[canttakemyid]

QUOTE (LeVelocar @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 15:55)

QUOTE (sivispacem @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 20:23) QUOTE (LeVelocar @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 09:52) They've (thinking Norway in particular) got a lot of socialist tendencies Are you sure about that? QUOTE (A dictionary) socialism 1. a theory or system of social organization advocating placing the ownership and control of capital, land, and means of production in the community as a whole. Most unlike Scandinavia, or Europe as a whole in all honesty. European nations are, as I said before, neoliberal. Socialism entirely rejects the idea of a capitalist, free-market-based economy. Europe consists entirely of capitalist, free-market-based economies, and therefore cannot be socialist. Yes, I'm entirely sure, because I am not a dingus working in absolutes. Nationalizing something is a socialist policy. That is not to say that they have full socialism, or even that such would be desirable. Even the soviets had money.

The problem with all of these "ism"s is that they completely disregard the need to deviate from a standard formula of procedure. They lack versatility and disregard context. Different scenarios call for different approaches. This realization is undermined by the absolute nature of each "ism".

In theory, several systems are feasible on their own. Yet, in reality, no system can stand on its own without the influence of other systems. This is why pure capitalism, socialism, and communism never have and never will exist. So to bring things full circle, no one has "full" anything. America never even had "full" capitalism.

[sivispacem]

QUOTE (LeVelocar @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 21:55)

QUOTE (sivispacem @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 20:23) QUOTE (LeVelocar @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 09:52) They've (thinking Norway in particular) got a lot of socialist tendencies Are you sure about that? QUOTE (A dictionary) socialism 1. a theory or system of social organization advocating placing the ownership and control of capital, land, and means of production in the community as a whole. Most unlike Scandinavia, or Europe as a whole in all honesty. European nations are, as I said before, neoliberal. Socialism entirely rejects the idea of a capitalist, free-market-based economy. Europe consists entirely of capitalist, free-market-based economies, and therefore cannot be socialist. Yes, I'm entirely sure, because I am not a dingus working in absolutes. Nationalizing something is a socialist policy. That is not to say that they have full socialism, or even that such would be desirable. Even the soviets had money.

Then why refer to them as "socialist" when they're clearly not by any definition of the word? Especially given the near-complete lack of nationalised industry in Europe in comparison to privately owned industry. I mean, aside from occasional pieces of critical infrastructure there's no nationalised industry in Europe. So, care to explain to me how this equates to socialism?

[LeVelocar]

QUOTE (sivispacem @ Wednesday, Mar 13 2013, 22:34)

Then why refer to them as "socialist" when they're clearly not by any definition of the word? Especially given the near-complete lack of nationalised industry in Europe in comparison to privately owned industry. I mean, aside from occasional pieces of critical infrastructure there's no nationalised industry in Europe. So, care to explain to me how this equates to socialism?

I'm sorry, what?

No nationalised industry?

I know we both live in a con-dem led Randian theme park of a country, but to claim places like Norway don't have aton of nationalisation is ridiculous. The world outside our tiny little island is a very different place.

And your definition of socialism is broken. The NHS is an institution founded and ran (badly) on socialist principles, for example, but you're happy to claim there's no such thing just because we haven't hung Lizzie from a lamp post and destroyed the concept of money. Get real.

This post has been edited by LeVelocar on Thursday, Mar 14 2013, 03:23

[sivispacem]

QUOTE (LeVelocar @ Thursday, Mar 14 2013, 04:20)

but to claim places like Norway don't have aton of nationalisation is ridiculous. The world outside our tiny little island is a very different place. And your definition of socialism is broken. The NHS is an institution founded and ran (badly) on socialist principles, for example, but you're happy to claim there's no such thing just because we haven't hung Lizzie from a lamp post and destroyed the concept of money. Get real.

As I said, government ownership relates usually to critical infrastructure. That's perfectly reasonable and logical, and a common theme across the world even in predominantly free market economies. The reason Norway possesses a disproportionately high quantity of state-owned enterprise compared to continental Europe is because the majority of it's GDP is derived from operations concerning areas of critical infrastructure- most notably natural resource exploitation in the form of extraction of Brent crude and natural gas. Norway is a glowing example of a Hybrid economy but the complete lack of current desire on the part of government organisations to expand state ownership of enterprise further than it currently extends suggests that we aren't talking about a country that can really be referred to as Socialist.

Similarly, the presence of a nationalised heath service is not an indicator of Socialism. Even the United States pre-Obama had some form of nationalised healthcare. In fact, I'm relatively sure it exists in every country in the world. Again, certain sectors of the economy related to critical infrastructure- of which I'd call healthcare provision one- tend to be state-run or run as a public-private-partnership as we have here in the UK, because that way it allows the government to maintain a secure monopoly on the services required to ensure the proper functioning of the nation.

[acmilano]

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/16/world/am...html?hpt=ila_c1

Unfortunatly,Venezuela can't find some peace these days. New elections brings more violence and division.