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Fundamentals Of Scientific Socialism
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1968
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 24, 2025
it's practically almost nonsensical to read this book in the modern era but I was interested in getting a glimpse of soviet era propaganda. So there I was trying to get through what is otherwise a compilation of boilerplate pro-communist talking points. one of the more bizarre things I've probably done to pass time.
As unremarkable as this piece of work was, I was particularly interested in certain parts of it; for one, there is a portion that argued against socialism being the cause for personality cults. I was pretty surprised that the author would criticise Stalin for possessing poor personal qualities, the 'actual' cause for his rule being marred with political repression.
Nonetheless, it is naive from his end to assume that the leaders that rule over us can always have good personal qualities, it's the lack of checks and balances in the USSR that has made Stalin's reign as authoritarian as it was, like many other communist governments succeeding his regime.
This book was published in 1968, more than a decade after the end of Stalin's regime, I assume it was more acceptable to criticise his policies by then in the USSR. But it's interesting to see that to this date, there are communists who regard him very highly despite his rule giving a poor rep for the ideology of communism as a whole.
Another portion of the book that I was interested with was about him discussing industrial production. Communists these days hold largely different viewpoints regarding exploiting the Earths natural resources compared to Afanasyev's because of scientific discoveries after the publication of this book; so it feels bizarre to read a communist advocating for exploiting the Earths natural resources for maximum industrial production so that we can satisfy the ever increasing needs of communist society.
Automation is another concept he discussed about, he explains how in the future many parts of our jobs would be automated but that automation would only serve to assist us rather than be of detriment to us. We are at this critical juncture in time where AI has only started to take over a huge bulk of career prospects. the jarringly speedy development only becoming more worrisome to many a folk working as software engineers, writers, artists and the like. One only wonders what human productivity will look like when AI has entirely taken over our current careers in perhaps half a century or less than that or so.
it's also interesting to see some of the statistics showcased in the book. For example; Afanasyev exclaims that in the non-socialist world, only one-in-ten people receive adequate nourishment. The statistics are flipped now; currently nine-in-ten people are adequately nourished, pretty cool progress in our capitalist world.
Another statistic being that half the world was illiterate back then. Currently only 9% of our population is illiterate. I feel like it sort of goes to show that we have to be pretty grateful for how much more developed our world has gotten compared to 57 years ago haha. As much as capitalism was either a bane or a boon, we've made it pretty far.
Nonetheless, An unsurprisingly dry work of propagandistic literature that I wouldn't necessarily recommend checking out, heck I'm pretty stupid for reviewing this more than half-century old work that's hugely outdated but not in the bulk of the propaganda it spews.
To all those who are still weirdly interested in reading this, please save your time and pick up some other work of communist literature lol.
As unremarkable as this piece of work was, I was particularly interested in certain parts of it; for one, there is a portion that argued against socialism being the cause for personality cults. I was pretty surprised that the author would criticise Stalin for possessing poor personal qualities, the 'actual' cause for his rule being marred with political repression.
Nonetheless, it is naive from his end to assume that the leaders that rule over us can always have good personal qualities, it's the lack of checks and balances in the USSR that has made Stalin's reign as authoritarian as it was, like many other communist governments succeeding his regime.
This book was published in 1968, more than a decade after the end of Stalin's regime, I assume it was more acceptable to criticise his policies by then in the USSR. But it's interesting to see that to this date, there are communists who regard him very highly despite his rule giving a poor rep for the ideology of communism as a whole.
Another portion of the book that I was interested with was about him discussing industrial production. Communists these days hold largely different viewpoints regarding exploiting the Earths natural resources compared to Afanasyev's because of scientific discoveries after the publication of this book; so it feels bizarre to read a communist advocating for exploiting the Earths natural resources for maximum industrial production so that we can satisfy the ever increasing needs of communist society.
Automation is another concept he discussed about, he explains how in the future many parts of our jobs would be automated but that automation would only serve to assist us rather than be of detriment to us. We are at this critical juncture in time where AI has only started to take over a huge bulk of career prospects. the jarringly speedy development only becoming more worrisome to many a folk working as software engineers, writers, artists and the like. One only wonders what human productivity will look like when AI has entirely taken over our current careers in perhaps half a century or less than that or so.
it's also interesting to see some of the statistics showcased in the book. For example; Afanasyev exclaims that in the non-socialist world, only one-in-ten people receive adequate nourishment. The statistics are flipped now; currently nine-in-ten people are adequately nourished, pretty cool progress in our capitalist world.
Another statistic being that half the world was illiterate back then. Currently only 9% of our population is illiterate. I feel like it sort of goes to show that we have to be pretty grateful for how much more developed our world has gotten compared to 57 years ago haha. As much as capitalism was either a bane or a boon, we've made it pretty far.
Nonetheless, An unsurprisingly dry work of propagandistic literature that I wouldn't necessarily recommend checking out, heck I'm pretty stupid for reviewing this more than half-century old work that's hugely outdated but not in the bulk of the propaganda it spews.
To all those who are still weirdly interested in reading this, please save your time and pick up some other work of communist literature lol.
August 20, 2025
(n foi este o livro q eu li mas ele n existe aqui 💔)
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews