Introduction
According to the world socialist movement, socialism can be defined as an economic and political system that is characterized by the common ownership. This implies that people have free access to their needs, everyone acquires the right to participate in the decisions regarding the use of the global resources, and the industry is responsible to produce people’s needs, rather than to profit and commerce (Fleming, 2008). In other words, nobody has the right to acquire personal control of resources, unless they are personal possessions such as professional.
Socialism can be defined as democratic, in sense that it is political as well as economic democracy. In many capitalist countries, institution democracy is not fairly enjoyed because all the political power is owned by wealthy people in the economy. In the socialism system, human needs are given the first priority and abolishes profit motive that initiates ecological destruction, war and inequalities based on race, gender, sexuality and nationality.
Origin of socialism
Socialism was established in the 18th and 19th centuries by the political movements with the aim to counter the traditional capitalist order that denied workers some rights of equality hence influencing them to lobby more. In the Europe, first concepts of socialism’s were proposed by the philosophers in the mid-1800s (Crick, 1987). The fundamental idea was to eliminate the hierarchies, which contained wealthy and powerful people who had full control of society’s resources. In 1928, a French communist, Charles Rappaport defined socialism as a “system based on the recognition of interests common to all citizens, in order to attain a ‘free individual in a free society’”.
Usage of socialism
The earlier attempts regarding the concepts of socialism appealed to disadvantaged, disempowered societies around the world. The twentieth century revolutions in China, Latin America countries, Russia and Cuba attempted to implement the socialist government with a similar goal to give their prospective citizens right to participate in the decisions regarding the utilization of commonly owned resources. However, the modern socialist does not consider these nations as true socialist countries; rather they categorize them in the “state capitalist regimes” class. The modern usage, particularly in the U.S., the term socialist is implied to expound any apparent attempt at redistributing wealth, a commonly espoused goal of communists and socialists. In the true socialism arena, common people are empowered and hierarchy-based regimes are eliminated.
Types of socialism
Anarchism
The socialists in this category believe that the government was negative and intimidating to both the global social state and the economy. They urged that the order was not to be imposed on the citizen by the use of the government instead the people should join the self-government in voluntarily.
Marxian socialism
This category of socialism is also known as scientific socialism, which is an academic form of socialism. This type favors against the idea of capitalism and was entirely based on the labor theory of value that was invented by Karl Marx.
Revisionism
The socialists abiding by this type believed that the society should be built where the state provides education and regulates monopolies.
In this type, the socialists believed the government owns the large stake and controls broad sectors of the economy.
Syndicalism
The socialists in this type believed that regardless of the socialisms’ scope, it could not exist within the territories of modern government. They believed that the self-interest and chasing power should be replaced by the achievement.
References
Crick, B. (1987). Socialism. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Fleming, T. (2008). Socialism. New York: Marshall Cavendish Benchmark.
Hughan, J. W. (1928). What is socialism?. New York: Vanguard press.
