The rise and fall of a secular religion:

Almost all the socialist and communist leaders were middle class and upper class intellectuals rather than workers or the poor. Communism was always the dictatorship over the workers, not of the workers.

 Despite immediate and persistent failures to fulfill its promises, "no amount of failure dampened socialism's appeal."

  The leaders, their organizations and primary associates are presented in the context of their overall lives and times. The book covers their political careers at some length. Almost all the socialist and communist leaders were middle class and upper class intellectuals rather than workers or the poor. Communism was always the dictatorship over the workers, not of the workers. While socialism in Europe gained considerable worker support, socialism in the United States had relatively little worker participation.
 &
  At its height in the 1970s, "roughly 60% of the earth's population found itself living under socialist rule of one kind or another." No other popular idea - secular or religious - ever spread so far so fast. Despite immediate and persistent failures to fulfill its promises, "no amount of failure dampened socialism's appeal." Then - in a couple of decades -it collapsed everywhere but in "a few flyspecks" on the map.

  The 1970s were a time when major capitalist nations were being driven into chronic inflation, stagflation and economic decline by Keynesian, command economy or "commanding heights" socialist policies. They thus did not appear to provide an attractive alternative even to socialism.
 &
  During the 1980s and 1990s, Keynesian and command economic policies were at least temporarily abandoned in many capitalist nations. Market capitalist systems were permitted to work their way out of their Keynesian and socialist problems and again begin to thrive -  easily leaving the socialist alternatives in the dust.
 &
  Also, the Asian Tigers began to thrive by adoption of crude capitalist models - providing attractive alternatives.

  This book review is more concerned with the development of the ideas of the socialist leaders and the impact of their ideas and careers on their world. It thus will skip most of the personal details. The story runs along two almost distinct lines - today referred to as totalitarian communism and democratic socialism.
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François-Noël Babeuf: 

  The totalitarian despotism line was adopted right from the beginning - during the French Revolution - by François-Noël Babeuf. As Friedrich A. Hayek was to explain almost a century and a half later, Babeuf's goals were so noble that they justified the most bloody-minded means. See, Hayek, "Road to Serfdom."
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Widespread slaughter, terror, and an apparatus of mind control - starting with early control over and thorough indoctrination of the children - would be needed to keep the people in utopia, to silence all dissent, and to prevent rejection.

Class warfare would be fomented as a means of destroying the existing power structure and then gaining power.

"Liberty" would have to be sacrificed to achieve "equality."

  People were to be brought into utopia and then held there whether they liked it or not. Widespread slaughter, terror, and an apparatus of mind control - starting with early control over and thorough indoctrination of the children - would be needed to keep the people in utopia, to silence all dissent, and to prevent rejection.
 &
  The past had to be destroyed - including all its art and literature. Class warfare would be fomented as a means of destroying the existing power structure and then gaining power. Like Pol Pot towards the end of the communist experiment, Babeuf believed his noble cause justified - and indeed required - total destruction.

  "A regenerator [a revolutionary like Robespierre] - - - must mow down all that impedes him - - - all that might hinder his safe arrival at the goal he has set before him - - -."

  After seizing power, a reign of terror must be initiated to slaughter all opponents and potential opponents. This must extend to all government functionaries and foreigners.
 &
  The people would be provided for by requiring bakers to provide bread for free distribution - indeed, all provisions had to be continuously provided or the providers would face execution.
 &
  A National Assembly would be elected, but the "Insurrectionary Committee" would remain permanently in charge. Thought was given to the possibility of its ultimate dissolution when the revolution was completed and all the people so thoroughly indoctrinated that they would always support it (which of course would never happen). "Liberty" would have to be sacrificed to achieve "equality." A strict censorship was required - enforced as needed by terror.
 &

The aim was to "remove from every individual the hope of ever becoming richer, or more powerful, or more distinguished by his intelligence." Only the ruling clique would have power - and its power would be absolute.

Large cities would be abandoned in favor of scattering the people among the villages.

• The people would be gathered into communes. Each worker would "work at the skill or job he understands." All the produce would be deposited with a government agency that would distribute it "with scrupulous fairness." ("Socialist Man" has to be perfect, or socialism is impossible - which it is.)

• The people would be "attached to their location of residency." Only there could they receive "the common ration" unless movement was authorized by the appropriate government agency. The government could command relocation as needed. Large cities would be abandoned in favor of scattering the people among the villages. (In Cambodia, under Pol Pot, this combination of anti-intellectualism and forced relocation out of cities would be implemented in all its grisly horror.)

• To control people's thoughts, the government "takes possession of every individual at birth, and never quits him till death." It gives them total security but controls their education and thoughts so that they "love equality" and their country and are mentally shaped into "a condition to serve and defend it." Love and family and their distractions are to be subordinated. The young are to be trained and disciplined as soldiers as soon as possible.

• The propaganda apparatus must work incessantly - through ceremonies, games, amusements, and the aligning of religious beliefs with the communal dogma so that the revolution will ultimately become the new religion

  In feudal societies - and socialist societies, too - this is largely true. It is only market capitalism that vigorously increases the size of the economic pie. Those on the left, from FDR in the 1930s to Lester Thurow in the 1980s, are constantly looking for signs that capitalist growth has come to an end - justifying an end to market capitalism. Of course, this is extraordinary stupidity.

The Conspiracy of Equals:

Robert Owen:

Man is malleable and can be molded by suitably crafted circumstances. There is no free will.

  Owen, a British industrialist and socialist visionary, first achieved fame and fortune during the early 19th century by the way he treated his workers at his factory in New Lanark, Scotland. He provided higher salaries, improved living conditions in the factory owned town, and stressed cleanliness and high moral standards. These policies were an outstanding success.
 &
  From the start, he, too, stressed the education of the young - starting at age one - as a key part of his program. This education was more moral than academic. Reading was taught only in the last year - at the age of 12. Singing, dancing and military drill were stressed as "the disciplines most conducive to good character." He hoped to transform the rabble into "superior beings."
 &
  Typically for socialist thinkers, Owen believed that man was shaped by his circumstances. Man is malleable and can be molded by suitably crafted circumstances. There is no free will. Muravchick explains Owen's belief:

  "[I]t is futile to call individuals to account for their behavior. Instead, society should recognize its power to shape each of its members into a person of high character."

  Also typical of certain socialist thinkers was a disparagement of religion. (After all, if you want to indoctrinate people in your own dogma - however secular - you must push aside competing dogmas - whether secular or sectarian.) The concept of sin implied free will - something Owen rejected.
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Education in a cooperative environment would produce "men and women of a new race, physically, intellectually and morally; beings far superior to any yet known to have lived upon the earth."

  In his plans for his cooperative communities - his "villages of unity and cooperation" - he provided separate dormitories for children of the age of three. Married couples could have a separate room. All would learn to live together in the closest harmony - "intimately acquainted with each other's inmost thoughts" - and would produce enough for all to be provided for abundantly.
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  Education in a cooperative environment would produce "men and women of a new race, physically, intellectually and morally; beings far superior to any yet known to have lived upon the earth."
 &
  Owen believed that abundant production could be assured by the intensive labor of those 15-to-20 years of age, supervised and assisted by those 20-to-25 years of age, with some assistance from those a bit younger. This would free the older adults to do what they wanted to do - work at what they wanted to work at - beyond a couple of hours a day to take care of storage and distribution of production.
 &
  Not only would this create a "new man," but it would lead to new attitudes towards animals, to the kindly domestication of all beasts - with those that couldn't be domesticated destroyed. While fantasies about including wildlife within the utopian world did not outlast Owens, the ability to mold man into a superior being became a centerpiece of socialist ideology.

  "Socialism promised a surfeit of material goods and brotherly harmony among people, but its ultimate reward would be the transformation of humans, if not into gods, then into supermen able to transcend the pains and limits of life as it had been known."

  Indeed, this is a requirement for socialist society. Uniformly and perfectly shaped characteristics were early recognized as essential for the implementation and maintenance of the socialist community. No ordinary human beings would ever put up with a socialist system.

New Harmony:

&

Lacking incentives for production, little work was done, and bickering broke out about who were the laggards.

Skilled workmen were lacking, but there were lots of bureaucrats.

  The first compromise was to exclude "persons of color." The country simply wasn't ready as yet for racial integration.
 &
  Unfortunately, few people of commercial skill - workmen or supervisors - could be enticed to join the egalitarian community. They had  no "potter, ager, saddler, or good tinner." The various workshops quickly lost productive momentum, and several ceased operations. Inexplicably, the community even failed to plant and cultivate sufficient crops on their fertile lands. Indeed, lacking incentives for production, little work was done, and bickering broke out about who were the laggards.
 &
  The distribution system used records of work provided and consumables distributed. Since everything had to be delivered to and dispensed from central depositaries, a substantial bureaucracy of "storekeepers, clerks, committeemen and rangers" blossomed. Unfortunately, there were few smiths, artisans and farmers.
 &

  Owen poured $30,000 into the project in a few months - a vast sum in those days. But even that wasn't enough to provide more than meager rations. Soon, pilfering became widespread. By the time Owen returned from England to take personal charge of the project, things were not going well.
 &
  He responded to these problems by implementing a system of character watchdogs who would record "the daily character of each person attached to their occupation." Such watchdog systems became a common feature of communist despotisms. Indeed, since Owen took dictatorial command of the community, the experiment began to look a good deal more like communism than socialism. Under his energetic and capable management, matters improved markedly.
 &
  The children were separated from their parents into a boarding school to implement some experiments in indoctrination. However, Owen's efforts to wean his followers away from religion and marriage met with little success.
 &
  In the event, there were problems with indolence and other undesirable characteristics, and differences of religion and marital morality. This led to splits and banishments. Several reorganizations were tried. Owen became entangled in litigation with one of the other contributors to the project.
 &
  Owen left to return to England in May, 1927. In his eyes, the experiment was an outstanding success. But, by the time he returned 10 months later, the project had completely unraveled. Owen blamed the character failings of the members - an excuse that became widely accepted by the true believers.

  "In short, Owen's argument was circular. Socialism, he said, would produce a new man. Until then, all people were necessarily products of the old system. If it required people reared under socialism to create socialism, then how could you get there from here?"

  One of his sons provided a more honest analysis of the problem. He emphasized the "most potent factor" in the failure of New Harmony.

  "All cooperative schemes which provide equal remuneration to the skilled and industrious and the ignorant and the idle, must work their own downfall, for by this unjust plan of remuneration they must of necessity eliminate the valuable members -- who find their services reaped by the indigent -- and retain only the improvident, unskilled, and vicious members.

  Between 250 and 300 cooperative communities were attempted in America in the 19th century, by Muravchik's estimate. The majority had a religious basis, and some of these lasted for considerable lengths of time. All the socialist communities failed rapidly. "Their median life span was two years."
 &
  The author contrasts socialist efforts with the practical approach of the Founding Fathers in the new nation. The latter constructed a system of checks and balances precisely because - as Madison noted - "men are not angels." They tailored institutions to human nature as they found it - and the system thrived.
  Socialism depended fatally on changing human nature - on uplifting men through economic instead of spiritual methods - and invariably failed. To the end, Owen blamed the failure of his efforts on the character flaws of the members. They were "too undeveloped at that period for the practice of a full true and social life."
 &
  Owen's true character is revealed starkly after the failure of New Harmony. Upon visiting Jamaica, he came away with a positive impression of slavery under masters he considered benevolent. He callously abandoned his young wife to pursue his public interests - she thereafter died at the age of 22. As one writer put it, "He became a humanitarian, and lost his humanity."
 &
  His example, however, did pay off as inspiration for consumer cooperatives - many of which succeeded notably - although he played no role in any of them. In 1834, he became president of the first nationwide labor organization - which disintegrated within a year.
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The labor theory of value:

  Inspired by David Ricardo's idea that labor was the source of all value, Owen established labor exchanges. They were intended to eliminate money and middlemen by a system of credits based on man-hours needed for production of the goods provided. This ideal, too, quickly unraveled.
 &

  The labor credits soon took the form of "labor notes" that functioned like money, but were not backed by precious metal or by law as "legal tender." Since labor hour claims for similar products varied widely, exchange officials had to "infer" worth in labor-hours from prices on the general market. They simply could not rationally administer prices without market guidance. (Nobody can!) Finally, even without a markup for profits, they ultimately needed a markup to cover overhead and inventory expenses. The final straw came when the person who had donated the use of the building began to charge rent -- forcing removal to a less convenient location.

  Marx, too, would be forced to approach as close as possible to market prices in money terms to provide some rational definition of his labor "use values" concept - and would still be unable to provide a rational - much less a practical - definition.

A religion based on pseudo science:

Socialists labeled their activities "scientific," invoking the new word of faith.

  With rigorous analytical methods, the members debunked religious beliefs. However, they never used those methods to evaluate their socialist faith. Nevertheless, they labeled their activities "scientific," invoking the new word of faith.

  "Through the halls of science with their hymns and Sunday meetings, the movement had been shaped into the simulacrum of a religion."

  After all, who can doubt "science?" Marx, too, would seize on this technique - using the pretense of "science" to reject all criticism and instill religious faith - as would several sectarian religions.

  In 1839, Owen's followers tried again to establish a cooperative community, in England, on an estate called Queenwood. Owen took a couple of turns as leader. He contributed significant sums and constructed a substantial building for the project. By 1844, it was all over but the shouting - and the very unbrotherly litigation between the surviving officers as they fought over what was left of the assets and liabilities.
 &
  Although about 77 years of age, Owen remained active,. He proselytized strenuously in France during the 1848 revolution. He deluged Paris with his literature. Towards the end, his credulous nature made him vulnerable to belief in séances. Nevertheless, religion remained mere "superstition" to him.
 &

  Having failed to prove socialism on a small scale, socialists decided that the ideals of socialism could only be achieved on a large scale - by the capture of the entire state - by the gaining of political power or the establishment of an outright despotism. (Since this was the epitome of irrationality, communism - and frequently socialism, too - were reduced  to an excuse for the gaining of political power or outright despotism.)
 &
  Owen's sons stayed in America - rejected socialism - thrived and lived lives of distinction. They retained a unique appreciation for the importance of private property and the opportunities offered by the American economic and political system.
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Friedrich Engels:

  Engels came from a deeply religious background - and his atheist beliefs were thus naturally held with religious fervor.
 &
  In 1841, Engels was attracted to a milieu of anti-establishment intellectuals called the "Young Hegelians." Karl Marx was also a member. Another member was Moses Hess, the first of the group to embrace the idea of communism - a recent innovation of some French and British radicals.
 &
  On meeting Hess, Engels was quickly converted. Believing that the revolution would come first in England, he soon traveled to that country - where his father had a textile factory.
 &
  Writing for some radical newspapers in both Germany and England, Engels used the success of religious communes in the U.S. - the Shakers and the Rappites - and the then ongoing Owen experiment at Harmony Hall, to argue the practicality of communism - "social existence and activity based on community of goods." Engels conveniently ignored the failures of Owen's experiment in the U.S. and subsequently in England. But his articles for a paper run by Marx "seized Marx's imagination and pointed him on the road to communism."
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The communist propaganda myth:

By creating a propaganda myth that it's all happening anyway, communists justify elimination of private property, morality, nations, and human ties. They justify the treatment of people as commodities and slaves.

They thus justify the destruction of economic and political freedom -  capitalism and democracy.

• Private property is theft. (Property rights remain under attack from the left.)

• All ostensible morality merely cloaks self interest. (A forerunner of deconstructionist philosophy.)

• Capital is making nations and national boundaries irrelevant. (The left, today, makes the same argument about economic globalization.)

• Capital is dissolving human ties - including the family. (The family remains under attack - but mainly from the left.)

• Man has become a dehumanized commodity. (Where capitalism relies on incentives and personal necessity, it is Socialism that attempts to manipulate people like commodities.)

• Man is a slave to capital. (It would be communism and despotic socialism that would enslave more people than any other system in history.)

• However, capital is just stored up value. (Not without markets or proper management and maintenance!)

• The expected dynamics of this system were such that the middle class would disappear as the few rich concentrated wealth and everyone else was pauperized - forced down to subsistence wages. (The myth of the disappearing middle class amazingly reappeared within the last decade of the 20th century. Unfortunately for this myth, both the middle class and the laboring classes perversely continue to expand and thrive under capitalism - and only under capitalism.)

• The ever-expanding productive capacity and productivity of capitalism would thus inevitably crash upon the rocks of inadequate demand - ultimately leading to socialist revolution. (A breathtaking demonstration of ignorance about the actual workings of capitalist markets - astoundingly revived in the 1950s with the widespread scare over automation - and in the "mature economy" beliefs of leftists from FDR in the  1930s to Lester Thurow and other declinists in the 1980s.)

It's all about power:

The real struggle, however, was against all on the left who did not accept Marxist ideas and leadership.

An extensive period of violence, civil conflict, and international conflict was inevitable and essential to the ultimate communist victory.

Communists would actively stir this pot to keep the violence going as they rose into authority.

  The Communist Manifesto, published in German in England coincidentally at the time of the 1848 revolutions, received very little attention at the time and actually played no part in the various uprisings.
 &
  During this time, Marx and Engels belonged to a Communist League, in which there actually were some artisans as well as the usual middle class radical intellectuals. Both found their relationships with real laboring class peoples very disagreeable. They were glad when the Communist League broke up - freeing them from having to take "half-measures" and make "mutual concessions" in dealing with the "jackasses" and "ignorant curs."
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  But the slogan of the League - "Workers of the World, Unite!" - remained alive. It marked the dual road of the two utopian camps. Socialism was based on atheist kindliness and love. Communism was based on bloody-minded, determined despotism - "the thrill of violence, now dressed up in the high theory of 'class struggle'" - with justice, retribution and hatred as its driving ideological force. The real struggle, however, was against all on the left who did not accept Marxist ideas and leadership.
 &
  Both Marx and Engels were really dilettante socialists - maintaining their attitudes of class superiority and their middle class life styles. Marx lived fairly well, primarily on the charity of friends - primarily Engels - and some small family bequests. Bourgeois was not so much an economic class to them as it was a frame of mind.
 &
  They were both rabidly anti-Semitic and racist. Like Babeuf, they believed that an extensive period of violence, civil conflict, and international conflict was inevitable and essential to the ultimate communist victory. Communists would actively stir this pot to keep the violence going as they rose into authority. Conflict must sweep away the old institutions - as well as the inferior Slavic races. Reactionary classes and dynasties would be swept away, and "reactionary races" - such as "Croats, Pandurs, Czechs and similar scum" - would be annihilated.
 &
  Eventually, Engels acknowledged the failure of the secular experiments in communal living, and began dismissively referring to them as "utopian socialism." Communism, on the other hand was based on "science."
 &
  Marx grew in prominence in radical circles - due in large part to Engels' efforts. But radical efforts to unite were plagued by schisms, as trade unionists on one side and anarchists on the other split off. After the Paris commune uprising in 1871, a Russian anarchist, Michael Bakunin, accurately predicted that the only practical result of any Marxist triumph would be a "despotic administration - - -."
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Das Capital:

&

  Without Engels, Marx would have accomplished nothing, Muravchik points out. Not only did Engels finance Marx's life, he also provided many - if not most - of his ideas - rewrote much of his generally incomprehensible work - and attempted to provide logic to his illogical rationalizations - especially with Das Capital - where the effort was clearly unsuccessful.

  "It is to Engels the popularizer that we can trace many of the catchphrases of Marxism: 'historical materialism,' 'withering away of the state,' 'dialectical materialism,' 'scientific socialism' and, above all, 'Marxism' itself."

  Das Capital was a mess. Engels published a volume of what could be published, and rewrote what could not - completing a second and third volume of Das Capital before his death in 1895 - admittedly still without reaching a viable theoretical conclusion.
 &
  Das Capital is a massive exercise in ignorance and irrationality, whose only redeeming feature is that its great length and painful rambling deters both adherents and critics from plumbing the full depths of its ignorance and irrationality. It thus remained a suitable bible for monstrous Communist movements.
 &
  "Large parts of [Das Capital] are difficult to read and in fact have rarely been read," Muravchik notes. This is true even amongst avowed Marxists. Muravchik wisely does not venture far into this morass. He mentions only Marx's ridiculous and totally unsuccessful effort to dispense with market exchange rates by substituting a concept of labor "use values" congealed in commodities.   See, Karl Marx, "Capital (Das Kapital)" vol. 1, Part I: "Value Determined by an Abstract Labor Standard. See, also, Karl Marx, "Capital (Das Kapital)" vol. 1, Part II:  "Contradictions Asserted in Capitalist Industrialization."

  Adam Smith, too, recognized that exchange value isn't real value - "value in use." However, he wisely recognized that that was irrelevant to the practical functioning of an economy, and thus only briefly mentioned it. Labor use value is indeterminable - the ultimate sin for a practical art like economics.
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  But Marx was desperate for a substitute for the capitalist market mechanism. He left vast piles of notes that wrestled vainly with this problem - trying to explain how it could be calculated according to an abstract standard based on simple, unskilled subsistence pay labor - amounting to nothing more than intellectual doodling.
 &
  One can just imagine your typical bureaucrat trying to adjust relative values for the myriad of economic items and services in accordance with this opaque and irrational concept. Efforts to administer prices have since invariably failed miserably whenever tried - in economic systems ranging from capitalist to communist.

  In 1878, Engels published a book that included three chapters, thereafter excerpted in a short pamphlet, from which most Marxists would learn their ideology. He spread the message that would shape much of the history of the 20th century.

  "Engels presented the basic ideas of 'scientific socialism': historical materialism, class struggle, surplus value, the contradictions of capitalism, the dynamic of the business cycle, the economic impoverishment and concomitant political rise of the proletariat, the inevitable revolution, the subsequent dying out of the state, and the ultimate fulfillment of mankind as it ascends from 'the kingdom of necessity to the kingdom of freedom.' There was even a brief exegesis on 'dialectic,' allegedly a more profound method of reasoning."

Eduard Bernstein:

  But Bernstein challenged the accuracy of Marxist prophecy soon after Engels' death - resulting in consternation in the ranks. Living in England as a result of an indictment against him in his native Germany, Bernstein was open to many influences. He became friends with Fabian Society socialists like George Bernard Shaw and Sidney and Beatrice Webb.
 &
  And then there was England itself at the turn of the century. The "science" of "economic self interest" simply didn't square with the facts on the ground.

  "The longer he lived in England, the harder Bernstein found it to align his observations of its open political process and cooperative relations between classes with the Marxist map. Similar questions were beginning to present themselves even in illiberal Germany."

  There was social insurance and an obvious concern with the well-being of subjects, and even support by the Kaiser for workers in some labor disputes.
 &

Ultimate communist objectives were meaningless - but the means of achieving immediate socialist objectives were "everything." Better social conditions, better pay and working conditions could - and were - being obtained now, without revolution.

  Bernstein abandoned the attempt to "reconcile the irreconcilable" - to reconcile Marxist doctrine with reality - and began to take a more critical view of Marxist doctrine. Reality appeared in tones of gray instead of Marxist black and white.
 &
  The rise of labor unions began to balance the power of capitalists. The idea that socialism would somehow resolve all problems was to "assume - - - miracles." Ultimate communist objectives were meaningless - but the means of achieving immediate socialist objectives were "everything." Better social conditions, better pay and working conditions could - and were - being obtained now, without revolution.
 &
  Although his new vision was far more practical, it thus robbed socialism of the "religious mystique in which Marxism had clothed it." The promise of a "new age" heaven on Earth was the heart of that mystique. For this heresy, Bernstein was immediately attacked - particularly by Israel Lazerevich Helphand - called "Parvus" - and Rosa Luxemburg - two Eastern European well educated upper class Jews. Parvus, through Trotsky, developed the "theory of permanent revolution" that would have its ultimate expression in the vast slaughter and miseries of Mao's "Cultural Revolution."

  That people of Jewish decent played so prominent a role in socialist and communist theories and movement - in numbers way beyond any relation to the proportion of Jews in the population - is an obvious and frequently noted fact. It is also quite strange, since Jews have suffered so massively throughout history at the hands of governments. Nothing so concentrates power in the hands of government as does socialist and other left wing policies.
 &
  With an irrational faith - determinedly disregarding all evidence to the contrary - a disproportionate minority of Jews persists in viewing government as the means of solving all social and economic problems. They are willing to invest all power and all wealth in government, leaving all people - including the Jews - totally dependent on the tender mercies of those in power.

If capitalism could evolve to improve the lot of workers - as was clearly occurring - its catastrophic collapse ceased to be a "scientific" certainty - and socialism ceased to be a "scientific" necessity - and Marxism "becomes anything you please" - even utopian - like Owen's socialism.

  Parvus attacked Bernstein for rejecting "all scientific foundations of current party tactics" - namely "its intention to seize political power -- the 'dictatorship of the proletariat' -- to expropriate the capitalists and [create] a socialist society." Luxemburg, in "Reform or Revolution," leapt to the defense of class warfare. Muravchik notes:

  "This was brassy, not to say ridiculous, coming from a twenty-seven-year-old child of privilege who had never supported herself, perhaps never held a job. But while her worldly experience was limited, she had a mind for abstraction."

  She realized that, if capitalism could evolve to improve the lot of workers - as was clearly occurring - its catastrophic collapse ceased to be a "scientific" certainty - and socialism ceased to be a "scientific" necessity - and Marxism "becomes anything you please" - even utopian - like Owen's socialism.
 &
  Thus, when communists participated in democracy and trade unions, it was not for the purpose of improving living conditions for the masses they professed to care about. Their purpose was to so stir the pot as to precipitate the ultimate breakdown of these institutions and systems. The resulting slaughter, misery and destruction could be justified only by the belief that breakdown was ultimately inevitable in any case.

  We would see many versions of this ploy, notably when socialists like John Kenneth Galbraith repeatedly condescended to give advice for dealing with ongoing capitalist problems which, if followed, would have indeed been disastrous.

Revisionism:

The "historical determinism" of Hegel was dead. Marx was not scientific - he was "a slave to doctrine."

  Instead of the middle class disappearing and poor workers getting poorer (left wing mirages even a century later) and the rich richer but fewer, nearly the opposite had occurred in the half century since Marx had made these predictions. "[The] rich were more numerous, as were the middle class, and the poor were better off." Instead of concentrating capital (also a persistent left wing alarum), small businesses were flourishing. In both Germany and England, real per capita income had in fact doubled since 1848 - something that would be confirmed by subsequent economic scholarship.
 &
  Thus, Moravchik points out, socialism would have to rest on an empiricism and on an extrinsic moral standard. The "historical determinism" of Hegel was dead. Marx was not scientific - he was "a slave to doctrine."
 &
  Bernstein returned to Germany in 1901, after his indictment was lifted. He proved immensely and immediately popular, gaining election to the Reichstag from 1902 until his retirement in 1928.
 &

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin:

Leninism:

If proletarians were becoming too well off to engage in "proletarian revolution," the revolution would be conducted for them and forced upon them. As political and labor agitation actually achieved observable benefits for workers, many Russian socialists were increasingly attracted to Bernstein - to Lenin's consternation.

  It would be done by dedicated revolutionaries - the "New Men" - as set forth in the early 19th century novel "What Is To Be Done?" by Nikolai Chernyshevsky. These New Men would be "courageous, unwavering, unyielding" and utterly devoted to the "common cause." They would rescue society - justifying the exercise of total control. Lenin - hardened by the execution of his elder brother after a botched conspiracy to kill the Czar - was captivated by this book.
 &
  Lenin passed his law exams at the top of his class despite a lack of coursework. But he practiced almost no law. Like so many other left wing ideologues, he despised the peasants and workers he was determined to save.
 &
  Political and labor agitation became his sole focus. However, as political and labor agitation actually achieved observable benefits for workers, many Russian socialists were increasingly attracted to Bernstein - to Lenin's consternation. Revisionism and "economism" were a direct threat to the "revolutionary dialectic" - the heart and sole of Marxism."
 &

  Marx and Engels were enthusiastic about all revolutions, even those like the Paris Commune that didn't involve more than a few of the proletariat. The materialist interpretation of history, the centrality of class struggle, the destiny of the proletariat, were all just minor aspects of Marx after all. The core was bloody revolution.

  "For neither Lenin nor Marx was the revolution the answer to the question: what can be done for the proletariat? Rather the proletariat was the answer to the question: what can be done for the revolution?"

  Others attacked Bernstein as a heretic - for disproving the sacred beliefs of their secular Marxist religion. Bernstein couldn't be right, because that meant Marx was wrong - an impermissible thought. Another line of attack was one still used today by left wing ideologues and historians - they attacked Bernstein personally, disparaging his intellect and lack of academic credentials.
 &
  However, this was all futile, because the target audience of their propaganda - the labor leaders and socialist party leaders closest to the workers - all loved the Bernstein message. It offered them immediate benefits and a road map to achievable results without having to suffer a vastly destructive revolution. Utopia could wait.
 &

Lenin was not concerned about possible errors in Bernstein's message. Lenin was more concerned that Bernstein was right.

  Thus, Lenin was not concerned about possible errors in Bernstein's message. Lenin was more concerned that Bernstein was right.
 &
  As Kautsky noted, worker inclinations were to strive for "the tangible, the obvious, the practical." It was up to middle class socialists to educate them otherwise - and to do "everything we can" to root out the Bernstein line of thought, "because it is the grave of revolutionary thinking."
 &
  Development of a full-time secret revolutionary party - to be the "political leaders," the "prominent representatives" of the proletariat - was Lenin's answer to this problem.

  Leninist parties would achieve widespread success in seizing power and imposing some of history's most noxious despotisms - of both the left and right - in nations large and small - throughout the 20th century - and they remain a threat today.

  The immediate vehicle was to be a revolutionary newspaper - published in secret from abroad - and distributed  clandestinely. The very act of clandestine distribution would create a party cadre active in the effort. This is how the German Socialist party had grown and thrived during the time of Bismark's anti-socialist laws - through distribution of Der Sozialdemokrat published in England by Bernstein. Lenin left Russia to begin his project.
 &
  The newspaper's name was "Iskra," meaning "spark." It was started in Munich in 1900, and thereafter moved first to London and then to Geneva.
 &

What was needed was "a military organization of agents" who were professional revolutionaries.

  In his book entitled "What Is To Be Done," published in 1902, Lenin explained with brutal clarity the need for a secret, despotic, ruthless revolutionary party. He sneered at democratic aspirations - at "infantile playing at 'democratic' forms." What was needed was "a military organization of agents" who were professional revolutionaries. They would be the vanguard of the Russian proletariat which would then be "the vanguard of the international revolutionary proletariat."
 &
  This vanguard, itself, however, would be despotically governed. They would "have not the time to think about toy forms of democratism [but instead they will] have a lively sense of their responsibility, knowing as they do from experience that an organization of real revolutionaries will stop at nothing to rid itself of an unworthy member."
 &

Lenin's revolution for the workers but not by them resulted in greater repression and exploitation than they had ever suffered under capitalism. Bernstein's insistence that the final goal meant nothing led ultimately to a rejection of socialism altogether.

  The presumed scientific basis for Marxism had been destroyed by Bernstein. Capitalism was working - even thriving - constantly providing increasing opportunities for wealth and for those born into poverty to enter the middle class. It was already observably improving workingmen's lives.
 &
  Meanwhile, democracy - where it existed - was increasingly opening channels for workers to peacefully pursue their collective interests. Since revolution was thus increasingly unlikely to occur by itself, Lenin would have to create it. Indeed, Muravchik points out, even the data cited by Marx as indicating worsening conditions as of the middle of the 19th century has since been shown by scholarly studies to be weak.
 &
  Thus, as the 20th century began, socialists had to choose between pursuing further gains peacefully through democratic means or abandoning reliance on the proletariat and forming revolutionary parties to take power and rule over the proletariat - and everyone else. Most socialists remained in denial about this reality (something socialists are very good at) - but not Bernstein and Lenin.

  "The divergent paths they chose each led to the dire consequences that the other predicted. Lenin's revolution for the workers but not by them resulted in greater repression and exploitation than they had ever suffered under capitalism. Bernstein's insistence that the final goal meant nothing led to a rejection of socialism altogether, not on his part but by those who were his spiritual heirs -- American labor leaders like Samuel Gompers and George Meany and a generation of social-democratic politicians who came to the fore in Europe late in the twentieth century."

  The author overstates Bernstein's influence. As Muravchik himself relates, American labor was ardently rejecting socialism long before Bernstein's heretical abandonment of Marx. Moreover, socialism died at the end of the 20th century not because of Bernstein or his movement but because the great socialist experiment had been tried in numerous nations and conditions worldwide, and its failures had caused massive suffering for billions of people.
 &
  These things would have occurred if Bernstein had never existed - but there would have been no Bolshevik Revolution in Russia without Lenin.

  Lenin himself was thus a revisionist - although he had to deny that. As the author points out, Lenin had to insist that his was the true interpretation of Marxist doctrine - which remained "omnipotent because it is true."
 &
  Socialism had to continue to be viewed as "a historical necessity." Since Russia had private property, it was sufficiently capitalist for communist revolution. A revolutionary party comprised mainly of intellectuals would nevertheless be "the proletariat."

  Lenin understood that the core of Marxism was violent revolution, absolute despotism, and total control. All the rest was myth - useful only as justification for rule by terror - and to confuse the credulous - especially the left wing intellectuals.

The Bolshevik revolution:

  Now his faction was the majority - the "Bolsheviks" - a useful label even for a despotic organization. Soon, even many of his Iskra agents left in disgust, leaving Lenin in control of a tight little group. Those who left - the majority - nevertheless were called the "Mensheviks."
 &
  How Lenin and his Bolsheviks eventually came to power is set forth by Muravchik. By WW-I, socialist parties were thriving, and winning substantial minorities in many European parliaments. However, they were helpless to prevent the war.
 &
  Being left wing idealists, the Mensheviks generally didn't leave the party. Typically, they persisted with attempts to conciliate the Lenin faction despite repeated outrages by Lenin - who continued to create secret bodies - and even made off with party records and funds. Lenin didn't want conciliation - he wanted extermination of his opponents - especially his leftist opponents. By WW-I, the party split had become final.
 &
  Besides intensity of effort, Lenin had another advantage - money. His followers began robbing banks - "expropriations." One of his most skilled operatives was Stalin.
 &

  The Socialist International took some preliminary steps to generate opposition to the war, but socialist politicians - reflecting the nationalist sentiments of their constituents - supported war. The International was thus a casualty of the war. It would not be the last casualty.
 &
  This was another body blow to Marxist theory. Class consciousness was no match for national pride. The Marxist "spirit of international solidarity" proved to be ephemeral.
 &
  Bernstein and Kautsky opposed the war - but primarily because they considered Germany at fault in starting the conflagration. In this, they joined a few stalwart internationalists like Rosa Luxemburg. Bernstein risked his seat in the Reichstag by his principled stand - which drew immediate attacks from many of his old socialist comrades - including anti-Semitic attacks - "a grim augury of things to come in Germany."
 &
  Lenin welcomed the war. He believed it would undermine existing governments and weaken capitalism - and create conditions ripe for revolution. This took somewhat longer than he expected - but he was right.
 &

The Russian Revolution was not an epic contest of vast forces. It was in reality a contest of weak forces operating in a power vacuum - with the Bolsheviks, thanks to Lenin and Trotsky, the most adept at filling that vacuum.

  The German Army - like a giant vacuum cleaner - slowly sucked all military and economic strength out of Russia. The Russian Revolution was not an epic contest of vast forces. It was in reality a contest of weak forces operating in a power vacuum - with the Bolsheviks, thanks to Lenin and Trotsky, the most adept at filling that vacuum. "Lenin took power in a coup, not a popular uprising." 
 &
  Over a period of months, Lenin's disciplined Bolsheviks relentlessly attacked all rivals. But the other left wing intellectuals (the "useful idiots," in Lenin's phrase) were incapable of realizing the threat on their left. Blinded by Marxist dogma, they concentrated  on the opposition from the right.
 &
  The Bolsheviks were the only left wing group to organize their own military force. The power vacuum had become so complete that it took them only five days to seize power. "It had all been 'as easy as picking up a feather,' Lenin commented later."
 &
  According to one commentator, Lenin "[seized] power not in a land ' ripe for socialism' but in a land ripe for the seizing of power." However, since socialism was solely useful only as an ideological excuse for despotism, that mattered not at all. Nor did the elected Constituent Assembly, in which the Bolsheviks could gain only a small minority. Lenin simply disbanded it.
 &

Dictatorship of the proletariat was revealed as dictatorship over the proletariat - and everyone else - even other party members.

  Lenin initially tried to rule by terror. When this failed, he resorted to capitalist markets - his New Economic Policy - to keep the country from falling apart. Anything goes, as long as it keeps the party in power.
 &
  "We are making economic concessions to avoid making political concessions," Nikolai Bukharin explained. (This would be repeated in China at the end of the 20th century - hopefully on a permanent basis.) In the 1930s, Stalin would complete the imposition of rule by terror, at a cost estimated at about 15 million lives.
 &
  Lenin, joined by Trotsky, had been tireless in establishing the initial effort to rule by terror. (This example would be followed by other Leninist revolutionaries - in nations large and small - from Mao to Pol Pot, Hitler to Bathists like Saddam Hussein.) He mercilessly attacked all rivals, left or right, workers or peasants. Dictatorship of the proletariat was revealed as dictatorship over the proletariat - and everyone else - even other party members. This last task - to prevent "factionalism" within the party - was entrusted to Stalin. It was something Stalin proved quite adept at.
 &

  Upon taking control in Russia, the Bolsheviks reversed their promise to allow a right of secession. They retook by force all the peoples that had been under the control of the Czar, except for the Poles, who beat them back. From the start, they were expansionist, with worldwide ambitions - but cautious - not to risk their gains in the Soviet Union.
 &
  Lenin did not escape unscathed. He received two bullet wounds from a disgruntled Left Socialist Revolutionary. He died in 1923, after a period of increasing incapacity and several strokes.

  "He had forged the instruments of the greatest system of absolutism history had ever known. And he had placed them within the reach of a favorite disciple, Stalin, although it is safe to assume that he never envisioned anyone but himself wielding them. Too late, he seems to have sensed what Stalin was up to, and to have glimpsed the Georgian's sinister side. He struggled to thwart him, but no longer had the strength to attend the necessary meetings, and Stalin had secured the authorization of the Politburo to isolate Lenin for the sake of his health."

Leninist revolutionary party despotisms:

Like Lenin, Mussolini viewed other left wing groups as his most dangerous rivals, and turned viciously against socialists and communists.

  Mussolini patterned his activities on the Lenin model, first as a socialist and then as a fascist. The differences were that fascists accepted the primacy of nationalism and did not object to private property.
 &
  Initially overshadowed politically by established socialist parties, the fascists took socialist stances. However, they then abandoned socialism - as an initial tactic - and again like Lenin and his New Economic Policy, retreated to capitalism to promote the "capitalist phase" of Marxist development.
 &
  Like Lenin, Mussolini viewed other left wing groups as his most dangerous rivals, and turned viciously against socialists and communists. Indeed, by protecting capital and civic order against socialist strikes and disorder, he won widespread support. He consolidated power with typical Marxist-Leninist stratagems and ruthlessness - but with more popular support and with considerably less actual slaughter. Also, he didn't oppose capitalism - he worked with and through capitalist markets.
 &
  Indeed, the political spectrum was not a line with extremes at the left and the right. It was a circle, with communists and other despotic socialists right next to fascists at the bottom. Those who left one found it easier ideologically to move to the other than to head towards the moderate democratic parties at the top. In different countries, fascist movements adhered in different degrees to socialist dogma.
 &
  But they hated each other because they viewed each other as primary rivals for the allegiance of revolutionary adherents, and after taking power, as threats to their political power. Also, Soviet communism, as a movement with international pretensions, was viewed as a threat to fascist systems based on nationalist beliefs.
 &

  The Great Depression revived Marxism. Here was proof  supporting Marxist expectations of an inevitable "crisis of capitalism." The Great Depression tore apart governments and paved the way to WW-II. The Soviet Union and communism were the primary beneficiaries of the WW-II military defeat of the fascist "twisted offshoot of the tree of socialism."
 &
  Conservative political parties were widely discredited by the Great Depression. They were poorly placed to counter the Marxist propaganda myth that capitalist instability must ultimately be chronic and fatal.

  Of course, Marxist inevitability had nothing to do with the Great Depression, but how could conservatives argue that point? They couldn't use the truth - that it was not capitalism - it was the failure of government policies that caused the Great Depression. The government policies that failed were all conservative policies.
 &
  Thus, socialist, Keynesian and other leftist propaganda myths about the Great Depression were - and to a considerable extent remain - uncontested and powerful weapons in the ideological wars. Conservatives simply couldn't admit that it was their policies that were in fact responsible for the Great Depression. Their nationalist and vengeful Peace Treaty at Versailles - combined with their trade war protectionist policies that made it impossible to finance war debts - condemned the world to economic disaster and the vast slaughter of WW-II. See links in Great Depression Chronology

Democratic socialism:

Many nationalized industries needed subsidies and became chronic running financial sores rather than sources of financial resources.

  The Labor Party in England won a sweeping electoral victory in 1944. Clement Atlee was ready to put democratic socialism into practice in the birthplace of capitalism. It would begin with nationalization of "the main factors in the economic system." The Bank of England, coal mines, civil aviation, cable and wireless communications, railroads and trucking, and electricity and gas were taken over.
 &
  Momentum waned as troubles mounted, especially in the essential coal mines. However,  iron and steel were nationalized in 1951. A comprehensive welfare state entitlement accompanied the nationalizations.
 &
  Unfortunately, things simply weren't working out as expected. Fees had to be imposed for health care, and rationing spread - even for bread. Aid from the U.S. kept things going for awhile, but inflation soon brought heaven-on-Earth back down to Earth. Tight money, spending reductions, and wage controls soon followed.
 &
  Reality simply perversely refused to conform to socialist expectations. Many nationalized industries needed subsidies and became chronic running financial sores rather than sources of financial resources. Schemes to extend socialism into newly independent British colonies were invariably disappointing - and sometimes financially disastrous. Budget constraints soon forced an end to further nationalizations and even a retrenchment on social expenditures, reductions in subsidies for food, and imposition of a modest charge for medical prescriptions. But 20% of the British economy had been nationalized.
 &
  The Conservatives under Churchill were back in power by 1951. The wage controls and limitations on the right to strike had undermined labor support for the Labor Party. The Conservatives reversed only the nationalization of iron and steel, so the bulk of the socialist experiment remained to encumber the British economy until the 1980s.
 &

Third world socialism:

&

  The socialist experience in Tanganyika under Julius Kambarage Nyerere, Africa's "outstanding theoretician of socialism," is related by Muravchik. Nyerere's experiment with socialism started off with stirring election victories in 1958 and 1960. However, it soon began to take on authoritarian tones.
 &
  Restrictions on trade unions and adoption of broad powers of imprisonment solidified power. In 1965, the Constitution was changed to make Tanganyika a one party state. Everything was justified by reference to socialist goals (exactly as Hayek explained).
 &
  Ultimately, Nyerere repressed all dissent, disbanded the labor unions, and moved into the Communist Chinese orbit. The nation now included the Island of Zanzibar and was called Tanzania.
 &
  In 1967, widespread nationalizations began. Outside support flowed enthusiastically from Western socialist states. Sweden made Tanzania "a special focus of its foreign aid." The other Nordic states and Canada also chipped in generously. Communist China was another big contributor. Western socialist intellectuals quickly fell in love with Tanzania.
 &

  Robert S. McNamara - now President of the World Bank - became an enthusiast for Tanzanian socialism. The Bank helped to finance various "packages of uplifting services in the countryside." (Muravchik calls this World Bank support "most surprising" - but readers of FUTURECASTS are quite familiar with the peculiar depths of incompetence of Robert McNamara.)

  "Under McNamara, the World Bank helped to finance ujamaa [collective] villages as well as the government marketing boards that were formed to monopolize the purchase of crops, much to the unhappiness of the peasantry. It also financed parastatal [nationalized] corporations such as the Morogoro shoe factory, designed to be the largest in the world. An in-house summary declared that the bank had 'supported Tanzania's transition from a market to a socialist economy during the late 1960s and 1970s.'"

  Nor did the Western powers forsake Tanzania. "In all, Tanzania emerged from its declaration of self-reliance as Africa's largest per capita recipient of foreign assistance."
 &

Collectivization efforts often turned bloody - and were always disastrous. Government managerial incompetence was everywhere in evidence.

The vast flows of foreign assistance just disappeared down the black hole of government mismanagement.

"Equality had been fostered by keeping everyone poor."

  However, Tanzania was emulating Communist China in both political and economic organization - with similar disastrous results. Even other socialist organizations - including many effective producer cooperatives - were suppressed. Procedures within the ruling party became totally despotic. All political power was centralized.
 &
  Neyerere remained modest, committed to true socialist ideals, and incorruptible. Gratuitous violence was never resorted to. Debate was tolerated within the party and even within the universities, even if not permitted to spill out into a public forum. Peace prevailed and the vast flows of assistance continued.
 &
  Nevertheless, collectivization efforts often turned bloody - and were always disastrous. Government managerial incompetence was everywhere in evidence. The author relates details of the widespread economic collapse in some depth. The vast flows of foreign assistance just disappeared down the black hole of government mismanagement.
 &
  Achievements included an end to "capitalist exploitation," "great progress" in egalitarianism, and the prevention of the development of a middle class. "In other words," the author points out, "equality had been fostered by keeping everyone poor."
 &
  But everyone was thus also corrupted. Black market activity became widespread, and government assets were routinely looted. Bribes were essential for all transactions. Official positions were sought after for rent-seeking purposes.
 &
  With the 1980s, came the retreat from socialism. It didn't take long for capitalism to pay off. By 2000, Tanzania was considered the most improved state in Africa by Harvard's Center for International Development. Whether despotic - like most - or democratic - like India - the author points out that socialism had failed everywhere.
 &

Collapse:

Samuel Gompers:

Gompers feared that collective ownership would reduce unions to adjuncts of the socialist movement - as in fact happened wherever socialism triumphed.

  Left wing ideologues were viewed as threats to their own power by these labor leaders. Meanwhile, while socialist experiments were failing everywhere, the U.S. provided a shining example of what capitalism in a democratic system could do for working men - and everyone else active in the economic system. In Gomper's words:

  "I saw the danger of entangling alliances with intellectuals who did not understand that to experiment with the labor movement was to experiment with human life."

  Although sympathetic with socialist goals, he saw  that socialism would not provide immediate improvements in wages or working conditions, and feared that collective ownership would reduce unions to adjuncts of the socialist movement - as in fact happened wherever socialism triumphed.
 &
  Gompers' efforts to keep socialists out of the AF of L quickly made him a target for socialist attack. Workers who also happened to be members of the Socialist Labor Party formed an opposition block in the AF of L. He called socialists "the men of isms and schisms," who would take the union away from worker control and subordinate worker goals to their goals. He fought bitterly against socialist efforts to create rival labor unions.
 &
  By 1903, any sympathy Gompers might have had for socialist objectives was gone. He declared that he knew what they had up their sleeve - he was adamantly in opposition - and he stated his beliefs about socialists as follows:

  "Economically you are unsound; socially you are wrong; industrially you are an impossibility."

  Gompers also accepted Marx's view of government as inevitably the instrument of the "ruling class." Whenever government  was more than minimally involved in labor disputes - even socialist governments - labor got the short end. However, since the courts could be used in any case to intervene, labor inevitably did have to involve government  in labor relations. With the election of Woodrow Wilson in 1912, labor started to achieve real legislative gains.
 &
  While Gompers was slow to oppose the socialists, he immediately recognized the Bolsheviks as a mortal enemy of the workers and actively fought them. A first generation immigrant, he was a committed patriot.
 &

George Meany:

Communism didn't lead workers - it repressed them. Marx to the contrary notwithstanding, the capitalist U.S. was worth defending because it gave even ordinary workers a chance for a better life.

  Meany was one of the first to take up the mortal fight against communism as WW-II drew to a close. Communism didn't lead workers - it repressed them. Marx to the contrary notwithstanding, the capitalist U.S. was worth defending because it gave even ordinary workers a chance for a better life. He threw himself into the battle to save Western Europe from communism.
 &
  In 1952, Meany became president of the AFL. When a faction-ridden CIO rejoined the AFL, he ruthlessly purged communists and gangsters from its ranks. The AFL-CIO became "the most powerful mass organization in the world in complete opposition to Communism."
 &

Lane Kirkland:

  By the time Meany stepped down in 1979, the true nature of communism was well established.
 &

  Lane Kirkland succeeded Meany and sustained his predecessor's committed anti communist policies. During the Solidarity union's first strike in Gdansk, Poland, the AFL-CIO Longshoreman's Union announced a boycott of all cargoes to and from Poland. Suppression of the Polish strike would result in an international labor boycott of all Polish transport. Money was raised to support Polish strikers, and office equipment was provided to Solidarity.

  "Here at last was the international proletarian solidarity that Marx and Engels had dreamt about but failed to achieve -- except that its purpose was not to bring about communism, but to abolish it."

Socialism in America:

In the 1970s, over 60% of mankind lived under communist, Third World, or social-democratic systems.

  U.S. workers understood that the political and economic conditions in the U.S. would permit them to protect their interests and even advance their interests within the system.

  "[While] they did not despise socialism in its democratic guise the way they did communism, labor leaders rejected it nonetheless as a false doctrine for the working man. Far from being born of ignorance of socialist ideas, the unique 'bread-and-butter' philosophy of American labor, formulated by Gompers and carried on by Meany and Kirkland, had grown out of an intense confrontation with those ideas and with American conditions."

  Engels had noted in despair that even temporary employment in the U.S. was enough to wash away socialist proclivities.

  "The solvent consisted not only of economic opportunity but also of self-confidence on the part of the working man. Everywhere in the world, socialism arose as an idea of middle-class thinkers who then set about selling it to the workers. Given the invidious class distinctions in Europe, workers felt they needed middle-class allies, and the socialists played this role. In gratitude, the workers were willing to accept their ideology. Nonetheless, within the socialist parties the ideologues struggled endlessly against the tendency of the labor representatives to slide back toward reformism."

  The author asserts that only the resistance to socialism in the U.S. prevented its victory worldwide. Already, in the 1970s, over 60% of mankind lived under communist, Third World, or social-democratic systems. Without the example of a thriving alternative in America, even disappointing results under socialist systems would not have led to their abandonment.

  "History is replete with examples of dogged human persistence in practices not validated by their results. The use of bleeding to cure disease, of human sacrifice to appease the gods, or trial by ordeal, of mercantilism or colonialism to generate wealth -- all reflected time-honored wisdom that was impervious to experience. Socialist economies yielded little growth, but economic growth has been the exception, not the rule throughout history. People are unlikely to relinquish ineffectual practices unless they can envision a better alternative."

  This conclusion - although dramatic - is undoubtedly false. The peoples of the Anglo Saxon democracies would not long stand for disappointing economic outcomes before kicking out the socialist politicians - as they in fact did repeatedly in England. For three decades, neither Labor nor Conservatives could make England's socialist system work - and the voters kept making their displeasure felt at the ballot box until the Conservatives found a leader - Margaret Thatcher - who could make a clean break from socialism.
 &
  There is no reason to believe it would have been otherwise in the U.S. - where it was Keynesian policies that had to be successfully overthrown, not socialism. Also, the economic system in the Soviet Union would have imploded in any case. There, as the author notes, it was not failure of economic growth, but rapid economic decline that was the result of socialist policies.

  Along with the amazing success of East Asia's four tiger economies, the economic success in the U.S. undermined socialism by example of a better alternative. From all over the world - in the face of vicious anti-American propaganda from a variety of dogmatists - millions vote with their feet for America - and tens of millions wish they could do so also.

  "Like Napoleon's failure to conquer Russia, socialism's failure to conquer America proved its undoing."

The collapse of communism:

Deng Xiaoping:

  The "household responsibility system" took only a year to demonstrate "impressive improvements" in agricultural output wherever it was initiated. "Communal farming --which Mao, like Stalin, had killed millions to impose -- melted away almost overnight."

  Communal farming was never about farming. It was always primarily a mechanism for controlling and enslaving peasants.

  Next came special economic zones for capitalist enterprise. Household trades sprang up around the country, as did private provision of basic services. Market incentives and pressures were even applied to state owned enterprises (often with little success). China experienced a long - still ongoing - period of robust economic growth. However, political repression remained to assure the continued dominance of the Communist Party.

  There are still many weaknesses in the Chinese system which are not reflected in the statistics - which themselves are not without some doubt. Successful small enterprises blossom everywhere, but remain small - constrained by a dearth of financial capital. Only the influential have access to financing. As a result, China is unable to come to grips with its massive unemployment and underemployment problems.
 &
  Deferred maintenance is visible everywhere, due primarily to a lack of property rights. Why should anyone do more than minimal maintenance if they don't own the property? Homes and shops are dingy and unkempt - exhibiting a total lack of interest in the expenditure of sweat equity maintenance. Public facilities are frequently no better.
 &
  China has no doubt enjoyed remarkable growth - albeit from a very low base. However, it is piling up massive problems that will continue to accumulate if it doesn't continue its liberalization efforts. And, yes, power does corrupt.

Mikhail Gorbachev:

Corruption, absenteeism and featherbedding permeated the system. Quantity of production was inadequate, quality was laughable, and variety was inconceivable.

  He came to power and finished consolidating his position in 1985 by seeding the Politburo and party leadership with his own people. Boris Yeltsin was promoted to Secretary of the Moscow party. By this time, Gorbachev was aware that the Soviet system "was dying away." Corruption, absenteeism and featherbedding permeated the system. Quantity of production was inadequate, quality was laughable, and variety was inconceivable.
 &
  Initial efforts to improve quality and reduce alcoholism failed. Early efforts to provide incentives for personal initiative also failed because the system was incapable of responding. Perestroika - or economic reform - by itself was clearly not enough. Gorbachev noted that "no one was against perestroika, everyone was 'for it,' but nothing was changing."
 &
  Unlike in China, where Deng was able to move the political officialdom gradually to accept increasing amounts of economic change, 70 years of despotic socialism had bestowed upon the Soviet Union a political officialdom so shaped by enforced servility as to be immovable. Gorbachev's answer was glasnost - or "openness."

  "Glasnost was not tantamount to free speech, much less democracy, but it invited freer speech, aiming to mobilize public criticism as a spur against immobile bureaucracy."

  Whereas Mao used his Red Guards to thwart reform elements in the Party, Gorbachev reached out for public support to push aside opposition to Party reform. (Unlike China - economic reform for Russia was impossible without Party reform - and Party reform was impossible without opening the system to public participation.) However, this loosed a whirlwind that Gorbachev - and the Party - could not control.

  "Gorbachev was the last true believer in the revolution's ideals. He felt they had gotten buried beneath a thick accretion of bureaucracy and that his job was to recover the strength and purity of unsullied socialism. Domestic and foreign criticism was suddenly welcome because it could provide some of the solvent to wash away the undesirable encrustation." 

  Gorbachev had forgotten - or perhaps didn't realize - that Soviet communism was Leninist - and was just about power - and nothing else. As in North Korea - economic performance and the economic deprivation of the people simply didn't matter.

  Some profit incentives were even introduced into the system - relying on Lenin's New Economic Policy as a precedent.
 &

  A struggle ensued. Gorbachev continued to encourage public opinion and discourse so as to apply increasing amounts of public pressure against an immovable system. Finally, in 1988, he subjected Party members to a real open election - and they were repudiated in massive numbers. As one result, Communist parties crumbled throughout Eastern Europe.
 &
  By 1990, Gorbachev was ready to push the dead weight of the Communist Party aside. The Central Committee voted to end the Party's monopoly on power, and permit a multi-party system - and private property. As Muravchik views it, the principle of obedience to the leader was so strong, that when the Party was ordered to commit suicide, it could not resist.
 &
  However, the weakening of the command structure without yet having a viable market system in place was catastrophic. The economy - such as it was - fell apart. Gorbachev found himself unable to command support in the new political world he had loosed.

  Again - unlike in China where there were still people who remembered how to run a farm or a business - 70 years of socialism in Russia had destroyed all human managerial capital - a loss that will take decades to overcome.

  Muravchik views Deng as a true Leninist.

  "For him, the dictatorship of party was the essence of socialism; all else was negotiable. The system he left behind he called socialism with Chinese characteristics, but it might better be called capitalism under the rule of the Communists."

  Gorbachev was a true socialist. He failed because socialism is impossible - something finally accepted by the socialists themselves.
 &

The British Labor Party:

  Tony Blair, after three electoral beatings by the Conservatives, joined a group of Labor Party members convinced that they could not win unless they unburdened themselves of the failed legacy of Clement Atlee. Finally recognizing their failures, the retreat from socialist policies began.
 &
  Not only had socialism failed in Britain, but also even more spectacularly in France under François Mitterand. In the face of stagnant output, trade balance collapse and soaring inflation, Mitterand had ordered "an abrupt about-face" from his socialist policies. "The private sector is recognized as the creator of social wealth," admitted the prominent French socialist.
 &

  "New Labor" under Blair was tough on crime, capable of independence from its core union support group on key issues, stressed "moral values" and the inability of government to solve all problems. It was against high tax rates and inflation and for welfare reform. Much of this was copied from Bill Clinton's successful 1992 presidential campaign. In short, Blair adopted the main features of the Thatcher Revolution.
 &
  Finally, the socialist plank was removed from the Party's constitution. Blair even accepted privatization policies. He would prove that the Labor Party could responsibly run a thriving capitalist economy. It was Thatcherist policies with a humanitarian emphasis - the "Third Way." In 1997, it all paid off in a sweeping electoral victory.
 &
  In Germany and elsewhere, leftist parties moved towards the center to repeat the Labor Party's success.

  Having perforce abandoned socialism, the socialist and liberal left now ironically have the biggest stake in the proper management of healthy, stable, strong capitalist systems. Their fall back ideology is an expanded social safety net and an enlarged entitlement welfare state - which are impossible unless capitalist economies can bear the burdens.
 &
  In England, Labor did a magnificent job of managing the economy in its first term, and richly deserved its second great electoral victory. However, now they are imposing ever greater welfare state burdens in a vain attempt to improve the quality of the welfare services provided by a massive unresponsive welfare bureaucracy. In this dream, too, the left will fail.

The Kibbutz:

  Israeli kibbutzim had an impressive period of success. Sustained into the 1980s by subsidies and other assistance, they nevertheless have now fallen into a state of decline.

  "By some point in the 1970s, the majority of kibbutz-raised children were leaving."

The only way to prevent waste and over-indulgence was to charge for electricity in the private cottages and for meals in the dining hall.

  Despite extensive educational and social efforts in a loving environment, the children were rejecting socialist lifestyles and communal and egalitarian values. Ultimately, individualism became expressed in child rearing, housing, eating arrangements, possessions, and spending allowances. It was recognized that the only way to prevent waste and over-indulgence was to charge for electricity in the private cottages and for meals in the dining hall.
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  Poor financial management brought the kibbutzim to the brink of insolvency during the volatile financial times of the 1970s and 1980s. Government bailouts saved the day, but the sense of security was dashed. Residents began worrying about saving for their old age in case the kibbutz failed.
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  Many of the difficulties and irrationalities of communal living were becoming increasingly difficult to overlook and overcome. Increasingly, capitalist techniques had to be introduced to achieve acceptable and sustainable results. These included hiring outside managers and professionals - and even foreign hired hands. It included pay differentials and - ultimately - transformation to a cash economy - even for education.
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  Home ownership is a likely next step, as is the sale of shares in productive assets, Muravchik speculates. The kibbutz effort to create a "new man" for socialist living has failed.
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The failed gods:

  The attractiveness of the socialist ideal in the face of its evident irrationality and invariable failures is analyzed by Muravchik.
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  It was a secular religion that provided a compelling faith for those for whom accepted religions were no longer adequate. Marx gave it pretensions to "scientific" inevitability at a time when real science was coming to be greatly respected for providing answers to life's mysteries.

  "Thus, part of the power of Marxism was its ability to feed religious hunger while flattering the sense of being wiser than those who gave themselves over to unearthly faiths. In addition, the structure of rewards proffered by socialism was so much more appealing than in the biblical religions. For one thing, you did not have to die to enjoy them."

"Only once did democratic socialists manage to create socialism. That was the kibbutz. And after they had experienced it, they chose democratically to abolish it."

  Its lack of any moral limitations made socialism immensely destructive..

  "Socialism - - - lacks any internal code of conduct to limit what believers may do. The socialist narrative turned history into a morality play without the morality."

  No wonder, then, that the socialist balance sheet looks so much worse than the cruelest regimes of the past. Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin were not exceptions - they were the rule.

  "Regimes calling themselves socialist have murdered more than one hundred million people since 1917. The toll of the crimes by observant Christians, Moslems, Jews, Buddhists or Hindus pales in comparison."

  And, for those who proceeded democratically, they inevitably were drawn further and further from their irrational socialist practices.

  "Only once did democratic socialists manage to create socialism. That was the kibbutz. And after they had experienced it, they chose democratically to abolish it."