Critiques du socialisme

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En cours : adaptation de en:Criticisms of socialism (matériau de base encore à travailler en fin du présent article). Doit en attendant être considéré avec circonspection.

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Le socialisme a, dès l'origine, suscité méfiance et opposition. Son objectif de transformer de fond en comble la société a soulevé l'opposition de tous ceux qui devaient y perdre (selon les termes même des théories socialistes : "capitalistes", "bourgeois" petits et grands), complété de scepticisme (est-il vraiment possible de tout changer ?) et de peur (car certains socialistes ne reculaient pas devant les moyens les plus violents).

Selon certains critiques du socialisme^{[réf. nécessaire]}, les réalisations concrètes inspirées par cette pensée au XX^e siècle, époque où elle avait connu un apogée en matière d'influence, ont montré qu'elle ne faisait pas mieux (et souvent bien pire) que les organisations critiquées par le socialisme. Plusieurs partisans du socialisme ont expliqué cela par le fait que, en dépit de leur inspiration, ces expériences avaient en fait une différence fondamentale avec le vrai socialisme.

Sommaire 1 Critiques théoriques 1.1 Le problème du calcul 1.2 Motivation de l'individu 1.3 Place des groupes intermédiaires 2 Critiques pragmatiques 2.1 L'emprise de l'État 2.2 L'incitation pour l'entreprise 2.3 L'absence de prix, source d'information 3 Lien supposé avec le national-socialisme 4 Voir aussi 4.1 Article connexe 4.2 Bibliographie 4.3 Liens externes 5 VO base de traduction 5.1 Incentives 5.2 Prices 5.3 The tragedy of the commons 5.4 Central Planning 5.5 Historical Examples

[modifier] Critiques théoriques

Un certain nombre de penseurs, d'économistes et d'historiens soulèvent certains problèmes découlant des théories socialistes. On peut citer entre autres Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek.

[modifier] Le problème du calcul

Le système capitaliste dispose d'éléments de comparaison : le profit, les prix, les salaires variables, etc. Le socialisme supprime tous ces éléments d'information. A la place, c'est une planification centrale qui doit déterminer le fonctionnement de l'économie.

Avant 1991, le débat était féroce sur la possibilité (ou non) d'une planification efficace. Ce débat est maintenant plus apaisé avec la chute du mur. Les éléments du débats sont

• l'existence de groupes qui représentent une fraction significative de l'économie de leur pays d'origine, et qui par ailleurs représentent une force économique (en chiffre d'affaire, en nombre de salariés, etc.) supérieure à des petits pays. Pourtant, ces groupes réussissent suffisamment bien à gérer leurs affaires.
• la disponibilité de moyens de calcul colossaux, tout à fait à même de gérer l'optimisation de plusieurs milliers de paramètres, ce qui est suffisant pour les grandes masses de l'économie.
• l'échec des économies planifiées des régimes d'inspiration marxiste-léniniste, qui n'est pas l'unique idée du socialisme.

La conclusion de ces débats est que le problème de la planification ne réside pas dans le manque de moyens de calcul, et ne réside que peu dans la faible qualité de l'information. C'est essentiellement un problème de motivation tant des chefs que des subordonnés.

[modifier] Motivation de l'individu

Le socialisme collectiviste ou communiste réduit, par définition, à presque rien le rôle individuel en économie : les moyens de productions sont communs et c'est le groupe entier qui prend les décisions. Cela peut avoir de nombreuses conséquences néfastes sur la production :

• Alors que dans une économie à base individuelle chaque acteur peut tester concrètement ses propres idées, ce qui conduit à de nombreuses variantes, au contraire le groupe socialiste ne teste, le plus souvent, qu'une seule option à la fois.
• la prise de décision par un groupe est toujours plus lente et plus difficile que la prise de décision par un individu seul. Inversement, il est difficile pour le groupe de faire marche arrière et de revenir sur une décision antérieure : une telle proposition constitue toujours une critique implicite de celui qui a pris la décision, beaucoup plus difficile dans un cadre public et alors qu'il n'y a pas d'alternative à la légitimité du groupe.
• le traitement des désaccords profonds au sein du groupe (ceux qui menacent jusqu'à son existence) pose une grave difficulté.
• l'individu peut être récompensé ou puni par le groupe ; cependant, les déterminants des décisions en la matière relèvent entre autres des affinités qu'il peut nouer au sein du groupe. Il peut être plus rentable de travailler directement son image au sein du groupe, que de travailler tout court (puisque cela ne constitue qu'un des éléments de son image au sein du groupe).
• Dans ce contexte, les efforts d'un individu ne lui profitent que peu.

Les socialistes insistent beaucoup, pour résoudre ces problèmes en partie, sur l'importance de l'éducation et de la morale civique, or

• Il est douteux que l'éducation permette de débarrasser l'Homme de tout son égoïsme.
• Il apparait immédiatement la question de la mesure du succès dans cette entreprise d'éducation, et des conséquences d'un échec : que faut-il faire des égoïstes incorrigibles ? Doivent-ils se soumettren à la loi commune de socialisation ou développer un autre système en parallèle?

[modifier] Place des groupes intermédiaires

Comme il est difficile d'imaginer consulter la population globale pour toutes les questions, et que cela n'apparait même pas souhaitable sur le plan de la justice sociale, il faut nécessairement des groupes intermédiaires. Cela pose alors le problème de leur place et de leur importance au sein de la collectivité socialiste (nous parlons ici d'un système autogéré).

[modifier] Critiques pragmatiques

Ces critiques se fondent sur les résultats concrets réellement observés des systèmes socialistes^{[réf. nécessaire]}

[modifier] L'emprise de l'État

Dans la pratique historique, le socialisme s'est traduit généralement par une plus ou moins forte emprise de l'État sur l'individu, laissant peu d'espace pour la libre solidarité et coopération entre les hommes que prône l'idée socialiste. On peut parler à ce sujet de "socialisme d'État" plus ou moins autoritaire et bureaucratique, ou d'État-providence visant un certain nivellement des situations économiques individuelles et dont les résultats trouvent vite leurs limites, voire effets pervers. C'est notamment une critique récurrente chez les anarchistes socialistes.

[modifier] L'incitation pour l'entreprise

Selon les partisans du libéralisme économique, le profit est le mécanisme qui permet d'évaluer le niveau de performance économique d'une entreprise : les entreprises les plus profitables sont celles qui sont les plus efficaces et qui répondent le mieux à la demande de leurs clients.

Dans un système planifié, il n'y a pas de mécanisme de pertes et profits qui permette de mesurer précisément l'efficacité des programmes. Sans le profit, affirment les critiques, il n'y a aucune façon de discipliner les entreprises qui ne servent pas l'intérêt public, ni de récompenser les autres.

[modifier] L'absence de prix, source d'information

Certaines formes de socialisme proposent d'abolir complètement le marché, ou de fixer les prix par voie gouvernementale. Selon les partisans du libre marché, la planification centrale est condamnée à l'inefficacité et est vouée à l'écroulement car le calcul économique est impossible. Sous le socialisme, les facteurs de production n'étant propriété de personne et ne faisant jamais l'objet d'échange, ils n'ont pas de prix significatif, ce qui fait qu'il est impossible de déterminer si une entreprise crée de la richesse ou au contraire la détruit.

[modifier] Lien supposé avec le national-socialisme

La question des relations, voire de la parenté existant entre nazisme et socialisme a provoqué des polémiques depuis l'origine du national-socialisme. Au-delà de celles-ci, cette question relève de la science politique et de l’histoire. La question a ainsi été sérieusement soulevée depuis les années 1940 par des penseurs comme Friedrich Hayek, puis Hannah Arendt. Elle a rebondi dans des travaux contemporains, comme ceux de Götz Aly, François Furet, Ernst Nolte, ou Jean-François Revel.

[modifier] Voir aussi

[modifier] Article connexe

• Critiques du communisme

[modifier] Bibliographie

• Friedrich Hayek, La Présomption fatale. Les Erreurs du socialisme, 1988
• Emile Perreau-Saussine, Ce qui reste du socialisme[1], Le débat, novembre 2006, 142, p. 56-74

[modifier] Liens externes

• Vers le social-nationalisme, dérive sécuritaire d'une pensée paranoïaque.
• Pour en finir avec le communisme
• La loi du plus faible, ou généalogie du politiquement correct, par André Lapied
• Google en anglais :
  • Google Directory: Opposing views on socialism
  • Google Directory: Opposing views on anarchism
  • A contemporary view of the calculation debate

[modifier] VO base de traduction

This article deals with opposition and criticisms of socialism, and arguments for and against such criticism.

One of the fundamental goals of the socialist movement, throughout its history, has been the abolition of capitalism. As such, the majority of socialism's opponents have been advocates of capitalism - most often, advocates of "pure" or laissez-faire capitalism. They include liberals, conservatives and libertarians such as Milton Friedman, Ayn Rand, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, and Joshua Muravchik, to name a few.

Socialism itself is by no means a monolithic movement; there are in fact important points of disagreement between its several branches. Therefore, some of the criticisms presented below may not apply to all forms of socialism (for example, many of the economic criticisms are directed at a Soviet-style planned economy, while some proposed socialisms advocate different methods of economic planning, and others reject planned economics altogether).

[modifier] Incentives

According to its supporters, a profit system is a monitoring mechanism which continually evaluates the economic performance of every business enterprise. In theory, under capitalism the firms that are the most efficient and most successful at meeting consumer demand are rewarded with profits. Firms that operate inefficiently and fail to serve the perceived public interest are penalized with losses.

By rewarding success and penalizing failure, the profit system provides a strong disciplinary mechanism which continually redirects resources away from weak, failing, and inefficient firms toward those firms which are the most efficient and successful at serving the consumer demands of their corresponding market segment. A competitive profit system ensures a constant re-optimization of resources and moves the economy toward greater levels of efficiency. Unsuccessful firms cannot escape the strong discipline of the marketplace under a profit/loss system. Competition forces companies to profit (which advocates of capitalism tend to equate with serving the public interest) or suffer the consequences.

Under central planning, there is no profit-and-loss system of accounting to accurately measure the success or failure of various programs. Without profits, critics argue, there is no way to discipline firms that fail to serve the public interest and no way to reward firms that do. Therefore, they claim that centrally planned economies do not have an effective incentive structure to coordinate economic activity. Slavenka Drakulic made this point in How We Survived Communism & Even Laughed (ISBN 0060975407), where she argued that a major contributor to the fall of socialist planned economies in the former Soviet bloc was the failure to produce the basic consumer goods that its people desired. She argues that, because of the makeup of the leadership of these regimes, the concerns of women got particularly short shrift. She illustrates this, in particular, by the system's failure to produce washing machines.

In response, most socialists claim that the incentives in a socialist planned economy should come from the democratic nature of the system. Economic planners are supposed to have an interest in doing a good job and delivering what the people need because that ensures the people will keep voting for them in elections, while if the planners are doing a bad job and the economy is stagnating, the people would vote them out of office and elect a new government with a new economic plan.

Drakulic lived under a system that was not a democratic one, and it can be argued that the planners had no incentive to cater to the needs of the people. Some socialists do not consider such an undemocratic system to be socialist at all. As a corollary to this argument, socialists claim that inefficient planned economies can only exist for prolonged periods in undemocratic conditions, where the people cannot reward or penalize the state for its performance.

Critics of socialism insist that publicly owned organizations are less efficient than private companies (see privatization for further discussion). A majority of socialists disagree with the notion that private companies serve the public interest. They argue that the profit/loss motive encourages companies to cut costs and raise profits in ways that do more harm than good to the public: a company will try to get the maximum work from its employees for the minimum amount of money, keeping wages as low as it can, and, as capitalists hold high concentrations of capital and may restrict access to vital resources, they claim that the workers are left with little bargaining power. Finally, since the rich have more money than the poor (and therefore there is more profit to be made in serving the rich rather than the poor), they claim capitalism encourages companies to cater to the interests of the rich and ignore the needs of the poor. They also point to drugs companies that have little incentive to produce drugs to cure diseases such as malaria, which primarily affect poor countries that cannot afford to buy them, but those same companies devote huge resources to developing drugs for the relatively trivial complaints of the rich western consumers who can pay.

Supporters of capitalism argue that companies compete for workers and thus cannot give arbitrarily low wages. They also hold that companies that sell luxury products are few; most money is made by selling products to ordinary people in developed nations. However, socialists argue that since companies are also in competition with each other and thus attempt to cut costs in order to enhance their competitiveness there is an incentive to "downsize" the workforce and/or cut wages.

Regarding poor people in developing nations, capitalists assert that people in the democratic developed nations could vote to raise taxes in order to increase foreign aid or otherwise give much help voluntarily, almost everyone in developed nations being very wealthy in comparison to people in developing countries. They argue that the little interest among the public for such aid is not something capitalism can be blamed for. Furthermore, they argue that nations that are more capitalistic have less poverty (see Index of economic freedom). Socialists argue that the reduced poverty in developed countries is either due to exploitation of poorer nations, or to the extensive welfare states that have been put in place in most of the developed countries.

[modifier] Prices

According to the critics of socialism, the price system in a market economy guides economic activity so flawlessly that most people don't appreciate its importance or see its effect. Adam Smith dubbed this effect the "invisible hand" of the market. Market prices transmit information about relative scarcity and then efficiently coordinate economic activity. The economic content of prices provides incentives that promote economic efficiency.

Some forms of socialism propose to abolish markets entirely. All, or nearly all, advocate some form of governmental or other "social" interference with market prices. Free-market economists argue that a controlled or fixed price always transmits misleading information about relative scarcity and that inappropriate behavior results from a controlled price, because false information has been transmitted by an artificial price.

Socialists opposed to the market generally argue that markets don't work nearly as well as thought. They point out that some people struggle to survive in capitalism while others have mansions, and that this itself is indicative of scarcity and evidence that free market pricing mechanisms are evidently not effective or equitable. Socialists also point out that even most economists supporting capitalism acknowledge the existence of various market failures that need to be regulated such as monopolies or externalities. The rules of the market may also be manipulated by those with more power.

A planned economy tries to replace the invisible hand with a highly visible (and, according to socialists, more efficient) one. The claim is that a more rational result can be achieved by the efforts of economic coordinators rather than by market forces. While some socialists oppose a centrally planned economy, all advocate the overt inclusion of non-economic factors in determining economic decisions.

Socialists are sharply divided on the claim that market pricing produces allocative efficiency. There are market socialists who believe it is both possible and imperative that socialistic systems take this point into account. David Schweickart, a philosophy professor in the US, has said that socialists must endorse the market because otherwise "everything in the economy is subject to political debate -- every price, every product, every technology" and he says only two possible outcomes can result from this, "either anarchy or, more likely, the subtle or not so subtle shutting down of democratic input."

On the other hand, a Hungarian economist, Jonas Kornai, once a market socialist himself, modified his views subsequent to the fall of the Soviet system and its eastern European variants. Kornai has written that "the attempt to realize market socialism...produces an incoherent system, in which there are elements that repel each other: the dominance of public ownership and the operation of the market are not compatible."

A capitalist opponent of socialism would argue that both Schweickart and Kornai are right -- that markets are both a necessity and an impossibility for a socialism that would be humane, sustainable, and allocatively efficient.

On the other hand, socialists who do reject the market mechanism of pricing make the following points:

• That capitalism has a natural tendency toward monopoly, leading to distortion in prices. This is essentially the same argument used by critics of socialism, but with the terms reversed: assuming monopoly to be inevitable, the socialists argue that the conditions will not be present for the "invisible hand", and other means not available under free market capitalism must be found. For example, this argument is repeatedly invoked in the 2001 Program of the Communist Party of Canada, which refers to the current system as "State-monopoly capitalism" and argues, that "financial and industrial monopolies dominate agriculture, and farmers are compelled to pay high monopoly prices for seed, equipment and other inputs, while the prices they get for their produce are set by the powerful packing, milling, grain-handling and railway monopolies." [2]
• That market systems are distorted by the unequal power of the players in the markets. Globalissues.org editor, Anup Shah (a leftist, though not necessarily a socialist) makes this case, suggesting that the current neo-liberal order might be better called "neo-mercantilism" and applying to it Adam Smith's critique of how military power distorted trade under mercantilism. [3]
• That one or another socialist approach can mitigate the role of externalities in pricing, producing results at least as efficient as those under capitalism. This was basically the argument put forward by Oskar Lange [4] and the Paretians [5]; see also Pareto efficiency.

[modifier] The tragedy of the commons

The tragedy of the commons, in its narrowest sense, refers to the situation of certain grazing lands communally owned by British villages in the 16th century. These lands were made available for public use (or, more precisely, the use of those with rights in that common land). According to Garrett Hardin and others, because each individual had more of an incentive to maximize his (or her) own benefit from this common land than to be concerned for its sustainability, the land was eventually overgrazed and became worthless. (However, studies by C.J. Dahlman and others have largely refuted the claim that any such tragedy actually occurred. Access to the commons in the 16th century was constrained by a variety of cultural protocols and was far from equal.)

More generally, the line of argument is that when assets are owned in common, there are no incentives in place to encourage wise stewardship. While private property is said to create incentives for conservation and the responsible use of property, common property is said to encourage irresponsibility and waste. In other words, the argument is that if everyone owns an asset, people act as if no one owns it. And when no one owns it, no one really takes care of it. This is an argument directed at libertarian socialism and other proposed forms of socialism where there is little or no central authority to act as a steward of public property. Planned economies avoid the tragedy of the commons by placing the state in charge of the use of resources owned in common.

One libertarian socialist counterargument is that the tragedy of the commons is an inherently psychological issue that can be resolved through proper education - that is, by creating a culture where people are respectful of common property and do not act as if no one owns it.

On a related note, many socialists point out that some things are almost inevitably commons, for example air and oceans. Paul Burkett makes a specifically Marxist case for socialism as being better able to address the issue of managing the environment in an article entitled "Ecology and Marx’s Vision of Communism" in Socialism and Democracy, Vol. 17, No. 2 [6].

Critics respond that air and oceans are indeed commons and that problems such as overfishing and global warming due to pollution can be traced to this fact. In economic terms, air and sea pollution are cases of market failure due to externalities (market agents do not pay the full costs of their actions). While most environmentalists propose to solve such problems through government regulations, there is also a theory of free-market environmentalism, which argues that the most effective direction of reform is continued privatization of the commons [7]. The United States, and some others nations, have experimented with market solutions in the form of emissions trading in order to reduce air pollution. Such trading uses an artificially created market in which a government decides the number of emissions credits that will be in circulation and the rules under which they may be traded.

Lastly, there is a body of thought, often linked to cultural anthropology and to modern institutional economics, that recognises that constraints must exist to prevent the private overuse of resources. However, this perspective contends that alternative institutions than private property might well be just as effective or more effective in meeting those goals and better suited to meeting social goals. This was the belief of many early Bolsheviks, particularly Georgui Plekhanov, who evoked this idea to make his case that a socialist state would need regulations.

[modifier] Central Planning

Even anarchist socialists usually advocate some form of coordination so that different groups of workers function smoothly together (whether on a local or global scale). Critics of socialism argue that it is not possible to vote on everything, if for no other reason than that information gathering, discussion, and voting takes time; therefore, theoretically, some power must be given to leaders, at least temporarily.

Large scale central planning (and anarchist coordination) requires an understanding of trends and statistics. Critics argue that it is often impossible to make long term predictions (eg. chaos theory) based on current trends and numbers. They further argue that a capitalist system solves this problem by simultaneously trying multiple solutions and letting economic competition find the best result. Central planning means that relatively fewer solutions will be chosen, and those that will will be based on numbers. Arguably, these solutions may be less effective due to a lack of variety in the number of options available.

[modifier] Historical Examples

Due to the existence of several branches of the socialist movement, who advocate different kinds of social and economic systems they call "socialism", there is no consensus on what countries - if any - can be given as historical examples of socialism.

The two kinds of countries most commonly said to be "socialist" are communist states on the one hand and Northern European welfare states (e.g. Sweden) on the other. Within the socialist movement, views are divided as follows:

• Marxists-Leninists argue that some or all of the historical communist states were examples of socialism.
• Social democrats argue that welfare states are examples of socialism.
• Other socialists argue that none of the above countries were socialist, and that socialism has never been applied in practice.

Different critics of socialism also hold different views on the subject. Some consider socialism to be a purely theoretical concept that should be criticized on theoretical grounds; others hold that certain historical examples exist and that they can be criticized on practical grounds. Criticisms of communist states are particularly prevalent (see criticisms of communism for a discussion of these).