Communism: The Role Of Socialism In American Politics

Socialism has made yet another comeback in American politics with many millennials actually preferring it to capitalism (Thompson). Similarly, it has also come under harsh criticism from the conservative right who claim that those who support it don’t have an understanding of basic economics. This is partly true since many of those who prefer socialism to capitalism cannot even define the word, let alone come up with solutions to implement it (Thompson). That is why I would like to start my essay off by providing a definition. Socialism is an economic system where the government has control over the means of production and evenly distributes capital to its citizens (Edgar 673). The end goal of this ideology is to move humanity towards self-sustenance

and create a utopian state. The criticism towards this way of thinking usually comes from a few key arguments. The first—and perhaps strongest—argument against socialism is that the worker has no incentive to work harder, stifling innovation and promoting laziness. Secondly, opponents argue that if a country was to transition to socialism, it would be outcompeted by other capitalistic nations. While these arguments are indeed supported by historical evidence, I don’t believe that socialism as an ideology is inherently bad. Let’s take a deeper look into some of these failed implementations of socialism to see why socialism is denigrated and deemed unachievable in the long run.
Though ideas of socialism have been present since antiquity, nothing accelerated its rise quite like the Industrial Revolution (Edgar 673). Once machines began to replace skilled workers, many people who were once part of the middle class had no choice but to join the newly created working class. This class was made up of those who worked in factories for low wages and long hours. Living conditions were very poor for this group of people, which led to unhappiness and a sense of subservience to their employers (Edgar 671). These poor conditions were the breeding ground for socialist ideals, which promised worker retribution and equality among all men. The prospects promised by socialism seemed ideal on paper: no one living in poverty, more free time, and equality among all citizens. Capitalism, on the other hand, breed corruption, income inequality, and unfair treatment of workers. It seemed like a no-brainer that capitalism was the enemy of the workers, while socialism is their redeemer.
This was the whole idea behind Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto, where he claimed that capitalism isn’t sustainable (cn). He argued that once a majority of citizens lose their purchasing power due to job loss or similar circumstances, they begin to affect those at the top, making capitalism collapse on itself. He then offered up a solution: the transition to socialism, and eventually to communism. According to Marx, communism was a more mature form a socialism where the government was no longer needed and the workers controlled all capital. Once his paper was popularized, the notion of universal ownership didn’t seem that far-fetched. It wasn’t until these ideas were put into practice, when the cracks in his theory were uncovered.
Tsarist Russia was a breeding ground for radical ideas due to its people being essentially oppressed. This oppression, combined with poor economic conditions, helped to move Russia away from its totalitarian feudal system to a temporary liberal democracy (book). Unfortunately, the temporary government was overthrown by a self-proclaimed Marxist known as Lenin. Instead of following Marx’s traditional path, which stated that you had to first transition to capitalism before attempting to implement socialism or communism, Lenin went ahead and established the first socialist nation, skipping capitalism in the process. In addition, he chose to compliment socialism with authoritarianism, a match that would cause the eventual downfall of the country. Contrary to popular belief, Soviet Russia never progressed to actual communism, and actually managed to move in the other direction towards state capitalism. Some might argue that it was the authoritarian regime that caused the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union, but if you look at the small socialist community of “New Harmony,” you can see that the USSR was doomed to fail either way.
New Harmony, which was established a few years before Karl Marx wrote his Communist Manifesto, was a small socialist town democratic in nature. This small community in Indiana, USA, was started after Robert Owen, a rich idealist, purchased a small Christian town called Harmony in 1825. Robert Owen believed that humans, by nature, would work hard to provide for their community. Though the experiment was successful at first, attracting intellectuals who believed a utopian society was achievable, the small town of New Harmony ultimately failed after there was no incentive to work hard. As _ says, there were “a lot of thinkers and not enough doers.” Besides proving socialism’s non-viability, this experiment also proved another notion: ideology is the enemy to progress.
After Karl Marx’s death in 1883, one of Marx’s biggest proponents, a German named Eduard Bernstein took over the communist vision.

Though he was a major supporter of Marx at first, Bernstein began to notice that capitalist nations were not collapsing like Marx had predicted, but rather thriving. Because of this, he began to question Marx’s theory and began to come up with new perspectives on communism. He called this new ideology called “revisionism.” This new ideology critiqued Marx by arguing that socialism (and eventually communism) can be achieved through gradual reforms in the already established political systems, as opposed to violent revolutions. This idea of Marxist revisionism gained popularity, mostly in Germany where the Socialist Democratic Party gained upwards of 4.5 billion votes, but also with the Labour Party in Britain. In Germany, communists split off from the social democrats and voted against them. In turn, this significantly weakened their power and led to the rise of fascism. After Hitler’s rise to power and a second world war become an inevitability, other socialist movements were halted. The two exceptions to the rule were in Sweden and Canada. In Sweden, the Sweden Socialist Party managed to counter large scale unemployment with extensive social policies. Canada followed a similar path to socialism as Sweden with the exception that their party was mainly comprised of rouge farmers who left the United States in search of better opportunities. These

farmers created the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, which later became known as the New Democratic Party.
Socialism in the United State never took hold like it did in Europe or Canada until after WWII, when the first few social policies were implemented. I believe this was due to a combination of the United States’ relatively strong economy and widespread labor union participation among workers. A notable figure who advocated for union participation was Samuel Gompers, who argued that workers could find retribution through strikes as opposed to revolutions. Because of its success, the United States became the “beacon of capitalism,” which set the stage for an ideological war on communism that has had lasting impacts through the twentieth century and beyond.
This war on communism hit its peak around the late 1940s or early 1950s during the height of the Cold War. This period of mass hysteria was known as the Red Scare (soviets were nicknamed reds, hence the name). With it came an entirely new ideology called McCarthyism. This term was coined after the US Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, who led the anti-communist movement in the United States. Senator McCarthy used fear-mongering tactics and accusations to gain power and influence politics. Instead of only targeting communist spies, McCarthy would accuse intellectuals, or anyone else who disagreed with his views, of treason. The fear that any liberalism may be mistake as communist activity successfully pulled American politics to the right, while crushing any liberal movements at the time.
In more recent times, it is apparent that America has moved back towards the left in an economic sense.

We even the first self-proclaimed “Democratic Socialist,” Bernie Sanders, running for president to prove it. So that brings us back to the question: is socialism a beneficial ideology? With all of the failures in the past it would be logical to assume so, but there is one thing that many people tend to overlook. The nations that implement pure socialism with no capitalism are always doomed to fail. The same could be said about pure capitalism as well. There is currently no country on earth to practice pure capitalism; even the US has a mixed economy, incorporating socialist aspects like Social Security, Welfare, public schooling, government jobs…the list goes on. While the public sector doesn’t usually stimulate the economy as heavily as the private sector does, it does act as a counter to poverty caused by joblessness and improves happiness across the board. Therefore, to say that one economic system is absolutely superior to the other is as disillusioned as the first settlers of New Harmony were. I believed that instead of engaging in an ideological warfare, we should be focusing on the facts and coming up with solutions on how to improve upon our current economic and environmental worries, as opposed to dismissing information because it’s against our

“beliefs.”