Socialism

“The goal of socialism is communism.”

Valdimir Lenin

“Socialism is the same as communism: only better English.”

George Bernard Shaw

“There are only two places where socialism will work; in heaven where it is not needed, in hell where
they already have it.”

Winston Churchill

Definition
By definition, socialism is any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or
governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.

According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with
one another. Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and
everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole,
therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members.

Origin of socialism
The origins of socialism as a political movement lie in the Industrial Revolution. Its intellectual roots,
however, reach back almost as far as recorded thought—even as far as Moses, according to one history
of the subject. Socialist or communist ideas certainly play an important part in the ideas of the ancient
Greek philosopher Plato, whose Republic depicts an austere society in which men and women of the
“guardian” class share with each other not only their few material goods but also their spouses and
children. Early Christian communities also practiced the sharing of goods and labor.

Then came Karl Marx, the German political philosopher and economist who would become one of the
most influential socialist thinkers in history. With his collaborator Friedrich Engels, Marx published The
Communist Manifesto in 1848, which included a chapter criticizing those earlier socialist models as
utterly unrealistic “utopian” dreams.

Marx argued that all history was a history of class struggles, and that the working class would inevitably
triumph over the capital class and win control over the means of production, forever erasing all classes.
Socialists versus capitalists
This conviction puts socialism in opposition to capitalism, which is based on private ownership of the
means of production and allows individual choices in a free market to determine how goods and
services are distributed. Socialists complain that capitalism necessarily leads to unfair and exploitative
concentrations of wealth and power in the hands of the relative few who emerge victorious from free-
market competition—people who then use their wealth and power to reinforce their dominance in
society. Because such people are rich, they may choose where and how to live, and their choices in turn
limit the options of the poor. As a result, terms such as individual freedom and equality of opportunity
may be meaningful for capitalists but can only ring hollow for working people, who must do the
capitalists’ bidding if they are to survive. As socialists see it, true freedom and true equality require
social control of the resources that provide the basis for prosperity in any society.

Socialists versus socialists

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels made this point in Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848) when they
proclaimed that in a socialist society “the condition for the free development of each is the free
development of all.” This fundamental conviction nevertheless leaves room for socialists to disagree
among themselves with regard to two key points.

A. The first concerns the extent and the kind of property that society should own or control. Some
socialists have thought that almost everything except personal items such as clothing should be
public property. Other socialists, however, have been willing to accept or even welcome private
ownership of farms, shops, and other small or medium-sized businesses.
B. The second disagreement concerns the way in which society is to exercise its control of property
and other resources. In this case the main camps consist of loosely defined groups of centralists
and decentralists. On the centralist side are socialists who want to invest public control of
property in some central authority, such as the state—or the state under the guidance of a
political party, as was the case in the Soviet Union. Those in the decentralist camp believe that
decisions about the use of public property and resources should be made at the local, or lowest-
possible, level by the people who will be most directly affected by those decisions. This conflict
has persisted throughout the history of socialism as a political movement.

Socialism and communism

Communism

Communism, sometimes referred to as revolutionary socialism, also originated as a reaction to the

Industrial Revolution, and came to be defined by Marx’s theories—taken to their extreme end. In fact,
Marxists often refer to socialism as the first, necessary phase on the way from capitalism to
communism. Marx and Engels themselves didn’t consistently or clearly differentiate communism from
socialism, which helped ensure lasting confusion between the two terms.

Similarities between socialism and communism

Both socialism and communism are essentially economic philosophies advocating public rather than
private ownership, especially of the means of production, distribution and exchange of goods (i.e.,
making money) in a society. Both aim to fix the problems they see as created by a free-market capitalist
system, including the exploitation of workers and a widening gulf between rich and poor.

Differences between socialism and communism

 Under communism, there is no such thing as private property. All property is communally
owned, and each person receives a portion based on what they need. A strong central
government—the state—controls all aspects of economic production, and provides citizens
with their basic necessities, including food, housing, medical care and education. By
contrast, under socialism, individuals can still own property. But industrial production, or
the chief means of generating wealth, is communally owned and managed by a
democratically elected government.
 Another key difference between socialism and communism is the means of achieving them.
In communism, a violent revolution, in which the workers rise up against the middle and
upper classes, is seen as an inevitable part of achieving a pure communist state. Socialism is
a less rigid, more flexible ideology. Its adherents seek change and reform, but insist on
making these changes through democratic processes within the existing social and political
structure, not overthrowing that structure.
 Marx summarized the communist philosophy in this way: “From each according to his
ability, to each according to his needs.” By contrast, socialism is based on the idea that
people will be compensated based on their level of individual contribution to the economy.
 Unlike in communism, a socialist economic system rewards individual effort and innovation.
Social democracy, the most common form of modern socialism, focuses on achieving social
reforms and redistribution of wealth through democratic processes, and can co-exist
alongside a free-market capitalist economy.

Socialism and communism in contemporary practice

Led by Vladimir Lenin, the Bolsheviks put Marxist theory into practice with the Russian Revolution of
1917, which led to the creation of the world’s first communist government. Communism existed in the
Soviet Union until its fall in 1991. 

Today, communism exists in China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam—although in reality, a purely
communist state has never existed. Such countries can be classified as communist because in all of
them, the central government controls all aspects of the economic and political system. But none of
them have achieved the elimination of personal property, money or class systems that the communist
ideology requires.

Likewise, no country in history has achieved a state of pure socialism. Even countries that are considered
by some people to be socialist states, like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, have successful capitalist
sectors and follow policies that are largely aligned with social democracy. Many European and Latin
American countries have adopted socialist programs (such as free college tuition, universal health care
and subsidized child care) and even elected socialist leaders, with varying levels of success.
In the United States, socialism has not historically enjoyed as much success as a political movement. Its
peak came in 1912, when Socialist Party presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs won 6 percent of the
vote. But at the same time, U.S. programs once considered socialist, such as Medicare and Social
Security, have been integrated into American life.

Democratic socialism, a growing U.S. political movement in recent years, lands somewhere in between
social democracy and communism. Like communists, democratic socialists believe workers should
control the bulk of the means of production, and not be subjected to the will of the free market and the
capitalist classes. But they believe their vision of socialism must be achieved through democratic
processes, rather than revolution.