"the following is a conversation with Bhaskar Sankara he's a Democratic Socialist a political writer founding editor of Jacobin president of the nation former Vice chair of the Democratic Socialist of ..."

"I will often fall short in pushing back too hard or not pushing back enough of not bringing up topics I should have of talking too much of interrupting too much or or maybe sometimes in the rare case ..."

"let's start with a big broad question what is socialism how do you like to Define it how do you like to think about it well there's so many socialists out there and we can't seem to agree about anythi..."

"we have intrinsic value we are individuals that have unequal talents of course we're individuals that want different things but this unique individualness can only Truly Come to light in a society in ..."

"but if all human beings have intrinsic value you don't have to be an Einstein for the application some of the ideas that you're talking about is there a tension or a trade-off between our human civili..."

"resources yes but it's also power and I guess one way to think about this is some thinkers on the right like Hayek they would say in their most generous moments talking about socialists and socialism ..."

"often of trade-offs between who whose freedom and autonomy are you going to prioritize the freedom and autonomy of the entrepreneur um or the capitalist in this case or the freedom of autonomy of ordi..."

"how can people take advantage of it so it seems like no matter what part of human nature is whatever the rules whatever the framework whatever the system somebody's going to take advantage of it and t..."

"me personally of course there's a giant set of circumstances of The Unlucky and the overburdened and so on okay so how can people take advantage of each system socialism capitalism so for one thing pe..."

"to be perfected and for me that's the importance of democracy so even a few years ago not to go on a pension but um people were allowing Chinese authoritarianism and they're saying China is building t..."

"you and we'll change your community for the for the better I'm taking notes here because I for me at least you're just about playing a lot of Skyrim this whole family relationship then I'm gonna have ..."

"now with enough abundance that we could afford more people deciding to opt out of the system out of production and that the carrots of staying in you know more money for consumption more ability to do..."

"can we actually step back a little bit on definitions because you said that some of the ideas practically that you're playing with is democratic socialism we talked about the higher level the higher k..."

"democracy the Kaiser is still still ruled these movements took Route across uh the capitalist world but including in Russia and in conditions of illegality so it was assumed for many many years and th..."

"and that's where official kind of Communism out of Russia emerged in other parts of Europe parties were actually able to take power some in the interwar period but most in the post-war period And they..."

"what is that world look like and how is it different from communism actually maybe we can linger before we talk about your vision of democratic socialism what was wrong with Communism stalinism implem..."

"action where we maintain as much of this territory of the old Russian Empire as possible we'll try to slowly Implement changes restabilize the economy through something called a new economic program w..."

"collectivization was a disaster I mean first of all I think was built on the faulty premise that scale always equals more productivity when in fact especially in agriculture but in any field it's a li..."

"economic picture is actually a little bit more complicated politically um I I think it's just a small party without much popular support but with real popular sport in a couple cities but a lot withou..."

"dictators authoritarians to take power is there something within the ideology that allows for that for the sort of uh for lying to people essentially well I might surprise you with my answer because I..."

"um you know our our basic rights and voice our voice so this this complicated picture because uh helped me understand you mentioned that social democracy is trying to have social policies within a cap..."

"and so on um now does that mean total State ownership of everything or a planned economy I don't think that makes any sense you know I think that we should live in a society in which markets are harne..."

"but what it would mean is a society without a capitalist class this class hasn't been you know individually these people uh you know haven't been taken to re-education camps or or or whatever else but..."

"capitalist class with a central leader populist leader that says the rich and the powerful they're taking advantage of you we need to remove them we need to put them in camps perhaps uh not said expli..."

"some of these countries in Western Europe there wasn't actually democracy before the workers move in and for the Socialist movement so the battle in Sweden for instance was about establishing politica..."

"happened had to do with the fact that it was never a democratic country it was ruled by a party and the party itself was very easy to shift from a somewhat Democratic party in London's day to an autho..."

"something that's manufactured but capitalism itself as a system as a system based on class division whether you're supported or oppose it I think you should we should acknowledge it's based on class d..."

"difference is over exaggerated that there's a difference but it's not the difference of the abuser and the abused it's more of a difference of uh people that were successful and people that were less ..."

"those Productions so we've taken enough socialism into capitalism that you could say that at a certain point maybe it makes a qualitative difference and not just a quantitative difference in people's ..."

"if I'm running a firm and all of a sudden my competition is paying is is able to find a labor pool and is paying people less than me I'm going to be undercut because they'll be able to take some of th..."

"capitalists so there's a I mean there's a lot of uh things to say maybe within just very very low level question of if the workers are running the show there's a brutal truth to the fact that some peo..."

"style economies which was soft budget you know constraints and um firms basically not being allowed to fail because the government was committed to Full Employment the firms employed people so even in..."

"but let's say your partner you kind of have equity in your Law Firm or something beyond your billable hours and let's say you're um going to be fired from your Law Firm or they're laying off people or..."

"class and sort of there's a lot of ways you can maybe correct me on the numbers but you could say that the top one percent of Americans have more wealth than the bottom 50 percent that's not talking a..."

"it's too um you know too difficult uh to um to start a firm and it benefits um no one really except for whatever bureaucracy might be might be um you know taking their 15 cut um but in general I think..."

"big role in your economy taking a lot of your money and taxes the unions are are really shaping your your life as a capitalist far more that would happen in a country like the United States and yet st..."

"need a raise or whatever else I could with my skill set my background my role in the company I could go to my boss the owner of the nation and say okay I need to renegotiate my contract on these terms..."

"because I think you're even taking your example that would be better for society if a firm cannot pay its workers a living wage but its competitors can then that firm should will either figure out a w..."

"mentioned living wage is there is there a tension between a living wage and maybe you could speak to what a living wage means and the workers owning all of the profit of the company sort of uh this ki..."

"a market mechanism firms competing against each other to expand uh connected to a system of public financing but even at that level the individual um bankers and and public Banks and so on would be op..."

"for example if you're in a hypothetical version of the U.S you might see a lot more corruption like the post office but you know you wouldn't have that corruption in your workplace so you kind of lear..."

"successfully um dealt with I think on the developmental trajectory of even countries today that we think of as being very corrupt um corruption will will um you know fade away as well but you definite..."

"for a combination of accidents of birth plus hard work let me push back because uh yes so I agree with you but let me push back on on a subtle point because I like to draw the difference between hard ..."

"a socialist in any degree Central planning or perhaps a collective of workers that it won't result in that kind of meritocracy that you're talking about but you're saying that no it's possible to have..."

"and try to implement it you have to you know do it as a process democratically and and so on so just philosophically in your gut you're more concerned about the innate equal value of human beings vers..."

"did actually too it's not just capitals but what Stalin did was he sacrificed whole Generations because he thought that he was building something for the future for future Russians to to enjoy and for..."

"think a lot of people would be surprised to hear that no I mean not not people who know my work I mean more generally I think a lot of people on the right um even in the center I think might have the ..."

"the way they make changes only through interventions and culture because they don't really have the same sense of class and class struggle that agree or disagree with it it's a very material plane so ..."

"King was a socialist to a degree was he a socialist I I would love to learn about that Martin Luther King I think broadly called himself at various points his life a Christian socialist or a Democrati..."

"redistribution it's fascinating it's fascinating which figures self-identified and were in part socialists Albert Einstein was one Albert Einstein Albert Einstein wrote an article for the first issue ..."

"um smaller Nations um I wouldn't call myself a pacifist I think most socialists wouldn't call themselves pacifists because there are some struggles that are worth fighting for you know there's Nationa..."

"um heightening up tensions or saying that we need to buy a new weapon system to be prepared for a conventional war with China Russia uh meanwhile I think we all know that if there's going to be conven..."

"that I think actually operates outside of the economic system of individual Nations it has to do more with honestly in part egos of leaders um and there's a international battle for resources but sure..."

"in a cosmic sense yeah I know for sure aliens would laugh at us or humans that go far beyond Earth and look at the history hmm well most of the history will be forgotten because if humans successfully..."

"60 years ago it would have just been a normal thing right this kind of territorial disputes and so on and I think you know projecting in the future I think within our lifetimes we'll live to see um th..."

"you know that that's that's beyond what Marxism is meant to do what economic system can tell us about the sex appeal blue jeans no economic system but socialism in the Soviet sense when it was turned ..."

"is am I there I miss something there I mean I think that was that was close enough I mean I think that's definitely uh true of of Marxist theory that the contradictions of capitalism the fact that it ..."

"so is this what's part of that is wrong no I think and broadly the Marxist theory of History is about different types different modes of of production that existed various times um based on material u..."

"of individual workers so it became kind of a collective action problem where you would need the massive workers to get together decide to change things but also people be afraid because they'd be depe..."

"inevitable uh Revolution we have to convince people of both one the struggle for day-to-day reforms and why it's important to be politically organized why it's important to be a member of a union or t..."

"Mass abundance and so on I myself don't share that Vision um I believe that we will always need to have a state in some form as a way to one um even just mediate difference I think traditionally a lot..."

"in general I'm kind of wary of visions of change that seem like they're not built off little thing pieces that we have now and not built of history and experience and whatever else like I don't want a..."

"make our lives better yeah and there's like deep ideas here where in some sense Universal Health Care and worker collectives are not so radically different that there is just uh there's philosophical ..."

"so like you people like you are basically saying like arguing for ideas and we'll have to explore those ideas together um why do you think if Universal Health Care is popular why don't we have Univers..."

"Universal Health Care um done without the bill even if you pass something you're trying to make a change like Obamacare was supposed to have a public option everybody's been running on a public option..."

"because I think the vast majority of people who aren't currently covered and also a lot of employers to be honest would probably drop their private coverage if they knew their employees can just get a..."

"difference in people's lives what do you think about free college should College be free so I would say free college is not at the top of my list of priorities but it definitely should be for you in m..."

"terms of order of operation I would just start with K-12 education improving it and and whatever else then College after but I'm not opposed to it so does that improving K-12 education does that mean ..."

"on on education and of course you can Define education more broadly which is like the care of the flourishing of the young mind whatever that is yeah whatever you call this early yeah a lot of it star..."

"especially bad for the people at the bottom of the the labor market so I saw various estimates for socialist programs like Social Security expansion free college uh Medicare for all will cost upwards ..."

"um now I think that that one for ordinary people most of them the trade-off of even hypothetically if if taxes on um lower middle class and Working Class People in certain cases go up the trade-off wo..."

"violence it's normal to have uh drug-related violence you know the we have what like four or 500 people some years in like Baltimore like a city of under a million getting getting killed um these are ..."

"family leave or whatever else like this is not the case in other other countries so I think there's all sorts of benefits from having a bigger uh welfare state but yes there are costs and there are go..."

"that's one reason why we'd have to take the investment function away from kaplers there has to be if you're gonna make it so hard for them that they can't invest or they can't employ labor the way the..."

"want just their money on that topic sort of a little bit of a tangent there's a lot of folks in the in the in the left community uh far left Community socialist community that I think are at the sourc..."

"trade-offs if you if you just snap your fingers and say um Elon Musk you're now um all your wealth is gone you're now you know on food stamps or whatever else and that kind of arbitrary way you'd be a..."

"now there's a lot of examples of billionaires that have gotten there in Shady ways and so on and you can point that out but in the same way we celebrate great artists and great athletes and great uh l..."

"so you know I would agree with that um LeBron James if he's not already in his lifetime will be a billionaire um and he got his money largely through just being an incredible athlete excelling in his ..."

"discourse okay speaking of which you said you're a fan of Bernie Sanders uh would you classify yourself as a Bernie bro what's the technical definition of a burning is that a very it's a subset no no ..."

"communicate it now Bernie Sanders was politicized a very long time ago I actually once told him I've only met him a few times but one time I joked that um in his in his book he mentioned that one poli..."

"something economic in a way I then obviously he had all his ideas and he was also a product to the left and that he went to Vermont he kind of did the back to the land thing he was basically like a no..."

"to convey basic points when she gets into like the like language of intersectionality and whatever else especially in the context of cultural issues and stuff like that exactly instead of just the pla..."

"her audience her rhetoric and how do you win over someone who really hates a lot of your ideas but might actually believe in some of your policies and um I think she's been um ineffective quite frankl..."

"struggling to relate to people who don't have a lot of her her you know starting points as far as moral and ethical beliefs yeah but she's actually great at flourishing in all the all the attacks she'..."

"position herself as a lightning rod cultural figure whereas I think a national political figure needs to pick their spots and also pick their moment for changing their their rhetoric and adjusting to ..."

"to set fire to the Republican um uh establishment right uh he was able to self-fund you know largely his campaign and he already was a media figure without them uh AOC has been much more cautious for ..."

"closer Association of AOC in our policies with ordinary Democrats where she needs to draw stronger distinctions she does need to do it like um Trump did with just man I forgot all of them though I fou..."

"national figure and choosing a deeper blue District but but we need to root our politics then in Working Class People and a lot of districts that I don't know the the type of kitchen table conversatio..."

"Clinton at two percent and AOC at 1.5 percent and then Bernie at one percent so uh I would not buy AOC at that Mark I would buy Biden like crazy though I'm not a Gambling Man but I would I would total..."

"for me I'm not I don't have a problem with partnership it's what kind of partnership so I think Trump has cultivated like a lot of right populists a relationship with his supporters it's almost like a..."

"in places like Hong Kong or or elsewhere um but to me um nothing the Chinese Communist Party does has anything to do with socialism I think even by their own definition today it really doesn't um it's..."

"there's there's a better way to do things which is quite simply a democracy the thing is though the lessons of history that China is looking at this is dark aspect um so building on top of the fact th..."

"um you know democracy not not every country had to go down the route of Yugoslavia and the USSR and and so on you are the founder of the magazine Jacobin of which I am a subscriber I recommend everybo..."

"for my future I kind of you know but I ended up um just being a magazine publisher I literally didn't know what a magazine publisher was but uh it just kind of happened what's the hardest part about r..."

"last thing I want is a young white teenager who who um you know feels unrepresented politically and wants to be a part of maybe even the left to feel like um like oh I should think more about my ident..."

"what we stand for and how we make our movement like it used to be more rooted in the working class so if anyone rewinds the tape may go to when we first started talking about early socialism when I wa..."

"were to read your book uh socialist manifest and do a review so I think Marx would say that um my vision of a socialism after capitalism maintains key elements of what he would uh uh the commodity for..."

"uh what uh advice would you give to Young Folks in high school in college how to have a career they can be proud of or how to change the world I think be intellectually curious um you know read outsid..."

"yeah but like you know they're just as they were just as clever as us you know uh what do you think is the meaning of this whole experiment we have going on on Earth Now what's the meaning of life wel..."

"future and I have to say thank you for doing so thank you for caring about the struggle of the people in the world through ideas that are bold and I think challenging for a lot of people in a time whe..."