Last week, I began this discussion by talking about how both communist and capitalist societies deal with resource scarcity. Today, I want to talk about power: specifically, who holds it? In communist societies, the ideal is that nobody holds the power. Everyone does their job, and provides the fruits of their labor willingly to whoever needs it. Likewise, everyone takes whatever they need from whoever produces it. However, on a scale larger than a small town, this becomes very difficult: how to you organize the transportation of food from the country to the city, for instance? How do you determine how much of every resource is needed to keep everyone supplied with their necessities? How do you deal with thieves, murderers, or people who refuse to give their product or service to one or more individuals? Enter the government: a body of officials whose job it is to organize the efforts of the populace into a cohesive, functioning machine.
As we have seen in pretty much every communist society to date, the government holds a great deal of power. It controls the production and distribution of products. It makes and enforces the laws. It handles foreign relations. It handles education. What doesn't it do? This is starting to sound like a bad infomercial: buy yours today! Question is, does the government need to handle these things? I would argue that it does: at least, a central organizing body is necessary for production and distribution. A central organizing body is necessary for law and order. A central organizing body is necessary for education, and ensuring that all necessary jobs are filled (tying into production and distribution). Who better than the government?
Posts
