63: Nietzsche Contra Socialism

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Feb 14, 2023

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INSIGHT

Capitalism And Socialism Share A Root

Nietzsche treats socialism and capitalism as two expressions of the same utilitarian value system that makes humans into homo economicus.
Once utility becomes the moral standard, socialism becomes the inevitable maturation of capitalism, not its opposite.

ADVICE

Look Beyond Accumulation

Resist defining life by accumulation and the market's incentives that channel behavior into predictable pursuit of capital.
Cultivate goals beyond wealth to avoid the emptiness Nietzsche diagnoses in the upper classes.

INSIGHT

Gold As The New God

Money replaces God as the avatar of power and motivates crimes of impatience and greed among the wealthy.
Nietzsche sees economic worship as a new fanaticism that channels the same will to power once expressed by religious conviction.

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Today, we look at the other side of the coin. Nietzsche's critique of capitalism is in fact inextricably bound to his critique of socialism. What he finds beneath both approaches to managing human economic affairs is the utilitarian value structure and the view of the human being as homo economicus. Socialism, rather than the solution to capitalism, is the necessary end of the same internal logic, and further seeks to cut off avenues for man's will to power as we labor under the mistaken assumption that by reducing suffering we will maximize pleasure. The closer we proceed to an idealized, painless society, the more our individuality is smoothed over. Increasingly, the only avenue for the expression of power is through the only remaining hierarchical structure: the state. Originally created by mankind to be a means, the state becomes the ends. In a twisted irony, the likes of the socialists and anarchists - who desire above all for a classless, stateless society - bring forth an all-powerful state as the means of doing this, and become consumed by it.

A neat aspect of the episode order here is that we're covering Nietzsche's political thought in a rough chronology - meaning that, while we might jump around from place to place, and occasionally grab a quote from Beyond Good & Evil, we're moving from the second and third book of Human, All Too Human into covering a lot more material from Daybreak, while still drawing on sources from elsewhere in the middle period. The next episode - Nietzsche's critique of fascism - covers around the same period, in terms of the letters and statements he made about Wagner and Elisabeth during his breaks with them, in addition to drawing on passages from throughout his work.

Ian Wright's article, "Capital as a Real God": https://ianwrightsite.wordpress.com/2020/09/03/marx-on-capital-as-a-real-god-2/

Thomas Brobjer's studies showing that Nietzsche knew Marx: https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110170740.298/html

My essay on Star Trek: https://untimely-reflections.blogspot.com/2021/05/neverending-frontier-star-treks.html