>But I oppose bourgeois property relations and support substantive equality.
>
>Tahir: I hope you will offer your definition of substantive equality.
You want the short version? The long one is a book I haven't written yet. But I was using your terms, and I thought I understood them. What Imean is roughtly this: formal equality is equality before the law, everyone gets due process, the right to vote, etc. Substanbtive equalkity means the resources, conditions, and effective power to exercise those rights in a manner that is righly equal in efficacy to anybody else. The distinction matches up on the freedom side to Berlin's distinction between negative and positive freedom. Isn't thsi roughly waht you meant?
>At the risk of sounding
>end-of-history-sh, what have you got that is better?
>
>Tahir: Well whether I have anything better is not the point.
It certainly is. No one, starting with me, will think you area nything but a total crank if you say that liberal dsemocracy should be transcended, presumably by something better, but you have no clue what. That is equivalent to saying that it shoulkd bot be transcenhded. I am perfectly willing to say that if sometrhing better comes along, I'll jump on it. But before I give up what we've fought and died for, I want to have a rational basis to think that it' for somrething better.
>The argument of communists, as well as philosophers such as Hegel that I
>mentioned, was that "something better" can only come out of a critique of
>what is. So no critique means "nothing better" to me. The idea of communism
>has no real substance outside the critiique of capitalism.
Yeah, well I say thesame thing about alternatives to capitalism. I am a market socialist and not a communist because I think that there are good arguments that MS would be better and communism would not. Of course this goes hand in hand with a critique of capitalism.
>My critique of liberal democracy was in that same spirit, not because I
>was comparing it point for point with some blueprint that I have up my
>sleeve.
We don't need a "blueprint," a detailed account of how to engage in institutional reconstruction, a constitution and law code for an alternative society. We need a description of the main features of the alternative that isarticulatedenough to answer obvious questions people will have about what it is better.
>Your points above are all about an obviously deep satisfaction with the
>institutions of liberal democracy,
Yes and no. I think that in principles, these thinhgs are all great. Univerasl suffrage? What's the alternative? Who would you exclude from voting? Representative govt? Well, the alternativesa re direct democracy,w hich won't work in a large society and would take too much time, or dictatorship or oligarchy. Competitive elections for represemnattive psoitions are a sine qa non--or are you a fan of one party states? Maybe no party states? But is that realistic? Exntensiuve civil and poolitiocal liberties--well, you're obviosuly notw ith Charles in his advocacy of repression, so aren't you for this?
At the same time, I don't think I could have been more clear that the realization of these values in capitalist society is deepky disappointing because of the class structure, the power of money, the corruption and cynicism. I am a Chicago lawyer, what I haven't encountered in the way of the corruption of democracy is is being developed here. So am am I rosy-eyed? I think not.
> which is one of the two main political expressions of capitalism (see below). I fail to see how they can be compatible with substantive equality.
I don't see why we can't have public ownership of productive assets, workers' control of production, and also the institutional structures I described. Besides, I cannot imagine acceptable alternatives. Now it's your turn. Tell me what you mean by substantive equality and why it is inconsistent with liberal democracy.
>Liberalism and democracy are of course not quite the same thing despite
>their conjoining in our discourse.
That's right,w hich is why I say liberal democracy, and it's not redundant.
>Liberalism is precisely minimal government - you are right - in the
>interests of capitalism.
That's one use of it, not mine. I didn't say MINIMAL govt, nightwatchman state, I'm not a Locke-Nozick libertarian. I said LIMITED government, basically that the govt must be given specific powers by the people, and the people have a lot of rights against the govt, free speech and the like. How does that promote capitalism?
>This is quite different to the communist idea of NO government within a
>communal society.
A total fantasy, completely impossiible in a complex modsern society.
>I think that there can still be some progressive content in democracy, in
>areas that you mention such as free press, freedom of association, etc.
>where these are still absent.
That's big of you.
>But if one believes that a communal society is both possible and necessary,
>then one would envisage an end to democracy,
Logical, but crazy. I don't think that it is either and I do not envisage the end of democracy.
> Within a communal society there could certainly be some choosing of representatives in certain forums,
Ahhh, the nub.
but it would be nothing like democracy for reasons already suggested. I
would never vote for a professional politician as my "representative", since
I think that elections are just another way of oppressing the masses through
demagoguery and the illusions of free and meaningful choice.
>
> >Why is this not good enough, because it alienates us to the core of our
> >being, i.e. from what makes us human, namely our species bond with our
> >fellow human beings. This alienation creates cynicism, despair,
>outsiders,
> >meaninglessness, etc.
>
>Liberal democracy does this? Wow, who woulda thunk.
>
>Tahir: Lots of people do and you damn well know it.
We have a different understanding of the terms.
>the core elements of liberal democracy:
>competitive elections, universal suffrage, representative government, and
>extensive civil and political liberties, it is difficult for me to imagine
>a
>change that is also an improvement. Maybe that is a failure of my
>imagination. Please enlighten me. I am not being sarcastic.
>
>Tahir: look the critique comes down to this: they are about freedom to
>exploit.
Huh? I thought they were about the roughly equal ability of every person to participate in self government, to have a say in decisions about policies that affect everyone, ands to be prorecteda gainst the government if it gets oppressive. That is unlike, for example,a right to private property in productive assets. You have NOT explained how lib dem is connected, except externally, contingently, and historically, to capitalism.
>But the circle remains unbroken. Liberals like you are a little better than
>the stopped clock that is right twice a day. You are on the crest of the
>wave for about half of the time, fondly imagining that it is because you
>were right, then the wave dumps you and you have to wait for the next wave
>of liberalism to come along and make you feel vindicated again. But it is
>the cycle itself that we oppose.
>
Well, better half the time than never!
jks
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