Retro. Fake `private’ is not better than fake `government-owned’

August 31 2013

As we know, the core of Napoleon’s constitution is the slogan
`liberty, equality, property’. The two traditional concepts are joined
by the third, more materialistic, which is one of major driving forces
for the development of humanity. Like also during Napoleon times,
systemic changes are taking place in a number of countries of today’s
world, and in this regard, the issue of ownership becomes the most
important matter. Extreme and self-forgetful liberals say, let’s hurry
up to get rid of this damned state property. I do not think that such
psychology is of market and liberal, the market, perhaps, assumes
equal respectful attitude towards all forms of ownership. If we really
want to be like the developed countries, the thinking should be
diametrically opposite, any ownership is sacred, and any encroachment
against it should be viewed as a heinous crime. Then, the property
that is called `government owned’, either good or bad, has sustained
us for decades. It is another matter that in early 80-s it finally
became clear that this form of ownership is ineffective and leads to
the country’s economic collapse. To the point, still Andropov
understood it, the spiritual father of Gorbachev. Consequently, the
KGB leader was braver in his economic programs that today’s
communists. But the whole problem is that during the communist times
the property was not `government-owned’ at all. The phrase `People’s
owned property’ is a nonsense, there is no product in the world,
ranging from a large factory and ending with a bunch of mixed greens
that belongs to `all people’ or `worker-peasant and the public
intelligentsia.’ Over the centuries, everything always has its master
who enjoys the benefits of the product belonging to the latter. The
owner for 70 years was the Central Committee with its bureaucratic
apparatus and various infrastructures. The Communists’ `people’s owned
property’, thus is a bluff. But often today’s `private-owned property’
is also bluff. It actually very rarely belongs to private persons, the
goods under the name `private-owned’ or `government-owned’ are still
largely in the hands of a state bureaucracy. The fake `private’ is as
inefficient, and creates as much opportunities for abuse, as in the
case of fake `government-owned’. And, here, other defects are
followed. For instance, the fact that there is a `right to call’ left
from the past regime still operates in our enlightened `liberal’
century, the state official is calling the private manufacturer and
the banker and dictates who should get the goods or credits. So, in
my deep understanding, the sense of privatization is not a change of a
signboard rather than formation of a real business (government-owned
or private). There is no other way.

Aram ABRAHAMYAN 24.07.1996