Jack Cohen – Heaven on Earth: The End of Socialism?
The book “Heaven on Earth,” by Joseph Muravchik, is an excellent history of socialism and communism and ends with a chapter titled “The Afterlife,” in which he lists some of the more recent and surprising resurgences of socialism.
He makes the point that while China opted for capitalism because its own socialist economic system failed, totalitarian control is retained by the Communist Party. Liberalization is allowed only on relatively trivial things, like what people wear, truly superficial. Western youth wouldn’t like it, because there is no free internet and social media are controlled. Russia too, after a brief flirtation with democracy after the fall of Communism in 1989, has reverted to an authoritarian political system of control under President Putin, a former KGB officer. It seems there is no escaping it.
Venezuela fell for the allure of socialism under Hugo Chavez and is now a totally ruined country under his successor Nicolas Maduro. In 20 years it went from a moderately wealthy middle-class country (35% poor) to a totally poor (80%) country, with no food, medicine, and a failed oil industry. Some 10% of the country’s population has emigrated to neighboring countries Venezuela is the perfect poster child for socialism.
The most surprising outcome has been the resurgence of socialist candidates in Western countries, Jeremy Corbyn in the UK and Bernie Sanders in the USA. It cannot be a coincidence! Both achieved the seemingly impossible, a resurgence of far-left socialism in countries that had previously rejected it. After Tony Blair’s New Labour “the party of business,” how could Corbyn ride a tide of leftist comeback in the UK, and after the downfall of socialism throughout the world, how could Sanders bring it back in the bastion of capitalist America? Suffice it to say that notwithstanding unexpected popular support, both have been defeated. Corbyn’s friendship with terrorist movements (Hamas and Hizbollah) and his antisemitism, and Sanders give-it-all-away economics (free tuition, free lunches, free child-care, free taxes) brought them down in the end.
But, their momentary success indicates a mutation in the definition of socialism. From Marx, we learned that the basis of everything was economics (after all his iconic book is Das Kapital). But, to the young people in 21st-century Western civilization, socialism means not only being anti-establishment but supporting equality, minority rights (blacks, women, Muslims, gays, trans, etc…) is all. This is not really socialism, but that’s how Sanders and Corbyn sold it to get support. The trouble is they almost succeeded, does it mark the beginning of a new wave of that old disease, socialism, returning like the plague? For those people, mostly young and naive, who voted for Corbyn and Sanders, it is important to note that socialism does not correct injustice!
