socialism

Movement aiming to establish a classless society by substituting public for private ownership of the
means of production, distribution, and exchange. The term has been used to describe positions as
widely apart as anarchism and social democracy. Socialist ideas appeared in classical times, in early
Christianity, among later Christian sects such as the Anabaptists and Diggers, and, in the 18th and
early 19th centuries, when they were put forward as systematic political aims by Jean-Jacques
Rousseau, Claude Saint-Simon, François Fourier, and Robert Owen, among others. Socialist
theories were also promoted by the German social and political philosophers Karl Marx and
Friedrich Engels.

The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw a division between those who reacted against Marxism,
leading to social-democratic parties, and those who emphasized the original revolutionary
significance of Marx's teachings. Weakened by these divisions, the second International (founded in
1889) collapsed after 1914, with right-wing socialists in all countries supporting participation in
World War I while the left opposed it. The Russian Revolution took socialism from the sphere of
theory to that of practice, and was followed in 1919 by the foundation of the Third International,
which cemented the division between right and left. This lack of unity, in spite of the temporary
successes of the popular fronts in France and Spain 1936–38, helped the rise of fascism and Nazism.

After World War II socialist and communist parties tended towards formal union in Eastern
Europe, although the strict communist control that followed was later modified in some respects in,
for example, Poland, Romania, and Yugoslavia. Subsequent tendencies to broaden communism
were suppressed in Hungary (1956) and Czechoslovakia (1968). In 1989, however, revolutionary
change throughout Eastern Europe ended this rigid control; this was followed in 1991 by the
disbanding of the Soviet Communist Party and the resulting disintegration of the USSR. In
Western Europe a communist takeover of the Portuguese revolution failed 1975–76, and elsewhere,
as in France under François Mitterrand (president 1981–95), attempts at socialist-communist
cooperation petered out. Most countries in Western Europe have a strong socialist, or social
democratic, party; for example, the Social Democratic Party in Germany, the Labour Party in the
UK, the Socialist Worker's Party in Spain, and the Panhellenic Socialist Movement in Greece.

The Early Theorists

Socialism arose in the late 18th and early 19th cent. as a reaction to the economic and social
changes associated with the Industrial Revolution. While rapid wealth came to the factory owners,
the workers became increasingly impoverished. As this capitalist industrial system spread,
reactions in the form of socialist thought increased proportionately. Although many thinkers in the
past expressed ideas that were similar to later socialism, the first theorist who may properly be
called socialist was François Noël Babeuf, who came to prominence during the French Revolution.
Babeuf propounded the doctrine of class war between capital and labor later to be seen in
Marxism.

Socialist writers who followed Babeuf, however, were more moderate. Known as "utopian
socialists," they included the comte de Saint-Simon, Charles Fourier, and RobertOwen. Saint-
Simon proposed that production and distribution be carried out by the state. The leaders of society
would be industrialists who would found a national community based upon cooperation and who
would eliminate the poverty of the lowest classes. Fourier and Owen, though differing in many
respects, both believed that social organization should be based on small local collective
communities rather than the large centralist state of Saint-Simon. All these men agreed, however,
that there should be cooperation rather than competition, and they implicitly rejected class
struggle. In the early 19th cent. numerous utopian communistic settlements founded on the
principles of Fourier and Owen sprang up in Europe and the United States; New
Harmony and Brook Farm were notable examples.

Following the utopians came thinkers such as Louis Blanc who were more political in their socialist
formulations. Blanc put forward a system of social workshops (1840) that would be controlled by
the workers themselves with the support of the state. Capitalists would be welcome in this venture,
and each person would receive goods in proportion to his or her needs. Blanc became a member of
the French provisional government of 1848 and attempted to put some of his proposals into effect,
but his efforts were sabotaged by his opponents. The anarchist Pierre Joseph Proudhon and the
insurrectionist Auguste Blanqui were also influential socialist leaders of the early and mid-19th
cent.

Marxists and Gradualists

In the 1840s the term communism came into use to denote loosely a militant leftist form of
socialism; it was associated with the writings of Étienne Cabet and his theories of common
ownership. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels later used it to describe the movement that advocated
class struggle and revolution to establish a society of cooperation.

In 1848, Marx and Engels wrote the famous Communist Manifesto, in which they set forth the
principles of what Marx called "scientific socialism," arguing the historical inevitability of
revolutionary conflict between capital and labor. In all of his works Marx attacked the socialists as
theoretical utopian dreamers who disregarded the necessity of revolutionary struggle to implement
their doctrines. In the atmosphere of disillusionment and bitterness that increasingly pervaded
European socialism, Marxism later became the theoretical basis for most socialist thought. But the
failure of the revolutions of 1848 caused a decline in socialist action in the following two decades,
and it was not until the late 1860s that socialism once more emerged as a powerful social force.

Other varieties of socialism continued to exist alongside Marxism, such as Christian socialism, led
in England by Frederick Denison Maurice and Charles Kingsley; they advocated the establishment
of cooperative workshops based on Christian principles. Ferdinand Lassalle, founder of the first
workers' party in Germany (1863), promoted the idea of achieving socialism through state action in
individual nations, as opposed to the Marxian emphasis on international revolution. Through the
efforts of WilhelmLiebknecht and August Bebel, Lassalle's group was brought into the mainstream
of Marxian socialism. By the 1870s Socialist parties sprang up in many European countries, and
they eventually formed the Second International. With the increasing improvement of labor
conditions, however, and the apparent failure of the capitalist state to weaken, a major schism
began to develop over the issue of revolution.

While nearly all socialists condemned the bourgeois capitalist state, a large number apparently felt
it more expedient or more efficient to adapt to and reform the state structure, rather than
overthrow it. Opposed to these gradualists were the orthodox Marxists and the advocates
of anarchism and syndicalism, all of whom believed in the absolute necessity of violent struggle. In
1898, Eduard Bernstein denied the inevitability of class conflict; he called for a revision of Marxism
that would allow an evolutionary socialism.
The struggle between evolutionists and revolutionists affected the socialist movement throughout
the world. In Germany, Bernstein's chief opponent, Karl Kautsky, insisted that the Social
Democratic party adhere strictly to orthodox Marxist principles. In other countries, however,
revisionism made more progress. In Great Britain, where orthodox Marxism had never been a
powerful force, the Fabian Society, founded in 1884, set forth basic principles of evolutionary
socialism that later became the theoretical basis of the British Labour party. The principles of
William Morris, dictated by aesthetic and ethical aims, and the small but able group that
forwarded guild socialism also had influence on British thought, but the Labour party, with its
policy of gradualism, represented the mainstream of British socialism. In the United States, the
ideological issue led to a split in the Socialist Labor party, founded in 1876 under strong German
influence, and the formation (1901) of the revisionist Socialist party, which soon became the largest
socialist group.

The most momentous split, however, took place in the Russian Social Democratic Labor party,
which divided into the rival camps of Bolshevism and Menshevism. Again, gradualism was the chief
issue. It was the revolutionary opponents of gradualism, the Bolsheviks, who seized power in the
Russian Revolution of 1917 and became the Communist party of the USSR. World War I had
already split the socialist movement over whether to support their national governments in the war
effort (most did); the Russian Revolution divided it irrevocably. The Russian Communists founded
the Comintern in order to seize leadership of the international socialist movement and to foment
world revolution, but most European Socialist parties, including the mainstream of the powerful
German party, repudiated the Bolsheviks. Despite the Germans' espousal of Marxist orthodoxy,
they had been notably nonrevolutionary in practical politics. Thereafter, revolutionary socialism,
or communism, and evolutionary, or democratic, socialism were two separate and frequently
mutually antagonistic movements.

Democratic Socialism

Democratic socialism took firm root in European politics after World War I. Socialist democratic
parties actively participated in government in Great Britain, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, the
Netherlands, and other nations. Socialism also became a powerful force in parts of Latin America,
Asia, and Africa. To the Indian leader JawaharlalNehru and other leaders of independence
movements, it was attractive as an alternative to the systems of private enterprise and exploitation
established by their foreign rulers.

After World War II, socialist parties came to power in many nations throughout the world, and
much private industry was nationalized. In Africa and Asia where the workers are peasants, not
industrial laborers, socialist programs stressed land reform and other agrarian measures. These
nations, until recently, have also emphasized government planning for rapid economic
development. African socialism has also included the revival of precolonial values and institutions,
while modernizing through the centralized apparatus of the one-party state. Recently, the collapse
of Eastern European and Soviet Communist states has led socialists throughout the world to
discard much of their doctrines regarding centralized planning and nationalization of enterprises.

rigin and development of socialist theories. The protest of the oppressed classes of the population
against coercion and exploitation was expressed in the emergence and development of doctrines
presenting socialism as a just social system. However, representatives of pre-Marxian socialism did
not understand the lawlike regularities of social development, nor did they view the working class
as the force capable of establishing socialism through revolution, on the ruins of the capitalist mode
of production.
The history of socialist theories is inextricably linked with the exacerbation of the class struggle and
with the growth of the revolutionary role of the proletariat. Undeveloped forms of the struggle of
the working class corresponded to immature socialist theories. The Utopian socialists, including T.
More and T. Campanella, were the first to undertake a systematic presentation of socialist theory.
Their ideas were further developed by Saint-Simon, C. Fourier, and R. Owen, whose views were a
source of Marxism. The representatives of Utopian socialism criticized the flaws of the capitalist
system and advocated a socialist society based on common ownership of the means of production;
they believed such a society could be established by convincing the representatives of the ruling
classes of the necessity of socialism, by changing human nature, or by founding associations and
cooperatives. Although the Utopian socialists brilliantly predicted certain features of the future
system, they were unable to link their theory to the revolutionary struggle of the working class and
thereby raise it to the level of a science.

The Russian revolutionary democrats A. I. Herzen and N. G. Chernyshevskii abandoned the idea of
a peaceful transition of humanity to socialism and linked the establishment of socialism with the
revolutionary struggle of the people. However, they were unable to grasp the principles of social
development and the role of the working class.

In addition to Utopian socialism, bourgeois and petit bourgeois theories of socialism became
popular. They were critically analyzed by K. Marx and F. Engels in theCommunist Manifesto.

As a result of the revolution they achieved in the social sciences, Marx and Engels were able to
transform socialism from a Utopian theory into a science. They established the scientific
foundations of socialism, demonstrated the inevitability of its victory over capitalism, and
elucidated its main characteristics and the principles of its development. In a new historical epoch,
that of the transition of humanity from capitalism to communism, V. I. Lenin creatively developed
socialist theory by generalizing from the first experience in building socialism, which took place in
the USSR. Socialist theory is constantly being developed, enriched, and made more specific through
the activity of the CPSU and other Marxist-Leninist parties, in the documents of the international
communist and working-class movement, and in research by Marxist scholars.

The first stage of communism. Socialism replaces capitalism as a result of the operation of the
objective laws of social development, by the revolutionary elimination of the capitalist mode of
production. Under capitalism, the material prerequisites for socialism emerge—the development of
the production forces and the large-scale socialization of production. The main contradiction of
capitalism is between the social character of production and the private, capitalist form of
appropriation. It is resolved by the socialist revolution, which ensures a correspondence between
the production relations and the character and level of the productive forces.

The construction of socialism, which is the result of the creative activity of the working class and all
the toiling people, under the leadership of the Marxist-Leninist party, marks the end of the period
of transition from capitalism to socialism.

Unlike all the other social systems, socialism emerges and becomes fully established not as a result
of spontaneous processes in the depths of the preceding mode of production but by the conscious
efforts of the masses, based on the knowledge and application of the objective laws of the
development of socialism. The building of socialism was essentially completed for the first time in
the mid-1930’s in the USSR. Centuries of backwardness were ended in the lifetime of a single
generation. The country made substantial technological, economic, and social progress. By the late
1930’s, the USSR ranked second in the world in volume of industrial output. The most important
branches of industrial production were entirely rebuilt, the socialist transformation of agriculture
was carried out, and a cultural revolution made advanced cultural and scientific achievements
accessible to the popular masses.

Since the victory of the socialist revolution and the building of socialism in the USSR, socialism has
become more than a theory and a popular social movement: it has become established as a social
system in many countries. A large group of European and Asian countries adopted socialism after
World War II (1939–45). With the formation of the world socialist system, there was an
international foundation for the further development of socialism. The political alliance between
the socialist countries is growing stronger, as is their economic, scientific, and technological
cooperation. The world socialist system includes 14 countries, which account for 25.9 percent of the
world’s territory and 32 percent of its population and produce more than 40 percent of the total
world industrial output. The members of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
(COMECON), the most rapidly developing area of the world, are united by their common
economic and sociopolitical systems, as well as by a common ideology and goals. The socialist
countries have actively promoted the reduction of international tension and have been the initiators
of the most important actions for disarmament and for the preservation of world peace.

Socialism abolishes private ownership of the means of production and the exploitation of man by
man, eliminates antagonisms in social development, and fundamentally modifies the character and
goals of economic progress. “The goal of socialism is to more fully satisfy the growing material and
cultural needs of the people by the continuous development and improvement of social production”
(Programma KPSS, 1976, p. 15). Socialism differs fundamentally from capitalism, over which it has
tremendous advantages. The socialist system eliminates all social barriers that hinder scientific,
technological, economic, and social progress; puts an end to economic crises, unemployment, and
national dissension; opens up wide vistas for the development of science and culture and makes
scientific and cultural achievements accessible to the broadest masses of the people; and establishes
the conditions for the comprehensive and harmonious development of the individual. The decisive
advantages of socialism include much higher growth rates in production and labor productivity, as
well as the use of economic achievements for the systematic improvement of the standard of living
of the people.

Economic structure. The economic structure of socialism is characterized by an adequate material

and technical basis and a system of production relations based on social ownership of the means of
production. Lenin wrote: “A large-scale machine industry capable of reorganizing agriculture is
the only material basis that is possible for socialism” (Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 44, p. 9). The
material and technical basis for socialism consists of large-scale machine production, based on
electrical energy and spanning all branches of the national economy. Large-scale machine
production constitutes the foundation for the shape and development of socialist production
relations, which strengthen the role of the working class as the leading force in socialist society, and
serve to build up the socialist economic system.

Socialist production relations, which completely dominate social production, ensure the rapid and
stable growth of the productive forces in conformity with a plan. The distinguishing feature of the
socialist economic system is harmony between the production relations and the character of the
productive forces. The establishment of public ownership radically changes the developmental goal
and mode of functioning of production. The spontaneous forces of anarchy and competition are
replaced by the organization of economic processes in conformity with a plan. The direct producers
are united with the means of production, full employment is ensured, each individual is assigned to
work corresponding to his capacities, and broad new prospects are opened for the development of
the personality.

The characteristic feature of a socialist society is the complete dominance of public ownership of the
means of production in all spheres and sectors of the national economy. By the mid-1930’s the
socialist sector had become dominant in the Soviet economy. By the early 1970’s, the socialist
economy included 100 percent of the fixed productive capital, the national income, and the output
of industry and agriculture (see Table 1).

Under socialism, there is the citizen’s personal property in consumer goods and household articles,
as well as public ownership of the means of production and fixed nonproductive capital, including
housing, theaters, museums, and stadiums. Another variety

of personal property is the property of the kolkhoz household, which includes certain very simple
means of production (agricultural equipment and domestic animals).

Socialist production relations constitute a single, integral system, all the elements of which have a
socioeconomic content characteristic of this stage of development of society, whether they are
characteristic of the communist formation in general or typical, to varying degrees, of several
socioeconomic formations. Thus, under socialism, ownership of the means of production by all the
people—a typical feature of both phases of communism—assumes the form of a specifically socialist
state ownership. Likewise, commodity-money relations, which are characteristic of several social
formations, have a specific content under socialism.

The system of economic categories and laws of socialism corresponds to the unified system of
socialist production relations. A leading role in this system is played by the fundamental economic
law of socialism, which is manifested in the dominance of social ownership of the means of
production and in the characteristic orientation of the development of production: that is, the
subordination of industrial development to raising the standard of living of the people and
comprehensively developing the personality of every member of society. The mode of functioning of
a socialist economy is described by the law of the planned, proportional growth of the national
economy.

Under socialism, economic laws lose the role of spontaneous regulators of social production. Society
consciously applies these laws to bring about a steady increase in production and to utilize the
advantages of the socialist economic system. Successful mastery of the economic laws through a
system of planned direction of the national economy lends a dynamic quality to the socialist
economy and accelerates the rates of growth. Rapid, steady growth of the national economy is one
of the principles of the development of socialism and one of its main advantages over capitalism.
Between 1950 and 1975 the average annual increase in industrial output in the socialist countries
was more than twice that of the capitalist countries. Socialism develops by stages, each of which
reflects the increasing maturity of socialist society. The experience of socialist development in a
large group of countries has shown that socialism is not a short-lived condition but a relatively long
stage in the development of the communist socioeconomic formation. As the first phase of
communism, socialism shapes an entire historical epoch of human development, distinguished by a
number of characteristics. The socialist phase consists of stages, each of which has specific features.
Socialism is characterized by exceptionally rapid changes in the productive forces, economic
relations, and the forms and methods of social organization. The qualitative transformation of
various aspects of the social structure determines the transition from one stage of socialism to
another.
The economic foundation of socialism emerges in the concluding stage of the period of transition
from capitalism to socialism—a stage marked by the formation of the main features of the material
and technical basis for socialism and the predominance of social ownership of the means of
production in all branches of the economy. In the Soviet Union the foundation of the socialist
economy had been created through the fulfillment of the first five-year plan (1929-32). The material
and technical basis for socialism was created, socialist production relations became dominant, a
planned economy was established, and a cultural revolution took place. All of these achievements
were reinforced by the political superstructure. The construction of socialism signifies the end of
the period of transition from capitalism to socialism. The final victory of socialism is achieved when
it is no longer possible to restore capitalism—that is, when the process of socialist transformations
is irreversible. In the USSR the complete and final victory of socialism was reflected in the
resolutions of the Twenty-first Congress of the CPSU (1959).

The historical experience of the socialist countries provides evidence of the inevitability of two
stages in the development of socialism after the period of transition: the initial, or first, stage of
socialist society and the stage of developed socialism. The first stage begins essentially when
socialism is built and ends with the construction of a mature, developed socialist society. Developed
socialism was established for the first time in the USSR as a result of profound changes in the
economy and the entire system of social relations by the selfless labor of the people, under the
leadership of the party. The transition to the stage of developed socialism took place in the USSR in
the early 1960’s. In the mid-1970’s a number of European socialist countries have adopted the goal
of building developed socialism. A developed socialist society can make fuller use of the advantages
of the new social structure. During the stage of developed socialism, economic and scientific and
technological competition between socialism and capitalism enters a decisive phase.

The transition from one stage of socialist society to another is associated with major changes in the
development of material production and in the system of economic, sociopolitical, and intellectual
relations. Thus, the criteria for recognizing developed socialism are complex. During the relatively
long stage of developed socialism, the comprehensive improvement of socialist society is ensured,
and the material and technical basis for communism develops. A developed socialist society is
characterized by the comprehensive manifestation of the advantages of socialism and by the
persistent unification of the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution with the
advantages of the socialist economic system. Some of the features of developed socialism are present
from the outset, and others emerge gradually.

Many processes are associated with the construction of developed socialism. In the economy there is
a multiple increase in social production, scientific and technological achievements are applied in
production, and there is a transition to an intensive type of expanded reproduction and a higher
degree of maturity in social ownership and the entire system of production relations. The national
economy is consistently oriented toward raising the standard of living of the population and
promoting the comprehensive development of the individual.

In the sociopolitical sphere there is an increase in social homogeneity and in the leadership role of
the working class. The dictatorship of the proletariat is transformed into a state of the entire
people, the full equality of nations and nationalities is established, and socialist democracy develops.
The toiling masses are extensively involved in the management of industry and all public affairs.

In the cultural sphere, Marxist-Leninist ideology becomes completely dominant, a high level of
education is provided for all strata of the population, and culture and art flourish and are made
accessible to all social groups.
As socialism develops and matures, the preconditions take shape for the transition to the higher
phase of communism. This process is particularly evident during the period of developed socialism.

The transformation of socialism into communism. The growth of socialism into communism is one of
the objective, lawlike regularities of the development of the communist mode of production.
Because socialism and communism have the same social character and are based on social
ownership of the means of production, there can be no specific period of transition from one to the
other. The transition from socialism to communism is a continuous process. It is just as incorrect to
delay artificially the construction of a communist society by hampering the development of its
elements as it is to force the pace of the transition to communism by skipping necessary stages of
development and neglecting the objective laws.

Three interrelated tasks are completed during the transformation of socialism into communism:
the creation of the material and technical basis for communism, the transformation of socialist
social relations into communist social relations, and the creation of the new man. As the productive
forces develop and the relations of production mature, the essential differences between the city and
the countryside are overcome, as well as the differences between intellectual and physical labor.
Society becomes completely homogeneous. The socialist state of all the people is replaced by
communist self-government. Labor is no longer simply a means of living. There is a growing
consciousness of the necessity of working for the general welfare, and the wealth and potential of
the human personality emerges. The creation of abundant material and cultural goods
simultaneously with the shaping of comprehensively developed people will make it possible to put
into practice the following principle: “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his
needs.”

During the lawlike transformation of socialism into communism, the leading role of the Marxist-
Leninist party increases further, owing to the growing scale and complexity of the problems
encountered in building communism, which require a higher level of political and organizational
leadership. Other reasons for the enhancement of the party’s leading role include the increasing
creative activity of the masses and the involvement of millions of workers in the management of
state affairs and production; the further development of socialist democracy; the increasing role of
public organizations; the growing importance, creative development, and propaganda of scientific
communism; and the necessity of strengthening the communist education of the working people
and the struggle to eradicate vestiges of the past from the consciousness of the people.

The construction of socialism and its transformation into communism depend on the creative
development of the theory of scientific communism by the CPSU and the fraternal Marxist-Leninist
parties. This is accomplished in the decisive struggle with bourgeois socialist “theories” and with
attempts by right and “left” opportunists to oppose scientific communism with various “models” of
socialism.