Socialism

A reader commented that Tan Kin Lian is a socialist. I am more inclined to be a social democrat, along the lines of our national pledge to "build a democratic society based on equality and justice".

I have also run a cooperative enterprise for 30 years based on the principles of cooperation. I wish to share this explanation of socialism, which I found in Wikipedia.

Socialism refers to various theories of economic organization advocating state, public or common worker (through cooperatives) ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and a society characterized by equal access to resources for all individuals with an egalitarian method of compensation.

Modern socialism originated in the late 18th-century intellectual and working class political movement that criticized the effects of industrialization and private ownership on society, however, socialism itself is not a political system; it is instead an economic system distinct from capitalism. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels used the terms "socialism" and "communism" interchangeably, and posited that it would be achieved via class struggle and a proletarian revolution.

Vladimir Lenin, perhaps influenced by Marx's ideas of "lower" and "upper" stages of socialism, later used the word "socialism" as a transitional stage between capitalism and communism.

Early socialist thinkers tended to favor an authentic meritocracy combined with rational social planning, while many modern socialists have a more egalitarian approach.

Socialists mainly share the belief that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth among a small segment of society that controls capital, creates an unequal society, does not provide equal opportunities for everyone to maximize their potentialities and does not utilize technology and resources to their maximum potential nor in the interests of the public. Therefore socialists advocate the creation of a society that allows for the widespread application of modern technology to rationalize the economy by eliminating the anarchy in production of capitalism, allowing for wealth and power to be distributed more evenly based on the amount of work expended in production, although there is considerable disagreement among socialists over how and to what extent this could be achieved.

Socialism is not a concrete philosophy of fixed doctrine and program; its branches advocate a degree of social interventionism and economic rationalization, usually in the form of economic planning, sometimes opposing each other. Another dividing feature of the socialist movement is the split between reformists and the revolutionaries on how a socialist economy should be established. Some socialists advocate complete nationalization of the means of production, distribution, and exchange; others advocate state control of capital within the framework of a market economy.

Social democrats propose selective nationalization of key national industries in mixed economies, while maintaining private ownership of capital and private business enterprise. Social democrats also promote tax-funded welfare programs and regulation of markets. Many social democrats, particularly in European welfare states, refer to themselves as "socialists", introducing a degree of ambiguity to the understanding of what the term means.

Tan Kin Lian