Socialist Voice Review:
July – 2023
On the first anniversary of our monthly reviews of Socialist Voice, it is time, at least for now, to close the book on this subject.
It is not that we would endorse all the subject matter in the current edition: two articles address the complex issue of Artificial Intelligence (AI) but manage to avoid most of the complexities. Both articles display a naïve approach to an innovation at its current stage of both development and application yet appear to reach near definitive positions on the issue.
While space can sometimes be a problem, there would have been little harm in the subject getting a part 2 in the next issue. A part 2 might have looked at the military and policing applications, at the loss of jobs and the impact on further propaganda manipulation. It is not just naïve but dangerous to deal with such a complex issue in such simplistic terms particularly as progressives will have little or no control over its current or future applications.
Another article, this time centered on China has this to say:
“In the process it becomes clear that the free-market system is again faced with major problems. Worse still from capitalism’s point of view is the presence of a viable alternative in the east, that is, the People’s Republic of China.”
While the article rightly addresses the increasing political influences being successfully developed by China, it fails to acknowledge that it has a highly unequal income distribution in absolute terms and relative to other countries. Whether China’s “path to socialism” is a viable alternative to the wholesale brand of vulgar capitalism is debateable. But, China’s “path to socialism” and the capitalist path to environmental catastrophe look fairly similar and as such, provides no alternative whatsoever in this particular but urgent aspect.
However, it was never our intention to just critique content – our primary interest concentrates on approach. In this respect, Socialist Voice has moved almost completely from the ‘we must’, ‘they must’, ‘do as you are told’ nonsense that pervaded so many articles in the past. Of course, as Socialist Voice is an integral part of the CPI, its content will reflect Party positions (or lack of), and as such will remain in sharp focus.
Still, the last hankering for the good old days has not been completely eradicated: it still has a sloganeer! “Trade unions must be radical or they will become redundant” screams Jimmy Doran.
In our series on the CPI and the trade unions we called out the banality of such sloganeering but like a bold child, Comrade Doran could not help himself – ‘there! I’ve said it again’ – in a pointless jesture of defiance.
We offered him a right of reply to some issues we raised in that series but, so far, he has not found a suitable slogan to respond with.
While we will continue to review Socialist Voice occasionally and respond to particular articles when necessary, our main focus will remain on the CPI itself. If the Party is able to respond to investigation and pressure in the same way that Socialist Voice did, then there could be interesting times ahead.
In the meantime, there are a lot of unanswered questions. They can not stay unanswered for ever.