Richard Wolff Explains 3 Kinds of Socialism

"I want to go over with you the three major ways this idea of socialism is understood, because those ways are relevant today, those ways are fighting it out amongst themselves in terms of the allegiance, feelings and thoughts of people around the world, and they're going to shape our future."

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Prof. Wolff's latest book "Understanding Marxism"

[lotsageorges]

We can't keep bringing this up enough to prevent the framing and demonization of the word socialism.

[seaside]

I like to call #1 caged capitalism, because it’s kinda like putting a bunch of bears in cages. Eventually all the bears will break out, and then they’ll start eating each other, and then you’ll have a really fat monopoly bear, and you can’t win against that.

[LjubomirLjubojevic]

Most do not understand that in SFR Yugoslavia there was best socialist mix. Govt or municipality would plan and fund creation of the enterprise/company, based on needs for workplaces and market demands, but once established it would turn OWNERSHIP to WORKERS from that company. Further more, all worker-owned companies COMPETED IN A MARKET! and were allowed to FAIL if incompetent. Price of products was free-forming (but with certain limitations). In working) meetings goals would be determined and CEO/director was mandated to implement those decissions. If this is augmented with govt/municipality owning shares based on loans given, it could be very effective.
Yugoslavia was chocked after Tito died and USSR disolved via MMF blocking further loans under Regans directive and MMF-forced changes to economic model, NOT before.

[WORLDCITIZEN]

Private market is impossible without compitation, greed and corruption.

[pusanghalaw]

socialism in various forms (just like capitalism) can thrive within evil empires. doesn't matter what ideology is put to practice if the state wages war around the planet.

[RFLCPTR]

Calling Germany a Social Democracy....oh boy...our government is very reluctant to seize apartments in our current housing crisis, the liberals argue that it would be against the law although our constitution gives the state/government this right.
But hey, at least Liberals are fine with seizing land for cole mines because capitalism is working great.
(The German Social Democratic Party has been dying for years...)

[LeakyBellows]

I'm sure Dr. Wolff didn't mean it, because he's a highly educated man who absolutely knows better, but he's misrepresenting what Communism is here. Saying that Communists want "The Government" to run industry is sending the wrong message. It's true to an extent, in that we do want a centralized authority of some kind to help organize logistics and manage the bureaucratic aspect of things, but it fails to make it clear that the "government" that we want in that position is one that is controlled by and is directly accountable to the people. You're not going to find very many Communists that believe in giving our current Capitalist government more control over the means of production.

[piku]

Libertarian socialism is imo the right direction to go to.

[searchforserenity]

I can see the third kind would appeal to many. But after witnessing the election and continuing support of Trump, I don't trust many of my fellow citizens to behave with any form of altruism or even rationality. Sad.

[mahgpie]

Great explanations in helping explain the nuances of socialism in the face of far-right politics that frame socialism as communism and demonize anything that challenges or critiques capitalism.

Have you considered doing videos with more visual info and not just talking head? Similar to Robert Reich’s videos?

Also, have you considered collaborating with Robert Reich to make educational pieces? I feel the two of you would be a great combination!

[leroitiaks]

Even though those who argued in favour of nationalisation called themselves communists in some places (USSR, China, etc), they called themselves socialist in Western Europe. I would reserve the term "communist" for people who seek "communism", that is a society without class and government as we know it (to quote K. Marx).

[princeofchetarria]

Mix of all three would be preferable in my opinion. Democratically owned private enterprise, alongside some state-owned companies to compete with, as well as having key industries (such as transport, healthcare, energy) nationalised/state-run. And also regulation of private enterprise in some way by the government as well (e.g. making sure wages don't rise above profits like what happened in Yugoslavia, or rules for media organisations so they can't tell bare-faced lies (such as Fox News)). And of course, democratic election of government (that goes without saying I think)

[mozearteffect]

Oh Wow!!! Gettin' Schooled here!! thank you Dr.!

[funkygrow]

Okay. As an orthodox Marxist / Libertarian Socialist, I have some empathy for the author in trying to make this video as accessible to the laymen as possible, but I fear in his summary he has left out some very key understandings of what Socialism is.

By the loosest definition, socialism is any philosophy that applies any critique of Capitalism. But if you could boil down the entire philosophy of socialism into one sentence it would be: An economic model in which there is a classless society, in which only the those who perform labor own the means of production.

So I don’t mind his explanations of #1. However, make no mistake, #1 is still a capitalist society. This is adhering to his loose based definition of socialism. Basically this philosophy recognizes that IF we are to live within capitalism, we should strive for a humane and conscious form of capitalism. But again, even the best version of this is still objectively capitalism - NOT socialism.

#2 is an explanation of Soviet Russia. Which should never have and never will be a definition of socialism. This is objectively defined as a State Capitalist society. Which like #1, privatizes the means of production to the state - NOT the working class. So again. This does not meet Marx’s definition of socialism. The word “communism” has now become a bastardized word do to the 20th century modes of State Capitalism which appropriated this word from Marx.

Now #3 is probably the closest he got to actually getting on track to the ideas of Marxism. But make no mistake - I reiterate that there is NO such thing as a socialist system in which there is private ownership of the means of production.

That is why many leftist forums we have adopted the capital S version of the word ‘Socialism’ when we are describing strict adherence to Marxism. And then any other version of socialism which is merely the critique of capitalism is showcased with a lower case s.

What 19th century Socialists required to meet their versions of Socialism are as follows.

1. The society must be classless
2. The society must be stateless / anti-authoritarian.
3. The Means Of Production must be owned and operated by those who contribute labor to the value of the good / service being made.
4. Value is created by transforming matter via labor and thus the compensation of the laborer must be equivalent to the value they put into the item.
5. All hierarchal structures in a society must be abolished as they are means of exploitation.
6. Society is a global construct in which all human beings are unequivocally connected to each other and the Earth, and must approach all issues under the scope of the common good.
7. All forms of government must adhere to the ideals of democracy.

These are the broad strokes of what Socialism is defined as. And they are pretty rigid.

Now implementations of socialism and theories of how such a society should / would look like are strictly in the realm of theory. Also, any such type of socialism that helps in the eventual evolution to Socialism will be regarded as socialism.

So while everything the author states is part of socialism. It is not necessarily a good definition of Socialism.

Once you get into advanced theory you see all different types of ideas on how to get to Socialism. Labor collectives, labor vouchers and all other interesting takes by socialists over the past 200 years have brought MANY ideas to the table. And I assure you all, there are way more than just 3 different kinds of socialism. But there is only 1 kind of Socialism.

[chuckpatenaude]

To paraphrase Bucky; i seem to be a Syndacylist.

[LeeTy-tuun]

Thank You for this educational video, explaining different type of Socialism and examples.

[DodoDodo-piev]

I'm curious as to how a democratic system within enterprises could be implemented. Wouldn't it require high transparency in terms of what the strategies and plans of the company are? And wouldn't it require every employee to be highly informed and knowledgeable about micro economics and the specific situation of one's company, in order to make educated and considered decisions?

[hb-nxem]

Thank you for that. It wasn't clear to me before, even after several videos on the same subject and even by you. lol

[wkmac]

I don't consider myself a socialist but this was very well done and in a short, concise manner. I have an admitted "limited" understanding of the idea of cooperative and worker owned enterprises but in what I do understand, that idea does interest me very much. Thank you Professor Wolff for doing this video. Albeit I'm a skeptic of the first 2 forms of socialism, not that present forms of capitalism are any better, I find myself very sympathetic to aspects of the 3rd form presented by Professor Wolff. From a non-socialist, keep up the good work and discussing this perspective as I may not always agree, I do believe we need a "Freed Market" so to speak or Freed Commons if that works better, where all ideas and concepts are out in the open and are freely and openly discussed, advocated, critiqued with no threat or coercion to silence. This is also what scares the powerful is that we even dare talk to one another in the first place.

[DavidSanchez-vxbv]

Keep in mind that an economic system, as the capitalism, is not displaced by others for moral questions... Feudalism didn't replace Slavery for consider having slaves as a bad thing but for its inefficiency and tendency to revolts... The same for Capitalism vs Feudalism... and the for Socialism to replace Capitalism will be based on the balance between good economic efficiency and good social development without the cyclical crisis Capitalism has... so, if the 3rd kind of Socialism brings that to the table, it could be a real successor for Capitalism...