Are there any reformist authors who advocate real socialism from a nonviolent and electoral process?
I feel as if only this could work in the modern age, socialism built on proof of democratic success, not just a single party of larpers who believe violence is tactically good simply because it is morally right(terrible track record btw).
Socialism should require not just the will or the interests of the masses but their votes too first and foremost. Otherwise, you're just preaching to the choir and literally creating room for the opposition and other countries to stop you.
Not explicitly, but it has always been held among Marx and friends that theoretically, in a very well developed capitalist society, nonviolent revolution is not entirely ruled out.
However, this nonviolence still requires the working class to have leverage, and without a threat of insurrection, this is extremely difficult and unlikely. I would even argue that in an age of mass media and government subversion, working within the system has become harder, not easier.
Elijah Nguyen
You are giving them too much credit, it never worked.
Dominic Hughes
If the majority votes it in though then what leverage is required except to normally penalize those who dissent? The state is already a tool of leverage in a way because you have the mandate to cut state actors who oppose the masses. Checks and balances already exist so long as there is real majority.
Joshua Wright
Slavoj Zizek.
Brayden Lewis
I don't think leftists really like violence or think it's a good tactic in and of itself, but they have few other options because the electoral process has been so thoroughly captured by interests hostile to them. Plus most recognize that there would be a preemptive counter revolution by the military complex if real socialists were about to take power.
Christian Kelly
It's only been captured by those interests because the masses have allowed it to. Meaning the socialism that is considered hostile by the masses is inept and needs to be radically different in order for it to be taken seriously. Leftists who would rather larp instead of changing people's minds only make things worse.
Nicholas Flores
The masses didn't allow anything, the neoliberal order was implemented with little input from them. Wealthy interest took advantage of the culture of legalized corruption in the political system itself. If you don't have loads of cash you simply can't create a political party or challenge the ones who do have all that money behind them. Creating a real people's party would require a purge of the professional class careerists that infest the political establishment, and a secure source of funding the increasingly marginalized working class can't provide.
James Howard
Failed harder than Leninism.
Xavier Flores
Yes, apathy and ignorance is a problem in any event. Politics is never perfect.
Ok then that clearly has to be reformed. Other countries have taken the first steps to doing this, clearly it's possible.
Because the US is a 2 party system but the democrats are a paper tiger, it's possible to subvert them with more left leaning people as Bernie Sanders was close to doing.
No it would require elections as does every other democratic movement. Just because it's hard doesn't mean it's impossible. We're dealing with a mass of uniformed voters. Why would it be easy.
M8, Bernie ran on 27$ a voter. It's really not impossible at all in 1st world America. All of your arguments are downright childish and it just seems like you're throwing a tantrum because politics isn't a cake walk for you. Of course it's hard but as Marx puts it, "history progresses on its bad side".
Easton Sanders
...
Cooper Allen
Lol, kys.
Ian Thompson
Bernie wasn't even a little close to "subverting" the Democrats and you're a deluded brainlet if you think that the Democratic Party is going leftward any time soon.
Cooper Morgan
Yes, a Democratic one.
Oliver Jones
He won over 20 states, you retard.
Isaiah Nelson
hehehe yeah man the boug will play nice
Nathaniel Ramirez
Name a single socialist program he advocates.
Liam Wilson
Bernie Sanders is by far the most popular politician in the country and he faced a virtual medial blackout during the election. Even mild socialist-leaning proposals are hugely popular, there's nothing "political" holding them back, it's the media, the military complex, the professional politicians who rightly conclude they'd be out of a job if socialists came to power.
Adrian Powell
Way to pretend as if you didn't just get called out for not knowing what the Paris Commune was.
You don't understand democratic socialism, it happens as an evolution not a failed political coup with morally correct gulags. Anything that gives people power over industry is a step towards socialism and its later higher stages.
Make an argument then.
Yes it was political, there was nothing stopping people from voting Bernie and the Democratic voters were already voting HRC from the start, she's a household name.
Adrian Howard
Clearly not.
Justin Anderson
Let me help you.
Someone actually having power to execute decision people voted for. IRL votes don't matter. See Catalonia, Greece, Ireland (EU constitution: results ignored, re-voting forced in 2009), France and Netherlands before that.
What checks and balances? There are only Capitalists.
Samuel Bell
The primaries are terribly corrupt. They have draconian conditions for registration most people know nothing about. The Democratic primary schedule is set up to favor well connected and conservative candidates with loads of cash and a friendly media environment, i.e. Hillary Clinton. Even if Sanders had won the primary and presidency, he would have been isolated and sabotaged by the rest of the political establishment. Look at how anemic Obama was, unable to even seat his own court nominations despite being a complete sellout to wall street. Obama's inability to deliver on reform is a big reason why people are so apathetic and turnout is so low, not because leftists are egotistical larpers.
I mean in polls of specific political figures. He is vastly more popular than anyone else who ran in 2016.
Charles Taylor
So the entire point of a state government. Welcome to pol sci 101.
So only the times when it hasn't worked smoothly is relevant, ok got'cha.
Oliver Gomez
I have to go to work, check back here in a few hours.
Jonathan Ortiz
No. The state is nothing but a machine for the oppression of one class by another, Welcome to Marxism 101.
Are you one of those who actually thinks that Hillary and Trump are the best America has to offer?
Blake Baker
why not just admit you don't think socialism is coming and campaign to renationalise the trains instead. the simple truth is that defeat campaigning for weirdo traitors in the labour party is more enjoyable or cathartic than impotence in some CPGB tier organization. if socialism is to come by non-violent measures this will primarily arise out of the material nature of production instead of by the ballot box.
then they lose (1983 uk) or disappoint you (1981 france) and i should emphasize here that despite putting the depressive realist case i still think tony blair was a traitor who compromised too much with neoliberalism. (personally were i an MP at the time, i'd have tied myself to the mast of impotence and drowned due to an unwillingness to compromise on "capitalist reality", i.e. keynes was right.)
his program was socdem even if he personally was socialist.
TIL thatcher's privatisations were socialist because they took share ownership of enterprise and transferred it from a distant state bureaucracy to the general public.
Ryan King
Have you ever heard the phrase "fascism is capitalism in self-defense"? Status quo liberalism is a farce, pretense that fosters complacency and protects the ruling class from blame when societal problems arise. The state is a functioning arm of the ruling class. Seizing control of this functioning arm for the benefit of the working class is the entire point of revolution. You are very naively assuming that people play fair in the real world. They don't. It doesn't matter whether breaking its own rules to enforce capitalism would outrage the vast majority of citizens when they wouldn't know the truth to begin with, Western governments already do shady shit all the time, especially the US.
Joseph Lewis
PSUV is quite literally a democratic socialist party that was promptly sbatoged you brianlet.
Hunter Brooks
No.
Gabriel Young
...
Samuel James
Wow, I can not believe Socdems get this sort of love on here wtf. Almost no one here argues that ithe is "morally right" because, like, Marx said moralism is bad so obviously that means morals don't real right? Like he couldn't have just wanted to make practical arguments, he hated all morality lollll. Anyways, your retarded Socdem policies have failed and will fail. Keep hating on Lenin, capitalists always hate socialists, no surprise.
Brody Martin
Hey guys i've never read Marx or Lenin but let me tell you there isn't possibly anything besides what i assign as ideology to what i call LARPers. Let's talk how we have to reinvent socialism and make it so it's all nice and fun with a little bit of capitalism and communism so that things are a bit more fair ^-^
Jace Jackson
i think writing in your laughter to your rebuttal is what really makes you an intellectual
Angel Mitchell
Even if non-violent revolution is possible, the protection of the revolution will entail great and sustained violence. Reformism does not, and cannot, work in bourgeois democracy. Peaceful revolution is conceivably possible, but again it result in civil violence.
You think the bourgeois will just sit still and allow the workers to take their property away from them?
William Jones
fixed it for you, and yes - there are plenty.
Jacob Mitchell
Made the pic better
Colton Jones
Stop confusing Marxism with anarchism.
David Hill
Marx literally wanted to overthrow the state, he just chose the wrong methods which opened the roads for vanguardism "dictatorship of the proletariat".
Austin Nguyen
The Ingenious Cyberneticist W Paul Cockshott of Edinburgh
Jason Cruz
Are you guys fucking retarded wikileaks proved that it got rigged against him. They literally denied him his rightful place. Hillary was one of the most hated people in the usa and she still almost won against an outsider promising everything middle America wanted.
I can't even get triggered by this. I was literally quoting Engels at you.
"Stop confusing Marxism with anarchism" (c)
Before political oppression (State) could be done away with, the economic oppression (Capitalism) must be done away with first. Then we'll have to abolish labour division (even after this we'll probably require post-scarcity economy to let the State truly go). Finally, when all of the above happens, we'll probably still be running Central Planning - which means that you are not going to have Full Anarchy (and don't go saying "but anarchism doesn't actually mean [something]" - there is no codified Anarchism, while Libertarian "Communism" of Catalonia did not like Planning).
Wyatt Ramirez
Yeah what's even the point of being "left-wing" if you want to make use of society's institutions and political mechanisms, and not alter them. I guess just presenting yourself as a liberal is not cool anymore.
