Private property, collectivisation and land as a special kind of property

[jondwhite]

Are these all red herrings when it comes to a future socialist society?

[DJP]

It seems to me you are not using the word ‘socialism’ to refer to the same thing as the socialist party does. If you were the answer to your question would be self evident.

[jondwhite]

More specifically, is it accurate to describe socialist society as the abolition of private property? What is the response to depictions of socialism as collectivisation? What is the response to the idea that socialism only abolishes land as a category of private property? And everything else flows from the abolition of land as a special kind of property. I think these are distinct but related questions.

[jondwhite]

Is the abolition of capital a better description than the abolition of private property? Is the abolition of land as property, a mutualist thing?

[ALB]

Here’s what Marx had to say on the subject (in chapter 46 of Volume 3 of Capital):

Quote:

From the standpoint of a higher economic form of society, private ownership of the globe by single individuals will appear quite as absurd as private ownership of one man by another. Even a whole society, a nation, or even all simultaneously existing societies taken together, are not the owners of the globe. They are only its possessors, its usufructuaries, and, like boni patres familias, they must hand it down to succeeding generations in an improved condition.

Of course, unlike land reformers who just wanted to end private property in land, Marx took the view that this principle should apply to human-made instruments of production as  well as to land and natural resources, and together at the same time.This is why socialism (or communism) can be described as a global society in which the resources of the planet, natural and industrial, are the common heritage of all humanity.

[Author]

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