Hi there, I'm not trying to start a political argument or anything, I'm just curious what people here think about this often repeated claim that the Federation is a socialist or even communist utopia? I know Strange New Worlds did say in dialogue it is socialist but I was wondering if people here think that's accurate? I'm not a communist or a marxist or anything like that, but I've had people who identify as such tell me the Federation basically is communist. So anyway, what's your thoughts?
Capitalism was eliminated on Earth by the New World Economy, which was likely a Dictatorship of the Proletariat as envisioned by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Roddenberry, etc. The Federation appears to be a classless, moneyless post-DotP society that still has one primary state apparatus (the Federation itself) that oversees many smaller state apparatuses (the Federation's many member-worlds). You'll notice a contradiction, though: If a state "is a system by which the ruling class maintains and perpetuates its dominance within the social formation... by subjugating the other class(es) within class society" then how can the Federation be a classless society? I propose two solutions:
- Star Trek is fiction and fictional worlds are often incomplete and contradictory. Everything I've said about the New World Economy, the Federation, etc. should be taken with a grain of quadrotriticale.
- No society has established a DotP, and there are certainly no examples of post-DotP societies. Marxism is a scientific and materialist worldview -- it has evolved since the 19th century and it will continue to evolve into the 23rd century and beyond.
EDIT: My answer is "Yes, but it's Advanced Sci-Fi Communism."
Most sources on Roddenberry's political beliefs are people who knew him, and they didn't open up about those beliefs until after his death. Here's an article that I've skimmed:
According to his last wife, Majel Barrett, he identified as a communist. But we know from the many accounts of his unethical business practices that he was also obsessed with making money. He preached peace and love but was infamously difficult to get along with. And he flew the flag for feminism while being a notorious womanizer.
Gene was a delightful man with great creativity and talent, but he was also a deeply flawed man who often failed to practice what he preached.
Yes, obviously. The Federation is a postscarcity socialist society
inhaled very deeply about to talk about activitypub and techrights idealism then noticed this is star trek dot website
Neither, since they are moneyless and post scarcity. We honestly don't have a word for whatever they are.
The most textbook definition of communism as a political-economic organization (rather than an ideology) is that of a "stateless, classless, moneyless society."
Which does not describe what we see of the Federation so I'm not sure what point you're trying to make with this.
It's pretty close, not sure why you're being so belligerent over this.
It's pretty close, you just don't want to admit it because you've been taught to hate that word.
Idk... for good starters, I'd ask ye this
I'd rather ask how it is not capitalist
Is it capitalist and hegemonic
Does this federation have a system of unequal exchange and resource exploitation of one place to another, the core, essentially, with the majority of the federation being an large mass of desperate wage and salary laborers, once self-sufficient peasants, in the resource-rich place of the periphery, under the guise of "investment"?
Does this federation love to lend and privatize foreign economies, and cut social spending, a la IMF, in order to dominate the latter's economy?
Does this federation have a policy of CAPITALIST settler-colonialism, based on classical-liberal style property rights and genocide of the indigenous people?
If this is all merely in the past of class struggles and national liberation movements, and the federation has fought and abolished such forms of exploitation, yay
To check if its communist, in the more modern form {there is such thing as primitive communism}, however:
Does this federation wrecked out any chance of capitalist and liberal restoration, due to past 'authoritarianism'?
Does this federation work without the use of money, any proprietorship, social class, and the force of government, but instead with collective ownership of major assets and modern cooperative values or 'ideology' being casually accepted as the norm, instead of as an old-fashioned ideology or academic subject?
This is to ensure that Communism is dominant, as to be practically 'Communist', in such a federation
Does surplus value, from labor, go into the needs of the people, even in its 'authoritarian' fetus defensive form, instead of going towards any capitalist profit or landlord's rent, or any past economic mode of production?
Note: Personal property, such as watches and purses, do not count as private property, unless you're using it to make into an asset, like a steam engine, to run a metro-train system, or a collection of buildings, to take rent upon
I would say the Federation is basically a liberal utopia so it's not against being liberal
One needs to be careful with the word "liberal", because it means very different things in different contexts (in large part due to political parties identifying themselves as "liberal"). In the stricter political-philosophical sense, liberalism is very closely tied with capitalism and the "freedom" to own things as private property (market allowing) and do what you want with it.
Yeah the Federation has private property and individual rights, so we wouldn't that be liberal?
Does the Federation really have private property? Are there landlords and business tyrants? Or does it just have personal property, things a person owns for their own personal use?
Personal rights also aren't monopolized by liberalism, as much as neoliberal media tells you it is so. Personal rights also existed in classical slave societies, under feudalism, and yes, under every Marxist state (I don't know about the weirdo ""communist"" ones like Peru or Cambodia)
I mean ppl own businesses, land and houses. Is that not private property?
I can't think of any societies that emphasize individual rights that aren't liberal
Consider Joseph Sisko's restaurant, Sisko's Creole Kitchen. Joseph owns the restaurant, but he doesn't sell anything. He provides goods and services, but he doesn't make any money. Sisko's Creole Kitchen is not a business, it is a labor of love that Joseph operates for himself and his community.
Additionally, the Federation is very socially liberal but it is not economically liberal. Economically, liberalism is a pro-capitalism ideology and capitalism has been abolished in the Federation.
Well an interesting question would be, could the government just seize his restaurant in the name of the good of society? If not, then it's private property as we understand it, no? Whether it makes money or not
Joseph Sisko's restaurant is his personal property, not his private property since it is not a money-making venture. Since money, and capitalism, do not exist in the Federation, there is no private property in any form. Furthermore, given Star Trek's egalitarian/utopian vision of the future, no one is going to take Joseph Sisko's restaurant -- the laws of the United Earth government (which has direct jurisdiction over Earth) exist (imo) to protect people's personal property, not take it away.
The government can seize private property in America via eminent domain. It's not a question of seizure, but what the space is actually being used for. Again, this is largely an economic question, so you can't sidestep economics.
It is interesting to consider that in the vastness of space that something like a single restaurant might be viewed similarly to a glass of water in the US.
Sure the government could come in and declare eminent domain on my glass of water, but it’s value is so low as to be effectively a nonissue.
In a future where there are tons of planets and tons of replicators, perhaps the idea of personal property has just been extended to include things like a restaurant or a vineyard.
If you use the definition that private property is the private ownership over the means of production, it could be reasoned that something like Sisko’s is not necessarily a means of production but more akin to personal property. If someone on earth wants some creole food they can use any number of replicators to produce and enjoy that. Sisko’s and Picard’s vineyard might be similar to how we would look upon historical preservation. Some people could choose to spend their lives making things the old fashioned way because they enjoy it and people enjoy experiencing it.
The economy of Star Trek is interesting, but I think there are plenty of times when the utility of storytelling ends up mucking with the clarity of the message. One example I was just thinking about the other day was the introduction of the borg queen.
I get why it’s nice for there to be a borg queen, she can embody a more nuanced thinking part of the borg collective and the audience can much more readily understand the idea of a queen ruling over her subjects (whether that be like the rulers of humanity or like the queen bee as they sometimes say). But it also kind of sucks. The borg are such a fascinating species, a collective hive mind acting to attain perfection, more a force of nature than any of the other species we encounter.
While the borg queen is a compelling character and is acted wonderfully, I can’t feel a bit sad that it’s so normal and pedestrian. It turns the borg from this almost incomprehensible force into something so regular, a bunch of drones carrying out the will of the queen. While expedient to the storytelling, I like the idea of what the borg are pre-borg-queen more than what they become post-borg-queen.
I think with the economy a similar thing happens in storylines. There are many scenes that make it clear that humanity doesn’t have money anymore, but when you are telling a story and you want to have some stakes and obstacles, money is soooooo useful. Money makes it trivial to have an obstacle, or shit we need some latinum. Money makes it trivial to introduce stakes.
Star Trek had to try to thread this needle of presenting a post scarcity society while also making a dramatic engaging show for people living in a capitalist society. Scarcity is at the heart of a lot of drama, if you can just replicate your way out of every problem it’s not a very interesting show. It also leads to a thing that once you spot it’s hard not to spot, so much of the tension is aided by the “oh no we can’t replicate that” McGuffin. It plays out in a lot of episodes because otherwise every episode would be 5 minutes of “there’s an outbreak of tallarian flu on Corso V, we emailed them the recipe for the medicine and told them to replicate it.” Then the credits roll.
Firstly, I thought it was a moneyless society. What do the so-called businesses operate with? Secondly, owning land is not the same as using land ownership to extract a rent from people who don't own land, which is what a landlord is. You're asking an economic question, so economic relations are important!
I can't think of any societies that emphasize individual rights that aren't liberal
Genuinely, how hard are you thinking? Everywhere from Ancient Greece to Medieval Ireland to every iteration of China (except Japanese occupation) had personal rights.
"Emphasize" here is a weasel word, but can you really say it about the darling of neoliberalism, America? America abuses more rights abroad than any other country, so I guess you mean American denizens. Oh, but non-citizens get treated horribly, especially illegal immigrants but also immigrants in general, so you must just mean citizens. Then again, prisoners in America are kept in conditions consistent with its own definition of slavery, which is why there's a cutout in the Thirteenth Amendment to permit just that, so I guess non-criminal citizens? Of course, being homeless in quite a lot of America is de-facto criminal and the homeless suffer heinous abuse by the cops with little recourse, so I guess it's actually the housed, non-criminal citizens. Speaking of the cops, they kill over a thousand people every year, something that would be called "summary execution" if it was done by America's enemies. Do I need to keep going? And mind you, this is all at the relative zenith of human rights in America, ignoring chattel slavery, Jim Crow, the various forms of patriarchal domination, disenfranchisement of non-land-owners, and so on.
What I'm saying is that your definition needs work.
I'm pretty sure all those ancient societies didn't have universal human rights and civil liberties. The concept of rights doesn't really begin until the 1600s afaik and universal rights until the 1800s at the earliest. There are non liberal societies right now, they're all dictatorships with no freedoms, hence my statement
I'm pretty sure all those ancient societies didn't have universal human rights and civil liberties. The concept of rights doesn't really begin until the 1600s afaik
What in the world are you talking about? Most societies throughout history had rights for their citizens.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/video/significance-of-citizenship-in-ancient-greece.html
and universal rights until the 1800s at the earliest
See my screed about America. Universal how?
There are non liberal societies right now, they're all dictatorships with no freedoms, hence my statement
But this flatly isn't true. Let's pick a country that both of us probably hate: Saudi Arabia. There are lots of backwards laws and abuses, but cops still typically need a warrant to search your house and aren't allowed to just go in and beat you to death. There are cases where they do anyway, but so it goes in most states. This black-and-white view where people are free in liberal states and there are "no freedoms" in other states is unserious.
It's also worth pointing out, and this might go a little way to explaining your argument with someone else in this thread, that the magical way neoliberals talk about "dictatorship" doesn't make any sense. A government might nominally operate in an autocratic way, where one dude's word is law, but it cannot subsist on one dude's authority. That autocrat's authority is dependent on some class of people who interests he serves creating the material basis for him to keep ruling (Saudi Arabia is a good example, since it is an absolute monarchy that serves the capitalist class). Thus, any so-called dictatorship is really the rule of that class and not of that individual, even if it nominally goes through the decrees of the individual. Likewise, if one class is fundamentally in power, it is no less of a dictatorship if the nominal system is more open, because the real power hasn't changed.
Land and houses aren't private property unless you're renting them out. If they aren't a financial asset, they're just personal property.
Businesses are an interesting question? The Federation, or at least its core worlds, doesn't use money (by the 24th century). The only business we see onscreen, on a Federation core world, as far as I can remember, is Sisko's Creole Kitchen. If there's no money, why does Joseph Sisko run it? My guess is to maintain the tradition of Creole cuisine, to perfect his skills as a chef, to meet and interact with guests, and to preserve an historic New Orleans building by keeping it in use. Is it private property? Does he own it? He owns the business in some abstract sense, but the building? Probably not. I'd expect he holds it in trust in some kind of legal arrangement with the city, but there's really no onscreen evidence.
No, the Federation has personal property, not private property.
Huh, do you exactly know exactly the term?
To me, Liberalism is to capitalism, like Christianity was for western feudalism; a ideological framework that the ruling classes of its day uses to justify their existence
Show
The federation tends to let member planets be independent, the federation doesn't come in and be like "we own your planet and we provide for you in return we take everything", so it's definitely leaning socialist.
The main difference is who owns the means of production. In communism, the government does. In socialism, the people do.
Both aim to provide for the population at large and not just benefit to a few rich elites that own everything, but socialism is a bit more robust against tyrannical governments.
It's amazing how people just make things up. I genuinely have no idea where you got these definitions unless it was some hole on Reddit or similar.
What manages the means of production if not a government? Saying "the people" is as hollow as the US talking about "Freedom" and "Democracy". "The people" cannot merely project their will into the aether and have it realized, they need some method of organization. They need to be able to administrate complex systems rather than just hang out in "primitive communism but with high technology somehow". Whatever that system is and whatever you call it, that's a government. In a system of democratic government that administers things, the difference between "the people" owning things and the government -- here an organ that exists only so the people can manage the means of production -- owning them is immaterial.
It's amazing how people just make things up. I genuinely have no idea where you got these definitions unless it was some hole on Reddit or similar.
I'm not claiming anything I said is facts, just the way I understand it to be/how it had been explained to me quite a while ago. I could absolutely be wrong, if that's the case I'll gladly retract my comment based on new (to me) information. I'm far from qualified to give an authoritative answer on this topic.
The way I understand it is "the government decides to build a factory because the country needs a factory" vs "the people of a region get together and build a factory because they want one". Well, in either case nobody really owns the factory (compared to capitalism), but rather who's in charge of it, who decides who works on what and how it comes to be.
Unfortunately the only examples of communism we've seen are authoritarian regimes like the Soviet Union, and currently North Korea and China (sort of). I don't think we have a true socialist community that's not some form of capitalist hybrid, let alone post-scarcity communism or socialism without massive corruption tainting it.
I'm not claiming anything I said is facts, just the way I understand it to be/how it had been explained to me quite a while ago. I could absolutely be wrong, if that's the case I'll gladly retract my comment based on new (to me) information. I'm far from qualified to give an authoritative answer on this topic.
I apologize for being coarse, it's a bad habit of mine.
The way I understand it is "the government decides to build a factory because the country needs a factory" vs "the people of a region get together and build a factory because they want one". Well, in either case nobody really owns the factory (compared to capitalism), but rather who's in charge of it, who decides who works on what and how it comes to be.
If the government is democratic, there's very little substantive difference here as-described, because "the government decides X" is an entity with the popular mandate doing it, and if that decision loses it the popular mandate, the people can oppose it. Likewise, if "the people" of a locality decided to build a factory in this hypothetical and a minority opposed it, if the minority cannot sway the majority, they are simply ignored.
The problem comes in when you realize that the goods produced by factories mostly aren't for the use of the local community, they are for a much more expansive group of people. There need to be systems to coordinate production at the full scale of society so that people have some idea of who needs what. It's compounded by the fact that the machines in the factory will themselves probably need to be imported from elsewhere.
Unfortunately the only examples of communism we've seen are authoritarian regimes like the Soviet Union, and currently North Korea and China (sort of). I don't think we have a true socialist community that's not some form of capitalist hybrid, let alone post-scarcity communism or socialism without massive corruption tainting it.
Depending on your definitions, you left out Cuba, Vietnam, and Laos. In any case, I don't think most people are able to maintain the "real communism has never been tried" stance. Eventually, you either come down on the side that "No, they were real communism and communism is therefore evil" or "I was lied to about at least some of these countries and should give them credit". For an anglophone, societal gravity is very much on the side of the first option, but it's possible to reach the second conclusion if you have a strong enough motivation to dig through information. Cuba is probably the route of least resistance.
Yeah I'm not a communist primarily because I'm against dictatorship and human rights abuse but socialism sounds more interesting
From a Marxist perspective, all class-based societies are governed by dictatorships:
A dictatorship is the political dominance of one group of people over others. In a class society, a dictatorship usually favors the interest of certain classes over the others.
Right now, we live in the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie
The bourgeoisie is the ruling class in capitalist society; it owns the means of production and has a decisive influence on production. It lives off of surplus value which it obtains by exploiting the labour power of the proletariat.
Well yes, but more broadly because you keep using words without knowing what they mean
Do you mean dictatorship? Most ppl use it in the way I mean, as the vast majority are not Marxists.
Dictatorship, socialist, communist, liberal, rights, private property
Really pretty much all of the relevant terms here
This particular string of replies was you doing a stupendously poor job of explaining anything or accomplishing anything but looking like a snob. It would be better to say nothing than to be an asshole to someone who has done nothing worse than be a slightly frustrating liberal in their own thread on a non-communist instance.
Given this thread is about whether or not the Federation is a communist or socialist society, Marxist definitions are the most useful, eh? Furthermore, I'd argue that the term Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie very accurately describes American (I'm an American) society, and does so regardless of one's personal beliefs.
Well there are non Marxist socialist/communist models and systems but I take your point. I was just answering you because you responded to why I'm not a communist, that's all
Again, perfectly fair. Before I was a communist, I rejected Marxist concepts as well. I've spent over two decades reading and listening to arguments for and against all sort of political, social and economic ideas. I've identified with centrism, liberalism, libertarianism, social democracy and other ideologies. Today, I consider myself to be a Marxist/socialist/communist not because it's just the latest thing I've hit upon, but because it's what's made the most sense to me. When I use Marxist words and ideas, I don't do so because I'm a Marxist; I'm a Marxist because those words and ideas have helped me to make the most sense of the world. And I'm certainly not demanding, or even asking, you do become a Marxist, I'm just asking you to consider what makes the most sense.
If you don't want to start a political argument, that's not the way to do it.
I would rate it as "almost communist" if we are going by a Marxist view because it still has a state. The state that exists appears to have two functions:
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To provide centralized infrastructure and services like schooling.
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To provide a military for defense against (primarily) external forces.
In a sense, the society if Star Trek has the federation being analogous to a bloc of socialist countries that still has to deal with a bloc of non-socialist countries that are sometimes aggressive. Star Trek itself has usually focused on telling stories about present humanity through a lens that operates on an interstellar scale. Aliens as standins for other cultures. An advanced egalitarian federation society that critiques current issues. The aggressive neighbors in star trek sometimes fulfill the sane roles.
So you could say that the federation is just part of a much wider society of sapient creatures across the galaxy, some of which are even capitalist, so society-wide communism is certainly not achieved. But rather than export revolution as socialists, the federation is highly passive in its approach to spreading its political program. In addition, leaders in the federation do not use the terminology of socialists nor do they seem very familiar with revolutionary thought. They seem to have adopted idealistic attitudes in their post-scarcity society, seemingly one where the economy is not thought of as an important or complex system needing critique.
Though again Star Trek is mostly a universe meant for telling stories about humanity as it is now. A proper commie would be explaining the problems of capitalism via the show.
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