The Federation are Communist?

[Tyler]

posted on December 1st, 2010, 2:05 pm

Last edited by Tyler on December 1st, 2010, 2:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

They also have money, it's called Latinum and Federation credits.

[machinor]

posted on December 2nd, 2010, 5:13 am

Last edited by machinor on December 2nd, 2010, 5:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

Well, if you go by the very very few passages in Marx where he describes the communist society (he never really developed any model of a communist society), then the Federation fits it quite well.
In Marx, "Communism" is not a concrete political/economic system but simply the next development step of human society after Capitalism (which also should not be confused with (free) market economics) is overcome.
A communist society would be every society, where man does not have to let himself be exploited in order to secure his subsistence. I remember one passage vaguely where he describes how somebody in a communist society could use his time basically for whatever he wants to do since he is not preoccupied with his material needs anymore. He would be free to go fishing, write a philosophical thesis or do whatever he likes (I'm quite certain he uses those examples).
It fits the federation lifestyle quite well, I think.

posted on December 2nd, 2010, 6:49 am

The Federation as a "government" is not Communist in my opinion. Rather, the people in the Federation just have socialist and/or communistic tendencies (no drive to make financial profit, all are treated equal). That sort of society is able to exist in an an environment with nearly limitless resources (as it seems the Feds have no shortage of anything with replicators and whatnot). Things start to fall apart when resources are low and cannot be spread among everyone, that's when good old selfish capitalism kicks in 

posted on December 3rd, 2010, 6:46 am

Hey all. I was just pondering something about the Federation. Are they Communist?

My reasoning being, as stated in First Contact, greed and the want to obtain more had been eliminated (and that money did not exsist) . In the episode on TNG (can't remember the name) where they find those people in cryo-stasis, Picard says that Earth was one planet among many in the United Federation of Planets. And also it seems that (apart from rank), ever person, in every race, in the Federation, is equal. And I don't think it would be hard to fit a hammer and sickle over that emblem of theirs (or should I say phaser and tricorder ).

So the question is... are the Federation, Communist? 

*Besides, modern day Russia is called - The Russian Federation 

My thoughts: The Federation is a lot like the United States is IRL, a sort of federalized republic (for those that have made cracks about the US isnt much of a democracy, it never was, it's founders abhorred democracy) execpt it is a lot more decentralized. The United States is a colection of states that have joined together (to the point were the state level of goverment is rather irrelvent for the most part these days). The Federation is a membership of worlds and species and colonies instead.

I imagine that each planet and/or member species would have its own starfleet of smaller ships for customs, border patrol, anti piracy, and whatever else is needed. I also imagine that for the most part, each planet runs itself, with Federation law only coming into effect if the crime is something that presents a large enough danger as to warrant Federation law taking it into effect (IE: Genetic enhancement).

I'd think that the military forces of the various member worlds would depend on the local culture. Earth, Andor, and Tellar would probably have larger 'local' space and ground forces than some others, however Earth as the capital system of the Federation, and the founders of the Starfleet, would likley have their military presence be more in Federation vessels/personnel/ships than local milita.

Past that, their whole outlook would be to live life while not gettting in the way of others trying to do the same, hence the prime directive.

As for the 'no money' stuff..... with replicators, all but the smaller colonies would have easy access to most material needs (and with holodecks, even the most pasty faced treker could get the other needs....) making money not that relevent, with some people (Picard as one example) all but ignoring the existence of it (and as a starship captain, he'd have basicly no need for it anyway.).

As for money, it'd largely be based on local needs. I imagine that many people would still prefer non replicated goods when possible (Sisko's resturant in New Orleans, for example) plus I'd also imagine that quite often people would buy replicator patterns. You cook the best steak Ever (capitalization used on purpose) ? Scan it into a replicator, and sell the pattern, and get royalties in return. On the core worlds in the center of the Federation, money would by and large mean much less. On the outter colonies and newer member worlds, it'd mean more as replicator tech has caught on much less (lets face it, a replicator isnt good for much on a planet if theres just a few, it'd be relegated to just replicating bulk food to be shipped all over) until said world is able to mass produce replicators.

Those worlds would need supplies shipped in. That would lead to econemies being devolped.

Of course there is usualy the saftey net of starfleet. Crops fail ? Send a distress signal, and a starship arrives with a hold full of food, and more seed stock.

posted on December 8th, 2010, 1:04 pm

Well, if you go by the very very few passages in Marx where he describes the communist society (he never really developed any model of a communist society), then the Federation fits it quite well.
In Marx, "Communism" is not a concrete political/economic system but simply the next development step of human society after Capitalism (which also should not be confused with (free) market economics) is overcome.
A communist society would be every society, where man does not have to let himself be exploited in order to secure his subsistence. I remember one passage vaguely where he describes how somebody in a communist society could use his time basically for whatever he wants to do since he is not preoccupied with his material needs anymore. He would be free to go fishing, write a philosophical thesis or do whatever he likes (I'm quite certain he uses those examples).
It fits the federation lifestyle quite well, I think.

Well said, Machinor. You covered the essential issue that needed to be addressed here.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 10:54 am

Who says that democracy and communism would oppose each other? Communism is nothing more than perfect, utopian democracy.

People's thoughts, behaviour is determined by their society, the people we meet in the federation obviously don't behave as capitalists(they are not Ferengi), they long for peace, freedom and improvement of everything. In my eyes the federation must be a communist democracy. However, we never get to know much about the federation economy(as we see in the discussion about money here). I'd say the producers of Star Trek want to entertain, therefor they have to show problems we can identify ourselfs with and that is why you need some problems with money every now and then .

posted on December 9th, 2010, 7:13 pm

Indeed. Marx himself defines communism as "democratization of property" not its abolishment as it is often falsly claimed.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 8:11 pm

Well, there are large differences between communism (the Soviet system) and Marxism (also called socialism).

[Anonymous]

posted on December 9th, 2010, 9:45 pm

Last edited by Anonymous on December 9th, 2010, 9:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

That's not right Ruanek. The Soviet Union didn't even call itself "communist", they said they are on the way to socialism(in the end they brought in the term "real-existing socialism" - only propaganda in my eyes), as does the PR China by the way(they say they'll need at least additional 100years for socialism). It's just western propaganda to call every state that does not follow US orders "communist". North Korea for example, they have more in common with a monarchie imo.
Communism is a society without classes, it is the final stage of development of the human society. Socialism is a stage in between to overcome capitalism. Marx' theory talks about those aspects, Lenins theory concentrates on how to achieve them. The Octoberrevolution was a first step towards that.
But then came Stalin and everything took a strange direction.  It's hard to define the political system of the "2nd world", but I think "Stalinism" is quite appropriate.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 10:01 pm

That's not right Ruanek. The Soviet Union didn't even call itself "communist", they said they are on the way to socialism(in the end they brought in the term "real-existing socialism" - only propaganda in my eyes), as does the PR China by the way(they say they'll need at least additional 100years for socialism). It's just western propaganda to call every state that does not follow US orders "communist". North Korea for example, they have more in common with a monarchie imo.
Communism is a society without classes, it is the final stage of development of the human society. Socialism is a stage in between to overcome capitalism. Marx' theory talks about those aspects, Lenins theory concentrates on how to achieve them. The Octoberrevolution was a first step towards that.
But then came Stalin and everything took a strange direction.  It's hard to define the political system of the "2nd world", but I think "Stalinism" is quite appropriate.

Indeed.

Silly Stalin =P

posted on December 9th, 2010, 10:31 pm

Well, Lenin wasn't really any better. Same totalitarian dipshit.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 10:41 pm

Well, I was using the word communism as it is generally used.  I was trying to avoid specific definitions.

The word communism is, as I said earlier, generally used to refer to the system created by Lenin and company (yes, including Stalin...) in Soviet Russia.    (Since it wasn't just Stalin, though he certainly had a large hand in it, I try to not call it Stalinism.)  They referred to themselves as communists.  The ruling party of the USSR called itself the KPSU, meaning the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.  In general, the Western world considers the words  Stalinism and communism to be interchangeable.

To distinguish between the differences between this form of communism and Marx's socialism, I have generally seen people use those two words with distinction, calling one "communism" and one "socialism" (or Marxism) (as I said in my post).  I think it's better to do that than to lump all the various "communist" systems together under he same name.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 11:28 pm

short answer no. if any star trek society is approaching communism it's the borg - where the good of the collective is placed over the individual. Still this is probabley more akin to social insects
People in the Federation have all their needs and wants fulfilled so the only objective in life is self fulfillment. Wheather its science, resteranturing, making good wine or the highly demanding careers in starfleet. Starfleet is the military technically so the very open for such an ordered institution.
The still have non commisioned or petty officers so as well as the military hierachy there still remains a form of class divide, but it's very subtul.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 11:33 pm

@Ruanek
Well, all those terms are part of the marxist theory and have their definitions. I must say I don't really care how western propaganda uses them, it should be most important what they do really mean. If I do constantly say "the Iran is a Christian country" it still doesn't become correct.
Those parties were and are called communist parties because that was what they aimed on, not what they thought was already in place. Marx said that the working class should always unite in/under a communist party, that's why they were called that way.
Concerning Lenin: I think Lenin's theory is a questionable one, but still the best one there seems to be. Because of the party's avantgarde role and their need to control everything it was possible to be misused. On the other hand we can see in South america today that it actually can work - just ask the people all the time like Chavez and R. Castro do now. If your party is the one to bring democracy it should behave like that. I think that's what they missed in USSR after reducing the power of the soviets. Stalin didn't do that, because all people who didn't like exactly what he said were fascists in his eyes.

@protean
Hmm, communism doesn't exactly mean "build up an insect state"   It rather means what you referred to in the second part of your post: self fulfillment for everyone.

posted on December 9th, 2010, 11:44 pm

@protean:

I think "the good of the collective" is closer to fascism, which is often considered to be on the opposite extreme of the ideological spectrum as communism (though the two are actually very similar in some ways).  Communism represents the triumph of the individual, while fascism represents the triumph of the state (and I think the Borg aren't fans if individuality).

I agree with the rest of your post, though.



@Lt. Cmdr. Marian Hope:

You have a point there, but I still think there's a value in making the distinction.  Marx's communism can generally be summed up with socialism.  Yeah, there's a difference, but I think it's a subtle one at best.  The media constantly calling something a certain term can actually change the meaning of the term.  I mean, even "Christian" (to use your example) doesn't mean what it did a few centuries ago.  (Please, don't get into a theological or political argument over that.)

I pointed out that the KPSU is specifically called communist because you said something along the lines of "Soviet Russia never claimed to be communist".  They are generally regarded as being communist, and most people think of communism as being their system.  They changed their name to communism (from being called Bolsheviks) for political reasons, not ideological ones.

I find it interesting that you brought up Venezuela and Cuba as being societies where communism can work.  Neither of those countries are generally considered to be great examples of it.