Wk. 10 George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius, 1941

Question 1

George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius, 1941

Answer 1

George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius, 1941 – George Orwell (1903-1950) was an English journalist and writer. You may be familiar with his two most famous works, Animal Farm or 1984. In this essay, written during World War II, Orwell argued for a democratic (i.e. non-dictatorial) form of socialism. NOTE: Orwell was a Hack! He knew nothing about economics and if he owned a political blog today, no one would even read it.

Why did Orwell think socialism was necessary?

Why might others have shared his opinions?

What did he think of the alternatives, capitalism and fascism?

• Orwell thought Capitalism was a failure. “private capitalism – that is, an economic system in which land, factories, mines and transport are owned privately and operated solely for profit – does not work”

What role did the war play in his thinking?

• He thought Hitler’s conquest of Europe debunked Capitalism – apparently because of capitalism’s sacrifice of control over the state. Or rather, under capitalism, the state has no control over the nation’s assets, something Orwell argues is necessary in times of war in order to be successful at supporting the war effort..“Hitler’s conquest of Europe, however, was a physical debunking of capitalism.”
• Defines Socialism: “Socialism is usually defined as ‘common ownership of the means of production.’ Crudely: the State, representing the whole nation, owns everything, and everyone is a State employee. This does not mean that people are stripped of private possessions such as clothes and furniture, but it does mean that all productive goods, such as land, mines, ships and machinery, are the property of the State. The State is the sole large-scale producer.”
• He believed that Socialism was the answer to balancing supply and demand without concern for price fluxuations. “unlike capitalism, [socialism] can solve the problems of production and consumption.”
• He ignores many important pionts in order to give air to his assertions. For example, “At normal times a capitalist economy can never consume all that it produces, so that there is always a wasted surplus (wheat burned in furnaces, herrings dumped back into the sea etc. etc.) and always unemployment.” Here he ignores the benefit of EXPORTS and trade with other nations that might have resources and goods that this socialist nation does not have.
• He also grossly underestimates the ability of a nation to pull together in times of stress. “In time of war, on the other hand, it has difficulty in producing all that it needs, because nothing is produced unless someone sees his way to making a profit out of it.” The US, for example, simply enacted the ‘War Powers Act’ which targets the nation’s public AND private resources toward the war effort.
• And he grossly underestimates the downside to socialism, “In a Socialist economy these problems do not exist. The State simply calculates what goods will be needed and does its best to produce them. Production is only limited by the amount of labour and raw materials” And there are SIGNIFICANT limits to both labour and raw materials as well as diverse skill sets. He completely misses the point that surplus goods are necessary to trade for goods that your country cannot produce.
• But the biggest thing that he decides not to mention is that socialism takes away our most valuable commodity – FREEDOM! – an aspect summed up by socialism’s necessary distribution of a“coupon or ration-ticket” which allows a very specific alotment of resources.
• Worse, he never addresses socialism’s destructive influence on innovation, motivation, and hard work. Essentially, if left solely to the means of socialism, the world would be forever stuck at the technological level that existed when socialism was implemented. No one will ever bother to do anything greater than what is necessary for socialist subsistence.
• At some point, he recognizes some of the failings of a state-run nation – that the government, out of necessity, has control of everything.“However, it has become clear in the last few years that ‘common ownership of the means of production’ is not in itself a sufficient definition of Socialism. One must also add the following: approximate equality of incomes […] political democracy, and abolition of all hereditary privilege, especially in education. These are simply the necessary safeguards against the reappearance of a class-system. Centralized ownership has very little meaning unless the mass of the people are living roughly upon an equal level, and have some kind of control over the government. ‘The State’ may come to mean no more than a self-elected political party, and oligarchy and privilege can return, based on power rather than on money.”
• Orwell Defines FASCISM as simply CAPITALISM + SOCIALISM. More specifically, he equates it to the greed-allowance of Capitalist business structures and private ownership and competition with the MASSIVE caveat that the state ACTUALLY And TRULY has control over ALL assets within the nation, whether they are public or private. He says that this STATE-CONTROL is necessary to properly run the Nazi WAR MACHINE. What he doesn’t note is that this particular ‘socialist’ aspect is also necessary to carry out the Nazi ‘Final Solution’. You can see that the things that Orwell decides to include or omit shows that he is little more than a left-wing ideologue as opposed to a respectible socio-political intellectual.
  
  • “Fascism, at any rate the German version, is a form of capitalism that borrows from Socialism just such features as will make it efficient for war purposes.”
  • “Fascism, at any rate the German version, is a form of capitalism that borrows from Socialism just such features as will make it efficient for war purposes. Internally, Germany has a good deal in common with a Socialist state. Ownership has never been abolished, there are still capitalists and workers, and - this is the important point, and the real reason why rich men all over the world tend to sympathize with Fascism - generally speaking the same people are capitalists and the same people workers as before the Nazi revolution. But at the same time the State, which is simply the Nazi Party, is in control of everything. It controls investment, raw materials, rates of interest, working hours, wages. The factory owner still owns his factory, but he is for practical purposes reduced to the status of a manager. Everyone is in effect a State employee, though the salaries vary very greatly. The mere efficiency of such a system, the elimination of waste and obstruction, is obvious. In seven years it has built up the most powerful war machine the world has ever seen.”
• Orwell’s idea of what Socialism has to offer is fundamentally flawed,“Socialism aims, ultimately, at a world-state of free and equal human beings.” Though socialism can create a moderate sense of evenness in terms of resource distribution, it is actually the opposite of freedom since EVERYONE is required to remain within the confines set by the socialist state. No one can every move to another level of comfort or advantage regardless their effort, work, creativity, or intellect. They are literally shackled to the socialist definition of ‘economic parity’ where no amount of effort can free you from those shackles.
• If you love socialism so fucking much, why don’t you go live in a socialist country? Answer: Because socialism has failed so terribly and consistently that every socialist nation is a total shit-hole, that’s why.
• Proclaims socialism stronger than fascism. Why?
• Says that rich men all over the world “sympathize with fascism“ because of the catalyst component. And he even suggests that the wealthy would side with the enemy just to preserve their status.“The British ruling class are fighting against Hitler, whom they have always regarded and whom some of them still regard as their protector against Bolshevism. That does not mean that they will deliberately sell out; but it does mean that at every decisive moment they are likely to falter, pull their punches, do the wrong thing.”
• Though socialism controls utility, it forgoes innovation and progress which can make everyone’s lives better. Is it better for everyone to be equally poor under socialism or for some to be extremely wealthy under capitalism while the poorest are also wealthier than they would be under socialism?
• Orwell sees the capitalist money securing the old, allowing them to remain in control while ignoring the young, who may bring a fresh and more realistic picture to leader ship. “Revolution does not mean red flags and street fighting, it means a fundamental shift of power. Whether it happens with or without bloodshed is largely an accident of time and place.”
  
  • “What is wanted is a conscious open revolt by ordinary people against inefficiency, class privilege and the rule of the old.”
• Sees the real England as represented by the common underbelly, the people who would benefit most from socialism.“we have got to break the grip of the moneyed class as a whole. England has got to assume its real shape.”
• Hates the rich. Ironically, a benefit of capitalism is that the poor can gain wealth through hard, smart work. Something impossible with socialism.
• Why work harder or put yourself at risk if there is not some additional award to be had? What results is that status quo and everyone suffers there is not one example of a True socialist nation thriving. Not one.

FROM POWERPOINT:

Orwell: why doesn’t capitalism work?

• In a capitalist system, there is private ownership driven by private profit
• This doesn’t work in wartime because they don’t produce enough weapons and war supplies because there might be more money to be made producing something else
• In peacetime, they produce more than they need (overproduction) that leads waste and bubbles/crashes
• Orwell says the basic problem is that capitalism can’t solve the problem of production and consumption because no one is thinking about what’s good for the country as a whole

Orwell: Socialism

• What is socialism?
• The state owns or controls “the means of production”
• AKA “common ownership of the means of production”
• The “means of production” means things that are used to make other things
• This allows for a planned economy, where the state decides what to produce based on what the country as a whole needs
• Free and equal human beings
• Equality in education and “the abolition of hereditary privilege” (eliminating class system)
• Equality of incomes
• Political democracy to ensure that the state represents all the people

Orwell: Socialism in Wartime

• “War communism” (p. 4-5)
• In wartime, socialism helps b/c it lets you produce as many weapons as possible
• Equality of sacrifice is possibly even more important
• Meaning that everyone shares the burdens equally
• This is vital for morale – “We’re all in this together”

Orwell: Fascism

• Recap: Orwell’s definitions of capitalism and socialism
  
  • Capitalism: private ownership of the means of production
    
    • Decisions about production make in pursuit of private profit
  • Socialism: “common ownership of the means of production”
    
    • Planned economy: the state manages production
    • Common ownership, plus other safeguards like democracy, ensures equality
• What is fascism?
  
  • There’s a planned economy in which the state decides what to produce
  • The means of production are still privately owned
  • The goal of fascism is to unify the German (or Italian, etc.) race
    
    • To create racial hierarchy or caste system