What is Socialism?

First, what is capitalism? Socialism? Communism? Without a clear understanding of what these words mean, it is easy to simply slide back into the common American distrust of that which is Red. Even growing up in the 80s and 90s, I was still instilled with this idea that Communists are the bad guys, that Capitalism is good.

There was a man named Karl Marx. Perhaps you’ve heard of him? He believed that there were distinct stages of development in human civilization. First was Primitive Communism. This was when men lived in communal tribes, each person pulling their weight and the small groups succeeded based on teamwork and cooperation. After this, one man found he could exploit another, sometimes due to prisoners of conflict, and the Slave Society was born. This society signified the tribal progression to city-state status, and the aristocracy was born. In Feudalism, aristocrats were the ruling class, and merchants evolved into capitalists, those who are ever searching for more profit, or capital. These capitalists become the ruling class by becoming the owners of “the means of production.” The means of production is a broad term for the land, mines, factories, machinery, etc that is needed to create or produce. Everything but labor. For labor, the capitalists ‘created’ and employed the proletariat, or workers. After this, the workers gain ‘class consciousness’ and, via revolution, depose the capitalist dictatorship of the bourgeoisie (those with the means of production) for a dictatorship of the proletariat. After this is communism, a classless and stateless society.

You see, even then, Marx knew you could not simply decide to be communist. There had to be a transition period. He believed, as do so many out there, that human behavior is something that is learned through culture. That if you reward a man for working as a piece in the machine, he will eventually gain pleasure from it. Current human nature is more like a man’s desire to gain more than the man next him. He believed that this ‘nature’ is actually a product of the capitalist mentality. We have been groomed to want more, to strive to be better, to push ourselves to earn what we can.

So, for definition’s sake, Capitalism is a system in which the means of production is owned by private individuals or corporations. Socialism is that which the means of production is owned and controlled by the community as a whole, and communism is a system in which ownership of all property is assigned to the community or to the state (country), and all economic and social activity is controlled by a totalitarian state, dominated by a single political party. If you don’t know, totalitarianism is absolute control by the state that does not tolerate parties of differing opinion.

You see, Communism can only work if everybody is on the same page. The only way for that to happen is if there is only one voice leading the masses. The Big Brother for the little man. The last blog I wrote talked about democratic centralism. Once the decision is made, every person must obey and defend that choice, even if they don’t like it. The Communist Party of the USA (cpusa.org) believes in democratic centralism.

Just based on these few ideas, the definitions of words, we can see why America rose up against the Communist threat decades ago. It is against everything this country is supposed to stand for. The Founding Fathers created a system of checks and balances, specifically to prevent this country from going down the path to fascism, totalitarianism, etc. They wanted to ensure that there is always room for the voice of dissent. The first three articles of the Constitution discuss these checks and balances. In this, there is no room for one dictatorship. Article 4 talks about state’s rights. Section 4: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government…” The very first amendment, the first in the Bill of Rights says that “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech,… or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Under democratic centralism or totalitarianism, one of which would be required for the communist form of government, there is no ‘petitioning the Government’ and with the former, all ‘free speech’ ends with the decision being made.

In the next blogs, I’ll discuss a planned economy (which is something that communism depends on) vs. a free market economy (which we don’t truly have anymore) and why communism didn’t work before and isn’t likely to work now.