Socialism
79
z z equality z z class politics z z common ownership.
Community At its heart, socialism offers a unifying vision of human beings as social creatures, capable of overcoming social and economic problems by drawing on the power of the community rather than simply individual effort. This is a collectivist vision because it stresses the capacity of human beings for collective action, their willingness and ability to pursue goals by working together, as opposed to striving for personal self-interest. Most socialists, for instance, would be prepared to echo the words of the English metaphysical poet, John Donne (1571–1631): No man is an Island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main… any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. Human beings are therefore ‘comrades’, ‘brothers’ or ‘sisters’, tied to one another by the bonds of a common humanity. This is expressed in the principle of fraternity . Socialists are far less willing than either liberals or conservatives to assume that human nature is unchanging and fixed at birth. Rather, they believe that human nature is malleable or ‘plastic’, shaped by the experiences and circumstances of social life. In the long-standing philosophical debate about whether ‘nurture’ or ‘nature’ determines human behaviour, socialists side resolutely with nurture. From birth – perhaps even while in the womb – each individual is subjected to experiences that mould and condition his or her personality. All human skills and attributes are learned from society, from the fact that we stand upright to the language we speak. Whereas liberals draw a clear distinction between the ‘individual’ and ‘society’, socialists believe that the individual is inseparable from society. Human beings are neither self-sufficient nor self-contained; to think of them as separate or atomized ‘individuals’ is absurd. Individuals can only be understood, and understand themselves, through the social groups to which they belong. The behaviour of human beings therefore tells us more about the society in which they live and have been brought up, than it does about any abiding or immutable human nature. The radical edge of socialism derives not from its concern with what people are like, but with what they have the capacity to become. This has led socialists to develop utopian visions of a better society, in which human beings can achieve genuine emancipation and fulfilment as members of a community. African and Asian socialists have often stressed that their traditional, pre-industrial societies already emphasize the importance of social life and the value of community. In these circumstances, socialism has sought to
preserve traditional social values in the face of the challenge from Western individualism (see p. 24). As Julius Nyerere, president of Tanzania 1964– 85, pointed out, ‘We, in Africa, have no more real need to be “converted” to socialism, than we have of being “taught” democracy.’ He therefore described his own views as ‘tribal socialism’.
Fraternity: Literally, brotherhood; bonds of sympathy and comradeship between and among human beings.
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