Socialism

An economic system in which the state or the people generally own most or all of the means of production. That is, under socialism, industries, agriculture and corporations are nationalized. The government may also manage the nationalized companies, or they may delegate this to a private company. Most socialist systems, however, allow some degree of private enterprise. Because it favors a strong role for the state, socialism should not be confused with Marxism, which holds that the state will eventually disappear.

socialism

a political doctrine that emphasizes the collective ownership of the means of production, ascribing a large role to the state in the running of the economy, with widespread public ownership (NATIONALIZATION) of key industries, although it allows limited scope to market forces. MARX regarded socialism as a transitional stage between the end of a PRIVATE-ENTERPRISE system and the beginnings of COMMUNISM. In practice, the revolutionary, communist form of socialism, which involves abolition of all private property, is limited to only a few countries, such as Cuba. Elsewhere, the main form of economic system is that of the MIXED ECONOMY, which combines elements of democratic socialism and the private-enterprise tradition. See CENTRALLY PLANNED ECONOMY.

Collins Dictionary of Economics, 4th ed. © C. Pass, B. Lowes, L. Davies 2005

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References in classic literature

And on its part, German Socialism recognised, more and more, its own calling as the bombastic representative of the petty- bourgeois Philistine.

This form of Socialism has, moreover, been worked out into complete systems.

The bourgeoisie naturally conceives the world in which it is supreme to be the best; and bourgeois Socialism develops this comfortable conception into various more or less complete systems.

A second and more practical, but less systematic, form of this Socialism sought to depreciate every revolutionary movement in the eyes of the working class, by showing that no mere political reform, but only a change in the material conditions of existence, in economic relations, could be of any advantage to them.

Bourgeois Socialism attains adequate expression, when, and only when, it becomes a mere figure of speech.

This is the last word and the only seriously meant word of bourgeois Socialism.

The significance of Critical-Utopian Socialism and Communism bears an inverse relation to historical development.

View in context

On the one hand, they were both comforting and compelling, elevating socialism above other normative theories by positioning it as the authentic voice of a large, ignored, pre-existing class and declaring its triumph an historical inevitability.

Platform socialism?

And here it is again from Theresa Thatcher (May), overflowing with socialism, yes socialism - from Tories!

New leader, same speech; Letters

Your talk of socialism has been the best part of your campaign, even if you have been less than skillful at drawing the line between your own democratic left and its antidemocratic cousins.

Dear Comrade Sanders: A Ghostly Lesson From the Socialist Past

This is all the more impressive because he is proclaiming the language of democratic socialism as part of his campaign.

What Bernie Sanders can teach the Canadian left

In his 2009 book Why Not Socialism? (Princeton University Press), the late philosopher G.A.

Not feeling much bern