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BWS A-Level Politics > Socialism > Flashcards

Socialism Flashcards

1
Q

What is socialism?

A

In its original conception, socialism was a political ideology that advocated the common ownership of the means of production in opposition to capitalism.

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2
Q

What is capitalism?

A

An economic system based on private property, private enterprise and competition where goods are produced for profit and wealth is privately owned.

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3
Q

What are the 5 core ideas and principles of socialism (in the spec)?

A

1) common humanity
2) collectivism
3) equality
4) social class
5) workers’ control

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4
Q

What ideas do socialists share about human nature/common humanity?

A
  • Positive: individuals are rational, naturally co-operative, generous, and altruistic (they seek solidarity fraternity and comradeship)
  • Optimistic: human nature is not fixed, and individuals are shaped by society, the state and the economic system
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5
Q

What ideas do socialists share about collectivism?

A

A positive view of humans as naturally social creatures that prioritises the group over the individual.

  • prefer to work together rather than independently
  • will work more effectively in groups than independently
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6
Q

What ideas do socialists share about three aspects equality?

A

1) Foundational equality – innate human rights, political and legal equality
2) Rejection of natural hierarchies – individuals have the potential to take up any position within society
3) Equality of opportunity – access to the same life chances

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7
Q

What ideas do socialists share about social class?

A

That capitalism creates and reinforces harmful social class divisions

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8
Q

What ideas do socialists share about workers control?

A

All socialists agree that pure unchecked capitalism will exploit workers but there are significant differences in the concept of workers control.

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9
Q

What is social justice?

A

A distribution of wealth that is morally justifiable and implies a desire to limit inequality.

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10
Q

What is fraternity?

A

The bonds of generosity and comradeship between human beings.

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11
Q

What is co-operation?

A

The belief that humans prefer to work together to achieve mutual benefits rather than apart in competition.

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12
Q

What is common ownership?

A

An alternative to private property and capitalism where assets and the means of production are owned by all, for the benefit of all.

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13
Q

What is communism?

A

A classless system in which there is common ownership of the means of production. In Marxism, the ultimate stage of social development after the socialist state has withered away and the ‘end of history’

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14
Q

What ideas do socialists share about the state?

A

All socialists argue that a strong state is essential to bring about a fairer and more equal society. Socialism rejects the monarchical, theocratic and aristocratic state.

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15
Q

What ideas do socialists share about society?

A

Individuals are the product of the society into which they are born so human potential can be fulfilled by improving society.
The economic system creates social classes that tend to be profoundly unequal.

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16
Q

What ideas do socialists share about the economy?

A

Capitalism and self-interest have a corrosive effect upon community and fraternity.
Capitalism generates huge inequalities of outcome.
Socialism can challenge the worst aspects of capitalism.

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17
Q

What are the 4 different strands of socialism?

A

1) Revolutionary Socialism − socialism can be brought about only by the overthrow of the existing political and societal structures
2) Democratic Socialism – capitalism can be gradually reformed via parliamentary democracy to achieve a socialist state.
3) Social Democracy − an ideological view that wishes to humanise capitalism in the interests of social justice
4) Third Way − a middle-ground alternative route to socialism and free-market capitalism.

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18
Q

What is fundamental socialism? Who are the examples from the key thinkers?

A

Fundamental socialism argues that capitalism must be eradicated to create a socialist state. (Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, Rosa Luxemburg and Beatrice Webb)

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19
Q

What is revisionist socialism? Who are the examples from the key thinkers?

A

Revisionist socialism argues that socialism is compatible with capitalism and a socialist state can be achieved alongside private property. (Anthony Crosland and Anthony Giddens)

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20
Q

What is revolutionary socialism? Who are the examples from the key thinkers?

A

Revolutionary socialism argues that a social revolution is necessary to destroy the capitalist economic system and bring about a socialist society. (Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Rosa Luxemburg)

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21
Q

What is evolutionary socialism? Who are the examples from the key thinker?

A

Evolutionary socialism argues that long-term, radical change should happen gradually and peacefully, to eliminate capitalism within the confines of the existing state. (Beatrice Webb, Anthony Crosland and Anthony Giddens)

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22
Q

What is democratic socialism?

A

A form of fundamental evolutionary socialism that aimed to eliminate capitalism gradually and peacefully through the existing parliamentary system. (Associated with Bernstein, Webb, The Fabian Society and the development of the Labour Party.)

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23
Q

What is social democracy? Who are the examples from the key thinker?

A

”- Mixed economy: a blend of free-market capitalism (private industry) and state collectivism (nationalised companies)
- State management: full employment and continual growth through Keynesian economics
The Welfare State: a redistributive economy that promotes social justice and equality of opportunity
(Anthony Crosland)”

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24
Q

What is the Third Way? Who is the example from the key thinkers?

A

The Third Way argues for a triangulation of the traditions of social democratic ideas of equality and neo-liberal free-market capitalism. By encouraging privatisation and deregulation it aims to boost economic grown, tax revenue and government spending in the name of more equality.

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25
Q

Where do the socialist strands disagree about human nature/common humanity? (HINT: impact of capitalism on human nature)

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels/Luxemburg) argue that capitalism corrupts human nature and installs a ‘false consciousness’. A common humanity can only be achieved by revolution to achieve a classless communist society. Luxemburg argues that fraternity and altruism still flourish in working-class communities.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) considered the working class to be intellectually inferior so extensive state nationalisation should be run by a socialist bureaucratic elite ‘the professional expert’.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue that capitalism should be reformed not replaced. A mixed economy combined with Keynesian economics can ensure full employment, steady growth and universal welfare to resolve inequalities and achieve collective human progress.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argue that neo-liberal capitalism can be ‘triangulated’ with socialist ideals to empower individuals to ‘self-actualise’ alongside community identity with an innate sense of fairness. Universal welfare fostered dependency.
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26
Q

Where do socialists disagree about collectivism?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels/Luxemburg) argue that workers would collectively own all industry and all agencies of society would be communal.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue for a fully collectivised economy through nationalisation and top-down state management.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue for a mixed economy with only key utilities and the NHS collectivised along with comprehensive education.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argue that the free market is the most efficient way to run businesses and introduced tuition fees and prescriptions/private healthcare.
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27
Q

Where do socialists disagree about equality?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels/Luxemburg) argue that equality of outcome is impossible in a capitalist system and equality of opportunity can only be achieved after a revolution. Welfare will not remove capitalism.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue that equality of opportunity can only be achieved in a full socialist society. Income distribution would narrow with high taxation but there would always be a wage gap. Nationalisation would ensure welfare through the redistribution of resources.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue progressive taxation and an expansive welfare state can break down class barriers. But absolute equality and equality of outcome would only weaken the meritocratic mixed economy.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argue that means-tested welfare needs to target the needy. Dismissed equality of outcome and absolute equality as impractical and unnatural.
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28
Q

Where do socialists disagree about social class?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels/Luxemburg) argue that class divisions can only be resolved by the removal of capitalism in an inevitable revolution.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue that class divisions could be narrowed gradually through the action of the state.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argued that class distinctions had become less binary between employers and employees and ‘infinitely more complex than Marx could ever have imagined’. Comprehensive education and redistribution would diffuse class divisions.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argued that the modern economy and the emergence of post-Fordist societies had broken down traditional notions of class whilst ‘embourgeoisement’ had spread middleclass materialistic values.
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29
Q

Where do socialists disagree about workers’ control?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists Marx & Engels argue that after the revolution a ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ would see workers temporarily manage their own workplaces before the state withered away and a classless communist society emerged. Luxemburg argues for genuine democracy.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) dismissed worker’ control as they were intellectually incapable.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argued that workers’ control was outdated and unnecessary as capitalism had been tamed by Keynesian economics and state management.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) saw workers’ control as impractical, the average worker lacked the skills to manage their workplace and nationalised companies could not compete with the free market.
30
Q

Where do socialists disagree about the state?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists Marx & Engels argue that the existing liberal-bourgeois state is a tool of the dominant capitalist class; it will inevitably be destroyed by revolution and replaced by the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ before withering away to a communist society. Luxemburg argues for genuine democracy. Both are internationalist rather than nationalist.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue the state should be used to create a socialist society gradually through the ballot box (the inevitability of gradualism) and be managed by a bureaucratic elite.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue that nationalisation has gone too far and that a socialist state is compatible with capitalism through Keynesian economics and a managed mixed economy to bring radical socialist change.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) reject the ‘cybernetic model’ of state management and communal ownership in favour of neo-liberal capitalism that maximises wealth creation and fund greater public spending with lower taxation. Political power should be redistributed and decentralised.
31
Q

Where do socialists disagree about society?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels) argue that capitalism corrupts society and creates class conflict. In the theory of base and superstructure the economic mode and relationships of production dominate all other aspects of society. Revolution and a communist society will provide equality and harmony.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue that capitalism corrupts society and human potential through competition. Evolution and a socialist society under state management will produce equality of outcome.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue that society is increasingly complicated, with new social groups of ‘meritocratic’ managers and classless ‘technocrats’. State management and welfare will bring societal change and social justice.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argue that Society has undergone ‘embourgeoisiement’ and the state must harness, rather than deny the forces of neo-liberalism instead of class conflict.
32
Q

Where do socialists disagree about the economy?

A
  • Revolutionary Socialists (Marx & Engels) argue that economic conflict is the catalyst for historical development. Capitalism is corrupt, inefficient, and ultimately self-destructive. It should - and will be replaced by collective ownership. (Luxemburg) argues revolutions do not need to wait until fully developed capitalism’.
  • Democratic Socialists (Webb) argue that the capitalist economy would be gradually and inevitably brought into common ownership under the top-down management of the state.
  • Social Democrats (Crosland) argue that the worst exploitation of capitalism has been reformed by state managed economies and Keynesianism. A mixed economy will finance the greater public spending necessary to secure equality.
  • Third Way thinkers (Giddens) argue that a neoliberal economy, propelled by privatisation and deregulation, will provide huge taxi yields. This will finance huge increases in public spending, which will secure greater equality of opportunity.
33
Q

Who are the 5 key socialist thinkers?

A 
· Karl Marx (1818–83) and Friedrich Engels (1820–95)
· Rosa Luxemburg (1871–1919)
· Beatrice Webb (1858–1943)
· Anthony Crosland (1918–77)
· Anthony Giddens (1938– )
34
Q

What did Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels call the early socialists Robert Owen and Charles Fourier?

A

Utopian Socialists

35
Q

Who wrote The Communist Manifesto (1848)?

A

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A empirical and ‘scientific’ analysis of the class struggle arising from the capitalist mode of production and a call for international communist revolutions.

36
Q

Who are the bourgeoise?

A

The ruling capitalist class who own the means of production

37
Q

Who are the proletariat?

A

The working class

38
Q

What is Marxism?

A

An ideological system, within socialism, that drew on the writings of Marx and Engels and has at its core a philosophy of history that explains why it is inevitable that capitalism will be replaced by communism.

39
Q

What were the 10 stages of historical materialism and dialectic change according to Marx and Engels?

A
  1. Primitive societies with no economic organisation
  2. Slave bay societies - slaves of the main mode of production
  3. Feudal societies - land owned by the monarch is leased to the lords, tenants and eventually serfs
  4. Emergence of capitalism
  5. Emergence of proletariat and class consciousness
  6. Revolution and destruction of capitalism
  7. Socialism (dictatorship of the proletariat)
  8. Withering away of the socialist state
  9. Communism
  10. End of history
40
Q

What is a dialectic?

A

A process of development that occurs through the conflict between two opposing forces. In Marxism, class conflict creates internal contradictions within society, which drives historical change

41
Q

What is historical materialism?

A

A Marxist analysis of history which argues that changes in a society’s structure are caused by the material conditions of a society’s mode of production.

42
Q

What is class consciousness?

A

The self-understanding of social class that is a historical phenomenon, created out of collective struggle.

43
Q

What slogan popularised by Marx argues for absolute equality based upon an abundance of goods in a communist society?

A

‘From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs’

44
Q

Why did revolutionary socialists reject evolutionary socialism?

A

Marx and Engels considered evolutionary reform an inherent contradiction as the liberal-bourgeois state would always be a tool of the dominant capitalist class. Society (superstructure) would be dominated by the economic system (base) and any socialist government would be frustrated by capitalist supporting interests.

45
Q

What is the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’?

A

In Marxist theory the stage of socialism after revolution. The dictatorship of the proletariat would obliterated traces of liberal capitalist values and pave the way for a stateless communist society based on common ownership.

46
Q

What is the theory of base and superstructure?

A

A Marxist theory of society in which the economic base (the means and relationships of production) forms the superstructure (culture, politics, law, religion, media, ideology)

47
Q

Who wrote Reform or Revolution? (1900) and The Accumulation of Capital (1913)?

A

Rosa Luxemburg. Rejected the evolutionary ideas of her fellow SDP member Eduard Bernstein and accepted Marx’s arguments that socialism was only possible through revolution.

48
Q

Who wrote Reform or Revolution? (1900) and The Accumulation of Capital (1913?

A

Rosa Luxemburg. Rejected the evolutionary ideas of her fellow SDP member Eduard Bernstein and accepted Marx’s arguments that socialism was only possible through revolution.

49
Q

Where did Rosa Luxemburg and Lenin disagree with Marx?

A

That Revolution could only occur in societies where capitalism and the proletariat were fully developed. They argued that accelerated revolutionary socialism could pre-empt the full development of capitalism.

50
Q

Where did Rosa Luxemburg believe the socialist revolution should come from?

A

Revolutionary spontaneity – spontaneous worker uprisings and strike action from below without the need of a revolutionary vanguard.

51
Q

What were Rosa Luxemburg’s key disagreements with Marxist-Leninism?

A
  • Revolutionary spontaneity – rather than a revolutionary vanguard
  • Democracy, open debates and elections – rather than the dictatorship of the proletariat.
  • Socialism should be international
52
Q

Who wrote the Minority Report of the Poor Law Commission (1909) which influenced the Beveridge Report (1942)?

A

Beatrice Webb. It argued that poverty could be prevented through a greater public role of the state in guaranteeing a ‘national minimum of civilised life’.

53
Q

What clause in Labour’s 1918 constitution aimed to secure ‘common ownership of the means of production’?

A

IV

54
Q

Why did Webb reject revolutionary socialism?

A

She argued revolutions were ‘chaotic, inefficient and counterproductive, and for that very reason, guilty of the same problem besetting capitalism - unpredictability’.

55
Q

What is the ‘inevitability of gradualism’?

A

An inevitable process advocated by Webb and other Fabians where:

  1. Peaceful campaigns by democratic socialists would win the trust of working-class voters who had no vested interest in capitalism
  2. Voters would elect socialist governments
  3. Socialist governments would gradually introduce state ownership
  4. Voters would recognise the progress and re-elect socialist governments
  5. Continuous socialist governments would produce a socialist society
  6. The clear benefits would make any reversal of socialism unlikely
56
Q

What was Beatrice Webb’s view of the state’s role in establishing socialism?

A

The expansion of the state is vital to deliver nationalisation and top-down state management through a highly trained elite of administrators and specialists to organise society.

57
Q

Which post war government put many of the ideas of democratic socialism into action?

A

Attlee’s Labour government 1945-51 – introduction of a planned welfare state, NHS and nationalisation of key industries.

58
Q

Who wrote The Future of Socialism (1956), The Conservative Enemy (1962) and Socialism Now (1974)?

A

Anthony Crosland

59
Q

How did Crosland want to achieve the socialist objective of equality?

A
  • A mixed economy of private enterprise and key services and industries owned by the state.
  • A managed capitalist economy through Keynesianism could provide more public spending and better public services.
  • Comprehensive education and the removal of Grammar Schools.
60
Q

What is a mixed economy?

A

An economic system that combines private and state enterprise. (Crosland - Social Democracy)

61
Q

What is Keynesian economics?

A

Government intervention through state spending and management of tax and interest rates can stabilise the economy to deliver full employment, steady growth and price stability.

62
Q

What is a redistribution economy?

A

Where the economy focuses on the needs of society as a whole:
· Progressive taxation (83% for top earners by 1974)
· Progressive public spending
· Extensive public services
· Extensive state regulation of capitalism
State or common ownership when private enterprise is seen to fail

63
Q

Which labour politician described redistribution as ‘the politics of robin hood - taking from the rich and giving to the poor’?

A

Tony Benn

64
Q

Who wrote The third way: the renewal of social democracy (1998)?

A

Anthony Giddens

65
Q

Influenced by the Third Way, what did Tony Blair and Gordon Brown persuade the Labour party to remove from its constitution?

A

The original Clause IV declaration for common ownership of industry.

66
Q

What did New Labour’s Peter Mandelson say about the stinking rich?

A

‘we are intensely relaxed about people getting filthy stinking rich… Just as long as they pay their taxes.’

67
Q

How much did public spending increase from 1997 to 2010?

A

39% in 1997 to 47% in 2010. This was largely based on economic growth of 2.4% per year in the years Blair was in power.

68
Q

What is ‘social capital’?

A

Investment in education and infrastructure (schools, hospitals, public buildings.

69
Q

What are PFIs and PPPs?

A

PFIs = Private finance initiative
PPPs = public-private partnerships
Both were used by New Labour to fund social capital infrastructure through the free market rather than state management.

70
Q

How did the Third Way envisage the welfare state?

A

‘A hand-up, not a hand-out’ – Tony Blair
Giddens argued self-reliance and mutual dependence could coexist, that a ‘welfare society’ and ‘positive welfare’ could target those most in need through:
- a national minimum wage
- tax credits for workers
- 10% tax band for low workers
- university tuition fees
- welfare assistance conditional on seeking work

71
Q

How did the Third Way influence education under New Labour?

A
  • introduced academies free from the control of local authorities
  • competition of schools in league tables so parents could choose
  • increased university participation (49% by 2017)
  • university tuition fees

BWS A-Level Politics (3 decks)

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