalty cards would help.
On the idea of a mixed economy, this is a bit of a pup that has been sold to us by the media (through people like David McWilliams) and the education system. It tells us that there is some halfway house, best of both worlds between Capitalism and Socialism. This is nonsense. The bottom line is that in our society the means of production are overwhelmingly in private hands and the majority sell their labour in exchange for wages, which is a fraction of the wealth they actually produce. That is Capitalism. No two models of Capitalism are exactly alike but the bottom line is the same. Our economy as has previously been stated is dominated by US capital I.E. we are economically dominated by the foremost neo-liberal capitalist/imperialist power on the earth. The juxtaposition of Capitalism and Socialism is the juxtaposition of a society where the economy is a means of making a relatively small number of people extremely wealthy against a society where the economy is used as a mechanism to provide for the needs and wants of everybody.
At the moment workers produce value, be it in goods or services. The capitalist provides 'capital' However capital is the accumilated theft from the workers over the generations capitalism has been in place. If 'Capital' was taken out of the equation, everything else needed to provide goods and services would still exist - land, labour, raw materials, machinery. As for enterprise, at the moment most people don't have time to think never mind think of great new ways to improve everybody's lives. But there are people out of work or in jobs where their productive powers are neglected. By organising - sharing out the work (and remember if more people are working more is produced) everybody has to do less work but does not suffer less "wages" as no profit is taken out by the capitalist, just tax which would go towards a social fund for further improving the means of production and social necessities like health education and transport. The result more people have time to participate in the running of society, and as the 'dividend' is an improved quality of life, everyone has an incentive. As for wages, well the more work you do the more you get paid, simple eh? But no capitalist means more can be spent on wages and still have more for the social fund. Any Keynesian model or attempt at making Capitalism fairer will result in the capitalist absconding to another country with more favourable taxation regulations, that is why capitalism as a system must be ended, not just reformed.
Competition under capitalism is a race to the bottom. Who can produce the cheapest? ie. who can drive down pay and conditions best? Who can produce a product using the cheapest shoddiest raw materials they can get away with? Who can force their workforce to botch this job by making them do it in half the time it should take? Who can drive all the small businesses to bankrupcey thus obtaining a monopoly and charging what they want for a sub standard product? Where monopolies don't appear as a result of competition it is only because a small number of large corporations call a truce and operate a virtual cartel by fixing prices between them.
Competition between capitalists of two or more nations for the cheapest raw materials they can get their hands on and for the domination of this or that market leads of course to war.
Competition under Socialism is the opposite. People with a genuine talent for invention will strive to create the very best product possible because only the very best wil be chosen by the democratic will of the people.
As I said before, the incentive for the majority under Capitalism is to starve or not to starve, to be destitute or not to be destitute. People are pitted against each other in a bitter struggle to survive. Who can work for the least wages, who can put one over on his brother or sister. Under Socialism the incentive is for the community to work together to better themselves collectively. It is a genuine opportunity to better yourself. Under capitalism bettering yourself can be as crass as having one more car than your neighbour. Under Socialism bettering yourself means unbending your back and joining the human race, appreciating and enjoying the finer aspects of civilisation and having the time to do so. In the present only the minority, the oligarchy can do this, yet their pitting of man against man somehow makes them inhuman still.
As for the crap work, well there is no need for anyone to work full time at those jobs. Their are many alternatives to the current system where this is necessary. For example, under socialism it may be only necessary for people to do three or four hours of productive labour. Everyone then be a janitor for an hour and a beuraucrat for an hour. Or perhaps at the age of 18 people could spend one year doing the crap work. Even so, it is possible with the technology available in society to automate a great deal of this. I've worked as a cleaner and as a kitchen porter, its ****ty work, but it would't kill anyone to have to do it for a couple of hours a day for one year.