Europe doesn’t have socialism, they have capitalism. Their economies are driven entirely by the direction of private capital, the latge firms and key industries are firmly in private hands. Ideas have nothing to do with it, economic power has everything to do with it.
Concentration of power does not necessarily lead to corruption, either. Centralization is an economic necessity as economies develop, so its better for these aspects to be publicly owned and planned so as to be more equitable.
The “modern socialist movement,” globally, is thoroughly dominated by communists. You have a very western, Social Democratic viewpoint. Ie, you see European welfare capitalism as the “modern socialist movement” when that’s a minority, and not even socialist.
Further, the European social democracies depend on heavy exploitation of the global south, a form of expropriation called Imperialism. Without imperialism, these economies collapse, which is why over time as countries in the global south nationalize their industry and throw off foreign ownership, safety nets and welfare systems are cut back in Europe and the US.
We are going to have to agree to disagree on the modern common definitions of things then. If socialism means only be definition a transitionary stage to communism then there is no meaning in people saying they are a socialist vs a communist, but clearly many people identify as socialist but not communist.
All communists are at first socialists, after all. Marx only used the word “communist” in order to take on a more radical term, it was Lenin that used socialism as a descriptor for what Marx called the “lower stage of communism” just to help make things easier to understand. There really aren’t any significant numbers of people that want to “freeze development” at socialism, among the two largest umbrellas for socialists are Marxists and Anarchists, and neither sees socialism as the final stage.
Europe doesn’t have socialism, they have capitalism. Their economies are driven entirely by the direction of private capital, the latge firms and key industries are firmly in private hands. Ideas have nothing to do with it, economic power has everything to do with it.
Concentration of power does not necessarily lead to corruption, either. Centralization is an economic necessity as economies develop, so its better for these aspects to be publicly owned and planned so as to be more equitable.
The “modern socialist movement,” globally, is thoroughly dominated by communists. You have a very western, Social Democratic viewpoint. Ie, you see European welfare capitalism as the “modern socialist movement” when that’s a minority, and not even socialist.
Further, the European social democracies depend on heavy exploitation of the global south, a form of expropriation called Imperialism. Without imperialism, these economies collapse, which is why over time as countries in the global south nationalize their industry and throw off foreign ownership, safety nets and welfare systems are cut back in Europe and the US.
We are going to have to agree to disagree on the modern common definitions of things then. If socialism means only be definition a transitionary stage to communism then there is no meaning in people saying they are a socialist vs a communist, but clearly many people identify as socialist but not communist.
All communists are at first socialists, after all. Marx only used the word “communist” in order to take on a more radical term, it was Lenin that used socialism as a descriptor for what Marx called the “lower stage of communism” just to help make things easier to understand. There really aren’t any significant numbers of people that want to “freeze development” at socialism, among the two largest umbrellas for socialists are Marxists and Anarchists, and neither sees socialism as the final stage.
That sounds like you being mindlessly stubborn.
Those people are usually welfare capitalists.