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Ethics

Thanks to Stuart commenting on the peice before last.

My reply is slightly convoluted, so I'll make it here rather than in the comment box.

ISTR William Morris stating: Peter sober needs protecting from Peter drunk. That's as fine an expression of a communitarian ethic as you'll find. The obvious danger is, inm saying people need to be protected from themselves inspite of their expressed preferrence ("No, leave me, I'm fine, I can walk") is that it turns into a nasty authoritarianism.

Obviously, the first point is that in a democratic society that ethic would be carried out by the community upon themselves - organically, to use a slightly dangerous term - rather than by an alien élite.

Secondly, this is in line with marx' Aristotelianism - and the notion of a Good. Free development implies a Good that we aspire to and can live by - which in turn implies a bad that we may want to prevent.

In essence, I see socialism as being the acknowldgement that the individual only can grow through a community, and having a community committed to helping that individual grow. The community cannot be some alien state, but the lived experience of all its individual members.