Why cryptocurrencies will kill private property

The very fact that society (members of the cryptocurrency network) can roll back any transaction or force any transfer by simply switching to the corresponding fork - it already signals that the private relation of commodity exchange ceases to be purely private, becomes general. This is a step towards the abolition of commodity exchange and private property in general.

How did commodity exchange develop?

At the dawn of capitalism, under the dominance of the market of free competition, there was a pure commodity exchange. Each owner of a product on the market owned only his own product, which he could exchange, while the medium of exchange was not regulated by anyone, it built itself up, objectively and independently of any consciousness.

Since the environment itself was formed by the forces of its independent participants, the redistribution of property in such an environment was the norm. In addition to some local aspects in which participants in the exchange have already begun to consciously regulate the rules of exchange and redistribution - to prohibit or allow something.

Then came the dominance of financial monopolies. The market became regulated in general: the monopolists who won in free competition established their own rules. In general, the formation of monopolies is a direct consequence of free competition, but we are often asserted that these opposites are independent of each other. But so far this is not about that.

Further, what happens to cryptocurrencies: do they destroy the monopoly? The monopoly of the most powerful private owners, which market regulators concentrated in their own hands, yes. Monopoly in general - no. Now the collective of all market participants has become a monopolist, a dictator of the rules of the medium of exchange.

That is, cryptocurrencies contribute to monopolization?

I think so far few who understand this. We are touted with cryptocurrencies and decentralized finance in general as a return to pure free competition. But this is not so; it is, on the contrary, a step towards super-monopoly and super-regulation, but not private, but public. And I consider this potential of cryptocurrencies to be truly revolutionary.

This is the communist potential of the cryptocurrency market: all of its participants can jointly set exchange rules in such a market and change them if necessary. This has not happened before. And each individual participant in the exchange will have to abide by these rules, if most have established them.

But then again, this technology can be used in a different way. Say, if only private banks are participants in the cryptocurrency network, then they will set the rules for exchange in the network. And the rest will only have bank accounts and will not be full-fledged participants in the cryptocurrency network, which means they will not be able to exert any influence on the rules, they will be forced to only obey the rules established by banks.

But what about the possibility of fork?

Any participant who does not like the rules and who does not want to obey them can fork or just create their own cryptocurrency, which is what happens.

But in reality, a private fork makes little sense. With the help of the fork, the majority defends itself against minor attacks on the general, from private attempts to steer the general. Roughly speaking, having made a private fork, we move to another world, and do not solve the problem in the existing one. Well, if that was our goal. But this other world can solve the problem of the source only when it replaces it with itself. And for this, the majority should already be in the fork, that is, now it should become common.

Here is an example: you can fork MySQL. What for? Let's say for some purely private improvement. But this will be only a special case, the original MySQL will not suffer from this. Private fork does not compete with it in any way, it is a parallel world. In order for this fork to take the place of MySQL, it will have to drag most of the MySQL audience (developers and users) onto itself, but this will happen if the fork is better than the original or will solve some fundamental problem of it. For example, MariaDB is an improved version of MySQL that lacks Oracle's “protection”; it is more dynamic and freer than MySQL.

There are thousands of cryptocurrencies, that's true. But for any new currency - a penny, it would be a price if it did not claim to universality, that is, to the place of a central cryptocurrency that could win over the majority. If cryptocurrency occupies a specific sector, then again, as part of its tasks, it claims to be central and the majority. Over time, society will choose the most suitable solutions from this variety, and they will remain until the best ones take their place.

A fork is not a defense against a monopoly in general, it is an instrument for ensuring a public monopoly against a private one. It is impossible to impose something on society with the help of the fork mechanism, but society itself can choose one or another branch for itself.

Imagine you forked Linux. How long can you use it? Over time, your fork will become obsolete and you simply will not be able to provide support for new hardware in it. And hardware manufacturers will also not be interested in your fork, so that you can spend money on it and create drivers for it. Because 2.5 people will use fork. But if Linux takes over some private company and starts to steer it in its own interests, against the interests of the community, then the community will be able to fork, drag the majority into fork and continue to develop this branch. Private traders over time simply will not be able to compete with a huge community and will begin to lag behind. This is such a kind of proof-of-work.. A fork is an attempt to break it if it comes to the same niche that both the original and the fork pretend to be. And the branch that will have more users and in which more labor will be accumulated will win.

So what is the result?

So, the reason for the formation of monopolies is private interest and free competition of such private owners. Competition is a fight. And in a fight there is always a winner who, after a victory, suppresses the vanquished. The formation of private monopolies is a direct consequence of free competition. Actually, that's why they arose: capitalism of free competition over time has become monopoly capitalism.

The state here only reflects, politically formalizes the situation that has developed in the economy, and does not give rise to it.

And if society as a whole wants to get rid of any private monopolies, then the only opportunity for it remains to establish a monopoly of its own, public. At the same time, free source codes and the mechanism of forks are means of ensuring and developing a social monopoly.

For socialism is nothing but the next step forward from the state-capitalist monopoly. Or otherwise: socialism is nothing but a state-capitalist monopoly, turned to the benefit of the whole people and so far ceased to be a capitalist monopoly. There is no middle ground. The objective course of development is such that one cannot go forward from monopolies (and the war has tenfold their number, role and significance) without going to socialism.

Remember these prophetic words? :)

The ideal of private property is when there is only private, and the general - the rules of exchange - spontaneously and uncontrollable to anyone. Each private trader does what he wants within the framework of a subordinate medium of exchange. Another thing is if this situation does not suit society . Society wants to control the rules of exchange in its public interest . For example, so that none of the participants in the exchange was deceived. Therefore, society establishes public control. But by doing so, it kills private property: now the private owner will not own what he actually has appropriated, but that the organized society considers it necessary to belong to him. And he considers it necessary to take it away - it will do it.

Therefore, cryptocurrencies today provide good tools for moving towards the development of public property and the destruction of private exchange from the very heart of the modern system - commodity exchange. It starts with controlling the rules of the medium of exchange and introducing the ability to jointly decide which transactions are considered correct and which are not. And the apogee of this movement is communism, when no one locks the door and does not steal because everything belongs to everyone anyway. No one recognizes for others the final private right to something that he has appropriated, and at the same time, all together equally manage everything that society has.