Capitalism and communism as aspects of evolution

The idea of modern communism in the West became intertwined with the threats of the Russian and Chinese empires. It could be argued that Russian communism was an extension of the Czar’s desire to expand the empire, communist insurgents were then similar to CIA insurgents for example in Iran Contra maintaining the Monroe Doctrine. Chinese communism has been referred to as an extension of ancient Confucianism, based on the family and the patriarch.

Much of the fear of communism is the fear of rival empires, with a different economic system. Communism has been regarded as a threat in the West for a long time, but it is often conflated with a fear of the Russians or the Chinese. Even now they are considered to be dangerous, Russia is no longer communist but the way it is handled has not changed. Because of this, communism is not well defined in the West compared to its original meaning.

This confusion happened because the West didn’t really understand what communism was. The reason was the communist countries didn’t understand what it was either. This is an important point, communism was a word from Karl Marx but then the word had to mean something. So they had to create a thing called communism, with some clues from Marx and Engels. But Marx had little idea on what would replace capitalism, only that something had to if it was as fragile as he thought. The presumption was that communism was a thing, if it was inevitable then it perhaps needed to be helped along.

But communism as Marx envisaged it was not a thing, just like capitalism is not a thing but a process. In capitalism there is competition between capital and labor, and against other businesses. In communism there was more cooperation between people, based on the evolutionary idea that the herd in nature was the natural protection against predators. With predatory capitalism then, the way to protect workers was by their uniting such as in unions.

This is a common process in Western society, first a name is invented and then it needs to grow to mean something. Liberalism is an example of this, it means countless different things in the Western media from capitalism to communism, to a cultural elite and wokism. But Liberalism started out as being against kings and authoritarian governments, from Locke, Bentham and Mills. It comes from the Roman Liber, to liberate as does libertarianism.

Karl Marx lived in the Industrial Revolution, he saw the contradictions of Capitalism and how it had evolved from Feudalism. That is where the aristocracy controlled serfs as laborers, instead of the aristocracy running the economy more businessmen did. They were often strongly associated with government power so the change was gradual.

Karl Marx tried to imagine what this change from feudalism and capitalism would evolve to naturally. He saw a progressive liberation of workers, that has certainly continued in our own world. Communism was feared more because Marx alone believed this transition would only happen violently, that Capitalists would never give anything to the workers voluntarily.

But it was also based on being against Darwin’s theory of evolution, which was a recent idea sweeping the world. The Capitalist take away from Darwin was that survival of the fittest was the best way for an economy to work. However capitalism at the time, like the earlier aristocracy, was nothing like this just as it is nothing like that today. Much of it was a club of self-supporting predators in an economy, like a pride of lions attacking together. The old aristocracy giving way to a newer one, getting their own knighthoods even today and becoming part of a new aristocracy.

The idea of predatory capitalism is not a criticism, it follows from Darwin as his most efficient way for an economy to evolve. Just as prides of lions might get stronger by overcoming rival prides, companies can become more efficient by taking over another’s territory. For the prey in nature, and workers in a capitalist economy, much of this competition is irrelevant to them.

Communism evolved in part from a different concept, such as Kropotkin’s belief in the cooperative nature of the herd such as with cattle and horses. He developed these ideas traveling through Siberia. This is how prey in nature protect themselves against predators ganging up on them. The mutual protection of the herd balances predators in nature.

One of the ideas of early communism was to create a herd mentality of their citizens supporting each other. This is not a controversial idea, much of modern society has herd like connections between people to protect them from predatory capitalism and salespeople. In China this merged with Confucianism, that defined the role of the family in a cohesive society.

But even this went beyond what Marx actually said. He believed that capitalism like feudalism would evolve into something more balanced for the workers. And so it did, unions were the equivalent of a herd of buffalo protecting itself against capitalists ganging up on them. When the herd mentality of unions declined, so did their wages, but there were more Darwinian evolutionary changes in the economy that came from this. Some might argue the benefits or drawbacks of this, but it also followed the evolutionary arguments of early herd communism against predatory capitalism.

Some of these rollbacks of herd protections were bad, such as from the previous predatory capitalists that caused the great depression. Many economists proclaimed that Marx was right after all, that capitalism would destroy itself.

Just as in nature, neither the herd or the individual person is a better system. Animals have evolved to do whatever works, some for example run away quite successfully from lions as individuals.

Marx thought the predatory aspect of capitalism would die away completely, the equivalent of lions being hunted down and removed from an ecosystem. This has happened throughout nature, man has often removed the apex predators which has had some benefits and drawbacks. Marx wanted capitalistic predators to be rooted out of society, much like many try to do today with social justice.

Then the herds of prey as citizens would be liberated, free of exploitation. Some societies are like this today, where capitalism is so hamstrung it cannot get rid of efficiency. Then their economies stagnated, particularly in the 1970s as the high point of this thinking. A lot changed with Thatcher and Reagan, more predatory business was allowed. It was the equivalent of reintroducing wolves into an ecosystem.

This is also the equivalent in nature of predators keeping prey healthy by eating the weak and sick, so the strongest and most wary survive. It can be good for an economy if it doesn’t go too far, but many people supporting social justice continue to protest against this.

It ended up going too far in the other direction in communist countries, from predators being supreme, to the prey running the Animal Farm. But this also happened in many Western countries that nationalized businesses and had too expensive a Nanny state to support. Modern society tries to be a balance between the two.

Much of what Marx saw did happen. He believed the weakness of capitalism was in engorging itself on the weak as prey until there were no resources left. Then the capitalists would starve as they finally attacked each other, leading to the system collapsing completely.

He referred to this as capitalists cutting wages for profits until the workers couldn’t afford to buy the capitalist’s goods and then capitalism would collapse as it did in the Great Depression. Modern macroeconomics is built on the same idea, that is why Roosevelt raised wages in the New Deal for example.

In fact Lenin and Stalin thought the 1930s were the end of capitalism, and were waiting around for communism to triumph in a matter of weeks. Helping it along with communist insurgents led to Nazis and Fascists evolving to protect against them, like capitalism protecting itself from communism. That turned into a global fight in the cold war.
The innate anti-communist part of Nazism and Fascism led to attacking communist Russia in WW2.

So much of this is just evolution, predator and prey, a pack against a herd. To say socialism doesn’t work is like saying herds don’t work, yet they are among the most common animals and are thriving.
There can be the right balance between pack and herd behavior, and individual behavior like libertarians and the original definitions of Liberals.

I think if Marx was alive today he would see modern society as what he envisaged. There are a lot of herd-like protections, an insurance-based Nanny state to protect citizens from predatory business and their own foolish behavior. But predators in nature often depend on catching foolish prey. But there is also limited predation allowed to create more innovation, which helps the economy.