Earlier quoted context omitted.
But almost every implementation of Marxism in recent history involved totalitarianism and ignored the part about decentralization of power post-revolution. I recently came across a very interesting thought, which is that this observation (which I also believed until coming across that thought) is induced by a kind of selection bias. The original article in which I encountered this thought is here: http://www.pieria.c…
"Explaining why communism always fail without faulting communism even slightly" is a very rich genre. It is also disingenuous in failing to consider the single most likely (by way of Occam's razor) cause of communism's failure, which is the ideology itself. But to apply some historical facts to the theory: From its founding, the Cheka was an important military and security arm of the Bolshevik communist government. I…
The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
91–100 of 153 posts
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#92The extent to which the Incas did it is remarkable, but historically civil engineering had little to do with markets. The ancient Sumerians, Egyptians, Persians etc. pretty much built their infrastructure and monumental buildings with drafted, unpaid labor. The French monarchy, one of the most advanced states in the world, relied on the corvée to build roads up until 1789 [1]. The decisive turn in the situation took…
I think the key point is that they didn't have money at all .
The story of Atahualpa’s Ransom (http://latinamericanhistory.about.com/od/theconquestofperu/p...) -- the king offered a ransom of gold -- seems to cast doubt on the claim the Incans didn't have money.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
But almost every implementation of Marxism in recent history involved totalitarianism and ignored the part about decentralization of power post-revolution. I recently came across a very interesting thought, which is that this observation (which I also believed until coming across that thought) is induced by a kind of selection bias. The original article in which I encountered this thought is here: http://www.pieria.c…
"Explaining why communism always fail without faulting communism even slightly" is a very rich genre. It is also disingenuous in failing to consider the single most likely (by way of Occam's razor) cause of communism's failure, which is the ideology itself. But to apply some historical facts to the theory: From its founding, the Cheka was an important military and security arm of the Bolshevik communist government. I…
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Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, theoretically, workers own the means of production in communism, but that's now how it happened in practice. In practice, the Party owned everything, and its high ranking members were effectively nobility. Workers in communism were nothing more than indentured servants.
That seems a best a very bad caricature of what happened in the Soviet Union. What's happening in Communist China now?
What makes you say it's a "very bad caricature"?
All the stories I've read and heard (from my relatives and friends in Romania) paint a very bleak picture of what life was like then. I was 4 years old in '89, but I heard a lot form my parents. Essentially they were prisoners in their own country, and the higher layers of the party practically owned all of it.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
>People don't fight hard against invaders if their "home" rulers are dictators--World War II provides other examples of that principle. You don't think the Russians fought hard?
I assume I have a limited knowledge of WWII history on that front, but from what I was taught in history class, the biggest deterrent of the Nazi invasion of the USSR was the weather. What we learned was that the Russians were invading Germany more than the Germans could invade Russia. Basically the Russians weren't fighting to keep the Nazis from invading, but were focused on a counter-invasion. I could very well be…
Weather helped somewhat to slow blitzkrieg down in 1941 (though it applies to both sides equally; Soviets were just better prepared), but it doesn't win wars. If you look at casualty figures, 2/3 of all Axis casualties in WW2 (this includes Japanese!) happened on the Eastern Front in Europe; and most of those weren't frostbite.
Soviets paid two for one in terms of casualties, though. But they could keep doing that for longer, and their industry could keep up as well (war production figures for Reich vs USSR are rather telling).
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#96"This io9 flashback previously ran in January 2012." This note on the submitted article prompted me to look for earlier discussion of the Inca empire through the HN Search tool. This article appears not to have been submitted before, but we have had other discussions here about the Inca empire and its conquest by the Spanish. The submitted article correctly notes that the history of the Inca empire is fragmentary bec…
> Basically the Russians weren't fighting to keep the Nazis from invading, but were focused on a counter-invasion. The thesis of Icebreaker [1], a controversial history book by an ex-GRU officer, is that Stalin was planning an invasion of Germany right when Operation Barbarossa happened. However, his interpretation is disputed by most historians. What is certain is that the Red Army was caught with its pants down and…
> You'll also note that Germans and Japanese troops fought with particular determination even when it became clear that defeat was the only possible outcome.
I actually recall reading regarding Germans that there was a very peculiar distortion of perception there when even during late 1944 and early 1945, with Soviet armies literally at the door, a lot of people genuinely still believed that a victory (at that point defined as peace on non-debilitating terms) was highly likely - based on letters and other personal correspondence from that period, journals etc.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was a siege of a well-fortified town, and the Spanish had non-negligible support from non-Incan people unsatisfied with the Incan rule. That said, a Spaniard on a thousand pound horse, wrapped in steel, on an open, unobstructed field, against people wearing mostly cloth armor, with stone or copper weapons, was effectively unstoppable. Again that said, many of the non-Spanish troops supporting Pizarro and Co. died.…
> That said, a Spaniard on a thousand pound horse, wrapped in steel, on an open, unobstructed field, against people wearing mostly cloth armor, with stone or copper weapons, was effectively unstoppable This is ridiculous. The problem was that the Incans didn't have access to (or had developed) the polearm (ie, spear axes), guerilla warfare or basic combat engineering (read: trenches/moats). 10 decently trained pole-a…
> More likely, the Incan slave/poor populace was split and easily co-opted by the Spaniards.
Why is this either/or? The above statement is undoubtedly true, but that doesn't mean what I said is false.
The problem, is, as you say, that the Incans only had access to cloth armor, copper axes, and stone clubs, as I said in my comment. They eventually developed guerilla tactics, but such tactics are not effective when you are sieging your capital, trying to take it back from invaders. Also, I cordially invite you to try and organize the digging of ditches when 50 to 90 percent of your population has been killed, most of the rest are in rebellion because your rule was, frankly, never terribly popular, and the remaining percentage are currently facing down a thousand pound warhorse. I would also like to point out that decently training a pole-armsmen is no easy feat when you have never done it before, and your empire is in disarray.
Also, the Spanish had plenty of experience in the European style of warfare based on cavalry supported by foot, since the European cultures had access to horses for many centuries at this point, whereas the Incans and other cultures and empires that arose in the Andes had access to the llama. Llamas are not, shall we say, renowned for their martial prowess. It takes time to develop new ideas and technologies in the face of change in the best of time. Saying "oh come on, just dig ditches and train spearmen" is a tad unrealistic.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#98"This io9 flashback previously ran in January 2012." This note on the submitted article prompted me to look for earlier discussion of the Inca empire through the HN Search tool. This article appears not to have been submitted before, but we have had other discussions here about the Inca empire and its conquest by the Spanish. The submitted article correctly notes that the history of the Inca empire is fragmentary bec…
What examples from WW2 do you have? I can see no pattern between countries ruled by dictators and not.
I think this was a reference to the fact that Soviet Union had extremely high (compared to average) rates of collaboration with the enemy among both civilian population on occupied territories, as well as and POWs.
Some keywords to look up: Hiwi, Russian Liberation Army, Lokot Republic, Ostlegionen.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#99Guns, Germs & Steel discusses the Spanish invasion of the Inca Empire in some detail. Well worth a read.
More surprising to me than the lack of money is the fact that they did not have the wheel.
Re: The greatest mystery of the Inca Empire was its strange economy (2012)
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not at all. Incan society had a caste system, nobles, royalty, etc. Nobles owned estates and laborers. Workers did not own the means of production.
Well, theoretically, workers own the means of production in communism, but that's now how it happened in practice. In practice, the Party owned everything, and its high ranking members were effectively nobility. Workers in communism were nothing more than indentured servants.
> In practice, the Party owned everything, and its high ranking members were effectively nobility.
The concept of nobility implies hereditary transfer of privileges, which was not the case in Soviet system. It was certainly easier for children of Party bureaucrats to get their own spot, but it was not guaranteed to them, they could lose it at any time, and "commoners" could get into the ranks (and it was not something exceptional).
So Party was the ruling elite class, but it was not an estate/caste, as nobility was in feudalism.