I learned many facts about Russian 20th Century history, important facts, that previously were unknown to me... thank you.
We share many goals: economic democracy, more equitable participation in the rewards of collective effort, freedom from tyranny by a minority that controls state and economic power to serve it's continuing self enrichment. Very difficult societal problems we nevertheless must strive to address. You are committed to exploring workable solutions, based on an extensive understanding of history, which I much admire.
The crux of the problem is, in my opinion: that rule of the majority in a society by a self interested minority is a 12,000+ year old legacy of all large human groups (ie. evolving civilization) that transitioned away from small collective hunter/gather tribes. It is a consequence of the diversity of human nature: a minority subgroup of humans more selfish than average, which the smaller scale of hunter/gatherer tribes managed effectively, by reeducation, banishment or if unsuccessful, that collective simply perished, ceding the area and opportunity to a more cohesive and resilient tribe.
Large settled human group civilization made possible by domestication of animals and farming did not evolve social constructs rapidly enough to counter the corrosive effects of a selfish small subgroup contagion and neither frankly have we under oligarchical Capitalism. At each stage, the majority might be made more miserable than they should have been by the controlling selfish minority, but an abundance of food resources enables evil inefficiency and oppression to prevail. Large and settled is more resilient, even if the majority are unhappy.
Socialism does not fix this issue. It's a scale problem of human nature (see "The Logic of Collective Action" by Mancur Olson). As Plato said of the philosopher King ideal (I think) "who watches the watchers ?". That is the issue socialism faces: a minority of "deciders" initially altruistic, eventually become corrupted by a selfish minority skilled in deception and dedicated to self enrichment. This has been the Achilles heel of all large human groups. Your recitation of the socioeconomic evolution in history from slavery --> feudalism --> bourgeois capitalism --> oligarchical capitalism, is a good summery of the failure of large human groups to counter domination internally by small self-serving subgroups. You believe modern well engineered socialism can break this pattern. Evidence of the implementation of socialism in the past 180 years tells me success is going to be exceedingly elusive even if one can avoid destructive perturbation by outside capitalist actors, by converting the most powerful capitalist sanctuary: the United States, to socialism internally.
Anthropological studies of the surviving traces of HG tribes are enlightening. They were communal in ownership of essential tribal resources, egalitarian in distribution of food and other important commodities and chose leaders who served by consensus, not inheritance. When some members of the tribe were unrepentant in their lack of commitment to the welfare of the group, (we would identify these individuals today as sociopaths or extreme narcissists), the tribe banished them to an almost certain death alone in the unforgiving wilderness. In this way, the genes of sociopaths were depreciated over time. In the rare circumstance that a minority subgroup in the tribe fought against the majority for domination, the loss of group cohesion and efficiency made the tribe vulnerable when challenged by nature, as happens from time to time, and was almost certainly fatal for these anomalous tribes. Internally conflicted organizations are not the fittest to survive when stressed by an unforgiving environment.
Hunting is an activity dominated by the random distribution of game. Tribes send individual hunting groups out in several compass directions. Yes, some hunters are more skilled than others, however this has almost no bearing on which hunting group will find game in their compass area and which will not see a valid target before returning to camp empty handed. Anthropologists surmise this basic facet of HG life: power and hunting skill, often did not outweigh the effect of chance in successfully returning with food for the tribe, promoted an egalitarian sharing of food among all. Some days the least skillful hunting group returned with food for all, owing to random game distribution. Everybody shared when any hunter was successful, otherwise, some days the most skillful hunters would go hungry. The law of averages rewarded egalitarianism in small HG tribes. While in large settled human groups the most selfish and cunning individuals gained advantage over time leaving the majority to know hunger as a means of control and repression.
With enough thought, I am hopeful a modern solution to Mancur Olson's human group scale problem can be found and tested. Perhaps it is some variation of your own concept of socialism. Right now neither myself or dozens of political science PhD thesis authors in (50) years have addressed Prof. Olson's core thesis - most small scale ( <3,000 member) human groups serve the true needs of the entire group, while larger groups, regardless of organizational purpose are hijacked by an internal subgroup that manipulates the organizational resources to serve their hidden agenda in pursuit of self enrichment.
I learned many facts about Russian 20th Century history, important facts, that previously were unknown to me... thank you.
We share many goals: economic democracy, more equitable participation in the rewards of collective effort, freedom from tyranny by a minority that controls state and economic power to serve it's continuing self enrichment. Very difficult societal problems we nevertheless must strive to address. You are committed to exploring workable solutions, based on an extensive understanding of history, which I much admire.
The crux of the problem is, in my opinion: that rule of the majority in a society by a self interested minority is a 12,000+ year old legacy of all large human groups (ie. evolving civilization) that transitioned away from small collective hunter/gather tribes. It is a consequence of the diversity of human nature: a minority subgroup of humans more selfish than average, which the smaller scale of hunter/gatherer tribes managed effectively, by reeducation, banishment or if unsuccessful, that collective simply perished, ceding the area and opportunity to a more cohesive and resilient tribe.
Large settled human group civilization made possible by domestication of animals and farming did not evolve social constructs rapidly enough to counter the corrosive effects of a selfish small subgroup contagion and neither frankly have we under oligarchical Capitalism. At each stage, the majority might be made more miserable than they should have been by the controlling selfish minority, but an abundance of food resources enables evil inefficiency and oppression to prevail. Large and settled is more resilient, even if the majority are unhappy.
Socialism does not fix this issue. It's a scale problem of human nature (see "The Logic of Collective Action" by Mancur Olson). As Plato said of the philosopher King ideal (I think) "who watches the watchers ?". That is the issue socialism faces: a minority of "deciders" initially altruistic, eventually become corrupted by a selfish minority skilled in deception and dedicated to self enrichment. This has been the Achilles heel of all large human groups. Your recitation of the socioeconomic evolution in history from slavery --> feudalism --> bourgeois capitalism --> oligarchical capitalism, is a good summery of the failure of large human groups to counter domination internally by small self-serving subgroups. You believe modern well engineered socialism can break this pattern. Evidence of the implementation of socialism in the past 180 years tells me success is going to be exceedingly elusive even if one can avoid destructive perturbation by outside capitalist actors, by converting the most powerful capitalist sanctuary: the United States, to socialism internally.
Anthropological studies of the surviving traces of HG tribes are enlightening. They were communal in ownership of essential tribal resources, egalitarian in distribution of food and other important commodities and chose leaders who served by consensus, not inheritance. When some members of the tribe were unrepentant in their lack of commitment to the welfare of the group, (we would identify these individuals today as sociopaths or extreme narcissists), the tribe banished them to an almost certain death alone in the unforgiving wilderness. In this way, the genes of sociopaths were depreciated over time. In the rare circumstance that a minority subgroup in the tribe fought against the majority for domination, the loss of group cohesion and efficiency made the tribe vulnerable when challenged by nature, as happens from time to time, and was almost certainly fatal for these anomalous tribes. Internally conflicted organizations are not the fittest to survive when stressed by an unforgiving environment.
Hunting is an activity dominated by the random distribution of game. Tribes send individual hunting groups out in several compass directions. Yes, some hunters are more skilled than others, however this has almost no bearing on which hunting group will find game in their compass area and which will not see a valid target before returning to camp empty handed. Anthropologists surmise this basic facet of HG life: power and hunting skill, often did not outweigh the effect of chance in successfully returning with food for the tribe, promoted an egalitarian sharing of food among all. Some days the least skillful hunting group returned with food for all, owing to random game distribution. Everybody shared when any hunter was successful, otherwise, some days the most skillful hunters would go hungry. The law of averages rewarded egalitarianism in small HG tribes. While in large settled human groups the most selfish and cunning individuals gained advantage over time leaving the majority to know hunger as a means of control and repression.
With enough thought, I am hopeful a modern solution to Mancur Olson's human group scale problem can be found and tested. Perhaps it is some variation of your own concept of socialism. Right now neither myself or dozens of political science PhD thesis authors in (50) years have addressed Prof. Olson's core thesis - most small scale ( <3,000 member) human groups serve the true needs of the entire group, while larger groups, regardless of organizational purpose are hijacked by an internal subgroup that manipulates the organizational resources to serve their hidden agenda in pursuit of self enrichment.
I agree with your statements but if you fall on the side of medieval Hamas we must part company.
Zionism is a national liberation movement.
Hamas is a version of far right Taliban style fascism.
However simply because the victims are Jews, the faux-left embrace Islamists.