this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2024
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Why capitalists are coming out against democracy - "Does classical liberalism imply democracy?"

https://www.ellerman.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Reprint-EGP-Classical-Liberalism-Democracy.pdf

"There is a fault line running through ... liberalism as to whether or not democratic self- governance is a necessary part of a liberal social order. The democratic and non-democratic strains of classical liberalism are both present today. Many ... libertarians ... represent the non-democratic strain in their promotion of non-democratic sovereign city-states."

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[–] swlabr@awful.systems 14 points 4 months ago (6 children)

As a non-denominational leftist, liberalism is poison and leads to fascism without intervention. So yeah this tracks

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 20 points 4 months ago (5 children)

I'm a leftist as well. The paper argues that the non-democratic liberals are wrong about the implications of liberal principles. It even goes further and makes an argument that coherent liberalism must also oppose capitalism, and capitalism is inherently non-democratic. By the end, the paper argues that a democratic economy controlled by workers is the only kind of economic organization compatible with liberalism. Capitalist liberalism is poison because it is incoherent

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[–] V0ldek@awful.systems 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (3 children)

coherent liberalism must also oppose capitalism, and capitalism is inherently non-democratic

Yup, and I hate that "liberal" for most people means something completely different. I self-identify as a liberal, in the sense that, for example, a rentier class of landlords existing or that any human's existence being completely dependent on their job and income is inherently counter to liberal ideals.

I don't know when someone decided we'll mean something anti-liberal by the word "liberal" but they can go fuck themselves.

I don't think democracy is inherently liberal or not, and I don't think it really matters? This is a question of outcomes. No other political system has a history of consistently producing relatively free states (as in freedom for the people within the state). All other systems, be it oligarchies or dictatorships, even if they result in a short period of stability and freedom, almost universally deteriorate into authoritarian hellscapes over time. If we can come up with a system that is better at preventing oppressive regimes then we should rally behind it, but currently only democracy has a positive track record there.

[–] froztbyte@awful.systems 5 points 3 months ago

(at a guess) that reversal in terms is probably thanks to the USA, where “Conservative” also doesn’t mean conservative, and “libertarian” has little to do with liberty

[–] grumpybozo@toad.social 4 points 3 months ago

@V0ldek @sneerclub It happened when rich people realized that their individual liberty in a world of mostly poor people would intrinsically be constrained by proper democracy.

A government dedicated to maximizing the broadest possible freedom will, if allowed, redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor, to provide the poor more opportunities & limit the dangerous “freedoms” of the ultra-wealthy to impose their own control over others.

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 3 points 3 months ago

Did you read the article? It argues that democracy is necessary to meet the requirements of liberal procedural justice, so it isn't just a matter of outcomes

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