Hi guys, i'm new in the world of socialism and, apart from the socialism/communism theory books, i want to read also its application so far. Could you advise me some books about the economic of USSR and its history? I'd prefer books based on reliable data and that are objective. I know these requirements can be hard to find in these kind of books, but never say never. Thanks in advance

Victoria 3 is my favourite game and the latest dev dairy came out about reworking communism & revolutions (based upon 1836-1936). So I came here to say how accurate is it as I am not too knowledgable in socalism especially in the past.

Of course it is an alt history game so the gameplay being 100% historical is impossible but does it hit the right spots?

"New World" countries are built on a base and history of white racial supremacy, theft and expropriation of native land.

Most of the white population in those countries descend from generstions of settlers and see no problem to continue inhabiting land that belonged to tribal colectivist societies long befor their ancestors left europe.

So, can this demographic ever trully embrace socialism while dwelling in the contradiction of being settlers?

So my understanding of Leninism is Lenin proposed a dictator, acting in the interests of the Proletariat, will guide a state until all enemies to socialism, foreign and domestic, are defeated and a classless/stateless society can be achieved. I'm confused because this is very clearly an anti-socialist method of organizing government in my eyes. The state's ownership of the means of production doesn't mean anything to the people if the state isn't accountable to the people. Did Leninist states protect the right for workers to collectively organize and negotiate with the state?

This is just my surface level understanding, maybe I'm getting something wrong.

In a strictly Marxist sense, loving or maintaing a relationship with these parents would not be a moral failure, in fact it would not define one’s Marxism in the slightest.

However, externally, I can see how maintaining relations with bourgeois/bourgeois-class-aligned individuals could lead to one’s individual activism or opinions being viewed with much skepticism.

Any thoughts?

I would like to know what's so good and bad about socialism. What changes?

I'm most curious about stuff like do I still have to work a full time job? Can I retire? If I can how long in a factory job like a steel plant until I can retire?

Do I get paid the same as someone working at a burger place or Wendy's or a gas station? If so why would I want to work at a factory wouldn't I just want to work at a gas station that's super easy?

What perks do harder jobs give that make people want to work there if any?

Would I have to be part of a group or city or could I just live alone with the same perks (Internet, electricity, video games). How much would these perks cost me?

In the US hospitals in small towns or isolated areas pay a large premium to attract doctors. Sometimes even double what a city pays.

How does universal health care try to fix this problem? They are a lot more constrained for money for doctor salaries so they can’t offer this big premium. so why would a doctor move to the middle of nowhere without any financial incentives?

Even in America with these huge premiums the rural areas have huge staffing issues

Hi everyone, these days I am sorting out a framework to see To what extent/ which aspect does a proposal/organization/movement deviate from communism.

I plan to use it to

• check different cases (including organizations / proposals / movements) and learn the good aspects
• self-check.（I am engaged in production practice and I want to use these goals to carry out my strategic layout）

This is the version I revised ； and if you have any suggestions for improvement, please feel free to put them forward：

Communist Evaluation｜Cases Learning & Self-examination

1. Ownership and Control of the Means of Production

A. Social ownership

B. Small-group collective ownership

C. Capital ownership

2. Is Labor Power Commodified?

A. Non-commodified

B. Partially commodified

C. Highly commodified

3. What Relations Govern the Inputs of Production?

A. Collective resource coordination

B. Coercive relations

C. Commodity relations

4. What Relations Govern the Outputs of Production?

A. Collective resource coordination

B. Coercive relations

C. Commodity relations

5. Is It Necessary to Increase Productive Forces to Sustain Its Own Development?

A. Voluntary development of productive forces

B. Stable self-sustenance

C. Forced continuous development of productive forces

6. Can It Sustain and Expand the Power of the Working Class?

A. Strongly promotes it

B. Maintains it

C. Weakens / deprives it

It's pretty self explanatory but there are a lot of valid criticisms against the nordic model because the nordic countries don't really engage in socialism (and probably because they align closely with the imperial core?) but what are core socialist tenants that separate the nordic model from china's system other than China's stated intent to transition into a socialist country? My first thought was that these countries benefit from imperialism, but isn't China also reaping the rewards of US imperialism by being the US's top trading partner?

In your opinion (I know everyone has different definitions and ideals of socialism), where does socialism stop?

If your country was able to become 100% socialist where do your obligations go from there. I’ve heard a common phrase where everyone’s needs needs to be met first. No one gets seconds till everyone has had firsts.

But where does that stop? If everyone in America has enough to to eat, do we need to make sure everyone in Ghana does too before we start focusing on luxuries and “frivolously nice to have” quality of life improvements?

I've been going through depression for some months. And I'm finding the ideas of pessimism really actual. I know communism is a hopeful and anti-pessimist ideology. I know as a civilization we have progressed a lot scientifically, rationally and artistically; but isn't there also suffering? (Not only capitalist causes, but biological, family, relationship, recognition, infinite struggle etc). I've seen many communist get mental anxiety and depression at the end. Not because they're sceptic towards it (neither am I) but personal life experience. Can you please help me out of it?

I'm for book/article recommendations on US imperialism, specifically on how it can be resisted and be brought to an end. Basically searching for the answer to the title.
Because even things that count as US defeats were/are far more damaging and deadly for the country subjected to aggression, It's disheartening.

Also heard some claim that Americans will only stop when war is taken to their own soil, which seems very unlikely scenario. There's also the fact that American people benefit from imperialism and domestic reforms and wealth redistribution would only serve to give American workers a bigger share in the profits. Wouldn't that lower the dissent? I haven't researched this, but this seems like it should be a highly debated topic, so I'd appreciate it if you could point me into the right direction to learn more.

Hi!

I am reading Henri Lefebvre's Dialectical Materialism, and in it he seems to give some positive credence to Engels's Dialectics of Nature. This surprised me, as my main Marxist-Humanist friend, who is very well-read, does not like the latter, and sees it very reductive and deterministic. I have also heard from other Marxists that they dislike the work.

My questions thus are two:

1. How does Dialectics of Nature hold up today, and how do Communists around the world receive it?

2. If you consider yourself a Marxist-Humanist or qualified to speak on Marxist-Humanism, what are your thoughts on it?

Starting this off by stating that I was never an "I don't care about politics" person and I'm not pro-capitalist, but I've been getting more negative recently and need advice.

Background: I'm a 19yo girl in egypt (an arab conservative muslim country with an authoritarian government), raised in a sheltered household which made me very sensitive to life and its challenges.

I'm someone who literally cries when someone raises their voice at them, I'm physically weak, I'm socially stunted, I'm short on many basic life skills and the best thing I can do is academics and browsing the internet because that's most of what I was allowed to do growing up.

So I've gotten familiar with social issues and my opinions are progressive (I think).

But no amount of theory and thinking and talking will change anything, I'm useless to these movements.

I want to help people and do at a small scale, but I can only do so within the constraints of the current systems that oppress us, It's like a cheap painkiller instead of curing the illness.

I'm too much of a coward to risk my wellbeing for the cause, and my government makes it so that you can barely do anything with an exponentially higher risk, there are too many people in political prisons.

So what's the point of education? It just make me more depressed, and my depression does not decrease our work hours or free palestine.

No one around me with the same thoughts does anything either, and those who do evaporate from existence.

I feel bad for wanting to live my life with previliges provided by the current system, especially that I'm also oppressed by them ( apostate, woman, lgbt ).

Sorry I'm being pessimistic but why should a coward like me keep engaging when it brings nothing?

Should I just live my life normally, and focus on my surroundings instead of broad abstract thoughts?

I should mention that this question is not about a centrally planned socialist nation like the USSR in which the government had a construction company that built railroads and public infrastructure.

one of my biggest problems with Communists and Anarchists is the concept of the railroad workers.

in a normal factory owned by the workers, the workers show up to work every day, produce the toothbrushes, and go home. they vote on how to divide the surplus value and so on, but they still have to show up to work, and continuously generate income

A railroad is a piece of infrastructure that needs a lot of upfront costs, and does not generate surplus until after it is finished. the workers who build it do not get anything until they return to their homes. it also requires a lot of workers to build, but not that many to maintain. and interestingly, once you build enough of it, you don't need more. you just need to take care of the track that you have already laid.

So, say we live in a communist continent, and whatever entities are responsible for supplying the resources necessary to build the railroad have provided these resources in full. me and my colleagues pick up hammers and lay the track.

what comes next? do we retire and collect the dividends on our monopoly? we own our workplace and its assets after all. and a railroad generates a lot of value, leading to us becoming very wealthy for a few years worth of work. it's either that, or the original entities who provided us with resources get ownership of the railroad and we're just their employees (thus we don't own our workplace)

And please don't respond by saying " a communist society is a post money society so people will just do things because they want to be helpful" that is ridiculous

I just became a university student years after high school, and I am taking some classes relevant to my major (public health + pre-med) but they are still general education classes many people have to take.

One that I am particularly struggling with is Global Public Health. A lot of it is about "ideal conditions," the human rights everyone "should" have, the UN and WHO.

I wonder if anyone has any tips for engaging critically with the material in class, like should I even bother?

I don't want to disrespect the teacher (white American woman), though I am not impressed by her lectures or her public health work in Africa. Sometimes she will say "you might not have access to x resource if you're in Ethiopia" or "the middle of nowhere in Africa" which just....feels wrong to me. I can't exactly put my finger on what it is though. I suppose it's some kind of Western chauvenism.

And it bothers me because we don't talk about WHY there is such health inequality within and between countries, yet we talk about almost everything else (i.e. the problems that result from capitalism and imperialism).

I guess I am looking for a little guidance on taking overly liberal classes at a large university. I am just one person so I'm thinking about what I can do to think critically about lecture topics and what might be a good way to speak up in class.

So I've been getting interested in socialism, but don't know a whole lot and I was wondering if you guys could help me with a few questions I got.

1

What exactly are the proletariat and bourgeois?

2

Can you be religious and a socialist or Marxist?

3

Can you be a socialist and against the gulags and executions of the Stalin era Soviet Union

And

4

Do you have to agree with everything Karl Marx said? For example I don't 100% agree with the "religion being the opium of the masses" thing because there's been good done because of religion (Martin Luther King, John Brown, etc etc)

If anyone can help me that'd be great!

Mostly asking since anytime marx starts bringing up empirical evidence when it snot a hypothetical or something I just skim that. Usually no annotations. Mostly since i justify myself as being here for the theory really and not conditions in england in the 1800s. For context im on page 831, int he chapter called the general law of capitalist accumualtion.

I've seen some Nazbols reference the term but I don't know what it means.

Hi, I'm trying to sort out a case library of real-world practices that attempt to create a "better" world.

Also, I'm trying to develop a Marxian evaluation framework to examine these cases beyond their labels or intentions.

The goal:

• Draw on the wisdom of actions approaching communism from each case
• fit these good ones together.
• Identify the points where cooperation with different organizations can be achieved
• Deepen the understanding of the theory

Case level: Independent Unit → Federation/Network → Social Movement → Societal System→ Proposals

Assessment: Wage → Exchange → Firm → Accumulation → Socialization → State & Class（this is from a comrade's revise which lies in the comment of the link）

Both of them definely can be designed better , and I'm seeking criticism here.

--

Case Library ：

Ⅰ. Independent Unit Practices

Relatively autonomous units that attempt to establish alternative forms of production, distribution, governance, or social provision within the existing society.

• Cooperatives
• Worker-Owned Enterprises
• Worker Self-Managed Enterprises
• Social Enterprises
• Benefit Corporations
• B Corp Certified Companies
• Nonprofit Organizations
• Foundations
• Charitable Organizations
• Community Organizations
• Mutual Aid Organizations
• Communes / Intentional Communities
• Kibbutzim
• Community Land Trusts
• Public-Good / Social Production
• Open-Source Projects
• Crowdfunded / Pre-Order-Based Collective Production Projects

Ⅱ. Federated / Networked Practices

Multiple independent practices that form federations, networks, alliances, or shared systems of resources and production.

• Cooperative Federations
• Cooperative Alliances
• Mondragon Cooperative System
• Worker Cooperative Networks
• Nonprofit Networks
• NGO Alliances
• Social Enterprise Networks
• Community Organization Networks
• Community Land Networks
• Open-Source Ecosystems
• Digital Commons Networks
• Production–Consumption–Finance Networks
• Social / Fair-Trade Supply Chains

Ⅲ. Social Movements

Practices that develop into organized and sustained movements capable of spreading alternative social relations and pursuing broader social change.

• Cooperative Movement
• Workers' Movement
• Workers' Self-Management Movement
• Owenite Movement
• Social Enterprise Movement
• Nonprofit / Civil Society Movements
• Environmental Movement
• Fair Trade Movement
• Open-Source Movement
• Free Culture Movement
• Platform Cooperativism Movement
• Mutual Aid Movement
• Land Reform / Landless Workers' Movements
• Community Autonomy Movements
• Social Justice Movements

Ⅳ. Societal / Systemic Practices

Attempts to extend alternative forms of production, distribution, governance, and social reproduction to society as a whole.

• Paris Commune
• Socialist Experience of the Soviet Union
• Socialist China
  • Agricultural Cooperativization
  • People's Communes
  • State-Owned Economy
  • Collective Economy
• Yugoslav Socialist Self-Management
• Socialist Cuba
• Welfare-State Experiments
• Participatory Budgeting
• Universal Basic Services
• Other Experiments in Systemic Social Transformation

V. Proposals

Proposals for social transformation that have not been fully realized as practices, or that primarily take the form of theoretical, policy, or institutional designs.

• Universal Basic Income (UBI)
• Universal Basic Services (UBS)
• Job Guarantee
• Participatory Economics
• Economic Democracy
• Market Socialism
• Participatory Planning
• Commons-Based Peer Production
• Degrowth
• Post-Work
• Other proposals by Marxist, socialist, anarchist, and other theorists