Sociodemocracy should be revised, says a new leftist group to be born in Beirut

BEIRUT - Alternative Staff

January 2003

In Beirut, a new leftist group, named still unidentified, is planning to come to life soon. Founding members summed up for Alternative of their brainstorming sessions.

According to the founders, the group believes in one world under socialism and democracy. It believes in a global nation, living under a universal, socialist, secular, freely elected government. It endorses globalization, but believes that this notion should be based on the spreading of values and ethics that give more weight to the welfare of human beings rather than material concerns.

Socialism should give the state the ability to monitor profit-making individuals or establishments and tap this generated profit through progressive taxes. Socialism should not abolish private property or kill entrepreneurship. The tapping of world profits should provide the state with money needed for running the bureaucracy (including police and the maintenance of internal security), funding development of the impoverished communities and securing for the universal nation basic needs of healthcare and education.

The state should not “command the economy,” or plan its future activity. The state should only monitor the conformity of products with preset standards of quality and specify relative tax percentages.

The best form of democracy exists among citizens enjoying greatest socioeconomic independence. Welfare services including healthcare, education and minimum income for citizens would grant the electorate with greatest freedom for the choice of their representatives, according to one of the founding members.

Sovereignty has become an obsolete term. The human race should redefine its perspective of “sovereign states,” which should become mere bureaucratic tools. The elected universal government should replace current sovereign states.

The group also argues against the notions of national segregation and national independence. All human beings are citizens of the world who enjoy equal rights and have similar duties. The world’s communities are inter-related and dependent.

World resources belong to the universal state, which for its part should ensure the equal distribution of the global wealth.

No nation should be entitled to an independent decision-making process, save for matters pertaining to preserving cultural heritage of the different communities. Elected autonomous local governments should be given the freedom to take measures to preserve the cultural identity of their different local communities, provided this independence be restricted to cultural affairs including issues pertaining to language, religion and holidays.