8 ms·

Socialist =! communist. Allende's government doesn't have much in common with Soviet Unions brutal authoritarian communism, which is the only practical form of

Socialist =! communist. Allende's government doesn't have much in common with Soviet Unions brutal authoritarian communism, which is the only practical form of large scale communism as per history. Allende socialized some small parts of his economy (only coal?), but it was mostly a market economy even during his height of popularity. Also, there's a lot to say about cybernetics and how a lot of it is pretty dead and for good reasons. I imagine most people see the cool Star Trek-like control room and enjoy Cybersyn on a visual design level than a "this was a good idea for government" level. I think its obvious that authoritarian governments do poorly with information technology, outside of whats needed for military dominance, due to its democratizing effects. The SU couldn't have a Western-style internet because it would have become a political threat to the SU and strangled in the cradle. Allende was a little left of, say, France, who had a system like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minitel France's Minitel network doesn't get enough ink, imo. Its impressive this proto-web network took off. We're talking nearly 10m sales in a country that had about 50m people at the time. France Telecom estimates 25m people had access to Minitels, so half the population. 50% wired in 1980s is very, very impressive.

vkou 9y ago
> I think its obvious that authoritarian governments do poorly with information technology, outside of whats needed for military dominance, due to its democratizing effects. Citation needed. Information technology has not done one whit to democratize China.
- losteric 9y ago
  Uh, what about the Arab Spring? Modern communication technology is what enabled those revolutions. In China, policies like the great firewall exist because the internet does challenge the central government. China is stable because 1.) people are happy with the CCP's economic results, 2.) the state controls large Chinese tech companies, and 3.) the government regularly "disappears" vocal dissenters. Expect a state crackdown if their economy starts crumbling.
  - vkou 9y ago
    And if they took place in the 60s, those revolutions would have used telephones and radios and leaflets. It's not clear that they would not have been possible without modern communications. Centuries of history have made it clear that you don't need Twitter to start a bread riot. The outcome of the Arab Spring has also not exactly resulted in democracy across the board, either. Remind me - how have things in Syria been, lately? > In China, policies like the great firewall exist because the internet does challenge the central government. As it turns out, you can just use more IT to repress the 'democratizing' effects of IT. Speaking of closer to home - if the United States were to turn into a authoritarian state tomorrow, the 'democratizing efforts of IT' would not protect you. If jack-booted thugs were knocking on their literal office door, Facebook, Google, Apple, Snapchat, etc will turn you over faster then you can blink. GPG won't help you, either. In fact, it'll make it all that much easier for them to find you. A dictatorship doesn't need to decrypt your messages, if using encryption to communicate is enough to send you to the GULAG. (Or if they can employ the $5 rubber hose.) Incidentally, what I described is all possible in China. So much for computers liberating us.
  - wz1000 9y ago
    And what came of the Arab Spring and its western cousin, Occupy Wall Street? Pretty much nothing, excluding moderate success in Tunisia. They were all crushed, either by the state itself, or through foreign intervention.
ekianjo 9y ago
Its not sales. The Minitel was technically free to get but expensive to use since you had to pay heavily taxed services at the minute instead of data volume. And it was slow as hell. When the net finally reached the public in France there was no doubt whatsoever which one was the best tech. Oh and the Minitel was all about centralized networks. Glad it died.
- drzaiusapelord 9y ago
  >When the net finally reached the public in France there was no doubt whatsoever which one was the best tech. That's almost 15 years of technological progress, of course the web/internet would replace it, the same way it replaced all other dial-up/BBS services. >The Minitel was technically free to get but expensive to use since you had to pay heavily taxed services at the minute instead of data volume. This, historically, was the telecom model. In the US (pre breakup) the telephone company would hand you a free phone for your home and it would be paid for by monthly fees. You never bought it nor ever owned it. This isn't a novel thing nor a real criticism imo.
losteric 9y ago
Unnaturally concentrated power always opposes coordination outside of state-managed structures - greater consolidation leads to greater oppression. > Soviet Unions brutal authoritarian communism ... is the only practical form of large scale communism as per history This is wrong. The USSR started as a socialist republic, but Stalin turned it into a totalitarian dictatorship. The USSR was as communist as the DPRK is democratic (that is: not at all)... their failings are the failings of a dictatorship.
- thehardsphere 9y ago
  Oh, so you're just ignoring the Red Terror? Or the murder of the Cossacks before Stalin came to power? Lenin never murdered anybody? The failings of the Soviet Union are the failings of an ideology whose explictly stated goal was the overthrow of every existing social institution. Stalin merely implemented the Bolshevik vision on a much grander and bloodier scale. Unless your argument is that the Bolsheviks were wrong (which would include people before Stalin).
  - danharaj 9y ago
    Ideology is not nearly as important as material circumstances in describing how history happens. > Stalin merely implemented the Bolshevik vision on a much grander and bloodier scale. I have a serious hunch that you haven't actually done any scholarly inquiry into the ideological landscape of the revolution and how that fits with its material reality. > Unless your argument is that the Bolsheviks were wrong (which would include people before Stalin). Well yes, of course they were wrong. The government Lenin established had to make essentially impossible compromises in order to survive. Lenin himself wrote about how they were making ideological compromises due to the exigencies of their circumstances. He thought that those compromises could be undone once the state had been stabilized. He died before that happened, and it never happened. The Soviet Union was always in a state of constant peril due to internal and external forces. It does not help that they were always militarized since its inception. No good civil institutions can come out of a state of perpetual war. My personal hot take which is not a position I would take if I had to give my opinion grounded in scholarship about the time period is that the revolution could have succeeded if the SPD hadn't order the Freikorps to crush the revolution in Germany; granted that they did so, it would have perhaps been better for the socialist cause for the USSR to collapse than cling to power. On the other hand, Stalin's USSR did the lion's share of the work in defeating Nazi Germany. What would have happened if he were deposed and the Soviet Union failed to industrialize?

vkou 9y ago

> I think its obvious that authoritarian governments do poorly with information technology, outside of whats needed for military dominance, due to its democratizing effects. Citation needed. Information technology has not done one whit to democratize China.

losteric 9y ago
Uh, what about the Arab Spring? Modern communication technology is what enabled those revolutions. In China, policies like the great firewall exist because the internet does challenge the central government. China is stable because 1.) people are happy with the CCP's economic results, 2.) the state controls large Chinese tech companies, and 3.) the government regularly "disappears" vocal dissenters. Expect a state crackdown if their economy starts crumbling.
- vkou 9y ago
  And if they took place in the 60s, those revolutions would have used telephones and radios and leaflets. It's not clear that they would not have been possible without modern communications. Centuries of history have made it clear that you don't need Twitter to start a bread riot. The outcome of the Arab Spring has also not exactly resulted in democracy across the board, either. Remind me - how have things in Syria been, lately? > In China, policies like the great firewall exist because the internet does challenge the central government. As it turns out, you can just use more IT to repress the 'democratizing' effects of IT. Speaking of closer to home - if the United States were to turn into a authoritarian state tomorrow, the 'democratizing efforts of IT' would not protect you. If jack-booted thugs were knocking on their literal office door, Facebook, Google, Apple, Snapchat, etc will turn you over faster then you can blink. GPG won't help you, either. In fact, it'll make it all that much easier for them to find you. A dictatorship doesn't need to decrypt your messages, if using encryption to communicate is enough to send you to the GULAG. (Or if they can employ the $5 rubber hose.) Incidentally, what I described is all possible in China. So much for computers liberating us.
- wz1000 9y ago
  And what came of the Arab Spring and its western cousin, Occupy Wall Street? Pretty much nothing, excluding moderate success in Tunisia. They were all crushed, either by the state itself, or through foreign intervention.

ekianjo 9y ago

Its not sales. The Minitel was technically free to get but expensive to use since you had to pay heavily taxed services at the minute instead of data volume. And it was slow as hell. When the net finally reached the public in France there was no doubt whatsoever which one was the best tech. Oh and the Minitel was all about centralized networks. Glad it died.

drzaiusapelord 9y ago
>When the net finally reached the public in France there was no doubt whatsoever which one was the best tech. That's almost 15 years of technological progress, of course the web/internet would replace it, the same way it replaced all other dial-up/BBS services. >The Minitel was technically free to get but expensive to use since you had to pay heavily taxed services at the minute instead of data volume. This, historically, was the telecom model. In the US (pre breakup) the telephone company would hand you a free phone for your home and it would be paid for by monthly fees. You never bought it nor ever owned it. This isn't a novel thing nor a real criticism imo.

losteric 9y ago

Unnaturally concentrated power always opposes coordination outside of state-managed structures - greater consolidation leads to greater oppression. > Soviet Unions brutal authoritarian communism ... is the only practical form of large scale communism as per history This is wrong. The USSR started as a socialist republic, but Stalin turned it into a totalitarian dictatorship. The USSR was as communist as the DPRK is democratic (that is: not at all)... their failings are the failings of a dictatorship.

thehardsphere 9y ago
Oh, so you're just ignoring the Red Terror? Or the murder of the Cossacks before Stalin came to power? Lenin never murdered anybody? The failings of the Soviet Union are the failings of an ideology whose explictly stated goal was the overthrow of every existing social institution. Stalin merely implemented the Bolshevik vision on a much grander and bloodier scale. Unless your argument is that the Bolsheviks were wrong (which would include people before Stalin).
- danharaj 9y ago
  Ideology is not nearly as important as material circumstances in describing how history happens. > Stalin merely implemented the Bolshevik vision on a much grander and bloodier scale. I have a serious hunch that you haven't actually done any scholarly inquiry into the ideological landscape of the revolution and how that fits with its material reality. > Unless your argument is that the Bolsheviks were wrong (which would include people before Stalin). Well yes, of course they were wrong. The government Lenin established had to make essentially impossible compromises in order to survive. Lenin himself wrote about how they were making ideological compromises due to the exigencies of their circumstances. He thought that those compromises could be undone once the state had been stabilized. He died before that happened, and it never happened. The Soviet Union was always in a state of constant peril due to internal and external forces. It does not help that they were always militarized since its inception. No good civil institutions can come out of a state of perpetual war. My personal hot take which is not a position I would take if I had to give my opinion grounded in scholarship about the time period is that the revolution could have succeeded if the SPD hadn't order the Freikorps to crush the revolution in Germany; granted that they did so, it would have perhaps been better for the socialist cause for the USSR to collapse than cling to power. On the other hand, Stalin's USSR did the lion's share of the work in defeating Nazi Germany. What would have happened if he were deposed and the Soviet Union failed to industrialize?