ORIENTATION
Name me one country where socialism works
When I first considered myself a socialist revolutionary in 1970, I was hounded by free marketers’ challenge: “name me one country where socialism works”. These market fundamentalists would then hold up the most strident expectations for socialism:
Everyone is exactly equal with no classes.
There is an abundance of goods which are conveniently circulated.
Political rule is not dictatorial.
All competition is banished.
People are working together, collectively and creatively.
The state has withered away.
Anything less than this was proof that it didn’t work.
Without really understanding how difficult it is to create any of these conditions when surrounded by a sea of capitalist sharks, I was at first intimidated. I was driven away from examining Russia, China and Cuba because they were “authoritarian”. Without realizing it, I had accepted that more than one political candidate was the ultimate measuring rod. I didn’t know how high the literacy rate was in socialist countries, that they had health care systems that were affordable or free, low-cost housing, free education, and there was little or no unemployment. What mattered was there was a single party rule. I was intimidated by that argument, without knowing that for the people in those countries having two parties to vote for instead of one was not their priority. As first an anarchist and then a council communist, I then would refer to the workers’ councils that existed during the Paris Commune, the Russian Revolution, the Spanish Revolution and say, “here you are, that works”. While I was right that workers’ councils were a stunning achievement, the rebuttal would be “why didn’t they last?” At 20 years old I didn’t really have an answer for this.