Re: Take Back Your Time Day

G*rd*n wrote:
> >>>Either median infant mortality dropped during the rise of
> >>>capitalism, or it didn't.  If it did, then capitalism fans
> >>>can argue that that was due to the rise of capitalism.  A
> >>>quick end to the argument would be to show that infant 
> >>>mortality remained the same or increased.

"chris.holt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> >>Wouldn't it also be a quick end to the argument to show that
> >>infant mortality dropped during the rise of socialism?  If
> >>it drops in both cases, that suggests that it was caused by
> >>factors other than economic/political systems, e.g.
> >>scientific and technological advances; and we know that
> >>these aren't directly related to economics or politics.

G*rd*n:
> > Socialism and capitalism, as they have usually been actually
> > proposed and realized, are hardly opposites.

"chris.holt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> No, but the synthesis we see around us does vary in proportions.
> Two teaspoons of one, one teaspoon of the other.  The point
> is that infant mortality used to go down in either case, suggesting
> that the cause lies elsewhere.
> 
> Now, life expectancy is supposedly decreasing because of
> obesity (and presumably, tobacco companies having taken
> a more subtle strategy in getting people addicted).  That
> might be seen as an argument against capitalism, though
> given the numbers of people smoking in China, I doubt it.


What I meant by capitalism and socialism not being opposites
was that they were not like two distinct ingredients mixed in
some kind of soup, but that they are (in practice) rather
similar forms of social organization.  In both cases, the
dominant political class consists of people who manage and
direct the industrial system.  This class is an elite and is
largely self-selected.  Nevertheless, its power rests in
large part on the consent of the non-elite, the mass the elite
dominates.  Part of what justifies the elite to the mass is
the ability of the former to produce a better life, or at
least the illusion of a better life, for the latter.  Since
"a better life" is an evaluation and since values are relative,
the elites must labor continually to produce either a life
which constantly appears better than the one people experienced
in the past, or is better than that observed in or believed
about other communities.  (Elites who fail to do this get in a
lot of political trouble, as witness the political turmoil
which accompanied the Great Depression, or more recently, the
collapse of the Soviet Union.)   Hence, elites, capitalist or
socialist, are strongly motivated to accumulate capital and
use whatever surpluses they can spare to produce technological
advances.  It is not surprising, then, that in both cases
significant technological advances are indeed produced.
-- 

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