I’m not sure why we would believe that socialism would require more unselfish behavior from individuals, if anything a more consciously planned economy would be able to align interests far more effectively than indirect capitalist social regulation.
Because you will also select the people who will make the “consciously planned economy” from the population and can most optimistically assume normal distribution of these traits in people in power. It is, however, more likely that the less unselfish people will aspire to these positions and ultimately use them for their own ends, resulting in a redistribution of power to more selfish people. Centralized systems inherently offer more affordances of seizing power to selfish ends.
Reading the history of Mao, the Russian Revolution, and the Gulag Archipelago helps with some context.
[you] can most optimistically assume normal distribution of these traits in people in power
This is not maximally optimistic! We can hope we could come up with a system that (a) empowers unselfish people over selfish people and (b) protects the system itself against interference from the powerful. This is a difficult thing to achieve, and many have arguably failed, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t possible to do.
Centralized systems inherently offer more affordances of seizing power to selfish ends.
I think this is kind of unclear. If you do not deliberately engineer a government to manage the distribution of power, instead you will get an unmanaged distribution of power, which in particular will not obviously be well-placed to prevent an individual accumulating and then seizing power for themselves.
But even if true, I think I would still be in favour of central government because centralized systems inherently offer so many other things, which together are IMO worth it.
I’m not sure why we would believe that socialism would require more unselfish behavior from individuals, if anything a more consciously planned economy would be able to align interests far more effectively than indirect capitalist social regulation.
Because you will also select the people who will make the “consciously planned economy” from the population and can most optimistically assume normal distribution of these traits in people in power. It is, however, more likely that the less unselfish people will aspire to these positions and ultimately use them for their own ends, resulting in a redistribution of power to more selfish people. Centralized systems inherently offer more affordances of seizing power to selfish ends.
Reading the history of Mao, the Russian Revolution, and the Gulag Archipelago helps with some context.
This is not maximally optimistic! We can hope we could come up with a system that (a) empowers unselfish people over selfish people and (b) protects the system itself against interference from the powerful. This is a difficult thing to achieve, and many have arguably failed, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t possible to do.
I think this is kind of unclear. If you do not deliberately engineer a government to manage the distribution of power, instead you will get an unmanaged distribution of power, which in particular will not obviously be well-placed to prevent an individual accumulating and then seizing power for themselves.
But even if true, I think I would still be in favour of central government because centralized systems inherently offer so many other things, which together are IMO worth it.