4 ms·

How would you define socialism and capitalism?

jmyeet 2y ago
In terms of feudalism. Feudalism was an economic system borne from the Divine Right of Kings [1]. But this was really just an excuse, much like every religious war isn't really about relilgion. Religion is just an excuse to seize land. Anyway, under feudalism, a King controlled some portion of land. That King would typically have vassals who control part of it. Depending on the size, those vassals may themselves have vassals. At the bottom of this totem pole was the serf. A noble would control all the land but would grant a serf the ability to use the land to grow a harvest and feed his family. Often the serf would live on that land. In exchange for this the serf would give a portion of his harvest to his lord. The serf may also owe the lord military service in times of war. By late feudalism, instead of giving crops, the serf would sell their harvest at markets and pay the lord money. This led to the rise of the merchant class and ultimately paved the way for capitalism. So what's going on here? In feudalism, the lord owns the means of production (being the land). The serf, through his labor, creates value by sowing and harvesting a crop. There is no value to the land without labor. So one can say the the lord is extracting the surplus value of the serf's labor. This framing and understanding was really formalized by Karl Marx later but the origin of the Labor Theory of Value [2] goes back to Ancient Greece and probably beyond. So what is capitalism? Capitalism simply replaces the noble lord with a capital owner. That's literally it. As the world industrialized the means of production expanded beyond farms and mines to factories. But everything else applies. A factory extracts the surplus value of the workers' labor to enrichen the factory's owner. Instead of kings, we have Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and the like. So what Marx talked about was the workers' relationship to the means of production. Socialism in this context simply means the workers own the means of production. So if you look at your local town or city, Walmart represents capitalism. The value of that labor and from that community is extracted to distant owners. If your town has a local family-owned restaurant, well that's socialism. The restaurant is the means of production here. The family who works there owns it. A Monsanto-owned agribusiness? Capitalism. Family-owned farm? Socialism. The crazy thing is that people like boutique hotels, farmers markets, family-owned farms, locally-grown produce and so on. Some theory wonks migh tyell at me about syndaclism, Marxism, Marxist-Leninism or Mao third-worldism. Don't get lost in the weeds however. The key part of this is that capitalism has almost nothing to do with markets (let alone "free markets", which is an oxymoron). Markets existed for thousands of years before capitalism did. Markets exist in non-capitalist countries. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_right_of_kings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_right_of_kings [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value
- lazide 2y ago
  A major difference here though is that in feudalism, you have one king with associated subordinates per physical area. In Capitalism, anyone(*) with sufficient capital can become a king in a specific fief, and there are often many overlapping ‘kings’ in a given fief, competing. Even labor. It happens all the time, albeit is not ‘that easy’, either. Socialism (depending on brand), means of production are usually controlled by the state, and that type of ‘inversion of control’ is rarely allowed. In most implementations, most of the economy is in those state owned/controlled entities. Benefits (and costs) to the population then flow down from there. * barring monopolies, which is why it’s so popular to stomp on them.
  - jmyeet 2y ago
    > ... you have one king with associated subordinates per physical area Yes and no. Land changed hands. As recently as the 19th century, a distant relative of mine fled Eastern Europe from an area where he could be conscripted by either the Prussians or the Russians. > In Capitalism, anyone(*) with sufficient capital can become a king in a specific fief We're talking about social mobility here, basically. This existed in feudal times too. A Viking called Rollo became the first ruler of Normandy and didn't seem to come from noble beginnings. A direct descendant of his became the King of England by conquest. In fact every European monarch today is a descedant of Rollo. The land here is simply the means of production, just like Amazon is. Amazon has many owners but is it that different really? Social mobility in modern times is more limited than you might expect. ZIP codes tend to be strong predictors of your economic outcomes. This is exacerbated by our existence being laden with debt. Student, medical, housing, etc. It's why a lot of people use terms like "neofeudalism" as all this debt makes is increasingly indistinguishable from brick kiln workers in Bangladesh, Pakistan and India. This is by design because a debt-laden worker is a compliant worker. > Socialism (depending on brand), means of production are usually controlled by the state That's more communism. Even so, the state is comprised of and answerable to the workers. Even then I'd rather have the state capture "profit" to build roads and schools rather than some guy buying another mega-yacht. A lot of people, myself included, focus on the workers owning the means of production because this can be done incrementally and we'd all be substantially better off if our megacorps were instead collectives.
psadauskas 2y ago
The loose analogy I use is Democracy is to Feudalism as Socialism is to Capitalism. In a feudal government, the laws are created by the wealthy landowners with complete control over how the people should live. The peasants have little say in how things should be run, and few options to leave. In a capitalist society, corporations are owned and operated by the wealthy, and they have complete control over the people at their jobs (and often outside it, too). The workers have little say in how things should be run, and cannot leave without fear of losing necessities like healthcare. Democracy gives the people a say in how their government should be run. Socialism gives the workers a say in how their company should be run. We've managed to no longer be exploited by our government (but not completely), but we still have to live with being exploited by the wealthy.
- AndrewKemendo 2y ago
  Very well put imo!

In terms of feudalism. Feudalism was an economic system borne from the Divine Right of Kings [1]. But this was really just an excuse, much like every religious war isn't really about relilgion. Religion is just an excuse to seize land. Anyway, under feudalism, a King controlled some portion of land. That King would typically have vassals who control part of it. Depending on the size, those vassals may themselves have vassals. At the bottom of this totem pole was the serf. A noble would control all the land but would grant a serf the ability to use the land to grow a harvest and feed his family. Often the serf would live on that land. In exchange for this the serf would give a portion of his harvest to his lord. The serf may also owe the lord military service in times of war. By late feudalism, instead of giving crops, the serf would sell their harvest at markets and pay the lord money. This led to the rise of the merchant class and ultimately paved the way for capitalism. So what's going on here? In feudalism, the lord owns the means of production (being the land). The serf, through his labor, creates value by sowing and harvesting a crop. There is no value to the land without labor. So one can say the the lord is extracting the surplus value of the serf's labor. This framing and understanding was really formalized by Karl Marx later but the origin of the Labor Theory of Value [2] goes back to Ancient Greece and probably beyond. So what is capitalism? Capitalism simply replaces the noble lord with a capital owner. That's literally it. As the world industrialized the means of production expanded beyond farms and mines to factories. But everything else applies. A factory extracts the surplus value of the workers' labor to enrichen the factory's owner. Instead of kings, we have Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and the like. So what Marx talked about was the workers' relationship to the means of production. Socialism in this context simply means the workers own the means of production. So if you look at your local town or city, Walmart represents capitalism. The value of that labor and from that community is extracted to distant owners. If your town has a local family-owned restaurant, well that's socialism. The restaurant is the means of production here. The family who works there owns it. A Monsanto-owned agribusiness? Capitalism. Family-owned farm? Socialism. The crazy thing is that people like boutique hotels, farmers markets, family-owned farms, locally-grown produce and so on. Some theory wonks migh tyell at me about syndaclism, Marxism, Marxist-Leninism or Mao third-worldism. Don't get lost in the weeds however. The key part of this is that capitalism has almost nothing to do with markets (let alone "free markets", which is an oxymoron). Markets existed for thousands of years before capitalism did. Markets exist in non-capitalist countries. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_right_of_kings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_right_of_kings [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value

lazide 2y ago
A major difference here though is that in feudalism, you have one king with associated subordinates per physical area. In Capitalism, anyone(*) with sufficient capital can become a king in a specific fief, and there are often many overlapping ‘kings’ in a given fief, competing. Even labor. It happens all the time, albeit is not ‘that easy’, either. Socialism (depending on brand), means of production are usually controlled by the state, and that type of ‘inversion of control’ is rarely allowed. In most implementations, most of the economy is in those state owned/controlled entities. Benefits (and costs) to the population then flow down from there. * barring monopolies, which is why it’s so popular to stomp on them.
- jmyeet 2y ago
  > ... you have one king with associated subordinates per physical area Yes and no. Land changed hands. As recently as the 19th century, a distant relative of mine fled Eastern Europe from an area where he could be conscripted by either the Prussians or the Russians. > In Capitalism, anyone(*) with sufficient capital can become a king in a specific fief We're talking about social mobility here, basically. This existed in feudal times too. A Viking called Rollo became the first ruler of Normandy and didn't seem to come from noble beginnings. A direct descendant of his became the King of England by conquest. In fact every European monarch today is a descedant of Rollo. The land here is simply the means of production, just like Amazon is. Amazon has many owners but is it that different really? Social mobility in modern times is more limited than you might expect. ZIP codes tend to be strong predictors of your economic outcomes. This is exacerbated by our existence being laden with debt. Student, medical, housing, etc. It's why a lot of people use terms like "neofeudalism" as all this debt makes is increasingly indistinguishable from brick kiln workers in Bangladesh, Pakistan and India. This is by design because a debt-laden worker is a compliant worker. > Socialism (depending on brand), means of production are usually controlled by the state That's more communism. Even so, the state is comprised of and answerable to the workers. Even then I'd rather have the state capture "profit" to build roads and schools rather than some guy buying another mega-yacht. A lot of people, myself included, focus on the workers owning the means of production because this can be done incrementally and we'd all be substantially better off if our megacorps were instead collectives.

psadauskas 2y ago

The loose analogy I use is Democracy is to Feudalism as Socialism is to Capitalism. In a feudal government, the laws are created by the wealthy landowners with complete control over how the people should live. The peasants have little say in how things should be run, and few options to leave. In a capitalist society, corporations are owned and operated by the wealthy, and they have complete control over the people at their jobs (and often outside it, too). The workers have little say in how things should be run, and cannot leave without fear of losing necessities like healthcare. Democracy gives the people a say in how their government should be run. Socialism gives the workers a say in how their company should be run. We've managed to no longer be exploited by our government (but not completely), but we still have to live with being exploited by the wealthy.

AndrewKemendo 2y ago
Very well put imo!