to think wanting to overthrow capitalism is not an extreme political stance

[chomalungma]

New school guidance issued last week for education.

www.gov.uk/guidance/plan-your-relationships-sex-and-health-curriculum#choosing-resources

Issued last Thursday, the guidance reads: “Schools should not under any circumstances use resources produced by organisations that take extreme political stances on matters.
“Examples of extreme political stances include, but are not limited to: a publicly stated desire to abolish or overthrow democracy, capitalism, or to end free and fair elections, opposition to the right of freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of assembly or freedom of religion and conscience

There are alternatives to capitalism. People may not like them, I don't necessarily agree with them - but I don't think it's an extreme political stance to take.

Yet the Government think it is.

Are people who think that there alternatives to capitalism taking an extreme political stance?

The guidance is abolish or overthrow.

If we were, for example, to renationalise the railways (again), capitalism in rail would be abolished in the U.K.

I also don’t think you can easily separate critique and abolition. Das Kapital is largely a critique of capitalism. Understanding why we apply socialism to certain aspects of society relies upon that critique.

@raspberryfields - I’m not advocating overthrowing capitalism, just enjoying the discussion (although if a majority ever voted for an alternative to capitalism democratically, I suspect capitalism would still have to be overthrown, because it would not be in the interests of the powerful minority to roll over and accept democracy if that were ever to happen - they would suspend democracy, first, or claim the election was rigged, or that it was the rule of the mob).

Why not both then?

The point is no one will do it for free. Nor should you expect anyone to do so..

We were still a capitalist country when we had state owned railways, a state owned airline and state owned water and energy providers. Apparently.

We also had lots of council houses. Not built for profit. They actually had decent sized bedrooms, too.

@Walkaround

Sorry, I wasn't saying that you were! I like the discussion. I think we should have more discussion.

I just don't think that the government guidance bans this type of discussion, which wasOP's original point.

Abolishing capitalism is not the same as renationalising assets, or being more Scandinavian. It is very different.

Sorry, what I meant is renationalising a railway is not the same as "abolishing capitalism for railways".

I know, @raspberryfields - I was ignoring whether or not I thought the guidance intended to ban discussion of capitalism, because the discussion of capitalism was too interesting to miss! It would be most odd to start talking about abolishing capitalism in a relationship, sex and health education lesson, anyway, which is why I think the OP found it incongruous, like some kind of thought experiment to make people subconsciously link any questioning of capitalism with extremism. After all, the other examples really relate to democracy, freedom of speech, freedom from discrimination, etc, so capitalism is a bit of an odd one out in the peculiar little list.

Yeah, I totally get that. To be honest, I think that the disadvantage of capitalism is exactly the kind of thing that the next generation should be debating and I can see that some might interpret the guidance as a warning against (though I don't, personally). I would make the point that in some respects though capitalism is in the same "box" as debating democracy in a way, so not that incongruous. If you asked the average Singapore resident whether they wanted democracy, they might not be that bothered - they have stability, the rule of law (contrast Hong Kong) - I am not saying that democracy is not (flawed as it can be) the wrong system, just that its value / flaws could equally be debated. And Many would say they would rather be in Singapore than venezuela.

Democracy certainly does have flaws. That’s why nowhere in the world is a pure democracy, either! There is a lot that is distinctly undemocratic about our system. Given that most people conflate the disadvantages of communism with the disadvantages of dictatorships, though, I think discussing all of the combinations of methods tried so far is worthwhile!

One thing’s for sure, though- I don’t think any sane person would advocate a pure, undiluted dictatorship.

Agreed. Though I don't think that anyone sane would advocate pure communism/socialism either personally. It isn't the same as having a dictator - they are different, although it has usually involved one in practice historically. That said, the more the state does and controls, the more people lose a level of self determinism - state utilities are EASY as examples, as the kind of things that should be administered for the public good whether in public hands or private (with high degrees of regulation or oversight), very successful capitalist economies have nationalised services.

The idea that the state controls how much food a family should be entitled to, what jobs a person can seek for themselves and what types of new businesses could be started is far trickier.

And if the state controls more and more in terms of what people can do economically speaking and how money is spent, the more unwieldy that system becomes and the less it becomes possible to vote on the matters that affect you, so you do get less freedom. You might not care, if the state is so fantastic at it, but you have less scope for self determination.

@raspberryfields - which is why, if you have a reasonable degree of democracy, you are unlikely to end up with “pure” anything!

Agreed - but I would say the same for capitalism (ie power of people to keep their money and a market being a valuable, if imperfect, way of helping to value things, rather than that being dictated by an amorphous body - who couldn't possibly do that accountably for everything we might want to value).

What are the world financial markets, but an amorphous body dictating to us all, though?!

We’ve all lost connection with the purpose of what we doing - making money out of money, rather than having any other sense of purpose.

It's a nonsense. I'd say the Green Party is anti-capitalist. Should mention of them be banned in schools?

It's a sign that capitalism is ready to be retired that the overlords are so touchy about it.

@Walkaround

Would you say the same for Scandinavia though? I wouldn't. I'd just say that is more responsible capitalism.

I personally do think that the markets are often good at moving money behind good ideas and innovation. Sadly, most governments are not nearly so good at picking winners and investing wisely. I do think that there should be a better redistributive system though.

I think that this is the Green position too. I haven't seen them publish a manifesto that says we are going to ban financial markets and nationalise everything as yet!

@raspberryfields - it wasn’t governments that invested in sub-prime mortgages, though, that was the “good ideas” people. So much for investing wisely!

I agree it isn't a perfect system. Of course!

But your argument isn't a winning argument against capitalism really - it could equally be an argument for better regulated and managed capitalism, where bankers are more likely to bear the risks where they take risks.

Your argument can be used to say that trump or brexit means we should throw out democracy. But I bet you would disagree and suggest we need better democracy, huh? Same argument!

Private capital has led to developments in renewables, to the invention of the car, to the railway. To the research of life science drugs, in partnership with universities. Has provided funding for small businesses that the government would never be able to match. It just has to be harnessed correctly.

The pandemic has shown that those governments who can mobilise partnerships with the private industry tend to win (see germany and its partnership with private industry in testing and in development of an app, compared to the U.K. with its initial slow attempts to do testing only using the public system and to develop its own app). It really isn't that simple - the state cannot specialise in everything.

@raspberryfields - what do you mean by “your argument”? I’m not arguing for the overthrow of capitalism?! I am arguing that the current expression of capitalism has somewhat lost its way. Also, I think the tail is currently wagging the dog. I am not arguing for the abolition of the tail or the dog...

I have a lot of sympathy for people who think there must be something better than capitalism, though, even if only in some instances. I don’t think you can really claim that everything we do in our society is regulated capitalism. Some things we do have nothing whatsoever to do with capitalism.

And don’t forget, alongside innovation, capitalism can encourage cover ups, lies and unfair competition. Capitalism has encouraged tobacco companies to deny their products cause cancer; to deny climate change; to pollute rather than go to the expense of tidying up after themselves; to cut corners for the sake of profit; to sell people things they don’t need. For capitalism to work, we need a better sense of direction as a society - just aiming for a profit doesn’t give a sense of direction.