This word, socialism, and related words, like capitalism, keep coming up.
During the election campaign in the US, the word socialism was often used in attempts to try to criticize Barack Obama. And a few days ago, when I was flipping through the channels during Obama’s inauguration, Singapore news station Channel News Asia was discussing whether Obama is a socialist or not.
In all these discussions, there is often no real discussion of what socialism is, and so it is actually misleading, and depends on the mind of the viewer how they interpret this word. Often in the US I have read bloggers who attempt to call Obama socialist as a way to criticize him, and they use the word as a scare tactic. They use the word in a way to make the reader feel that, if Obama is elected the US will become like the Soviet Union, with the loss of all liberties, gulags, etc.
But the blogger won’t define what socialism is, which either reflects the writer’s ignorance, or is done deliberately to avoid real discussion which would reduce the fear they are using to manipulate people.
Words like “capitalism” often suffer the same fate. Last night I was having a talk with a person I met traveling recently, and he indicated that he was anti- capitalist. He explained that he doesn’t like capitalism because of how it increases the inequality between rich and poor. So I asked him what kind of system he would like. And he said he would like a system more like European social democratic countries, where the government uses tax money to re-distribute to the poor, or to pay for state provided healthcare.
The irony here is that this person at first said they were against capitalism. But the system he described is still an essentially capitalist system, the only difference between these countries and the more free market capitalist countries is that the state taxes people and uses that money to provide certain services. In these countries, the economy is still dominated by corporate enterprises, stock markets are in operation, private ownership of productive enterprises is still the norm- all of which are features of advanced capitalist states.
On the other hand, some people might still like to call countries like Sweden in the 1980s as socialist. The definitions are blurry, so it’s probably necessary in fact to talk about different kinds of socialism or different kinds of capitalism. But too often when there are discussions, no one is being clear what we are talking about.
As for those bloggers who try to use the word as a scare tactic- it’s a lame activity to try to influence people this way. Let’s have a rational look at capitalism and socialism without introducing fear or manipulation into the equation. And this could be said for both sides of the political spectrum.
So, out to the readers with a question- what is your definition of socialism and capitalism? What different kinds of socialism or capitalism do you think there are?
Its late here now, but perhaps in a future post I’ll discuss my interpretations of these terms more. Until then, people who are reading this, please leave your comments and thoughts…
well…when people are treated the same and there is no different between one person to another…that’s socialism. Socialism is about fairness but capitalism is about justice. fairness means that all equal but justice means there is reward and punishment.
Obama tend to be a socialist since he focus on fairness than justice. Just see how easy he decided to close guantanamo. Obama only think about human rights without think how it will affected others. I think it’s better to change the system of guantanamo than to close it.Well…it is just like a fresh air for terorist if guantanamo were closed.
In Indonesia, if HAMBALI. one of the prisoners of guantanamo, were back, I bet that he will only be punished for years in prison. Our law isn’t good enough to charge on terorist like him. Is it justice or fairness???
By: kiky on Sunday, 15 February, 2009
at 10:14 am
Kiky,
Thank you for your reply. I will give a thoughtful reply soon!
By: Patrick Mosolf on Thursday, 5 March, 2009
at 10:52 am
Kiky, I think you’re right in your first paragraph. Socialism aims to make people more equal, to eliminate economic inequality through redistribution. I think when you say Capitalism is about justice, you mean that it provides justice by rewarding those who are more skilled and work harder.
But in your second paragraph, I think you are getting off the subject a little bit. The issue of closing Guantanamo Bay is a political issue which is not directly related to the economic system (i.e. Socialism vs. Capitalism). Of course, Socialism and Capitalism can also affect the structure of the political system, but in the case of Guantanamo, this is a specific policy decision, not really an issue of the structure of the political system.
As for Guantanamo, I don’t really know what alternatives the US has to Guantanamo, in order to be able to comment. I think you are right, that the US (and the world) has to have an effective legal procedure to handle the terror suspects. But I think that Obama made the right decision in closing Guantanamo, because it had become such a public relations disaster and hurt the image of the US. In fact even if a few terrorists get away, it may be better than having Guanatanamo. Why? Because in my opinion, things like Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib prison abuses actually drive more people to become extremists.
Even if Hambali is free, it won’t make much difference if no one listens to him. They may succeed in killing a few people, but it will just make them look bad and discredit their ideas, if the world’s governments respond appropriately and do not react by enacting their own abuses.
I do tend to agree with you about the Indonesian government’s handling of terror suspects. It seems they are afraid of alienating Islamists. Abu Bakar Bashir spent only 25 months in prison (and was released early) even though it is likely he was behind the Bali bombings in 2002.
By: Patrick Mosolf on Wednesday, 25 March, 2009
at 1:35 am
Socialism is where everyone complains of the rich
Communism is where only the rich can complain.
Capitalism is where everyone complains of not being rich. And these days it means: everyone pays – to save the rich :)
Cheers,
olga shulman lednichenko
http://thebookofolga.wordpress.com/2009/05/19/the-book-of-olga-scrolls-what-exactly-is-socialism-the-war-of-isms-communism-socialism-and-capitalism/
By: olga-shulman-lednichenko on Tuesday, 19 May, 2009
at 2:58 pm
Although the official justification for socialism is the critique and closing of capitalist gap between rich and poor, socialism is actually an intensification of capitalism through mandatory spending.
If money is given to people through jobs or other income, they spend it. If licensing and permitting is used to limit who is allowed to provide goods and services, the economy is effectively frozen since consumers must spend or be taxed so others can spend AND the businesses that the money is spent on are practically guaranteed revenues. This in turn allows for job-protection for those selected to work for those businesses. It’s all about guaranteeing income and money-flows so that no one is ever subject to fiscal discipline.
U.S. republicans are too quick to blame the government for socialism and fail to see that the “government of the people” has its own socialist logics for spending and redistributing money to shield people (family members for example) from fiscal discipline.
True anti-socialists would be for fiscal discipline in government spending but ALSO in private business and consumption. They would see that ONLY when money-transfers are limited to necessity is economic activity sufficiently liberated from social control.
Independent individuals in a true republic do not need to work for money or need spending money by other means if they can’t get paid. A true capitalist economy would consist of individuals producing everything they can themselves and only making money to buy what they cannot produce themselves.
The reason for this is that people would know that if they would run out of money for whatever reason, they would not want to have to steal or demand socialist redistribution to eat and fulfill other basic needs.
People with economically independent homesteads/farms work to have enough to eat and build a house to live in, chop wood for fire, etc. and when those necessities are taken care of produce other items to sell for money.
When a business produces basic necessities for other people and sells them for money, this is the beginning of socialism. Why? because once people become dependent on money for survival, they become susceptible to support socialist spending or redistribution as a means of insuring their business revenue or other income does not disappear. They will use government as the means to ensure money-flow to avoid starvation, etc.
Republic is the form of society that encourages people to become economically independent so that they will not need to depend on others for basic necessities. Farmers can always eat if they put labor into their land (assuming no natural disaster kills the crops).
Socialism started with feudalism, which was also the economic system of plantations. People are prevented from running their own independent farms/homesteads because they are not allowed to own the land they live/work on. They become servants/slaves of the land owner and therefore need the owner’s permission to consume their own products. From the land-owner’s perspective and the aristocrats, it is necessary to keep capital flowing to the workers so they will keep spending it to produce food and products for the aristocrats.
In modern socialist-capitalism this is done through government and business management. The goal is to create economic interdependence between people to produce more than would be produced if everyone was running an independent farm/homestead. Once people are dependent on this system of interdependence, they use socialist fiscal-control to preserve it.
If you think of it in plantation-terms, it is like taking the slaves and creating jobs for them so they will continue to do the work that provides everyone, including themselves and the aristocrats, with necessities. If the system runs into problems, for example if the price of food gets too high for the workers to afford, the plantation government will arrange for the workers to get enough money to buy food. They do this because they understand that if the workers starve to death, there will be no more food for the aristocrats. If the system was left to its own “laissez faire,” the aristocrats would not give any money to the poor workers and the workers would starve, leaving the agriculturally unskilled aristocrats to do their own agricultural labor or starve as well.
So the best solution for failing capitalism is to strengthen independence of individuals in a republic. Once they have achieved a certain level of security that comes with not having to worry about income, they will be free to produce, buy, and sell non-necessities on the open market. That is the solution for capitalism’s problems, not socialist-mandatory spending.
I suspected Obama at first for his socialism, but I am beginning to think that he may be pursuing a balance between using socialist taxation/spending to smoothen the changes in capitalism while also promoting economic independence of individuals to strengthen the republic. This is a juggling act, since spending always has the potential to lead to greater dependence, but arguably a very harsh crash of capitalism could also harm the ability of individuals to sustain themselves and transition to greater independence from government and corporate control.
By: name withheld on Thursday, 13 August, 2009
at 7:03 pm