5 Flaws of Communism
Prout recognises the great contribution of Karl Marx to the world of politics and economics - there are a large number of things that are good and progressive regards communism, not least that it helps society to move forwards together and not leave anyone behind. However, Communism as a theory is fatally flawed, and so, it can actually be damaging to society in its implementation. Here are five flaws that Prout sees in Communism:-
- You cannot treat everyone uniformly - Diversity is the Law of Nature - By nature each expression of each plant, animal and person is unique, and trying to standardise their expressions goes against a fundamental law of nature. (This is a flaw in Capitalist Mass Production also!). Any progressive society must treat every individual according to their merits, and reward them meritocratically, otherwise there are no incentives for hard work or innovation. However, this needs to work in conjunction with two basic Prout principles - that accumulation of wealth by any individual needs to be restricted and that the minimum necessities need to be guaranteed for everyone.
- Humans are more than Material - Both Capitalism and Communism suffer from reducing life to materialism. When looking at how resources are utilised, one must consider that humans are more than just their physical labour/potential. They also have psychic (metaphysical) and spiritual potential that needs to not be exploited and to be given expression in a way that will benefit society. For example, an artist whose works are of a spiritually uplifting nature, should not be made to work in a call centre or restaurant in order to maintain themselves, but should be given support to allow their expression scope to benefit the most number of people.
- Spirituality must not be suppressed - Yes, we have all heard that religion is the opiate, but consider for a moment that the physical world is finite. Humans have an innate propensity to not be satisfied by anything finite - to try to let humans satiate this desire in the physical world will only lead to conflict, exploitation and suffering. Humans need boundaries in the physical sphere (this earth is not infinite), but they need to be allowed scope to fulfill their desire for something infinite. This is best done through facilitating spiritual pursuits. Prout understands that the dogmatic constraints of many religions also prohibit the individual from fulfilling their desire for grasping something infinite in nature, and so we would say that these types of religions are the placebo of the masses, and should not be used as substitutes for scientific spiritual pursuit.
- Centralised economics leads to corruption - Collecting all revenue in a country centrally and then trying to aportion it out again fairly has always lead to disgruntlement, conflict and even separation (Look at the disintegration of Yugoslavia, and how the North of England has become impoverished of late). Not only that, the practise of trying to aportion a central pot fairly is alway open to corruption regards who will get the large government contracts for spending. A smarter way is to decentralise the economy - allow local governments and boroughs to control their own budgets. Of course this needs to be blended with ensuring minimum standards of education, housing, medical care and infrastructure, and so there should be a portion of funds attributed centrally in a country for this, for execution by a non-political body.
- There is no end to political history - There will never come a time when exploitative tendencies will cease and we can give up fighting against them, or forming alternative progressive political movements to fight for better ideas. Capitalist exploitation will in time succumb to Worker domination, then Military domination and then Intellectual domination in society, which will eventually lead to Capitalist domination again. This is a cycle that societies undergo as they progress in a world that requires a physical base. The role of Proutists in all of this is to ensure that we never get stuck at any point and that we continually struggle to move society forwards. This struggle is the essence of true progress.