Socialism: key terms

Question 1

Fraternity

Answer 1

Socialism’s belief that human relationships should be marked by generosity, warmth comradeship. Our fellow humans are our siblings, not opponents.

Question 2

Co-operation

Answer 2

For socialists this, rather than competition, should be the norm.

Question 3

Class

Answer 3

Social class defines an individual’s circumstances, prospects and attitudes. Classes denote a type of employment, status and wealth.

Question 4

Social justice

Answer 4

Healthcare and education accessible to all, minimum wage etc.

Question 5

Common ownership

Answer 5

State and public ownership; an alternative to private property and capitalism.

Question 6

Clause IV

Answer 6

Labour’s 1918 Constitution included a section, Clause IV, which committed the party to common ownership of “the means of production, distribution and exchange”. It was changed by Tony Blair in 1995 to reduce its overt commitment to socialism.

Question 7

Fundamentalist socialism

Answer 7

Socialism is at odds with private ownership and capitalism, which therefore have to be destroyed, though there is disagreement as to whether that requires a revolution.

Question 8

Revisionist socialism (also evolutionary socialism)

Answer 8

Socialism can exist alongside private property and capitalism.

Question 9

Marxism

Answer 9

Reference to the writings of Marx and Engels, which sees communism as the perfect society, based on communal ownership and living and “each according to his needs”.

Question 10

Dialectic

Answer 10

The clash of ideas which take place within each stage of history.

Question 11

Historical materialism

Answer 11

Marx and Engels’ view that each stage of history is defined by a clash of economic ideas.

Question 12

Class consciousness

Answer 12

A by-product of capitalism, especially pronounced among the working classes, which will be the engine of the revolution

Question 13

The proletariat

Answer 13

Marx and Engels’ terms for the working classes

Question 14

False consciousness

Answer 14

The socialist term for the situation in which workers develop sympathy for capitalist values.

Question 15

Democratic centralism

Answer 15

Lenin’s idea that there would only be one party, and all political discussion would take place within it; decisions would represent the will of the people.

Question 16

Democratic socialism

Answer 16

Emerged during the late 19th C. Preferred change via democracy, which would happen thanks to the extension of the franchise.

Question 17

The inevitability of gradualism

Answer 17

Democratic socialists would steadily, via the parliamentary system, transform society into one based on public ownership and control.

Question 18

Social democracy

Answer 18

The end of capitalism’s cyclical nature, thanks to Keynesian economics, meant socialists could concentrate on other means of securing equality, such as education in particular.

Question 19

Keynesian economics

Answer 19

Where the state manages market forces to ensure steady growth and full employment, financing more spending and thus greater equality.

Question 20

The Third Way

Answer 20

To triangulation of social democrats’ wish for democracy with a neo-liberal, capitalist economy, and to reconcile socialist parties with an increasingly propertied, suburban, individualistic economy, socialists must accept the free market and inequality of outcome, which boost government revenues and therefore spending and equality.