Key Socialist Thinkers

Question 1

What did Marx and Engels believe about human nature? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 1

Marx and Engels believed human nature to have been damaged from its naturally fraternal and altruistic form by capitalism, with workers pitted against each other in a selfish and competitive world. Capitalism has also instilled bourgeois values rather than those of the proletariat, with this process eventually leading to class consciousness emerging.

Question 2

What did Marx and Engels believe about the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 2

Marx and Engels believed that capitalism should be overthrown through a revolution, as the bourgeois state has become a tool to perpetrate capitalism and oppress the proletariat. Employers extract a surplus value from their employees to produce profit, which alienates workers from their labour. The economy should be owned collectively for common good.

Question 3

What did Marx and Engels believe about the state? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 3

Marx and Engels believed the state to be a tool of capitalist oppression and should be overthrown, replaced by an initial socialist dictatorship, before a classless society will see the state wither away. The state was not politically neutral as it works in the interests of the bourgeoisie, yet would lose purpose without class conflicts.

Question 4

What did Marx and Engels believe about society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 4

Marx and Engels believed that society is composed of class differences and conflicts, with these classes determined on the value of our labour in a capitalist society. A communist society, where resources are distributed based on need, would result in ‘the end of history’.

Question 5

What did Rosa Luxemburg believe about human nature? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 5

Luxemburg believed humanity to be naturally fraternal and had not been damaged to the extent suggested by Marx, with working class communities still working collaboratively in light of oppression through capitalism.

Question 6

What did Rosa Luxemburg believe about the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 6

Luxemburg believed that a revolutionary abolition of capitalism should be undertaken, with this arising spontaneously through industrial action which advances to violence, rather than being planned. To destroy capitalism, the proletariat requires determination and solidarity. This should see the economy replaced by one of worker control.

Question 7

What did Rosa Luxemburg believe about the state? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 7

Rosa Luxemburg believed that the existing state should be overthrown due to its relationship with capitalism, yet that it should be replaced by a new democracy underpinned by common ownership, debate and elections. Some have argued that this is a betrayal of revolutionary socialism.

Question 8

What did Rosa Luxemburg believe about society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 8

Luxemburg thought that humanity could achieve class consciousness and rise up against the bourgeoisie in a spontaneous revolution of the proletariat. Luxemburg did however value the existence of alternative sub-cultures and downtrodden proletarian groups within society rather than wishing to create a single societal identity.

Question 9

What did Beatrice Webb believe about human nature? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 9

Webb held a slightly pessimistic view of human nature, believing that a collaborative society and socialist state should be planned and organised by a group of radical intellectuals in the form of a civil service rather than led by the general proletariat. She did, however, believe that capitalism had damaged humanity by instilling competitiveness that undermined cooperation.

Question 10

What did Beatrice Webb believe about the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 10

Webb believed that a capitalist economy should be disbanded and replaced by one founded upon common ownership and which secures for workers the fruits of their labour. Capitalism had perpetrated poverty and inequality, and as such should be abolished. Trade unionism and increased accountability within the economy needed.

Question 11

What did Beatrice Webb believe about the state? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 11

Beatrice Webb believed that socialism could be achieved through the existing parliamentary system, and that gradual, piecemeal change could create a socialist society. Revolution and the overthrow of states creates volatility, something which should be avoided. The state should intervene to reduce inequality.

Question 12

What did Beatrice Webb believe about society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 12

Webb thought society had been made to be impoverished and unequal due to capitalism. It has also been shaped and contorted into one based around selfish and cruel instincts by capitalism, with competitive instincts having subdued the naturally cooperative nature of humans.

Question 13

What did Anthony Crosland believe about human nature? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 13

Crosland thought that humans sought both equality and justice, with them being opposed to both INEQUALITY of opportunity and INEQUALITY of outcome.

Question 14

What did Crosland believe about the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 14

Crosland thought that capitalism’s potential for wealth creation could be exploited and manipulated to create a more prosperous society. The economy could be mixed between moderate public ownership of key industry and a majority of business being privately owned. Public ownership was only a method of achieving socialism rather than its aim. KEYNESIAN ECONOMICS could sustain steady economic growth and maintain full employment.

Question 15

What did Anthony Crosland believe about the state? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 15

Crosland believed that the state could act to support society through provision of a welfare state, financed by increased tax yields from economic growth. The state should have a role in the economy by controlling supply and demand to reduce inequality but should not have wholesale ownership of the economy. Welfare should create equality of opportunity and social justice.

Question 16

What did Crosland believe about society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 16

Crosland believed that society could be made more equal while a capitalist system was employed, believing that society was no longer just polarised between employers and employees as Marx and Engels had asserted. New classes had emerged, creating a more complex and diverse society.

Question 17

What did Giddens believe about human nature? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 17

Giddens believed capitalism had eroded typical socialist values of fraternity and cooperation, creating an atomised society, yet that this should now be worked with rather than against. Human nature is conflicted between the individualism fostered by a capitalist society and a desire for social justice.

Question 18

What did Giddens believe about the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 18

Giddens thought that capitalism and individualism had become entrenched in the world, with laissez-faire economics the best way to achieve economic empowerment. However, to maximise the effectiveness, this must be combined with a social democratic view of society to focus economic freedoms on creating equality of opportunity.

Question 19

What did Giddens believe about the state? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 19

Giddens believed that the state had a role to play in financing services and infrastructure to provide equality of opportunity and prepare its citizens for the knowledge economy. The state should also seek to redistribute political power and decision making by decentralising it, therefore encouraging democracy and empowering the population.

Question 20

What did Giddens believe about society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 20

Giddens believed that individualism was now entrenched in society, with an atomised society created in both the upper classes and working classes (with working class individualism created in the Post-Fordist era of capitalism which had damaged tightly knit industrial groups). By increasing public investment in tandem with neo-liberal economics, greater equality of opportunity would develop yet equality of outcome would decline.

Question 21

What did Marx and Engels believe about class and class consciousness? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 21

Marx and Engels believed that class was society’s greatest division, with this largely being defined by whether individuals were part of the bourgeoisie or the proletariat. This was determined by economic status. Class consciousness was the stage at which the proletariat would become aware of their inferior position and inevitably rise up against the bourgeoisie.

Question 22

Explain Marx and Engels’ idea of ‘surplus value’ and its impacts - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 22

Marx and Engels believed that capitalism was built upon the idea that the bourgeoisie would extract a ‘surplus value’ from their employees labour (through minimum wages or paying them less than the value of their work) in order to create profits. This would result in workers eventually resenting their employers when they achieved class consciousness.

Question 23

Why did Marx and Engels believe that the state would eventually ‘wither away’? What would precede this stateless society? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 23

Marx and Engels believed that the state would eventually lose its purpose as a communist society where all things work for mutual benefit would have no conflict due to the lack of class differences. Prior to this, a ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ would observe the transition period from a capitalist economy to a socialist/communist economy and society.

Question 24

What stance did Luxemburg take on Marx’s idea of revolution? How does this link to human nature and the economy? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 24

Luxemburg believed that communist revolutions could occur in developing states rather than states at an advanced stage of capitalism. This could occur if the working class determined it to be so and did not subscribe to the idea of historical determinism. This also meant that societies would not have to endure years of capitalism to reach a communist society.

Question 25

How did Luxemburg justify the presence of the German Communist Party in mainstream politics, given that this supposedly went against Marxist ideals of a revolution? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 25

Luxemburg stated that the presence of a Communist Party in democratic elections in Germany would help spread the message and convince workers of the need for a revolution to overthrow the existing bourgeois state in Germany.

Question 26

What was the idea of ‘the inevitability of gradualism’? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 26

‘The inevitability of gradualism’ was an idea spread by Webb and other democratic socialists who believed that reform of a capitalist economy could be conducted bit by bit through the existing parliamentary system, rather than replacing it immediately through revolution.

Question 27

How did Webb believe that an extended franchise could advance socialism? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 27

Webb believed that with an extended franchise, greater numbers of working class people would be able to exercise the vote in favour of socialist parties that would act in their interests, meaning that society can be steadily transformed through parliamentary reforms to the existing capitalist system.

Question 28

What was Crosland’s attitude to public ownership? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 28

Crosland believed that public ownership was a method of achieving equality, socialism’s main aim, rather than THE aim of socialism. He argued that capitalism was now significantly less volatile than previously, and, if moderated with some public ownership of key industry and Keynesian economics, greater equality can be achieved.

Question 29

What did Crosland aim to achieve in terms of education? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 29

Crosland aimed to create a universal standard of education available to all, known as comprehensive education. This would help to advance equality of opportunity, as well as diminish class-based divisions.

Question 30

What was Giddens’ idea of triangulation? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 30

Giddens’ idea of triangulation is an attempt to reconcile centre-right political thinking (capitalism and low tax) with centre-left social thinking (providing quality services and seeking to advance rights/equal treatment). Essentially an attempt to meet in the middle.

Question 31

What was the significance of the rise and fall of Fordist Capitalism to Giddens’ Third Way? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 31

Fordist capitalism has developed tightly knit and fraternal industrial units in urban areas that reflected the natural attitudes of humanity. Its decline in the late 20th century fractured these units and developed an atomised society, something which Giddens looks to respond to by recognising the significance of the knowledge economy in the Third Way.

Question 32

Why did Giddens believe that public investments must be increased in the Third Way school of thought? - Key Socialist Thinkers

Answer 32

Giddens believed that as society became more atomised, individuals would lack confidence without the communities they had once thrived within. They would therefore follow economic and cultural elites, reducing their individualism. Giddens hence believed that by expanding infrastructure and public service spending, individuals would have greater determination over their own actions.