That is a great point. And probably links logically with the idea of forced collectivization. The first point probably goes to scalability. If “the workers” means the workers on that farm or in that community, it seems very unlikely that they would vote to starve. On a larger scale, it might not work that way. Whatever collective is responsible for fuel distribution might have other priorities than our farm, also the people who distribute water for irrigation. There has to be some coordination on a larger scale for it to work.
I have actually been spending a bit of time on the DSA site. Not just their constitution, but also quite a few of their articles. I agree it is unfair to just casually pick out a few troubling sentences and focus on that with the exclusion of everything else. There is quite a bit of speculation about how the transition to a socialist economy would take place. That collectivization is the ultimate goal is not in doubt. How to achieve that goal is the question. It seems to me that collectivization is either forced or voluntary. I can imagine ( and see the history of) forced collectivization and how that might occur, but I have more trouble imagining the mechanism of voluntary collectivization.
There seem to be two major false arguments about socialism. First, one might see problems in a socialist state and conclude that those problems are necessarily caused by socialism. The other big one seems to be that when a socialist experiment fails, it is labeled “not real socialism”. Neither of those arguments are logical.
I guess that goes back to scale, and which “workers” are making the decisions. As far as my reasoning on your last point, I am looking at history somewhat, but also having some issues with how an alternative would work. We have some neighbors who farm communally. Their system works adequately on a very small scale, but it is good that they are experimenting with it inside a larger conventional farming community. They can always rely on us when they run out of hay or their equipment breaks down.
Agreed, and previously discussed, at least India.
Anyway, this discussion is interesting, and gives me something to think about while running fences. This morning, I was pondering how people are incentivized in our hypothetical socialist state. Under our current system, Much of what we do here is about long-term investment in work. We plant things with the knowledge that our grandchildren will be the first people to enjoy them. A lot of what we do is part of a long-term multi-generational effort. We hire people seasonally, but they understandably do not have the motivations we do, as far as ranch work goes. If they, as “workers”, had an equal vote on ranch decisions, we might find ourselves voting on a proposal to not work on rainy days, or to forgo difficult drainage improvements because it is miserable work, with no short term payoff.
Not everyone is motivated by a personal quest for excellence in their daily work. In that regard, I am not sure that decisions by all the workers would be better than the self interest shown by shareholders in a corporate system. That seems to be a thing that would vary by occupation.
But back to the specific topic of young people and socialism. Besides seeming to not have much of an idea what socialism is, young people are less likely to own property or have children. So the risk they feel they might take in supporting a system that could fail is much less. And they are very much less likely to have lived in a socialist state.
Each of my kids, at one school or other, has come home to tell me how one of their teachers or professors has lectured them on what a great system Marxism would be, if it were ever tried. My kids are pretty much immune to that sort of thing, but it has to have an effect on a large part of their generation. I never encountered any of that until college. It would have been absurd when I was in elementary school. I can imagine doing a reading from Das Kapital right after a “duck and cover” Civil Defense drill.
