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Psst, Buddy, Wanna Buy Some Libertarian Socialism?

by Trevor Loudon

If you want to con people, you've got to lie, you've got to make what you're selling seem more desirable than it really is.

Such it is with socialists. In the old days it was easier. Communications were poor, there were no TV, satellites or mini-series.

All you had to do was stand on a soapbox and shout to the masses the truth of the wonders of life under a workers' government. How Comrade Stalin/Mao/Fidel...has transformed his nation and inspired the workers to higher and higher levels of production. Socialist paradise was around the corner and all that was required was to give a certain leader enough power to deliver it.

Some of them, at least, would believe you.

These days that doesn't work. The masses have satellite TV now. They've seen the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the overloaded rafts crossing the Florida Straits, fleeing from Castro's socialist Shangri La to the capitalist hell of the USA. They've watched The Killing Fields on video. They've seen how Pol Pot liberated a million of his countrymen from their dreary lives in the name of socialism. (A liberation, incidentally, that a recent Alliance Party spokesman on Foreign Affairs labelled at the time, a "Victory for Humanity".)

Canterbury University Socialistology Lecturer, John Freeman-Moir summed up the agony facing today's liberators of mankind in a March 1990 article in the Monthly Review.

"As a university teacher I have found it increasingly difficult to argue the case for socialism and the transition to communism. My students are just as likely to throw their hands up and declare that they know all about that and they know it's wrong! There is even a hint of humour in their reaction as they wonder how anyone could be bothered with such old-fashioned stuff... Socialism should be kicked into the dustbin of history or, as some of my younger students now put it, in the idiom of the day socialism is "wasted." Like their counterparts in Poland these young New Zealanders, are, it seems, allergic to socialist values... It is precisely at this point in the discussion that Marxists like myself are now having difficulty in putting the case for socialism across... The challenge facing socialists is to construct a vision which can serve as an antidote to the allergies of "socialism".

Some socialists have already risen to the challenge with an antidote to this dangerous allergy.

Popular mainly among Trotskyites and former Maoists and inspired by the likes of Noam Chomsky and Andre Gorsz, "Libertarian Socialism" is the latest con-phrase of the Pink-Brigades. In essence it is the idea that an equitable, collective and egalitarian society can be achieved without the oppression commonly associated with the socialist idea. It is the proposal that society can make the transition to "Communism" without the "Dictatorship of the Proletariat" on the way.

In a way it was inevitable; Socialists stole the once respectable word Liberal, and through identifying it with their corrupt cause have turned it into a term of abuse only slightly less insulting than child molester or Alliance Party activist.

Having exhausted the respectability of Liberal, some socialists have tacked Libertarian onto socialism in a desperate attempt to salvage some credibility.

But can one really be both Libertarian and Socialist? Can these people really be serious?

Writing in a recent Metro, former "Progressive Leftist", Ralston Groupie and well-known Dunedin revolutionary, Chris Trottersky asked this vital question.

According to Trotterskyist theory, capitalist libertarians confuse socialism with Stalinism and Maoism (just as most of today's Libertarian Socialists did 10 years ago). This mistake blinds them to the possibility of socialism and freedom happily co-existing.

"Of course, libertarian capitalists such as Lindsay Perigo will argue that liberty and equality are mutually exclusive concepts, and that attempt to impose social equality can only succeed to the degree that individual liberty is diminished. If you require evidence say the Perigos, just study the history of the Soviet Union or the Peoples republic of China. In both cases an obsession with equality has led to terrorism and murder. This line of reasoning is based on a fundamental misreading of socialism. What political despots like Stalin and Mao called socialism had little to do with genuine socialist principles."

OK Comrade Trottersky, I'll swallow that, but what is socialism really then?

Unfortunately Chris doesn't say. What he does do is explain the difference between the "rights" of the poor and the rich.

"To those with property, liberty was defined in a negative sense. We are free only if our persons are free from the unwarranted interference of others. States hungry for revenue, paupers hungry for food, priests hungry for souls - none possess the slightest title to an individual's private property, without his or her freely-given consent.

"To those without property, liberty tended to be defined in a positive sense. We are free only if we possess the power to realise our full potential as human beings. People without food, people without shelter and people deprived of the very means of securing their own and their families' needs can never be called free. The Liberty of the poor had to be an altogether larger conception than the Liberty of the rich."

To give Trottersky credit, he is half right. Libertarians do see liberty (in relation to the government and society) in a negative sense. All we ask of others is to be left alone.

To us, a free society is one in which government protects us from the unwelcome intrusions of others and otherwise plays no role in our lives.

Libertarians don't see liberty in economic terms but as primarily a spiritual or philosophical concept. What we value most is our ideas. To be free is to be free first to think and then to be able to apply our ideas in the world around us. The only limitations being that we only apply our theories to our own property or in conjunction with like-minded people who share our values.

The fact that free people applying their ideas to the world can sometimes create huge amounts of wealth is marvellous, but very, very, secondary. Wealth, to a Libertarian, is a by-product of freedom, not a prerequisite of it.

Socialists, like Chris Trottersky, are materialists and can only relate a spiritual concept like freedom to the world they know.

Freedom to a socialist means generous welfare benefits, state houses, adequate stodgy food and an equal division of scarce material resources for all. It means the freedom to be protected from failure and the freedom to benefit from others' work and energy on the basis of their perceived need.

Not only do they want their cake and eat it too, they want your bloody cake as well!

Both Libertarians and "Libertarian Socialists" claim to value freedom. The difference lies in their conception of freedom.

A Libertarian seeks freedom with responsibility. The freedom to live life by his own resources, guided by conscience and rational thought and willingly accepting the consequences of all his actions, right or wrong.

A "Libertarian Socialist" seeks freedom from responsibility. The freedom to chase whims without negative consequences, to live off unearned income without stigma, to enjoy all the benefits of society without necessarily contributing a bean.

Ultimately "Libertarian Socialism" is a con. It is significant that Comrade Chris doesn't even attempt to explain how his ideal world would work in practice. All socialism must degenerate into some variant of Stalinism as sure as left is never right.

Good people will always have to forced to be socialists because they can too clearly see the evil of rewarding the slothful, the incompetent and life's eternal victims.

People will never willingly accept such a life and even the most benevolent "Libertarian Socialist" will eventually have to resort to the whip, the gun and the Gulag to realise his or her Utopia.

To humanity's eternal credit we're all individuals and most of us want to stay that way. No matter how great the force, no matter how overwhelming the odds, some will always resist.

"Libertarian Socialism" is an oxymoron, Comrade Trottersky because most people are too good for it. The rest are too bloody hopeless to keep it working.

So if a grubby little University Professor in a dirty raincoat and a Lenin cap should try to sell you some Libertarian Socialism, ring up the Commerce Commission. They might be able to do something useful for a change.

 
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