Socialism is, according to Engels, the "direct product of the recognition of class antagonisms between capitalists and wage workers".[1] When we talk about it, we talk about proletarian socialism, which is the antithesis to capitalism; it is the stage of production in which labor is owned, controlled, and solely profited from by the proletariat, and is the bridge to communism.
Variations
Socialist tendencies are divided primarily on the basis of philosophy; utopian socialism vs scientific socialism. The former is used to refer to Marxism.
Proletarian socialism is a term used to describe socialist states that are a dictatorship of the proletariat, and is almost always an instance of applied scientific socialism. Exceptions to this include countries like Gaddafi's Libya, where the religious values of Islam have been applied to socialism.
Bourgeois socialism is a term used to describe bourgeois states bearing resemblance to socialism, with things like central planning of the national economy.
Notable socialist states
- Soviet Union (1917-1991)
- Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), known colloquially as North Korea (1948- )
- People's Republic of China (1949- )
- Republic of Cuba (1959- )
- Lao Democratic People's Republic (1991- )
- Polish People's Republic (1952-1989)
- Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1945-1992)
- German Democratic Republic (1949-1989)
- Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya (1976-2011)
- Syrian Arab Republic (2000- )
Further Reading:
- Islamic Socialism
- Socialism: Utopian and Scientific by Friedrich Engels