Why conservatives misuse the word Socialism

So Who and What is 'Socialism'?           -   Part 1

Depends on who you ask

I started this blog because I want Americans to stop thinking of socialism as a dirty word and understand that in terms of Western Democracies, nearly all have socialist features including the United States. That's right conservatives, there are many socialist policies right here in the USA.

One of the most important starting point in any reasoned discussion is to have the correct definitions and meanings, and with socialism there is a vast difference depending on who you ask. According to Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, Obama, Clinton, and a host of other democrats are all socialists. They sling the word socialist around almost as much as the word Nazi or Hitler. Of late, there has been a huge discussion about who and what is socialism, much of the dialogue of course is completely wrong or so opinionated as to not even count. But it does leave one to wonder what exactly is it then? 

In this blog I'll explore this very issue and start a new dialogue about socialism, one that is based on sound research and historical facts. Since this is such a massive topic, I'm going to break this post into sections to help make it a little more entertaining and digestible. In this first post I'll be exploring the history of socialism and how it was applied in the past.

The Century of the -isms

The early twentieth century produced an explosion of new political thought, most of it inspired in one way or another from Marx ideology and a new burgeoning sense of nationalism in a post-monarch Europe. Marx's ideas found their biggest supporters in the recently dissolved Imperial Russia with partisans such as Lenin and his Bolsheviks. The violent civil war in Russia during 1917 resulted in an entirely new European landscape; one dominated by political ideology rather than religion and monarchy. Lenin and his Bolsheviks seized power from one of the greatest dynasties of all time and converted the world's largest country into a communist experiment. Unfortunately for the citizens of the new USSR this did not translate into the promised utopia of Marx but rather "the USSR was turned into a grotesque, gargantuan laboratory of social engineering and human misery."*(1) Of course this achievement did not go unnoticed in intellectual circles throughout Europe, and surprisingly many westerners viewed this revolution as the dawning of a new age: one free from the constraints of class warfare, rampant capitalism, and religious dogma. Lenin had many supporters in Western Europe and communist parties began springing up left and right throughout post-war Europe. In their defense, some of these intellectuals had no idea of the horrors taking place behind the scenes as the soviets were experts at creating the illusion of a peaceful, stable new socialist country. Many western journalist may have also been blackmailed to produce positive articles about the new soviet country.*(2)

Different Strokes for Different Folks

As a quick side note, democracies/republics in Europe were set-up quite differently than the American two-party Presidential system. They were run not by individual politicians, but rather by an independently formed political party. Citizens vote for the party only, not individual leaders. This difference lead to much more radicalism and instability in that small fringe parties could gain footholds in governments then slowly build power over time, or enact a coup and take over the reins of the government. (see 1933 Germany)

Thus, the rise of a multitude of communist parties throughout Europe implied quite a bit of real political power and influence over policy. It also inspired a new counter-communist political ideology that would eventually change the course of history: fascism. Characterized by a fanatical nationalism and cult of the leader, fascist regimes began springing up all over Europe in the late 20's and 30's: Franco, Hitler, Mussollini. These parties were in large part a reaction against the Bolshevik movement; in fact the Spanish Civil war was an armed conflict between the two parties. Although proclaimed to be anti-Bolshevik, fascism drew on ideas from the right and the left. The extreme nationalism and militarism came from the right, but the appeal to populism and revolution of the masses was very similar to communism. Also, both systems ultimately had one goal in mind: the complete dominance of a one-party state through totalitarianism.

The Battle of Ideas gets ugly

Europe in the 30's thus became a battle royal between the three dominant political ideologies; fascism, communism(called socialism back then), and democracy. Two of the three were totalitarian and headed by a strong central government with a dictator, and the other was the bureaucratic committee system inherent in democracy. The one-party states had a clear advantage politically against their democratic rivals since they didn't have to bother with regulatory bodies or rule of law, but could simply act based on their immediate will. Hitler best exemplified this fascist trait in his triumphant conquest of Europe that took only the better part of a year to accomplish. Meanwhile, the western allies were mired in inaction and stagnation in large part to the inefficiency of their governments.*(3) More on the topic of World War II can be read in my posts later, but now let's return to the root of socialism.

We all know how WWII played out and it certainly doesn't need another rehashing here. The salient point for this discussion however, is that the USSR beat Germany and therefore communism beat fascism and lived to fight another day. Why the allies didn't continue east and destroy Stalin when they could will never be known, but their inaction led to a 50 year nightmare for any country caught behind the Iron Curtain. By now you should start to see that Stalin's form of 'socialism' was very harsh and bears no resemblance to the modern usage of the term. The soviets used the political framework of Marx to mask their true intentions of creating a totalitarian state full of all of the horrors that go along with such a repressive system of government. Marx envisioned the progression to communism as an organic process that would proceed only in highly developed capitalist countries that had a large bourgeois, not a backwards country like Russia that was operating an 18th century peasant-style economy. Thus, communism/socialism was doomed to fail from the get-go in Russia.

So what was the original meaning of socialism as defined by Marx and how did it get so convoluted by the Bolsheviks?
Check out Part 2 to find out......




Citations
* "The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich"
*"The Storm of War"
*"No Simple Victory" Norman Davies