How Communist Autarchy Works
By Benjamin Noria
HAVANA TIMES – I have to confess… writing about these things sends a chill down my spine, but let’s start off by looking at the definition of another term from the Dark Ages of Communist and Socialist governments. I personally believe that these things must disturb anyone with a bit of common sense.
Autarchy is the name given to the kind of government where self-sufficiency and economic independence rule supreme, and imports of foreign products are avoided. Of course, this stops the Capitalist market’s production from entering the country, for example, as well as their objects to satisfy spiritual, cultural, and social needs.
In the autarchy, the government only allows entry of the foreign goods that it considers “good” for life in Communist society. Who are they? For example: The Communist Parties.
I have added the adjective Communist to autarchy because it seems that by blind chance, dictators and followers of Marxist/Leninist ideology with totalitarian, demagogic, autocratic, absolutist and tyrannical regimes are fans of them.
That said, let’s examine one point: Marxists/Leninists don’t believe in the market and they don’t see private enterprise as an engine for progress, but rather as an instrument to exploit workers. They think that it stops the State from managing the national economy and they encourage state interventionism as a safeguard for social justice.
But let’s quickly go over some of Karl Marx’s theory. Everything would start with a conflict based on economics between the exploited and exploiters. Then, the proletariat, which is the exploited class, would conquer power via a revolution, which would be their solution to this conflict. The government would be a dictatorship of the proletariat and would oust the exploiters’ government (the bourgeoisie). Lastly, the State would disappear. Humans would be able to live without the state, like a kind of primitive community, and wealth would be equally distributed.
Plus, Karl Marx wrote that Socialism means collective ownership of production resources and Communism means a trend towards the general, equality.
However, Communist governments have one political party, one ideology, the State has an iron hold over the army, police and mass media and, last but not least, they also have a centralized and inefficient economy.
So, I don’t believe that the autarchy is a way to become independent for the sake of achieving social equality or moving away from the alleged influence of Capitalist market consumerism and its satisfaction of fictitious needs, but rather as a government tool that has been used by totalitarian Communist regimes to stop the influence of Capitalism’s free trade and to subject their subjects to the ruling party’s mind control.
Herein lies a term of the Socialist and Communist totalitarian regimes and their repressive machines, who have never thought about community, or in looking out for the masses and the wellbeing of every citizen, but rather about indoctrinating people just so they can stay in power.
Whereas one has some sympathy with dani’s frustration with Boris Johnson, he is a bit off the mark when suggesting that UK citizens are subjected to the same level of government control and repression as that suffered by Cubans.
Certainly, those who recall the UK government between 1945 and 1951, could draw some parallels – petrol rationing, coal rationing, food rationing, clothing rationing, and having to bear identity cards to be produced upon demand by the police, can assure dani, that life in the UK was even more trying and restricted than it is currently.
Secondly, those who criticize Brexit, ought to remember that the swing factor in the referendum, was the vote in the North and Midlands of England by the blue collar section of society, that helped to achieve a majority in favour. That support was again reflected in the last General Election, when constituencies that had long term histories of Labour Party support, voted for Boris and his nationalist policies. The presence of Covid does not create, but merely emphasizes the problems.
The final paragraph in the article by Benjamin Noria, neatly summarizes the reality of the Castro regime, which makes the UK look like only like a mere garden party.
You don’t have to live in a communist country to suffer all that. The UK is suffering fuel shortages and long queues at petrol stations as well as empty shelves in the supermarkets. But Boris Johnson is as popular as ever. Figure that one out.
Communists become capitalists when they get the taste of the good life and the wealth they control. I bet there’s not too many of the communist political leaders and their family’s having to scrape together some food for to feed their families daily, or have to go to work on a bicycle or horse drawn carriage because they have no fuel for their cars. No. It’s ok to push communist ideals to the masses while they live in capitalist wealth and luxury.