My experience in Socialism

[The Penetrator]

I see some debates here about socialism lately, people argue about what they read about it on internet or heard, didnt want to bomb threads and maybe this could be an interesting read for some of you..

As a guy who lived in both socialism and capitalism, first thing i will say is socialism ( as i t was in yugoslavia ) wasnt that bad really, and it really isnt that different from capitalism in everyday life: we all did wake up, go to work, get paid, eat, sleep, hang out ,go to concerts, party hard, drink heavy, smoke weed, had sex, did whatever, its not like time stopped or we were not "free" or whatever bs i read on internet today, like "in socialism there is no music" i was like WTF...

Generally as a political system of a country, here are good and bad aspects of socialism as it was in everyday life:

bad aspects

- missing out on technology. When rest of the world had colour TVs, we were still on black and whites. When they had VCRs, we had colour TVs. Right now we would probably be at Nokia 3310 phones. In reality this isnt a real problem for humanity, but desire to be the best and having advanced shit is a part of human nature.
- ugly ass buildings / structures. Also not sure if this was to blame on socialism or just architects of the time, but some of that shit really makes you wonder. Most of them still stand and are pretty damn sturdy, material was not spared, literally everything was made of reinforced concrete...
- if your dream is being financially wealthier than others, you re probbly not gonna be able to do it. Everyone was a part of solid, stable middle class. There ofcourse were richer and poorer people, regular worker normally was paid less than a company director, singers and celebrities were wealthy, but differences in wealth were vastly smaller ( it also has some upsides compared to todays capitalism, since today random instagram hoe earns more money than an average professor ).
- It was really hard to own a big private company, cause competing with state run businesses was damn near impossible. Private businesses were mostly small, family ran businesses with less than 10 workers.

good aspects
- everyone had a job. Literally. You finish school, you get a job ASAP based on what school/college you graduated in. When you get a job, state gives you a house or apartment based on your family size, for free, and its yours ( ie my father had 3 children so we got a 3+2 room apartment from his company ). When you die, your children inherit it, it belongs to your family. So practically no homeless people.
- Cause everyone had a job, working was far less stresfull. Companies werent competing, so there was no reason to fire people just to increase profit for a company, so every company had like 50% more people than it should. IE my grandad worked in a iron factory that had over 1000 workers. After we adopted capitalist democracy, same factory with same machinery and production rate worked on 300 workers, and later shut down cause it was cheaper to import iron from wherever...
- Free health care for everyone. We still have this system here. You could ofcourse, always pay for a private doctor if you feel he can do a better job at certain situations, but 95% of time you just go get fixed for free, whatever it is dental or medical. Stuff like plastic or cosmetic surgery obviously arent included.


Whats worrying though is the way we were enforced to adopt capitalism, just a couple of years of targeted media made us hate Serbs and vice versa to the point they invaded us with tanks, soon enough both sides were armed and went on to full on war with people we were friends and family for generations. Ofcourse it all made chaos, inflation, companies were ruined, and made it all possible for Germany, Italy, USA and others that happily provided weapons for both sides, to buy our companies for like 1$, and so now 80% of Croatian companies ( telecomunications, post office, banks, you name it ) are owned by ones that provided us weapons to kill eachother, but we are now supposed to be happy cause were free from the grasp of socialism.

For socialism to work today it would require alot of changes. To me it is stupid to make this black and white separations between anything, let alone something as complicated as political systems. If I was to choose, I would probably keep some form of capitalism, cause i believe healthy competition is good ( except this todays form of capitalism is not healthy competition at all ) , but i would try to implement some things from socialism, probably some new ideas too.

Thats my 2 cents, its not to be agreed or disagreed with, its just my opinion based on my experience.

Cheers!

 

[Lord_Impaler]

Nice post, thanks for the insight.

Yugoslavia has always intrigued me.

Just started reading "The Balkans: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers, 1804-2011"

 

[slivercord]

Gave it a shot and read it, good post! I'm just wondering what kind of socialism you're talking about, in the 80s? heavily influenced by soviet communism, or the one we have now in Europe. Actually the good aspects beat the bad I think. I'm supposed to live in a socialist country, which I align myself with. But it's sometimes a load of crap, I can't really blame the ideology but the fake politicians who are greedy, corrupt and fly under the banner, when in reality they are crony capitalists. I don't wish a utopia, it's impossible. But progress would help. Just to end my point, a lot has been done, drugs regulations, free Healthcare, education up to 12 grade. More affordable college in top universities. All laws that passed under the socialist government, it comes with a price in my taxes which I'm willing to pay. Nothing will ever be perfect, but I lean on the ideals of a better society. Got kind of off topic but that's just some of my thoughts.

 

[Falsedawn]

Quality thread, thanks for your experiences.

Do you think there are any inherent flaws that prevent a socialist society from persisting indefinitely? You said you all were kinda forced into capitalism, do you think that was inevitable if considered in a vacuum? That may be an unrealistic question given the circumstances surrounding Yugoslavia's breakup, but i'm curious.

 

[Blackened]

Interesting.

I take it was different from Soviet style communism? I had a friend from college whose parents live behind the Iron Curtain, said they didn't have shit and it was horrible. Came here in 1994.

Was it more like the Nazi Germany's, "has nothing to do with Marxian Socialism," saying that "Marxism is anti-property; true Socialism is not."?

More like the United States today? Have any resources where I can learn about it?

 

[The Penetrator]

Do you think there are any inherent flaws that prevent a socialist society from persisting indefinitely? You said you all were kinda forced into capitalism, do you think that was inevitable if considered in a vacuum? That may be an unrealistic question given the circumstances surrounding Yugoslavia's breakup, but i'm curious.

It probably could presist, it also had some good times and bad times, like in any system i guess... Maybe one of the biggest reasons was, like i said, the human nature to want the latest and most advanced shit, so since many people from here would go to germany to party on weekends ( Germany in 80s was the shit, legal prostitution, drugs, parties everywhere ) and see the latest shit, things back home werent that interesting anymore... Yugo was a reliable and a good car in 80's, but driving home a beamer from Berlin raises alot of eyebrows and brings alot of pussy So just because human nature, it might be impossible for it to presist unless the whole world were socialist, or the technology just didnt develop as rapidly as it did in outside world.

It probably could still presist over here, but pressure from the outside world was way too powerful, media is the most powerful thing known to man, like i said, couple of years of targeted media made us kill eachother, with weapons provided by the ones that pushed that propaganda and then bought out our entire country for pennies. That war shuold never happen, there was 0 reason for it...

 

[bigbangspiritbomb]

Nice post, thanks for the insight.

Yugoslavia has always intrigued me.

+ 1

Thanks TS for the insight. Again, I always acknowledge the level of self interest each ideology brings. I have not lived outside short vacations to socialist and communist countries. I know more of capitalism living in America. I think that it is a good sentiment and very Christian/Jesus like but, in a economic world, I don't see it taking. The fact that you could tomorrow become very wealthy or rich even over night. I guess I am a firm believer of the devil you know is better then the one you don't know.

 

[Harmonica]

I was surprised to see you didn't put "nationalization" under bad aspects. You are alright with the state seizing private assets on the ground of dividing it equally among its citizens?

I take it was different from Soviet style communism?

Indeed it was but it also had some catastrophic practices that no true American would put up with. As in, the state nationalizing factories and ultimately housing. Some of the more well off people had to, on the orders of the state, let provincials move in with them. Their apartments were technically no longer theirs since the state seized them, and newcomers weren't treated as subtenants but actually had equal rights as original owners. Nobody could chuck you out of your apartment but all you really had was a right of occupancy, you couldn't sell it.

 

[Kalmah]

I was surprised to see you didn't put "nationalization" under bad aspects. You are alright with the state seizing private assets on the ground of dividing it equally among its citizens?

Depends what you're nationalizing, I guess. You can make an argument for privatization being a bad aspect of capitalism as well.

 

[Harmonica]

Depends what you're nationalizing, I guess. You can make an argument for privatization being a bad aspect of capitalism as well.

How about people's living space? Read the second part of my post I just added.

 

[dontlaugh]

My experience in it :

When things are going well, they start lying as if the future will be even better

When things go to shit, they start lying that it will be better soon

Sorry i'm too lazy to elaborate right now. But in my experience it is frustrating. Too much to pay for, no money to spend. Gotta work and study your ass off and pray to have a good job that can maintain you and your family.

 

[Cuauhtemoc]

Socialism is not bad in itself. Marxist totalitarian socialism is pretty bad. By that I mean a totalitarian government that tries to implement all of Marx ideas like abolishing religion, families and marriage(eventually).


It is also very ineffective so eventually your country will be poor and be destroyed by a more advanced one.

If I lived in a homogeneous country I'd be OK with some aspects of socialism. It works well in some european countries. But in places like the USA it wouldn't work because white people would feel scammed because although 60%+ of the population they receive only around 40% of the welfare aid, it goes mostly to blacks and hispanics, who contribute much less. That's the reason they vote for the small government conservative idiots after all.
Also it goes pretty much against american culture, of the self made man, the pilgrims and so on.

 

[panamaican]

Interesting read. Glad I stopped in.

 

[Kalmah]

How about people's living space? Read the second part of my post I just added.

I think it depends on the circumstances of the country. I can see arguments for it being a bad aspect now but also a good one at the time when it was introduced considering the state Yugoslavia was in after WWII.

Nationalization of industry and private property might have been what Yugoslavia needed to help kickstart the rebuilding of their country. The occupation and liberation left Yugoslavia's infrastructure destroyed. Even the most developed parts of the country were largely rural, and the little industry the country had was mostly destroyed. There really wasn't much to be "seized".

Despite what TS says, unemployment (and thus homelessness) was a chronic problem for Yugoslavia. The unemployment rates were amongst the highest in Europe during it's existence and they did not reach critical levels before the 80's only because they sent a million guest workers yearly to advanced industrialized countries in Western Europe. By the early 70's 20% of the country's labour force were employed abroad.

Your description of what housing and property rights in Yugoslavia were like is quite simplified and not really correct. Yugoslavia abandoned the Soviet model of state ownership over production means and real property in the late 50's in favour of something called "social ownership" which was formally introduced in the Constitution of 1963.

However, social ownership did not completely banish private ownership. For residential property, private ownership was allowed but significantly limited to a certain size of living space. The land that privately owned houses were built on remained in social ownership however. For agricultural land, private ownership was limited to a maximum of 10 hectares.

In this respect, Yugoslav socialism was rather pragmatic since it considered private ownership as an existing necessity and a remaining capitalist relic for a transitional socialist society*** (Major emphasis on transitional). The restrictions on private property were imposed to prevent capitalist exploitation.

 

[JDragon]

I think it depends on the circumstances of the country. I can see arguments for it being a bad aspect now but also a good one at the time when it was introduced considering the state Yugoslavia was in after WWII.

Nationalization of industry and private property might have been what Yugoslavia needed to help kickstart the rebuilding of their country. The occupation and liberation left Yugoslavia's infrastructure destroyed. Even the most developed parts of the country were largely rural, and the little industry the country had was mostly destroyed. There really wasn't much to be "seized".

Despite what TS says, unemployment (and thus homelessness) was a chronic problem for Yugoslavia. The unemployment rates were amongst the highest in Europe during it's existence and they did not reach critical levels before the 80's only because they sent a million guest workers yearly to advanced industrialized countries in Western Europe. By the early 70's 20% of the country's labour force were employed abroad.

Your description of what housing and property rights in Yugoslavia were like is quite simplified and not really correct. Yugoslavia abandoned the Soviet model of state ownership over production means and real property in the late 50's in favour of something called "social ownership" which was formally introduced in the Constitution of 1963.

However, social ownership did not completely banish private ownership. For residential property, private ownership was allowed but significantly limited to a certain size of living space. The land that privately owned houses were built on remained in social ownership however. For agricultural land, private ownership was limited to a maximum of 10 hectares.

In this respect, Yugoslav socialism was rather pragmatic since it considered private ownership as an existing necessity and a remaining capitalist relic for a transitional socialist society*** (Major emphasis on transitional). The restrictions on private property were imposed to prevent capitalist exploitation.

Quality post. I will keep an eye on your posts in the future

 

[LatFlare]

It all fell apart without tito.

 

[Harmonica]

I think it depends on the circumstances of the country. I can see arguments for it being a bad aspect now but also a good one at the time when it was introduced considering the state Yugoslavia was in after WWII.

Nationalization of industry and private property might have been what Yugoslavia needed to help kickstart the rebuilding of their country. The occupation and liberation left Yugoslavia's infrastructure destroyed. Even the most developed parts of the country were largely rural, and the little industry the country had was mostly destroyed. There really wasn't much to be "seized".

Despite what TS says, unemployment (and thus homelessness) was a chronic problem for Yugoslavia. The unemployment rates were amongst the highest in Europe during it's existence and they did not reach critical levels before the 80's only because they sent a million guest workers yearly to advanced industrialized countries in Western Europe. By the early 70's 20% of the country's labour force were employed abroad.

Your description of what housing and property rights in Yugoslavia were like is quite simplified and not really correct. Yugoslavia abandoned the Soviet model of state ownership over production means and real property in the late 50's in favour of something called "social ownership" which was formally introduced in the Constitution of 1963.

However, social ownership did not completely banish private ownership. For residential property, private ownership was allowed but significantly limited to a certain size of living space. The land that privately owned houses were built on remained in social ownership however. For agricultural land, private ownership was limited to a maximum of 10 hectares.

In this respect, Yugoslav socialism was rather pragmatic since it considered private ownership as an existing necessity and a remaining capitalist relic for a transitional socialist society*** (Major emphasis on transitional). The restrictions on private property were imposed to prevent capitalist exploitation.

You are wrong. There was a lot to be seized and it was seized. Not in the rural parts of the country but in bigger cities. My great-grandfather, for instance, had to give up almost everything he worked hard to build, from his bakery to his apartments, in spite the fact he acquired it through legal and non-exploitative means.

True, unemployment was an issue even back then.

Everything I stated is correct, although I can see why you objected since I failed to mention that Yugoslavia didn't abolish private property entirely.