=============================================== Marx is the most mentioned, the least read and the most misunderstood of philosophers. His, most human since Christ, ideology has been turned into Gulag Inquisition by Engels with his idiotic Hegelian absolute Materialistic Dialectics. The concepts of Comunism and Socialism are corrupted through their abuse by all sorts of dictatorial Gulags. (Nazis called themselves Socialists: "National Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeitspartei"). They trigger gut reactions and emotional quarrels. Let us try to look at them rationally for a change. =============================================== COMMUNISM "Communism" denotes a social system where "Everyone contributes according to his possibilities and everybody gets according to his needs". Kind of similar to Christian Talents and Charity, isn't it? Thus in a Communist system a sick fellow will not contribute at all, but get more than anybody else because the artificial lung he needs costs millions. Now, let's clearly distinguish between Communism and "Communist" Gulags abusing of the idea of which they are diametrical opposition and which we shall not discuss here. Back to the genuine Communism, you may argue that it is a nice idealistic Utopia contradicting human nature and thus impossible to be realized in practice. Not quite. There is one (and only one) example of Communist collectivities: Israeli Kibbuzim Shomer ha Tsair. Several of my colleagues, Profs at the Haifa Uni were Kibbuznikim. They did not own anything besides personal things. Their salary was payed to the Kibbuz, which supplied them with what they needed as Profs in Haifa: a modest room or flat if married, a cheap car, etc., but sometimes most expensive trips to the States etc. Kibbuzim represent 10% of the population but supply 90% of fighter pilots who go through the toughest selection I heard about and to succeed must be free of any mean egoistic motivation. =============================================== SOCIALISM Again, we shall ban from this discussion all systems abusing of the name Socialism like the Soviet Union, China, Nazi Germany,etc. "Socialism" denotes a social system where "Everyone contributes according to his possibilities and everybody gets according to his merits". Now, look at it any way you want, it is nothing else but the first basic principle of the total Free World. Does it mean that we are all Socialists? Strictly speaking, in this general connotation of "Socialism", yes. If Marx woke up today, he would find the USA closer to his idea of Socialism than his most audacious dreams. Still, such general "Socialist" bag into which we would damp all free countries would be useless for our discussion. We want to determine differences among free countries, we want to classify them and for this purpose we shall need a narrower definition of "Socialism". Prior to formulate it we have to introduce a few intermediary concepts. =============================================== THE CAKE Our systems are governed by economy and economy boils down to two most general and fundamental problems: 1.Make the biggest possible cake. 2.Split the cake. and to the unique task: find the optimum solution of both of them. Optimum, because they are contradictory: Concentrate exclusively on 1 would result in splitting favoring only the top makers and disregarding the masses. But poor masses would not buy and thus kill the makers and the cake. Concentrating exclusively on 2. would result in just and equal splitting, but the cake would shrink so that all will die of hunger. =============================================== LEFT AND RIGHT All governments and parties of the free world are mainly busy with this task of search of optimum, under different names and, of course, with thousands of details, which we cannot mention here. LEFT programs put more stress on 2, RIGHT programs put more stress on 1, but all of them recognize and consider the counterparts. Left programs are often called "Socialist" but I don't find it proper and propose to reserve this term to the case introduced in the next section. =============================================== SOCIALISM in narrow meaning. I propose to call "Socialist" a country which has found and realized in practice a reasonable approximation of our optimum. Other countries of the Free World I propose to call "Capitalist" with Left or Right shades. (Let me stress that Socialism has nothing to do with nationalization, which is proper of dictatorship and is sometimes used as local measure by LEFT oriented Capitalist regimes.) In that sense the only Socialist country in the history was Sweden. Let's look at the Swedish experience with respect to the principle of Socialism. A.EVERYONE CONTRIBUTES ACCORDING TO HIS POSSIBILITIES. It's much more complex than it looks. One has first to have the possibility, but an unemployed, a sick an uneducated does not have it. A. implies no unemployment, universal medical care and an equal chance education. Sweden succeeded to have 0 unemployment, a free universal medical care and everybody, regardless of age and past history was accepted as student upon a successful entrance examination with a room and a modest scholarship. Father of a good friend of mine was a successful physician. At the age of 55 he came to the conclusion that taking care of the body was not sufficient and registered as Theology student refusing the room and scholarship which he got automatically. In his late sixties he became a famous preacher. B.EVERYBODY GETS ACCORDING TO HIS MERITS. There was absolutely no nationalization and the range of income was 1/10. Somehow it was enough to motivate the entrepreneurs who were getting all quality of life benefits compensating the money fortunes. Anyway, it was the period of peak development of Swedish industry which became one of - if not the first per capita in the world, without talking about its quality. Volvo, Saab, Erickson, SKF, Steel industry, IKEA, Wood industry etc. were example to the whole world. Sweden produced one of the biggest cakes per capita and split it better than anybody else with free medical care, equal opportunity education and the whole welfare kabudel. =============================================== FAQ ABOUT KIBBUZIM ----------------------------------------------- HOW DOES LIFE IN A KIBBUZ LOOK? A friend of mine, Baruch, lived in the most advanced Kibbuz in the Negev desert mainly busy with the legendary task of transforming desert to orchards. He was one of the best blues saxos I ever heard, 5th Dan of Karate and Zen addict. I visited him often to play together, to have one or two kumites and to learn how to listen to the singing silence of the desert. His job was maintenance of watering installation, rather tough, walking miles and miles along the narrow pipes in 40-50 C, fetching heavy tools from his jeep and repairing any discovered failure, often accompanied by his Beduin friends who initiated him into the mysteries of the desert. Due to the heat he started at 5 and at 1 pm was free. Free in a way you cannot imagine. Free from stress, worry, anguish or trouble which fill up our life. He could not get any bill, was never bullied by a boss nor worried about being fired. He did not have any money, any savings, nor needed any. He did not have any insurance, nor needed any: if one day he needed exceptional heart surgery the Kibbuz would send him to South Africa, to Barnard, whatever the costs involved. If something got wrong in his house, it would be repaired usually during his working hours, without him noticing it. And back from work he found his kids and could play with them, take care of their real personal problems without worrying about| their food, dressing, education and future. When he, or his wife were mobilized, the family separated with worry about a dear person but free of worries about the future of the kids. An American wrote a dramatic letter about his Father killed in WW2 and the trouble his widowed Mother had to bring him up. If Baruch were killed it would be a personal tragedy for his family, but would in no other way influence their life. His kids supported by the Kibbuz would get the best possible education, neither better nor worse than if he were alive.| He organized a blues trio and had to travel a lot to play with the other guys and to give concerts, but also to attend ones of good visiting bands. When he had to go to a Tel Aviv concert, he prevented a secretary who reserved the tickets, a hotel room, a car and provided required pocket money. On one of my visits we had together a dinner in Kibbuz's restaurant and were served by Golda Meir, the Prime Minister at this time. She was member of this Kibbuz and, spending there a week-end, took the service duty in her turn. Otherwise she lived in a 2 room flat rented by the Kibbuz in a modest house near her office and had a smallest Renault car belonging to the Kibbuz for her personal use. Her Prime Minister wages were payed to the Kibbuz. ----------------------------------------------- WHY ONLY 10% ISRAELIS LIVE IN KIBBUZIM? While Kibbuz experience shows that the Communist principle is not an Utopia incompatible with human nature, it is nevertheless difficult to accept by somebody brought up in the context of our establishment. First, one has to give up several individualistic habits and replace them with ones decided by the collectivity. An example: All Kibbuzim share some general principles, like the Communist one, but most of details are decided locally by directly democratic vote. One of such details is the children dormitory. Some Kibbuzim decided that children sleep with parents, but other ones prefer children dormitories, arguing that they consolidate group consciousness and prepare children to face the society. You may want your kids permanently in your house, but if the majority votes for dormitory, you would have to accept their decision. But the most difficult would be to give up your dreams. Who of us has not dreamt about being reach enough to have bigger car than the neighbor and to enjoy the envy in his eyes. To have a big house with butlers and things and to enjoy the envy in the eyes of our guests. To afford a famous fashion model, to enter with her to Maxim's, to see all heads turn towards us and to enjoy the envy in all eyes. And to scrap her in a week and replace her with a newer model. A man's dream, of course, and I was never a woman, but women seem still more catty with respect to one another, still more snobbish and jewelery and pen-and-ink obsessed. Now, choosing to join a Kibbuz you would have to give up those dreams and it's very difficult. Impossible for most. ----------------------------------------------- ===============================================