11.4 - Differing Views and Tensions within Socialism Flashcards
What is the ‘Third Way’?
A perspective that seeks to modify left-wing ideology towards economic and political realities of globalisation.
What type of help should the state provide?
Enough help to allow disadvantaged people to thrive, but not so much that they need to do nothing.
‘A hand UP, not a hand OUT’
What are the core values of the ‘Third Way’?
A balance between rights and responsibilities and combination of social justice alongside market-orientated economics.
Welfare state.
Stakeholding society.
Communitarianism.
Who were the biggest examples of the ‘Third Way’
New Labour.
What left-wing policies did New Labour introduce?
Increased income tax on high earners (funded minimum wage, Education Maintenance Allowance)
Welfare-to-work (sure start, tax credits etc.)
Increased gov. expenditure on essential public services.
What ways did New Labour ‘abandon’ socialism?
Clause IV was completely watered down.
Committal to privatisation, deregulation and marketisation of the welfare state.
Little / no progress towards even distribution of wealth.
Who was regarded as more left-wing, Gordon Brown or Tony Blair?
Gordon Brown. (although he adopted many of the same Third Way policies)
What are the main schools of socialist thought?
Communism
Social Democracy
The Third Way
What was the earliest form of socialism?
Revolutionary socialism.
What were the two main schools of revolutionary socialism?
Utopian socialism
Marxism
What was the main concept of utopian socialism?
Small-scale cooperative communities should replace capitalism.
Why did utopian socialism not really take off?
Marx ironically named it ‘utopian’ as he deemed the ideas as too idealistic with no depth of thought as to how they would be implemented.
All utopian socialist societies of the nineteenth century failed.
What were the main ‘firsts’ that Marx and Engels came up with?
- Human nature had been distorted by capitalism
- Capitalist economics were bad
- Social class at the heart of their arguments
- The state is not neutral but a puppet of the ruling class
- The need for revolution
What did Marx and Engels claim their theories were based upon?
Science.
Revolution was inevitable.
Based on the ideas of:
* Historical materialism
* Dialectic
* Social Class
* Class conciousness
What is historical materialism?
Economic factors are the driving force for changing events.
The economic base forms the superstructure:
* Culture
* Politics
* Law
* Religion
* Ideology
* Social Consciousness
What is dialectic?
A class of ideas between each stage of history.
When pre-existing sets of rules set by the ruling class are not longer valued by the majority and therefore a new society will be born from those two tensions.
What is class conciousness?
The moment the proletariat realises capitalism is exploiting them, empowering them to begin the collective struggle of revolution.
What is economic determinism?
Society is based upon an economic system in which the various agents of social control are determined by the economic mode of production.
Which socialist key thinkers are determenists?
Marx
Engels
Luxembourg
Did Luxembourg argue with Marx’s view of historical materialism and why?
No.
She felt that less economically developed societies were capable of having revolutions without capitalism reaching a final stage.
What did Luxembourg think of democracy post revolution?
She felt it was necessary, contrary to Marx.
‘Without general elections, without unrestricted freedom of the press and assembly, without a free struggle of opinion, life dies in every institution.’
Why did Luxembourg think Marxist revolutions would be dangerous?
She felt they would lead to dictatorships (she was right..)
What is the disconnect between real applications of Marxism and ideological views of Marxism?
In the USSR, China and Cuba, the state grew rather than withered and, in the case of China and Russia, extreme violence was used to enforce socialist ideals. All cases of Marxism were nationalist rather than internationalist.
What is revisionism?
To review and change a political theory.
i.e. social democracy revised the ideas of democratic socialism.