tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca-fr/topics/socialism-1138/articlesSocialism – La Conversation2024-03-02T12:59:12Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2248862024-03-02T12:59:12Z2024-03-02T12:59:12ZAli Hassan Mwinyi: the Tanzanian former president who oversaw the transition to market economy<p>Ali Hassan Mwinyi, Tanzania’s second president <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/former-tanzania-president-ali-hassan-mwinyi-dies-at-98-4541336">who has died aged 98</a>, pushed through tough economic and political reforms that transformed the East Africa nation from socialism to an open economy and a multi-party democracy. He was president from 1985 to 1995.</p>
<p>He did all of this in the shadow of Julius Nyerere who had led Tanzania since independence in 1961 and turned the country into a one-party socialist state. Tanganyika joined together with Zanzibar in 1964 to form the United Republic of Tanzania. Nyerere stepped down in 1985 but remained chairman of the party that had ruled Tanzania since independence.</p>
<p>Mwinyi’s presidency was always going to be a test, coming at a difficult period. The country was in a serious economic turmoil. Nyerere had admitted that the <a href="https://books.openedition.org/africae/713?lang=en">Ujamaa policy</a> – Tanzania’s socialist experience – had failed. Nyerere decided it was time the country tried another leader. He stepped aside in 1985. During that period, the country had experienced drought, the impacts of the oil shocks and the <a href="https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/document/obo-9780199791279/obo-9780199791279-0242.xml">Kagera War</a>, which Tanzania fought to oust Uganda’s dictator Idi Amin.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=kxptJf0AAAAJ&hl=en">political science scholar</a>, I have studied the politics, political parties and democratisation of Tanzania and Zanzibar in the last 10 years. It is my view that it took Mwinyi’s careful balancing act to ward off Nyerere’s influence after taking the presidency. He had to take bold decision amid the shadow of Mwalimu Nyerere who remained as the chairman of the ruling party CCM.</p>
<p>Mwinyi will be remembered for steadying the economic ship and setting ground for <a href="https://theconversation.com/tanzanias-benjamin-william-mkapa-a-life-of-achievements-and-regrets-143422">President William Mkapa</a> to consolidate economic liberalisation. Although there are controversies as to whether he was truly a Zanzibari. This notwithstanding, his elevation as the first Zanzibari Union president somewhat helped to ease the Union tensions. In the postscript of his memoir, Mwinyi reflects on several issues and prided his legacy on the economic reforms he initiated. </p>
<h2>Early life</h2>
<p>A trained teacher, Mwinyi was born on 8 May 1925 in Mkuranga, Coast region, Tanzania Mainland. Between 1933 and 1942, he attended primary school at Mangapwani and Dole – Zanzibar. He studied for Diploma in Education from 1954 to 1956 at the University of Adult Education in Dublin, United Kingdom. He specialised in English and Arabic languages. He taught at Mangapwani and Bumbwini schools in Zanzibar. He later served as an ambassador, and minister in various government ministries before becoming president of Zanzibar.</p>
<p>A rank outsider, Mwinyi’s elevation to the presidency of Tanzania was rather fortuitous. Nyerere had other preferred successors. <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Aboud-Jumbe">Aboud Jumbe</a>, the man who Mwinyi succeeded as president of Zanzibar in 1984 was Nyerere’s preferred successor. Nyerere had always wished a Zanzibari to succeed him as a way of galvanising the Union which was formed in 1964. However, the tense political period between 1983 and 1984 culminated with Jumbe falling out of favour, and being <a href="https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/national/aboud-jumbe-he-dared-and-paid-the-price-2564240">kicked out</a> as the president of Zanzibar and as vice president of the Union government. By virtue of being president of Zanzibar and vice president of the Union, Mwinyi became Nyerere’s compromise successor. Nyerere had described Mwinyi as honest, humble, and a loyal socialist.</p>
<h2>The reforms</h2>
<p>Mwinyi was not a socialist. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/45341629">At the time he was taking over as president</a> of Tanzania, Mwinyi compared himself to an anthill, succeeding the colossal socialist ideologue. He carefully negotiated and struck a balance between loyalty to Nyerere and driving the reforms. Chief among his reforms was re-initiating negotiations with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund – two institutions Nyerere had fallen out with. These negotiations meant that Tanzania was transitioning to a liberal market-led economy. </p>
<p>During Mwinyi’s first term in office, he <a href="https://www.elibrary.imf.org/downloadpdf/book/9781557752321/ch003.xml">launched</a> the three-year Economic Recovery Program in 1986. The aim was to spur positive growth, reduce inflation and restore sustainable balance of payments. </p>
<p>With this programme, there was an <a href="https://www.elibrary.imf.org/display/book/9781557752321/ch003.xml">upturn</a> in the country’s economy with the GDP growing at an average rate of 3.9% compared, to 1% during the 1980-1985 period. There was also a 4.8% increase in agricultural productivity, a 2.7% upsurge in manufacturing as well as a significant growth in external investment. The downside to these reforms was the rise in corruption and misappropriation of public funds. These economic reforms necessitated political reforms. President Mwinyi was able to rally the ruling CCM party, which was reluctant to accept International Monetary Fund and World Bank conditions. </p>
<p>In 1992, the Mwinyi administration acceded to constitutional amendments with a return to multiparty politics.</p>
<h2>Foreign policy</h2>
<p>Mwinyi also changed Tanzania’s foreign policy. Tanzania had modelled itself as a champion of <a href="https://theconversation.com/tanzania-south-africa-deep-ties-evoke-africas-sacrifices-for-freedom-202448">pan-Africanism and African liberation</a>. This was the key pillar of the country’s post-independent foreign policy. </p>
<p>In line with Tanzania’s position regarding apartheid South Africa, Mwinyi called for tough sanctions as a means of defeating white minority rule. </p>
<p>The transition from Nyerere to Mwinyi in 1985 heralded a new foreign policy with major conflicts in the Great Lakes Region. As President Mwinyi was settling into his second term, conflicts in the Great Lakes began, with Tanzania feeling the need to act as a mediator. In the 1990s, Tanzania was the key facilitator in the Rwanda domestic crisis. The Rwanda Genocide of 1994 had immediate impact on Tanzania with massive inflows of refugees. </p>
<p>President Mwinyi admitted in his <a href="https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/mzee-rukhsa">autobiography</a> that the Rwanda Genocide was one of his greatest foreign policy challenges. He recalled the circumstances leading to the events of 6 April 1994, the start of the genocide. He had called for the meeting to discuss the peace and security in Burundi and Rwanda in Dar es Salaam. </p>
<p>After the meeting ended, Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira and Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana left in one plane which was shot down, sparking off the genocide in Rwanda. Tanzania received many refugees fleeing the killings. In 1995, Tanzania’s city of Arusha became host of the UN backed International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to investigate those charged with genocide. During Mwinyi’s second term in office, plans to revive the East African Community began with the signing of an agreement to establish the permanent commission for East African Cooperation in 1993. This process culminated with reformalisation of the East African Community in 2000.</p>
<p>But it is Mwinyi’s contribution to liberalisation that will be his enduring legacy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224886/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicodemus Minde is affiliated with the Institute for Security Studies. </span></em></p>Ali Hassan Mwinyi successfully drove economic and political reforms in Tanzania, all in the shadow of his predecessor, Julius Nyerere.Nicodemus Minde, Adjunct Lecturer, United States International UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2231292024-02-14T16:56:01Z2024-02-14T16:56:01ZNorth Korea steps up efforts to stamp out consumption of illegal foreign media – but entertainment-hungry citizens continue to flout the ban<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575396/original/file-20240213-26-yfm4hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C284%2C3456%2C2012&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People walking on the street in Pyongyang, North Korea, August 2012.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/pyongyang-north-korea-aug-2012-local-1308095560">Chintung Lee/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Consuming and sharing foreign media in North Korea can be punishable by death. But that did not stop <a href="https://www.nknews.org/2024/02/north-koreans-consumption-of-foreign-media-grows-over-last-decade-survey/">more than 83%</a> of those who escaped the country between 2016 and 2020 using increasingly sophisticated means to access foreign music, TV shows and films before they left.</p>
<p>According to a survey report that was released by the South Korean Ministry of Unification, illegal media consumption among those who left in the five years up to 2020 increased by 15% compared with the previous five-year period.</p>
<p>Since the mid-1990s, over 34,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea. However, North Korea closed its borders during the COVID pandemic, and since then the steady flow of escapees has <a href="https://www.unikorea.go.kr/eng_unikorea/whatwedo/support/">slowed considerably</a>.</p>
<p>The number of informants has dropped and the information they bring may be somewhat dated by the time they reach the South. But many tell a <a href="https://yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300217810/north-koreas-hidden-revolution/">common story</a> of huddling around a TV or laptop behind locked doors, consuming foreign media that was smuggled into North Korea on USB sticks and SD cards.</p>
<p>Escapees also tell how knowledge of the outside has changed North Korean consumer behaviour, relationships and trust in the Kim family’s regime. This has prompted North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, to adopt increasingly harsh measures to combat access to illegal media.</p>
<h2>Crackdown</h2>
<p><a href="https://en.tjwg.org/publications/">Research</a> that I conducted with my colleagues in 2019 while working for a human rights documentation NGO in South Korea found that public execution had been used by the North Korean state against people convicted of consuming or disseminating foreign media. The <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-68015652">BBC reported</a> one such case having recently taken place. </p>
<p>Forcing friends and neighbours to <a href="https://en.tjwg.org/publications/">witness the punishment</a> of those known to them for such a crime is a powerful deterrent deployed by a state that considers outside knowledge a <a href="https://scholarlypublications.universiteitleiden.nl/handle/1887/44120">profound threat</a> to its ideology and the control of its people. </p>
<p>Shortly after inheriting the leadership in 2011, Kim tried a number of relatively soft approaches to controlling foreign media access, alongside continued punitive measures. They included a suite of <a href="https://scholarlypublications.universiteitleiden.nl/handle/1887/44120">information strategies</a> aimed at making North Korea appear competitive and attractive in the eyes of its citizens, capable of producing its own “popular” content to rival the <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/10.4324/9781351104128/south-korean-popular-culture-north-korea-youna-kim?refId=31ae7775-0a75-452a-bc83-dc4d7619c047&context=ubx">mighty force</a> of the (South) “Korean Wave”. </p>
<p>More recently, the North Korean government has capitalised on its <a href="https://www.nknews.org/pro/new-dprk-border-security-and-infrastructure-revealed-by-satellite-imagery/d-chinese-border-security-hurts-north-koreans/">border closure</a> to work harder than ever to keep foreign information out of the country. In 2020, it introduced a new “Law on the Elimination of Reactionary Thought and Culture”. This law sets out specific punishments for both viewers and distributors of foreign media, going further than the existing criminal code. </p>
<p>At the same time, Kim has <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/k-drama-takes-dark-turn">publicly condemned</a> K-Pop (pop music originating in South Korea) as a “vicious cancer” permeating North Korean society.</p>
<h2>Changing hearts and minds</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.nkmillennials.com/">Testimonies</a> published by organisations working with North Korean escapees show that consumption of South Korean television dramas has inspired young North Koreans to copy the fashion choices and catchphrases popularised by key characters.</p>
<p>North Korean escapees have also <a href="https://www.nkmillennials.com/">reported</a> paying keen attention to the settings they saw in films and dramas. Modern streets, cars and homes, with people displaying relative freedom of choice, expression and movement, all offer North Koreans a glimpse into life under capitalism.</p>
<p>These depictions profoundly contradict the state’s narrative. North Korea presents the South as a depraved hellhole where people are ideologically corrupt and languishing in poverty. </p>
<p>A recent video from North Korea shown to me by the <a href="https://www.kinu.or.kr/eng/index.do">Korea Institute for National Unification</a> shows that the new law on foreign media and culture is being accompanied by television campaigns. These campaigns harshly name and shame citizens seen wearing clothing in foreign styles, particularly with English language writing or slogans – the language of the “American bastards”. </p>
<p>A similar campaign condemns young North Koreans for showing affection in public and mimicking “western style” dating culture. Such behaviour is criticised as corrupt and destructive to North Korean societal purity.</p>
<h2>Building social bonds</h2>
<p>Consuming foreign media does more than just cause North Koreans to question their government’s claim that they live in an “ideal” society, striving to attain a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/03/north-koreas-kim-jong-un-opens-new-city-and-socialist-utopia-of-samjiyon">socialist utopia</a>. It also unsettles the government’s ability to maintain a culture of suspicion and mistrust between citizens. This could potentially <a href="https://www.nknews.org/2023/03/friendship-and-family-networks-are-key-to-getting-outside-info-to-north-koreans/">generate social change</a>. </p>
<p>When asked about his experience watching foreign media with friends and family before his escape, one North Korean man <a href="https://www.nkmillennials.com/">said</a>: “If you’ve watched it together, then no one would report it. They’d go down for it too.” For some North Koreans, consuming foreign media is an activity that builds closeness through shared indulgence in an illegal act.</p>
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<img alt="North Korean soldiers guarding a border fence." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/575571/original/file-20240214-28-yvw98y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">North Korea’s borders have been closed since January 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/hyesan-ryanggang-province-north-korea-august-698336161">Stefan Bruder/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Foreign diplomats, humanitarian aid workers and tourists are not yet allowed back into North Korea following the pandemic. So, combined with many fewer escapees arriving in the South, it is difficult to know whether foreign media access and consumption has declined since 2020. </p>
<p>But the Ministry of Unification has pledged to <a href="https://www.nknews.org/2024/02/north-koreans-consumption-of-foreign-media-grows-over-last-decade-survey/">offer an update</a> in a year’s time to evaluate the effect of the new law against foreign culture and the campaign around it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223129/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah A. Son does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A survey shows the impact foreign media is having on North Korea’s residents, despite the government’s harsh crackdownSarah A. Son, Senior Lecturer in Korean Studies, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2221142024-01-30T16:53:08Z2024-01-30T16:53:08ZHow Jürgen Klopp reconnected Liverpool FC with Shankly’s socialist soul<p>In his first press conference after arriving at Anfield in 2015, Jürgen Klopp <a href="https://twitter.com/footballdaily/status/1224366407757987840?lang=en">stated</a>: “It’s not so important what people think when you come in. It’s much more important what people think when you leave.” </p>
<p>After nine years, his words resonate through the hearts of Liverpool FC fans. On January 26, Klopp <a href="https://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/jurgen-klopp-announces-decision-step-down-liverpool-manager-end-season">announced</a> that he would be leaving the club at the end of the season.</p>
<p>Klopp has given Liverpool fans many memories to cherish. In 2019, his side staged a miraculous comeback against Barcelona on the way to lifting the Champion’s League trophy in Madrid. The following year, he ended Liverpool’s 30-year wait for a Premier League title.</p>
<p>Klopp inherited a Liverpool squad without any promising potential and a board that lacked vision and desire. Between 2010 and 2015, Liverpool had won just a single trophy – the League Cup in 2012. </p>
<p>However, Klopp delivered his first elite European trophy within three years of being appointed. From that point onward, he’s gone on to win all major trophies, guide Liverpool to four major European finals, and lose out on two Premier League titles by a single point. </p>
<p>Klopp will leave a legacy similar to that of Liverpool’s iconic manager, Bill Shankly. Between 1959 and 1974, Shankly transformed the club from second-division obscurity to three-time English champions and winners of the Uefa cup (Europe’s second-rank club competition). </p>
<p>Shankly endeared himself to fans of Liverpool FC, a club with deep working-class roots, by embracing the ethos of socialism (where individuals work together as a collective) as a fundamental principle for team success. Klopp’s persona as a man of the people – through his style, attitude and background – also strongly resonates with Liverpool’s socialist roots and blue collar community.</p>
<p>For instance, Klopp insists that every Liverpool player must <a href="https://www.dailystar.co.uk/sport/football/liverpool-anfield-sign-norwich-jordan-18924539">earn the right</a> to touch the famous “This is Anfield” sign by winning silverware. The iconic Anfield sign was first hung up on the wall of the player’s tunnel by Shankly to remind opponents of the spirit of Anfield.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Jürgen Klopp announcing he will leave Liverpool FC at the end of the season.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Socialist Spirit</h2>
<p>Klopp has never sought to create a hierarchy between himself, the players and the fans. Early on in his tenure, he referred to himself as “<a href="https://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/first-team/238155-the-normal-one">the normal one</a>” and has, on several occasions, been spotted sharing a drink with local people in the pub. In his press conferences, Klopp has often said that the team drew <a href="https://www.football365.com/news/klopp-on-cl-inspiration-we-do-it-for-carol-and-caroline">inspiration</a> from the staff at the club’s training ground.</p>
<p>Since his appointment, Klopp has also recognised the power of Liverpool fans, referring to them as the 12th man responsible for supplying energy to the squad. As Anfield reverberates today with the chant “I am so glad that Jurgen is a red”, the echoes of such intense emotions are a reminder for loyal Liverpool supporters of a legacy still sung about around half a century later.</p>
<p>Klopp has brought the same fiery socialist spirit back to Liverpool that Shankly managed to harness in the 1960s. Two managers separated by generations but bound as Merseyside icons who understood that success stems from people.</p>
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<h2>Engaging with the fans</h2>
<p>Like Shankly before him, Klopp has resurrected Liverpool by understanding what the club’s fans craved more than silverware – someone who embodies the club’s working-class soul. A leader to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with through good times and bad. </p>
<p>From Klopp’s iconic fist pumps after victories, to his <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11635563/Humiliated-Jurgen-Klopp-apologises-Liverpools-travelling-fans-Brighton-defeat.html">meaningful apologies</a> to fans during times of crisis, show his authentic relationship with the club and the fanbase. He celebrates goals in nerve-wracking victories by running up and down the sideline (once <a href="https://www.espn.co.uk/football/story/_/id/37638431/when-goal-celebrations-go-bad-liverpool-boss-jurgen-klopp-pulls-hamstring">pulling his hamstring</a> in the process). And he openly <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11635563/Humiliated-Jurgen-Klopp-apologises-Liverpools-travelling-fans-Brighton-defeat.html">asked supporters for forgiveness</a> after a humbling 3–0 defeat by Brighton in 2023. </p>
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<p>Klopp’s outgoing authenticity has also resonated powerfully with Liverpool supporters around the world. He actively embraces fan media like “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@theredmentv">The Redmen TV</a>” YouTube channel, and makes an effort to appear in person for interviews and podcasts. He even once wrote a letter to a young fan reassuring him over his feelings of personal anxiety.</p>
<h2>Revolutionary vision</h2>
<p>When Shankly was appointed in 1959, he was frustrated with Liverpool’s training regime and facilities. Previously, players had become accustomed to running on the street as part of their training routine. However, Shankly <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/the-agony-and-the-ecstasy/2018/dec/01/liverpool-boot-room-throw-in-jurgen-klopp-bill-shankly">revamped the training regime</a>, introducing sessions on the training ground where players could run and practice while wearing appropriate football boots.</p>
<p>In a similar way to Shankly, Klopp has helped the club evolve. He insisted on building modern training facilities where the youth academy could be integrated with the first team, and played a part in the development of the club’s new training ground.</p>
<p>Liverpool’s managing director Andy Hughes <a href="https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11669/12134609/liverpool-boss-jurgen-klopp-delighted-with-new-kirkby-training-ground">praised</a> the combined efforts of Klopp, sporting director Michael Edwards and academy director Alex Inglethorpe for their “instrumental role” in creating the new facility. </p>
<p>Klopp’s legacy at Anfield, in the Premier League and in modern football, is beyond doubt. As was the case for Shankly’s successor, Bob Paisley, the next Liverpool manager certainly has big boots to fill.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222114/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ronnie is an avid Liverpool FC fan and has carried out research into transforming management practices in English football.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Wasim Ahmed does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Jurgen Klopp will leave Liverpool with a remarkably similar legacy to the club’s iconic manager, Bill Shankly.Ronnie Das, Associate Professor in Digital and Data Science, AudenciaWasim Ahmed, Senior Lecturer in Marketing, University of HullLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2198872023-12-15T14:54:55Z2023-12-15T14:54:55ZMark Drakeford: what the resignation of Wales’ first minister means for the country and the Labour party<p>This week, Mark Drakeford announced his <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-67702232">resignation</a> as Wales’ first minister after five years as leader. Back in 2018, Drakeford built his <a href="https://skwawkbox.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/manifesto-english-print.pdf">leadership bid</a> on a platform of “21st-century socialism”. As the manifesto reveals, the mantra was rooted in the ideas of “the radical tradition of Welsh socialism”, which would drive the creation of “a more equal, fair and just society”. </p>
<p>While it’s difficult to assess his legacy so soon, it is worth reflecting on whether these initial aims have been achieved. And what does Drakeford’s departure mean for the future of Wales and the Labour party?</p>
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<p>Arguably, the COVID-19 pandemic was the defining feature of Mark Drakeford’s tenure. During this period, Drakeford raised the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/may/04/covid-crisis-makes-mark-drakeford-most-recognisable-leader-in-22-years-of-welsh-devolution">profile</a> of devolution in Wales to the rest of the UK. His measured and cautious approach to the pandemic was <a href="https://nation.cymru/news/sunday-times-declares-mark-drakeford-comfortably-the-most-popular-uk-leader/">popular</a> and a <a href="https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/politics/democracy-uk-voting-reform-votes-28283666">stark contrast</a> to that of Boris Johnson. </p>
<p>This popularity was reinforced when Drakeford led Welsh Labour to a decisive victory in the 2021 Senedd <a href="https://research.senedd.wales/research-articles/election-results-2021-what-s-changed/">election</a>. It further extended the party’s more than 100 years of electoral dominance in Wales.</p>
<p>In June this year, Drakeford <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/more-senedd-members-among-mark-drakefords-top-priorities-for-next-12-months-as-conservatives-blast-out-of-touch-plans-12910448">emphasised</a> Senedd reform as one of his <a href="https://www.gov.wales/senedd-reform">priorities</a>, including increasing the number of Senedd members. That is potentially a hard sell to the public, but Drakeford saw it as a “once in a generation” opportunity.</p>
<p>While the Welsh pandemic response appeared to be popular, Drakeford’s government is certainly not immune to criticism. Serious questions hang over the consequences of certain Welsh government COVID <a href="https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/politics/welsh-government-coronavirus-covid-mistakes-21107573">measures</a>. To compound this, the rejection of a Wales-specific COVID inquiry has led to <a href="https://nation.cymru/news/first-minister-urged-to-right-a-wrong-and-commit-to-wales-covid-inquiry/">accusations</a> that Drakeford is shying away from scrutiny.</p>
<p>More recently, the Welsh government has faced significant <a href="https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/swansea-20mph-welsh-government-confusing-27941424">backlash</a> over its <a href="https://theconversation.com/wales-residential-speed-limit-is-dropping-to-20mph-heres-how-it-should-affect-accidents-and-journey-times-210989">policy</a> to drop the residential speed limit to 20mph, which appears to have led to <a href="https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/politics/discontent-grows-towards-mark-drakeford-28157637">concern</a> even within Labour ranks.</p>
<p>When it comes to achieving 21st-century socialism, five years on and in nearly all measures – health, poverty, education – Wales is struggling. The Welsh government’s ambitions have been hamstrung by a lack of <a href="https://www.gov.wales/written-statement-welsh-government-response-uk-autumn-statement-2023">funding</a>, the confines of Wales’ devolved powers and the extreme circumstances of a global pandemic. And while these constraints cannot be ignored, the rhetoric of 21st-century socialism is not being met in reality.</p>
<h2>Wales and Westminster</h2>
<p>Drakeford’s legacy leads to questions concerning the future relationship between Welsh and UK Labour. Central to Drakeford’s <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/13691481231158296">rhetoric</a> during his tenure was to position Welsh Labour as the <a href="https://policymogul.com/key-updates/31452/mark-drakeford-s-speech-to-the-labour-party-conference">defender</a> of Welsh interests against a harmful Conservative government. </p>
<p>With the potential of Labour governments in both Cardiff and London, this line of argument may soon come under pressure. Starmer has been <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67608097">clear</a> that the economy is simply not in a position for public spending to be significantly increased. </p>
<p>The Welsh and UK parties are also <a href="https://nation.cymru/news/welsh-labour-deputy-leader-says-she-doesnt-want-policing-devolved-to-wales/">at odds</a> when it comes to the future of the union and the UK constitution.</p>
<p>If a Starmer government takes a different view on the constitution, or if the spending taps are not turned on sufficiently, would the new Welsh Labour leader seek to build a closer relationship with Starmer? Or, if competing agendas emerge, will the “<a href="https://sochealth.co.uk/the-socialist-health-association/sha-country-and-branch-organisation/sha-wales/clear-red-water/">clear red water</a>” between Welsh and UK Labour become choppier? Any new Welsh Labour leader will need to deal with these potential issues.</p>
<p>The phrase “clear red water” is a legacy of Drakeford’s that stretches back to before he became first minister. As special advisor to former first minister Rhodri Morgan in 2002, Drakeford coined it to mark the Welsh approach to policy making as distinct to new Labour, based on classic Labour principles and rooted in nationally bounded <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0952076712455821?casa_token=5-5e05bH1v4AAAAA%3AZQj1ky-kb3Jk61ha3dZnmfO03wBy0VRDXNRTY0X3aeixkdm3xV_51PRz4HHdnCqlkNF-Ui_pX5iO">politics</a>. </p>
<p>The saying has almost become a cliché by now, but if Labour wins the next general election, Drakeford’s successor will need to take inspiration from its purpose of emphasising the distinctive needs of Wales. </p>
<p>Drakeford made people across the UK take notice of Wales and devolution during the pandemic. Whichever phrase is deployed next – 21st-century socialism, clear red water, the Welsh way – the next Welsh Labour leader will need to fight Wales’ corner within their own party.</p>
<h2>The future of 21st-century socialism</h2>
<p>Drakeford stressed throughout his time as first minister that 21st-century socialism could only be achieved through practical action. His methodical and calm <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/14/england-chaos-boris-johnson-wales-mark-drayford-wales-legacy">approach</a> to governance has won him supporters both within and beyond the Labour party. </p>
<p>However, whether due to the nature of devolution, the lack of funding, the impact of the pandemic or the limitations of Welsh Labour’s programme for government, the 21st-century socialism Drakeford promised has not materialised.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/universal-basic-income-wales-is-set-to-end-its-experiment-why-we-think-thats-a-mistake-218206">Universal basic income: Wales is set to end its experiment – why we think that’s a mistake</a>
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<p>It is unlikely that the next leader will articulate their vision in the same way as Drakeford, who tried to root himself within Welsh Labour traditions. But if they are serious about pursuing progressive policies, they will need to be bold in tackling the challenges plaguing Wales today. </p>
<p>They will need to be innovative in their approach to public policy and the economy, and forthright in demanding adequate funding from the UK government, no matter which party is in power at Westminster.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219887/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nye Davies does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What does the future hold for Wales and Welsh Labour in the wake of Drakeford’s resignation?Nye Davies, Lecturer in Politics, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2138802023-10-10T14:52:15Z2023-10-10T14:52:15ZEconomic Freedom Fighters became South Africa’s third largest political party in just 10 years. What’s behind its electoral success<p>South Africa is drawing nearer to a <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-za/support-political-parties-two-years-next-national-election">landmark national general election in 2024</a>. Based on recent <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-anc-dips-below-50-but-opposition-parties-fail-to-pick-up-the-slack-171253">electoral trends</a> and opinion polls, the governing African National Congress <a href="https://www.anc1912.org.za/">(ANC)</a> is expected to drop below 50% of the national vote for the first time since democracy in 1994. </p>
<p>The end of single party dominance is expected to result in the country having its first national coalition government since the ANC came to power. The <a href="https://effonline.org/">Economic Freedom Fighters</a> (EFF), the country’s third largest party, is a <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2023/07/27/polling-study-suggests-eff-outdoing-anc-in-western-cape-voter-support/amp">must watch</a> in that transformation. The party’s electoral support has been growing since 2014, <a href="https://theconversation.com/ramaphosa-saves-the-ancs-bacon-but-this-could-be-its-last-chance-116903">amid declines</a> for both the ANC and the Democratic Alliance (DA), the main opposition.</p>
<p>In that time period, the ANC’s electoral support has fallen from over <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/content/Elections/Results/2014-National-and-Provincial-Elections--National-results/">62%</a> in 2014 to <a href="https://results.elections.org.za/dashboards/npe/app/dashboard.html">57.50%</a> in 2019, and the DA’s from over 22% to 20.7%. The EFF’s share of the vote rose from <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/content/Elections/Results/2014-National-and-Provincial-Elections--National-results/">just over 6%</a> in its first election in 2014 to about 11% <a href="https://results.elections.org.za/dashboards/npe/app/dashboard.html">in 2019</a>. </p>
<p>The EFF also gained more seats in provincial legislatures and municipal councils in 2014 and 2016. Research shows that it’s been <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/358680973_The_Youth_Vote_in_the_2021_Local_Government_Elections_in_South_Africa">appealing to mainly young voters</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-votes-in-2024-could-a-coalition-between-major-parties-anc-and-eff-run-the-country-204141">South Africa votes in 2024: could a coalition between major parties ANC and EFF run the country?</a>
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<p>We are political scientists with experience in leftist parties in <a href="https://www.thriftbooks.com/a/gary-prevost/293102/">Latin America </a> and <a href="https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/theoria/68/169/th6816901.xml">South Africa</a>. We did a <a href="https://www.ajol.info/index.php/ai/article/view/244258">critical analysis</a> of the EFF through the lens of the party’s communication strategies. We analysed survey and exit polling data as well as the ideology, strategy and tactics of the EFF from a <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/23808985.1977.11923698">political communication theory perspective</a>. Political communication focuses on how political actors craft and distribute their messages. </p>
<p>Based on the findings, we argue that the EFF has gained its modest but significant standing in South African politics by stealing the ANC’s mantle. It portrays itself as the true custodian of the values the ANC espoused during the anti-apartheid struggle, as stated in the <a href="https://www.anc1912.org.za/the-freedom-charter-2/">Freedom Charter</a>, its blueprint for a free South Africa. The EFF accuses the ANC of having abandoned this agenda. This has enabled black South African voters to shift their support from the ANC to the EFF without changing their political orientation.</p>
<p>This lies behind the EFF’s decision to focus its messaging around land and jobs. These resonate given the country’s history of black <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/land-dispossession-history-1600s-1990s">land dispossession</a> and stubbornly <a href="https://www.statssa.gov.za/publications/P0211/P02112ndQuarter2023.pdf">high unemployment</a>, especially <a href="https://theconversation.com/millions-of-young-south-africans-are-jobless-study-finds-that-giving-them-soft-skills-like-networking-helps-their-prospects-202969">among young people</a>. </p>
<h2>Electoral performance</h2>
<p>The EFF <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/founding-economic-freedom-fighters-eff">was founded</a> as a political party in July 2013 following the expulsion of its leader Julius Malema from the ANC in 2012. Malema had been president of the ANC Youth League before being expelled <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-04-24-malema-expelled/">for misconduct</a>. </p>
<p>The EFF went on to garner 1.2 million votes in 2014, and 25 seats in parliament. Come the 2019 national election, it won 44 seats in parliament with just under 1.9 million <a href="https://results.elections.org.za/dashboards/npe/app/dashboard.html">votes</a>. </p>
<p>The strength of the EFF is greatest in the North West province, where it garnered 17.9% of the vote in the 2019 national general elections. This is followed by Gauteng (13.53%) and Limpopo provinces (13.14%).</p>
<p>It is the official opposition in North West, Limpopo and Mpumalanga, where it got 11.51%. It continues to battle in the Western Cape (4.1%) and Eastern Cape (7.72%). Its share of the vote in KwaZulu-Natal increased from 1.97% in 2014 to 9.96% in 2019.</p>
<p>In the 2021 local elections, the party received <a href="https://results.elections.org.za/dashboards/lge/">10.31%</a>, mainly replicating its 2019 national results.</p>
<h2>Ideology, strategy and tactics</h2>
<p>Our <a href="https://www.ajol.info/index.php/ai/article/view/244258">analysis</a> sought to understand the drivers of the EFF’s growth and its role in the party system. We analysed the ideology of the party and its strategy and tactics as stated in its <a href="https://effonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Founding-Manifesto.pdf">electoral documents</a>.</p>
<p>Ideologically, the party’s 2013 founding manifesto <a href="https://effonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Founding-Manifesto.pdf">states that</a> it </p>
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<p>draws inspiration from the broad Marxist-Leninist tradition and Fanonian schools of thought in their analyses of the state, imperialism, culture and class contradictions in every society. </p>
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<p>It positions itself as “anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist” and opposes what it calls the “neoliberal agenda” of the ANC.</p>
<p>The EFF <a href="https://effonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Founding-Manifesto.pdf">declares</a> that it is a radical and militant economic emancipation movement, rooted in popular grassroots formations and struggles. These include workers’ movements, NGOs, community-based organisations and lobby groups.</p>
<p>In a bid to position itself as a viable radical alternative to the ANC, the EFF has used “grievance exploitation”, radical posturing, <a href="https://fbaum.unc.edu/teaching/articles/J-Communication-2007-1.pdf">agenda setting</a> and <a href="https://fbaum.unc.edu/teaching/articles/J-Communication-2007-1.pdf">framing</a> in its strategic arsenal. <a href="https://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=12930">Inequality</a>, <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201802/landauditreport13feb2018.pdf">racialised land ownership</a> patterns, persistent <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/03/09/new-world-bank-report-assesses-sources-of-inequality-in-five-countries-in-southern-africa">racism</a>, <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-za/south-africas-unemployment-nightmare-burden-its-people">unemployment</a> and other issues are the main grievances the party has exploited. </p>
<p>It has done this through political communication and <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/politics/watch-eff-mps-thrown-out-after-disrupting-ramaphosas-budget-vote-calling-him-a-money-launderer-20220609">theatrics in parliament</a> – including wearing the uniforms of workers, disrupting proceedings and chanting slogans – as well as the issues it has chosen to fight for in “the streets”, social media, the courts and party events. </p>
<p>It has had skirmishes with <a href="https://www.news24.com/citypress/news/clicks-bows-to-effs-demands-after-racist-advert-20200910">allegedly racist companies</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rL85mQxvfNI">white farmers</a> and <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/news/fists-fly-outside-brackenfell-high-school-as-tensions-spike-between-residents-and-eff-protesters-20201109">schools</a>, and many other opponents that help drive its narrative.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-effs-self-styled-militarism-says-about-south-africas-third-largest-party-116463">What the EFF's self-styled militarism says about South Africa's third largest party</a>
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<p>The EFF’s success in the North West, Mpumalanga and Limpopo appears to have a lot to do with the party’s rhetoric on the mining sector, which is prominent in these provinces. The party’s strategic political communication portrays it as fighting for oppressed mine workers or host communities in these areas.</p>
<p>Its overtures in <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/politics/marikana-is-our-spiritual-home-says-malema-as-eff-marks-its-10-year-anniversary-at-massacre-site-20230726">Marikana</a>, the site of the 2012 massacre of striking mineworkers by police, attest to this. </p>
<p>Additionally, Limpopo is the home base of the founders of the party, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/julius-sello-malema">Julius Malema</a> and his deputy <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/nyiko-floyd-shivambu/">Floyd Shivambu</a>. Founder constituencies tend to contribute significantly to a party’s success in South Africa. For instance, the <a href="https://www.ifp.org.za/">Inkatha Freedom Party</a> and the <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/abs/10.10520/EJC-5140815cb">National Freedom Party</a> are strong in KwaZulu Natal, where they were formed and their leaders originate. </p>
<p>Our findings show that EFF supporters among students who had come from the ANC cited <a href="https://www.statecapture.org.za/">corruption</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02589346.2023.2257502">failure to deliver</a> on promises as their reasons for changing. Those who had shifted from the Democratic Alliance were drawn by the appeal of the EFF as a more radical alternative. </p>
<h2>Looking forward</h2>
<p>In our view the party appears to have lost some momentum in terms of its political communication strategy after the fall of former President Jacob Zuma <a href="https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/profiles/president-jacob-zuma-0">in February 2018</a>. It has also made some tactical mistakes. For example, it started calling President Cyril Ramaphosa corrupt and similar to Zuma, without proof.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-african-voters-are-disillusioned-but-they-havent-found-an-alternative-to-the-anc-171239">South African voters are disillusioned. But they haven't found an alternative to the ANC</a>
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<p>Moreover, South Africa has a number of new parties that will be standing in the <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/pw/elections/whats-new-in-the-2024-elections-electoral-amendment-act">2024 elections</a>. They include <a href="https://www.actionsa.org.za/">ActionSA</a>, <a href="https://bosa.co.za/">Build One South Africa</a> and <a href="https://www.risemzansi.org/">Rise Mzansi</a>. They may present an alternative to the ANC on the good governance front without the radical politics of the EFF or the <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-main-opposition-party-caught-in-an-unenviable-political-bind-150296">race politics of the DA</a>. </p>
<p>The elections will show whether the alternatives have a significantly negative impact on the EFF and its ability to present itself as a long term alternative to the ANC.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213880/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ongama Mtimka has received publicly-sponsored PhD research funding through Nelson Mandela University. He is a Lecturer at Nelson Mandela University, the Treasurer of the South African Association of Political Studies, and the executive chair of the South African Political Risk Institute. He writes in his personal capacity. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gary Francis Prevost does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Opinions differ widely about the true character of the EFF and what it really stands for since it gained seats in parliament in 2014.Ongama Mtimka, Lecturer, Nelson Mandela UniversityGary Francis Prevost, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, College of Saint Benedict & Saint John's UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2116422023-09-13T15:39:31Z2023-09-13T15:39:31ZPatricio Guzmán: fierce filmmaker who chronicled 50 years of Chile’s history after Pinochet coup<p>This week marks half a century since the beginning of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/dec/11/chile.pinochet4">Augusto Pinochet’s</a>
brutal 17-year dictatorship – a dark and devastating period of Chile’s history that continues to leave scars on the South American country.</p>
<p>On September 11 1973, Pinochet led a <a href="https://nacla.org/news/2011/9/11/september-11-and-story-behind-coup">right-wing military coup</a>, ending the democratically-elected socialist Popular Unity coalition of President <a href="https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-09-09/salvador-allende-according-to-biographer-mario-amoros-an-elegant-freemason-far-from-the-typical-image-of-a-socialist-revolutionary.html">Salvador Allende</a>.</p>
<p>Anyone wanting to understand Chile’s turbulent political and social recent history should turn to the films of <a href="https://mubi.com/en/cast/patricio-guzman">Patricio Guzmán</a>, the country’s most important documentary filmmaker, who has just been honoured with <a href="https://www.cinematropical.com/cinema-tropical/patricio-guzmn-is-the-2023-recipient-of-chiles-national-arts-prize">Chile’s National Arts Prize</a> for his work.</p>
<p>His significance as a filmmaker is being marked with a <a href="https://www.cinematropical.com/new-events/patricio-guzmn-dreaming-of-utopia-50-years-of-revolutionary-hope-and-memory">retrospective of his work</a> in a collaboration with Cinema Tropical and Icarus Films in New York this month. The week-long event, Dreaming of Utopia: 50 Years of Revolutionary Hope and Memory, features cinema screenings of Guzmán’s films including new restorations of the previously unreleased <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-firsty">The First Year</a> (1972) and his classic film <a href="https://www.facebook.com/CinemaTropical/videos/1360863011134450">The Battle of Chile</a> (1975).</p>
<p>This is welcome recognition. Despite being an important <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0350099/awards/?ref_=nm_ql_2">award-winning filmmaker</a> with an international reputation, Guzmán’s work deserves to be more widely known.</p>
<h2>In exile under Pinochet</h2>
<p>Like so many Chileans under Pinochet’s dictatorship, Guzmán was forced into exile in 1973 following a period in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/general-pinochets-long-shadow-still-hangs-over-chiles-national-stadium-70305">notorious Estadio Nacional</a> (National Stadium), where many thousands of political prisoners were tortured and murdered. After some time in Cuba and Spain, the director made his home in France. </p>
<p>As someone directly affected by the dictatorship, his films combine the personal with the political. A fiercely partisan defender of Salvador Allende, there is no neutral point of view in Guzmán’s films. They celebrate popular protest and struggles for democracy and equality. They reserve their ire for Pinochet and his legacy, including the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/chile/Patrick-01.htm">atrocities</a> committed by the <a href="https://irp.fas.org/world/chile/dina.htm">military police</a> under his command. </p>
<p>In an <a href="https://www.patricioguzman.com/libros">interview with Jorge Ruffinelli</a> in his book on the director, Guzmán describes the role of documentary film as:</p>
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<p>The critical conscience of a society. It represents the historical, ecological, artistic and political analysis of a society. A country without documentary cinema is like a family without a photograph album.</p>
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<h2>Battling for Chile</h2>
<p>The Battle of Chile regularly features in lists of best political films and documentaries. It is a three-part, four-and-a-half-hour epic that captures Chile’s complex political landscape and the deep divisions that led to Pinochet’s coup in 1973.</p>
<p>The personal cost of the film is apparent in its opening dedication to the memory of Jorge Müller Silva, the film’s cameraman who was <a href="https://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/onlinessays/JC08folder/ChileMurders.html">tortured and “disappeared”</a> by the military police.</p>
<p>One of its most famous scenes illustrates a shocking clash between a peaceful camera shot and a violent gun shot through the footage of Argentinean cameraman Leonardo Hendrickson, who <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-ca-mn-patricio-guzman-chile-films-20151004-story.html">records his own death</a>, as the camera is left running after he is fired on by a solider. The film was described by Guardian journalist <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2002/sep/14/books.featuresreviews">Andy Beckett</a> as “the sacred text of the general’s opponents at home and abroad”.</p>
<p>Its legacy at home is the subject of Guzmán’s <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-chile">Chile, Obstinate Memory</a> (1998), a film about the screening of The Battle of Chile on his return to the country in 1996. Banned during the dictatorship, the film is shown, to emotional effect, to young people with little knowledge of the nation’s recent history other than that sanctioned by the military regime, as well as to veterans and survivors of the dictatorship.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-disappearance-became-a-global-weapon-of-psychological-control-50-years-on-from-chiles-us-backed-coup-213014">How disappearance became a global weapon of psychological control, 50 years on from Chile's US-backed coup</a>
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<p>The two protagonists of this Chilean history and all that they represent have marked Guzmán’s work. His film <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-sal">Salvador Allende</a> was released in 2004, followed by <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-pino">The Pinochet Case</a> in 2006, which is an exploration of the international and national attempts to bring the dictator to trial.</p>
<p>More important films follow in a remarkable career, including his trilogy <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1556190/">Nostalgia for the Light</a> (2010), <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4377864/?ref_=nm_flmg_t_3_dr">The Pearl Button</a> (2015) and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9567718/?ref_=nm_flmg_t_2_dr">The Cordillera of Dreams</a> (2019), all of which, the films’ distributor Icarus Films explains, <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-cord#:%7E:text=Winner%20of%20the%20Best%20Documentary,his%20native%20country%20of%20Chile">investigate</a> “the relationship between historical memory, political trauma and geography in his native country of Chile”. </p>
<h2>The feminist revolution</h2>
<p>The roots of the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2021/country-chapters/chile">recent Chilean mass protests</a> known as the <em>estallido social</em> (social explosion) are explored in Guzmán’s remarkable film, <a href="https://icarusfilms.com/if-imagin">My Imaginary Country</a> (2022). As he says in his documentary, the director wanted to discover how “a whole people had woken up 47 years after Pinochet’s coup in a so-called social outburst, a major rebellion or even a revolution”. </p>
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<p>In contrast to The Battle for Chile, a film in which men dominate the public space, the answer lies with the women activists who feature, and who make up all of the interviewees. My Imaginary Country reveals a Chile riven by deep structural inequality and subjugated by a militarised police force (<em>carabineros</em>) <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/chile">seemingly at war with its own population</a>.</p>
<p>Yet the film shows Chilean women fighting for a peaceful future. One image shows a protestor’s powerful slogan: <em>La Revolución será feminista o no será</em> – the Revolution will be feminist or it will not happen at all. </p>
<p>This message permeates the film and is encapsulated by the central role of the <a href="https://artistsatriskconnection.org/story/lastesis">feminist theatre collective LasTesis</a>. As my co-author Deborah Martin and I pointed out in our <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/blar.13215">research paper</a> on LasTesis, their street performance of the song A Rapist in Your Path, which calls out state-sanctioned rape culture, went viral globally in 2019, the year of the <em>estallido</em>. </p>
<p>In December 2021 the new president-elect Gabriel Boric <a href="https://www.pressenza.com/2021/12/gabriel-boric-speech-as-president-elect/#:%7E:text=Today%20is%20a%20day%20of,governing%20with%20all%20the%20people.">thanked the women of Chile</a> after beating the far-right Catholic candidate José Antonio Kast. Boric promised to defend the rights they had “worked so hard to achieve”.</p>
<p>Memory is central to the films of Patricio Guzmán, but a key point in My Imaginary Country is that if Chile wants to escape from the cycle of violence and repression his films have chronicled, the future has to be led by women’s movements. Ever the documentarian, no doubt he will be watching how his country responds with interest.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Deborah Shaw does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As a passionate and partisan defender of Allende’s socialism, Guzmán’s films celebrate popular protest and struggles for democracy and equality in Chile.Deborah Shaw, Professor of Film and Screen Studies, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2028062023-05-09T11:43:28Z2023-05-09T11:43:28ZAneurin Bevan’s writings still have lessons for contemporary politics – and far beyond the NHS<p>The NHS will turn 75 this year, a considerable legacy for the person responsible for <a href="https://theconversation.com/nhs-was-not-solely-modelled-on-a-welsh-workmens-medical-society-98024">establishing the service</a>, Aneurin Bevan. But Bevan’s political career encompassed far more than this one achievement. </p>
<p>When today’s politicians talk about Bevan’s values or principles, these references often do not go beyond his ambition to make the NHS free at the point of delivery. While this was essential to Bevan, there is a tendency to overlook his wider principles. And by only focusing on the NHS, we run the risk of oversimplifying a complex figure.</p>
<p>One way of uncovering Bevan’s wider political philosophy is to explore his voluminous writings in the socialist magazine, Tribune, for which he wrote more than 300 articles between 1937 and 1960. My new book, <a href="https://www.uwp.co.uk/book/this-is-my-truth/">This Is My Truth: Aneurin Bevan in Tribune</a>, includes 72 of these articles. It provides an opportunity to delve deeper into Bevan’s philosophy and to critically engage with his ideas and their relevance to contemporary politics.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/an-end-to-want-disease-ignorance-squalor-and-idleness-why-the-beveridge-report-flew-off-the-shelves-in-1942-88097">An end to 'want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness': why the Beveridge report flew off the shelves in 1942</a>
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<p>In his writings, Bevan voiced his belief in parliamentary democracy, his critique of capitalism and his reflections on class conflict. Bevan saw capitalism as a system of “crystal gazing” based on “gambling and speculation”, with pernicious effects that led to class conflict pervading all forms of political debate. For Bevan, “the class struggle is the underlying motif of politics”.</p>
<p>In waging class conflict, Bevan believed that parliament was “one of the weapons of the general interest” in the “struggle between the sectional and the general interest or between Property and the People, which is endemic in capitalist society”. He insisted that the “more effectively Parliament asserts the general against the sectional interest the more bitter grows the conflict between the People and Property”.</p>
<p>Bevan was often at loggerheads with the Labour leadership over the extent to which parliament could (or should) seek to achieve radical change. As shown by the articles in the collection, Bevan used the pages of Tribune to state his case during <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=tnvHk8g1crUC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_book_other_versions_r&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false">Labour’s ideological disputes</a>, particularly after 1951, when the party entered opposition and began a period of soul searching. He used Tribune to vent his frustrations at those in Labour whom he accused of failing to pursue socialist policies with enough vigour.</p>
<p>Beyond domestic politics, the collection demonstrates Bevan’s ambition to apply his principles of democratic socialism to the international arena. To achieve peace and foster international cooperation, Bevan argued that the “institutions of peace must be strengthened and clothed with power and dignity”. </p>
<p>He also insisted that large countries needed to put their war machines in reverse and reallocate that money to economically poorer nations in the hopes of waging a “resolute attack on world poverty”.</p>
<h2>Bevan today</h2>
<p>Although the world has moved on significantly since Bevan’s time, many of the issues he grappled with remain relevant today. In the UK, politicians, activists and the public are still debating Labour’s ideological positioning, the ability of parliament to achieve radical change and the correct role for the state in the economy. In international politics, the world is still ravaged by war, power politics and global poverty.</p>
<p>It is important to be careful, however, when trying to interpret the works of historical figures. There is a tendency to pick and choose the elements that fit particular narratives while ignoring those that do not. Bevan is not immune to criticism. Insisting on the need to re-engage with his writing does not mean that he was correct or that he has all of the answers to our current situation.</p>
<p>But it is crucial to return to figures like Bevan in greater detail and to critically engage with their ideas. By doing so, we might find lessons that are relevant today, and avoid reducing significant political figures to snappy one-liners and quotable lines.</p>
<h2>The role of the past</h2>
<p>When reflecting on Labour’s election defeat in 1955, Bevan wrote that youth “does not build its case on the memory of the old”. He reminded readers that “communal memories are overlaid by a new situation and their influence grows ever more remote and vague”. Therefore, as time goes by, those memories “were not sufficient in themselves to form the basis of mass appeal”.</p>
<p>Bevan’s words can be read as a reminder of the enduring legacy of the past. They are also a warning against nostalgia and uncritically relying on old ideas. Instead, we must learn from them. </p>
<p>As we commemorate the 75th anniversary of the NHS and remember Aneurin Bevan’s role in its founding, his work for Tribune allows us to engage with his wider political philosophy and reflect on it in the light of contemporary politics.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202806/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nye Davies does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new book analyses the Labour politician’s prolific political writing.Nye Davies, Lecturer at School of Law and Politics, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2030272023-04-18T12:43:50Z2023-04-18T12:43:50ZThe presidential campaign of Convict 9653<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520530/original/file-20230412-28-gtwh6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C5%2C3949%2C2883&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Eugene Debs, center, imprisoned at the Atlanta Federal Prison, was notified of his nomination for the presidency on the socialist ticket by a delegation of leading socialists who came from New York to Atlanta.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/for-the-first-time-in-history-a-candidate-for-president-has-news-photo/530858130?adppopup=true">George Rinhart/Corbis via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>On April 4, 2023, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg announced the indictment of former president and current presidential candidate Donald Trump on <a href="https://manhattanda.org/district-attorney-bragg-announces-34-count-felony-indictment-of-former-president-donald-j-trump/">34 felony charges</a> related to alleged crimes involving bookkeeping on a 7-year-old hush money payment to an adult film actress.</p>
<p>Trump is unlikely to wind up in an orange jumpsuit, at least not on this indictment, and probably not before November 2024, in any case. Yet if he does, he would not be the first candidate to run for the White House from the Big House. </p>
<p>In the election of 1920, Eugene V. Debs, the Socialist Party presidential candidate, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eugene-V-Debs">polled nearly a million votes</a> without ever hitting the campaign trail. </p>
<p>Debs was behind bars in the federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia, serving a <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/fiery-socialist-challenged-nations-role-wwi-180969386/">10-year sentence for sedition</a>. It was a not a bum rap. Debs had defiantly disobeyed a law he deemed unjust, <a href="https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1239/sedition-act-of-1918">the Sedition Act of 1918</a>. </p>
<p>The act was an anti-free speech measure passed <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/historic-document-library/detail/espionage-act-of-1917-and-sedition-act-of-1918-1917-1918">at the behest of President Woodrow Wilson</a>. The law made it <a href="https://govtrackus.s3.amazonaws.com/legislink/pdf/stat/40/STATUTE-40-Pg553.pdf">illegal for a U.S. citizen</a> to “willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the United States government” or to discourage compliance with the draft or voluntary enlistment into the military.</p>
<p>By the time he was imprisoned for sedition, Eugene Victor Debs had enjoyed a lifetime of running afoul of government authority. <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eugene-V-Debs">Born in 1855</a> into bourgeois comfort in Terre Haute, Indiana, he worked as a clerk and a grocer before joining the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen in 1875 and finding his vocation as an <a href="https://debsfoundation.org/index.php/landing/debs-biography/">advocate for labor</a>. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A balding man's profile illustrating an old newspaper article headlined 'There will be work for all and wealth for all willing to work for it.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520533/original/file-20230412-18-1i8t9k.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Eugene Debs ran for president five times, including in 1904, when he wrote this column for The Spokane Press.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88085947/1904-10-26/ed-1/seq-3/">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<h2>Representing American socialism</h2>
<p>For the next 30 years, Debs was the <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/18/eugene-v-debs-and-the-endurance-of-socialism">face of socialism in America</a>. He <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eugene-V-Debs">ran for president four times</a>, in 1900, 1904, 1908 and 1912, garnering around a million votes in the last cycle.</p>
<p>“The Republican, Democratic, and Progressive Parties are but branches of the same capitalistic tree,” <a href="https://ehistory.osu.edu/exhibitions/1912/content/SocialistParty">he told a cheering mass of people</a> in Madison Square Garden during the 1912 campaign. “They all stand for wage slavery.” </p>
<p>In 1916, he opted to <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eugene-V-Debs">seek a seat in Congress</a> and deferred to socialist <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Allan-L-Benson">journalist Allan L. Benson</a> to head the party’s ticket. Both lost.</p>
<p>In April 1917, when America joined World War I’s bloodbath in Europe, Debs became a fierce opponent of American involvement in what he saw as a death cult orchestrated by rapacious munitions manufacturers. On May 21, 1918, wary of a small but energized and eloquent anti-war movement, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/jsch.12219">Wilson signed the Sedition Act into law</a>. </p>
<p>Debs would not be muzzled. One June 18, 1918, in an address in Canton, Ohio, <a href="https://newspapers.library.in.gov/cgi-bin/indiana?a=d&d=RPD19180701.1.11&srpos=2&e=01-07-1918-01-07-1918--en-20--1--txt-txIN-%22Eugene+V.+Debs%22------">he declared that</a> American boys were “fit for something better than for cannon fodder.” </p>
<p>In short order, he was arrested and convicted of violating the Sedition Act. At his sentencing, he told the judge he would not retract a word of his speech even if it meant he would spend the rest of his life behind bars. “I ask for no mercy, <a href="https://www.cantondailyledger.com/story/opinion/columns/2018/07/02/eugene-debs-recalled-as-free/11615035007/">plead for no immunity</a>,” he declared. After a brief stint in the West Virginia Federal Penitentiary, he was sent to serve out his sentence at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.</p>
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<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Last-minute pre-election campaigning on Debs’ behalf by the Socialist Party is described in the New York Tribune of October 27, 1920.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn83030214/1920-10-27/ed-1/?sp=2&q=Socialist+Party+1920&st=image&r=0.205,-0.077,0.823,0.351,0">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Imprisonment only enhanced Debs’ status with his followers. On May 13, 1920, at its national convention in New York, the Socialist Party unanimously nominated “Convict 2253” as its standard bearer for the presidency. Debs was later given new digits, so the campaign buttons read “For President, Convict No. 9653.”</p>
<p>As Debs’ name was entered into nomination, a wave of emotion swept over the delegates, who cheered for 30 minutes before bursting into a rousing chorus of the “Internationale,” <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1920/05/14/96891587.html?pageNumber=3">the communist anthem</a>. </p>
<h2>A ‘front cell’ campaign</h2>
<p>Debs’ opponents both were better funded and enjoyed freedom of movement: They were <a href="https://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/elections/election1920.html">Warren G. Harding, the GOP junior senator from Ohio, and James M. Cox</a>, governor of Ohio, for the Democrats. </p>
<p>Yet Debs did not let incarceration keep his message from the voters. In a wry response to <a href="https://millercenter.org/president/harding/campaigns-and-elections">Harding’s “front porch” campaign</a> style, in which the Republican candidate received visits from the front porch of his home in Marion, Ohio, the Socialist Party announced that its candidate would conduct <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1920/07/11/issue.html">a “front cell” campaign</a> from Atlanta. </p>
<p>In 1920, broadcast radio was not a factor in electioneering, but another electronic medium was just beginning to be exploited for political messaging. On May 29, 1920, in a carefully choreographed event, newsreel cameras filmed a delegation from the Socialist Party arriving at the Atlanta penitentiary to inform Debs officially of his nomination. The intertitles of the silent screen described “the most unusual scene in the political history of America – Debs, serving a ten-year term for ‘seditious activities,’ accepts Socialist nomination for Presidency.” </p>
<p>After accepting “a floral tribute from Socialist women voters,” the “Moving Picture Weekly” reported, the denim-clad <a href="https://ia801302.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookReaderImages.php?id=movingpicturewe1014movi_1&itemPath=%2F0%2Fitems%2Fmovingpicturewe1014movi_1&server=ia801302.us.archive.org&page=leaf000474">Debs was shown giving</a> “a final affectionate farewell” before heading “back to the prison cell for nine years longer.” </p>
<p>At motion picture theaters across the nation, audiences watched the staged ritual and, depending on their party registration, reacted with cheers or hisses. </p>
<p>The New York Times was aghast that a felon might canvass for votes from the motion picture screen. </p>
<p>“Under the influence of this unreasoning mob psychology, the acknowledged criminal is nightly applauded as loudly as many of the candidates for the Presidency who have won their honorable eminence by great and unflagging service to the American people,” <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1920/06/12/98297951.html?pageNumber=14">read an editorial from June 12, 1920</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A vintage telegram regarding President Harding's commutation of Eugene Debs' sentence." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/520537/original/file-20230412-16-nukmwa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">One year after the election of 1920, President Harding commuted Debs’ sentence and he was released from prison on Christmas Day, 1921.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.loc.gov/item/2002697246/">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Public opinion turns</h2>
<p>On Nov. 2, 1920, when <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/United-States-presidential-election-of-1920">the election results came in</a>, Harding had trounced his Democratic opponent by a record electoral majority, 404 electoral votes to Cox’s 127, with 60.4% of the popular vote to Cox’s 34.1%. Debs was a distant third, but he had won 3.4% of the electorate – 913,693 votes. Debs’ personal best showing was in the presidential election of 1912, with 6% of the vote. To be fair, that was when he was more mobile.</p>
<p>Even with the Great War over and the Sedition Act repealed by a repentant U.S. Congress on Dec. 13, 1920, President <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1921/02/01/archives/wilson-refuses-to-pardon-debs-rejects-palmers-recommendation-to.html">Wilson, during his final months in office, steadfastly refused</a> to grant Debs a pardon. But public opinion had turned emphatically in favor of the convict-candidate. President Harding, who took office in March 1921, finally <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/01/06/warren-harding-eugene-debs/">commuted his sentence</a>, effective on Christmas Day, 1921, along with that of 23 other Great War prisoners of conscience convicted under the Sedition Act.</p>
<p>As Debs exited the prison gates, his <a href="https://www.newspapers.com/image/471549359/?terms=%22Debs%22%20%22cameras%22%20&match=1">fellow inmates cheered</a>. He raised his hat in one hand, his cane in the other, and waved back at them. Outside, the newsreel cameras were waiting to greet him.</p>
<p>It was the kind of photo op that Donald Trump might relish.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203027/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Thomas Doherty does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Can you run for president from a prison cell? One man did in the 1920 election and got almost a million votes.Thomas Doherty, Professor of American Studies, Brandeis UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1925202023-01-24T13:05:54Z2023-01-24T13:05:54ZGhana’s Nkrumahist parties keep splitting - a threat to their strength in the 2024 election<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506301/original/file-20230125-16-ace5r6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kwame Nkrumah's political legacy is struggling to stay afloat in Ghana.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons/Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Political parties are not always completely united, as most classical political scientists argue. Dissenting opinions and the scramble for party apparatus tend to trigger internal schisms and factions. If these aren’t managed well, parties can split. A notable example is the recent emergence of splinter parties from the <a href="https://www.swp-berlin.org/en/publication/new-political-parties-and-the-reconfiguration-of-turkeys-political-landscape">Justice and Development Party</a> in Turkey.</p>
<p>In Ghana, all three of the country’s main political traditions have experienced internal conflicts and sometimes party splits. The <a href="https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/features/The-Danquah-Dombo-Busia-Tradition-179601">Danquah-Busia-Dombo</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/ghanas-small-political-parties-have-found-a-way-to-stay-afloat-124810">Nkrumahist</a> and <a href="https://asq.africa.ufl.edu/tag/provisional-national-defense-council-pndc/">Provisional National Defence Council/Rawlings traditions</a> differ in terms of ideology. The Provisional National Defence Council/Rawlings tradition subscribes to social democracy while the Danquah-Busiasts hold property-owning democratic ideals. The Nkrumahist group is known for socialist beliefs grounded in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/44484206#metadata_info_tab_contents">Nkrumahism</a> – the philosophy of Ghana’s first president, Kwame Nkrumah. This tradition focuses on self-reliance and pan-Africanism, and abhors neocolonialism. </p>
<p>The broad traditions have endured since the 1940s, but the parties within them are susceptible to conflicts. </p>
<p>My <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10220461.2022.2127870">research</a> explored the possible reasons for factions and schisms in the Nkrumahist parties. I focused on the <a href="https://asq.africa.ufl.edu/tag/provisional-national-defense-council-pndc/">Convention People’s Party</a> and the <a href="https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/republic/pnc.php">People’s National Convention</a> and interviewed present and past party technocrats, academics and media practitioners. I also reviewed the literature on intra-party conflict, factionalism and fragmentation in Ghana.</p>
<p>The breaking up of parties affects their electoral fortunes. Political party fragmentation often culminates in elite disarray and cynicism among voters.</p>
<h2>Party schisms in Ghana</h2>
<p>The first account of intra-party squabbles and splintering in Ghana occurred in 1949. This was when Nkrumah and some members of the United Gold Coast Convention youth wing <a href="https://www.cegastacademy.com/2020/11/18/6-reasons-why-nkrumah-broke-away-from-the-ugcc/">rebelled</a> to form the Convention Peoples Party. It marked the birth of the Nkrumahist tradition in Ghana. </p>
<p>The tradition has had the most splinter parties in Ghana over the years. The People’s National Convention, National Independence Party, Peoples’ Heritage Party and National Convention Party emerged in 1992. The Progressive People’s Party was formed in 2012 and the All People’s Congress in 2016. </p>
<p>The Danquah-Busia tradition has also experienced some splits. The most devastating one <a href="https://d-nb.info/1201276179/34">occurred ahead of the 1979 elections</a>. The tradition, which had just recovered from a coup in 1972, divided into two feuding groups and ultimately two parties emerged: the Popular Front Party and the United National Convention. </p>
<p>Disagreements within the Provisional National Defence Council/Rawlings-inspired National Democratic Congress resulted in splinter parties like the National Reform Party in 1992, Democratic Freedom Party in 2006 and National Democratic Party in 2012.</p>
<p>Despite the divisive tendencies within the National Democratic Party and the New Patriotic Party, they have managed the problems in order to sustain their dominance of Ghanaian politics. However, the Convention Peoples Party and the People’s National Convention have failed to manage theirs.</p>
<h2>Diagnosis of the problem</h2>
<p>I found three major factors that help explain the instability within the Nkrumahist tradition. </p>
<p>First, there is evidence of a personality cult, especially among the “old guard”. These are individuals who have been described as gatekeepers and have personalised the party apparatus. <a href="https://www.modernghana.com/news/671143/why-i-resigned-from-cpp-dr-abu-sakara.html">Foster Abu Sakara</a>, the 2012 presidential candidate of Convention Peoples Party, cited this as a reason for his resignation from the party in 2016. </p>
<p>Second, political opportunism and patronage by some leading party members worsens the schisms. For instance, political personalities like Edward Nasigiri Mahama and Bernard Mornah of the People’s National Convention have benefited through <a href="https://www.graphic.com.gh/news/politics/ghana-news-appointment-of-ambassador-at-large-killing-pnc-mornah.html">political appointments</a> from two major parties in Ghana. <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/200601180216.html">Kwabena Duffour </a>and <a href="https://ghanaguardian.com/freddie-blay-renounces-cpp-says-he-is-the-joseph-of-npp">Freddie Blay</a> of the Convention Peoples Party have defected to the National Democratic Party and the New Patriotic Party respectively. The 2012 presidential candidate of the People’s National Convention, Hassan Ayariga, is believed to have defected to <a href="https://www.graphic.com.gh/news/politics/hassan-ayariga-forms-all-people-s-congress.html">form</a> the All People’s Congress because he was <a href="https://www.peacefmonline.com/pages/politics/politics/201211/147231.php">accused</a> of having close relations with the National Democratic Congress.</p>
<p>Finally, I found that ethnocentrism has stalled unity talks between the People’s National Convention and the Convention Peoples Party in the past. <a href="https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199766567/obo-9780199766567-0045.xml">Ethnocentrism</a> is when an individual views the world from the perspective of his or her own ethnic group.
In that regard, the People’s National Convention was viewed as a party with restrictive membership to the northern regions of Ghana without any strong appeal to other parts of Ghana. Hence, in coalitions, the Convention Peoples Party has projected itself as true Nkrumahists, labelling the People’s National Convention as just an offshoot, as a strategy to lead the coalition.</p>
<h2>Ghana’s 2024 general elections</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.modernghana.com/news/975755/are-ghanaians-really-tired-of-npp-and-ndc-are.html">Public debates</a> ahead of the 2020 general elections – and currently – suggest that voters are somewhat tired of the three-decade two-horse race between the National Democratic Congress and the New Patriotic Party. With barely two years to Ghana’s 2024 general elections, <a href="https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/features/The-third-force-needed-to-win-the-2024-election-has-been-divided-1518095">the call for a third force</a> is audible. But its feasibility keeps waning. The recurrent bickering and fragmentation within the Nkrumahist parties raises doubts as to whether they can rise to the call by Ghana’s electorate. </p>
<p>I recommend that leaders of all Nkrumahist groups reconsider merger talks so as to form a united front. Second, leaders should focus on building effective and robust structures, rather than political patronage. Finally, Nkrumahists must adopt pragmatic political strategies to appeal to all sections of Ghana’s electorate.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/192520/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Baffour Agyeman Prempeh Boakye does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The recurrent bickering and fragmentation within the Nkrumahist parties raises doubt as to whether they can rise to the call by Ghanaian electorate.Baffour Agyeman Prempeh Boakye, PhD Student, University of DelawareLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1847112022-08-05T12:18:17Z2022-08-05T12:18:17ZWhat is neoliberalism? A political scientist explains the use and evolution of the term<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/477260/original/file-20220802-11521-fi7yh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=101%2C39%2C2787%2C1809&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Ronald Reagan, shown here speaking in Moscow in 1980, was an early adopter of neoliberalism in the U.S. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-ronald-reagan-speaks-at-the-spaso-house-may-30-news-photo/849177?adppopup=true">Dirck Halstead/Liaison</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Neoliberalism is a complex concept that many people use – and overuse – in different and often conflicting ways. </p>
<p>So, what is it, really? </p>
<p><a href="https://dornsife.usc.edu/cf/faculty-and-staff/faculty.cfm?pid=1008310">When discussing neoliberalism with my students</a> at the University of Southern California, I explain the phenomenon’s origins in political thought, its ambitious claims of promoting liberty and its problematic global track record. </p>
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<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>‘Markets work; governments don’t’</h2>
<p><a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/neoliberalism/">Neoliberalism contends</a> that markets allocate scarce resources, promote efficient growth and secure individual liberty better than governments. </p>
<p>According to the progressive journalist <a href="https://prospect.org/economy/neoliberalism-political-success-economic-failure/">Robert Kuttner</a>, the “basic argument of neoliberalism can fit on a bumper sticker. Markets work; governments don’t.” </p>
<p>From such a perspective, government represents bureaucratic bloat and political imposition. Government is wasteful. The verve of capitalism, along with a limited democratic politics, is neoliberalism’s balm for all that ails humankind.</p>
<p>Completing his bumper-sticker mantra, Kuttner continues, “there are two corollaries: Markets embody human freedom. And with markets, people basically get what they deserve; to alter market outcomes is to spoil the poor and punish the productive.”</p>
<h2>Evolution of neoliberalism</h2>
<p>The moniker “neoliberalism” was coined by Austrian economists Friedrich von Hayek and Ludwig Von Mises in 1938. Each elaborated his own version of the notion in 1944 books: “<a href="https://mises.org/library/road-serfdom-0">The Road to Serfdom</a>” and “<a href="https://mises.org/library/bureaucracy">Bureaucracy</a>,” respectively. </p>
<p>Neoliberalism ran contrary to the prevailing economic strategies promoted by <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/collected-writings-of-john-maynard-keynes/oclc/971381838">John Maynard Keynes</a>, <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2014/09/basics.htm">which encourage governments to stimulate economic demand</a>. It was the opposite of big-government socialism, <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/socialism/">whether in its Soviet manifestation or its European Social Democratic version</a>. Neoliberalism’s proponents embraced <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/neoliberalism/">classical liberal principles such as laissez-faire</a> – the policy of not intervening in markets.</p>
<p>By the 1970s, Keynesian policies were faltering. Hayek’s organization, the <a href="https://www.montpelerin.org/event/429dba23-fc64-4838-aea3-b847011022a4/summary">Mont Pelerin Society</a>, had drawn wealthy European and American benefactors to its ranks and funded <a href="https://prospect.org/economy/neoliberalism-political-success-economic-failure/">powerful think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Cato Institute</a>. These groups refined neoliberalism’s message, making it a viable and attractive ideology. </p>
<p>By the 1980s, neoliberalism had gained ascendancy with <a href="https://history.jhu.edu/faculty-books/the-great-persuasion-reinventing-free-markets-since-the-depression/">Republicans such as president Ronald Reagan</a>. High-ranking officials in the Democratic presidential administrations of <a href="https://prospect.org/economy/neoliberalism-political-success-economic-failure/">Jimmy Carter</a> and, later, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/05/books/review/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-neoliberal-order-gary-gerstle.html">Bill Clinton</a> also embraced neoliberalism. </p>
<p>Neoliberalism was also championed by conservatives like British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot">international institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund</a>. </p>
<p>But deregulating free markets had some unfortunate political consequences. It promoted <a href="https://doi.org/10.4000/regulation.7729">financial and labor crises in the U.S. and U.K. </a> and exacerbated <a href="https://doi.org/10.4000/regulation.7729">poverty and political instability</a>. The crisis was felt from the Global South to the U.S. Northwest, manifesting in the anti-World Trade Organization protests often referred to as the <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/oureconomy/battle-seattle-20-years-later-its-time-revival/">“The Battle of Seattle.”</a> To critics like <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/whats-neoliberal-do/">Frantz Fanon</a> and <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/40603">David Harvey</a>, neoliberalism is more akin to neoimperialism or neocolonialism. Basically, they contend, it achieves old ends – exploiting the global working class – through new means.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Mural with 'neoliberalismo' written in light-gray text and 'solidaridad' written below it in bigger, red text." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476959/original/file-20220801-33954-bmrgfx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A mural in Havana, Cuba, promoting ‘solidarity’ over ‘neoliberalism.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">A. Kammas</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This critique fuels <a href="https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/neoliberalism-against-democracy-wendy-browns-in-the-ruins-of-neoliberalism-and-the-specter-of-fascism/">another argument</a>: that neoliberalism harbors <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/in-the-ruins-of-neoliberalism/9780231193856">anti-democratic sentiments</a>. What if citizens prefer government regulation and oversight? History demonstrates that neoliberal stalwarts would still <a href="https://jacobin.com/2021/06/neoliberalism-democracy-populist-right">push market orthodoxy over popular opinion</a>.</p>
<p>An extreme example of this was Hayek’s support of the repressive Pinochet regime in Chile. Augusto Pinochet toppled the popular socialist government of Salvador Allende in 1973. Pinochet was <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB110/index.htm">cautiously welcomed by the Nixon administration</a> and looked upon <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-01-02-me-1475-story.html">favorably by both Reagan</a> and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-oct-07-mn-19796-story.html">Thatcher</a>. In their view, Pinochet’s commitment to neoliberalism trumped his anti-democratic character.</p>
<p>This history helps explain the election last year of Gabriel Boric, Chile’s 36-year-old president. Boric <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/06/13/can-chiles-young-president-reimagine-the-latin-american-left">ran on an agenda for profound change</a> following a period of turmoil over Pinochet-era policies. His campaign slogan was “If Chile was the cradle of neoliberalism, it will also be its grave.”</p>
<h2>A flawed, contradictory ideology</h2>
<p>Beginning in the 1980s and for a long time after, neoliberalism for many Americans conjured individual liberty, consumer sovereignty and corporate efficiency. Many Democrats and Republicans alike championed it to justify their policies and attract voters. </p>
<p>But, in my opinion, that was only the popular façade of a deeply flawed ideology.</p>
<p>One need only consider the consequences of U.S. bank deregulation after <a href="https://www.economist.com/special-report/2017/05/04/how-the-2007-08-crisis-unfolded">the global financial crisis of 2008</a> to see what happens <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/a-guide-to-the-financial-crisis--10-years-later/2018/09/10/114b76ba-af10-11e8-a20b-5f4f84429666_story.html">when government allows markets to run themselves</a>. Key American <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2019/12/13/two-recessions-two-recoveries-2/">economic indicators</a> like class inequality also tell the grim story of unchecked markets.</p>
<p>For many Americans, however, the <a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/30/evolution-and-the-american-myth-of-the-individual/">mythology</a> of <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/misconception-of-individual-liberty-letters-to-the-editor-1419984888">individual liberty</a> remains strong. U.S. politicians who hint of curtailing it – by, say, proposing more regulations or increased social expenditures – are often branded “<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulroderickgregory/2012/01/22/is-president-obama-truly-a-socialist/">socialist</a>.”</p>
<p>Ultimately, neoliberalism was a child of its time. It’s a grand narrative born of the Cold War era, claiming to have the solution to society’s ills through the power of capitalist markets and government deregulation. </p>
<p>There is no shortage of articles showing that it has not delivered on its promise. Arguably, it has <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/05/14/is-capitalism-a-threat-to-democracy">made matters worse</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184711/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anthony Kammas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The word ‘neoliberal’ gets thrown around a lot, often with differing and even contradictory meanings. Here, a political economist explains the origins and evolution of this complex concept.Anthony Kammas, Associate Professor (Teaching) of Political Science, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and SciencesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1876602022-08-04T07:26:04Z2022-08-04T07:26:04ZRacism in South Africa: why the ANC has failed to dismantle patterns of white privilege<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476919/original/file-20220801-77700-t3rcsj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">ANC leaders led by Cyril Ramaphosa cut a giant cake to mark the ANC's 110th birthday in January.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Phill Magakoe/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>One of the sources of social discontent in post-apartheid South Africa is the legacy of white racism. This toxic legacy is evident in racialised poverty and inequality. </p>
<p>It is a <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/719876">historical fact</a> that the economic prosperity of whites in South Africa is based on the racist exploitation and impoverishment of blacks. </p>
<p>The long <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/719876">history</a> of racism enabled white South Africans to enjoy one of the highest standards of living in the world by the 1970s. In his new book, titled <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=31759">Can We Unlearn Racism?</a>, Jacob R Boersema, a New York University academic, shows that by the 21st century white South Africans’ “lifetime work-related earnings on average are four times higher than for Africans”. </p>
<p>Add to this <a href="https://www.statecapture.org.za/">corruption</a>, rampant <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/minister-bheki-cele-release-quarter-four-crime-statistics-202122-3-jun-2022-0000">crime</a>, frightening levels of <a href="https://theconversation.com/change-what-south-african-men-think-of-women-to-combat-their-violent-behaviour-167921">gender based violence</a> and <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2020-08-18-south-africas-profound-institutional-failure/">failing political institutions</a>: the outcome is a social horror show that produces misery for millions of black people. This is what former president Thabo Mbeki was referring to in his <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2022-07-22-thabo-mbeki-slams-anc-for-failing-on-unemployment-poverty-inequality/">recent scathing critique</a> of the governing African National Congress (ANC).</p>
<p>Mbeki also criticised the party for not being able to organise a racially diverse audience for the memorial service of the late ANC deputy secretary general <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jessie-yasmin-duarte">Jessie Duarte</a>. That, he said, showed that the ANC had failed to embody its fundamental value of <a href="https://repository.uwc.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10566/5829/Non%20racialism%20and%20the%20African%20National%20Congress%20views%20from%20the%20branch.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">non-racialism</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pandemic-underscores-gross-inequalities-in-south-africa-and-the-need-to-fix-them-135070">Pandemic underscores gross inequalities in South Africa, and the need to fix them</a>
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<p>Mbeki’s thinking reveals deep confusion about “race”, racism, diversity and non-racialism. He falsely assumes that diversity means harmony. </p>
<p>Non-racialism is one of the unexamined dogmas of the ANC. It has its roots in the politics of Christian humanism that inspired the formation of the party in 1912. That humanism regarded Christianity as transcending race by offering <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Rise-African-Nationalism-South-Africa/dp/0520018109">“an ultimate goal of inter-racial harmony based on the brotherhood of man”</a>. </p>
<p>Whatever solidarity there was between different racial groups in political structures like the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/significance-congress-people-and-freedom-charter">Congress Alliance</a> – which drew up the ANC’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-legacy-of-south-africas-freedom-charter-60-years-later-43647">“Freedom Charter”</a> in 1955 – did not translate to the social world outside politics. </p>
<p>The world outside politics was defined by racial segregation. That has not changed much. Apart from the workplace and in schools, ordinary blacks and whites continue to live <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-johannesburgs-suburban-elites-maintain-apartheid-inequities-169295">racially segregated lives</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-south-africas-white-liberals-dodge-honest-debates-about-race-127846">How South Africa's white liberals dodge honest debates about race</a>
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<p>The ANC, since its formation, has been ideologically trapped in the 19th century black Cape politics of Victorian liberalism – which advocated for loyalty to the British Crown. This resulted in blacks making moral appeals to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/274742">white benevolence</a> for justice and freedom, instead of making political demands. The ANC has never fully understood how white racism functions.</p>
<h2>The history</h2>
<p>The ANC’s establishment in 1912 was driven by an ideological blending of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Rise-African-Nationalism-South-Africa/dp/0520018109">British liberalism and a Christian vision of non-racialism</a>. This equipped it poorly to respond to and make sense of racism and modern South Africa. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Men and women give the thumbs up sign from inside a train coach reserved for whites only in 1952, during apartheid. A sign on the train says 'Europeans only'." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C0%2C528%2C390&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=557&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=557&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476916/original/file-20220801-24-eadx6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=557&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Black commuters defiantly board a train reserved for whites during apartheid in 1952.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Bettman via Getty Images</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>For most of the early 20th century, the ANC thought it could defeat racism by appealing to Britain’s sense of common justice. In his presidential address to the South African Native Congress (now ANC) in 1912 – which was published in the Christian Express, the Christian missionary journal published by the Lovedale Press – <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/john-langalibalele-dube">Reverend John Dube</a> <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1arfjVg421EBuXh6iMRiWwC7e1-ouGFcn/view?usp=sharing">encouraged</a> black people to show “deep and dutiful respect for the rulers whom God has placed over us” because the</p>
<blockquote>
<p>sense of common justice and love of freedom so innate in the British character (would) ultimately triumph over all other baser tendencies to colour prejudice and class tyranny.</p>
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<p>Consequently, from its formation to the 1950s, when its leaders were subjected to government bans, the ANC failed to win a single political victory over white racism, as <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520039339/black-power-in-south-africa">historians</a> have pointed out.</p>
<p>From the 1950s, it moved away from <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24738360">“black Victorianism”</a> and incorporated a Pan-Africanist worldview, as well as Das Kapital – Karl Marx’s critique of capitalism. The Marxists in the ANC argued that the aim of the struggle was to overthrow capitalism, which they saw <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520039339/black-power-in-south-africa">in terms of class rather than race</a>.</p>
<p>Black people thus focused their hostility on the apartheid government, and <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520039339/black-power-in-south-africa">“never on whites as such”</a>. Black people who dared to use race as an analytical category were eventually purged from the ANC. </p>
<p>By the turn of this century the ANC had rid itself of British liberalism and Christian politics. But it remained committed to the idea of non-racialism.
And it has <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237800101_The_ANC_black_capitalism_in_South_Africa">embraced capitalism </a> – in particular the capitalism entrenched in South Africa by white people.</p>
<p>There are three consequences.</p>
<p>Firstly, the ANC is an intellectually impoverished organisation that rewards incompetence and greed, and encourages individuals to strive to be the king of the rubbish pile. </p>
<p>Secondly, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gangster-State-Unravelling-Magashules-Pieter-Louis/dp/1776093747">corruption</a> and blatant disregard for the <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2022-06-03-crime-crisis-continues-in-first-quarter-of-2022-with-women-and-children-worst-affected/">law</a> have achieved ambient levels. </p>
<p>Thirdly, South Africa is dysfunctional and <a href="https://www.opensaldru.uct.ac.za/handle/11090/900">social cohesion</a> has broken down.</p>
<h2>Failure of non-racialism</h2>
<p>Mbeki is one of the few ANC politicians <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PpZlvfSP_A">to admit publicly</a> that non-racialism has failed to unite South Africans. The black intellectual ecosystem has yet to develop a compelling analysis of the relationship between white wealth and black poverty. </p>
<p>The white narrative that <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01419870.2021.1878251?src=recsys">blames the black elite</a> for the persistence of <a href="https://www.da.org.za/2018/08/das-position-on-economic-empowerment">racialised inequality</a> erases white racism from post-apartheid South Africa. </p>
<p>According to <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/publications/Report-03-10-19/Report-03-10-192017.pdf?_ga=2.14935350.1863706996.1659349869-103406588.1655989340#page=59">Statistics South Africa</a>: </p>
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<p>The labour market experiences of different population groups in South Africa continue to diverge substantially, and still reflect the strongly persistent legacies of apartheid policies … Thus, black African unemployment rates are between four and five times as high as they are amongst whites.</p>
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<p>The black middle class remains largely an academic construct. It consists of a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1750481317745750">mere 4.2 million</a> people whereas blacks make up 80% of the population of <a href="https://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=15601">60 million</a>. <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/scis/publications/working-papers/">Research</a> shows no sign of a decrease in racialised wealth inequality since apartheid.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-pro-poor-policies-on-their-own-wont-shift-inequality-in-south-africa-117430">Why 'pro-poor' policies on their own won't shift inequality in South Africa</a>
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<p>The ANC’s failures mean that the vast majority of black people are trapped in poverty, with few prospects of escaping.</p>
<p>Thabo Mbeki is right to be worried. And it is not only the ANC that does not have the solution to the country’s problems. </p>
<p>Until black people break from the ideological capture of non-racialism, the legacy of white racism will never be dislodged.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187660/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mandisi Majavu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Non-racialism is one of the unexamined dogmas of the governing ANC, which has never fully understood how white racism functions.Mandisi Majavu, Senior Lecturer, Department of Political and International Studies, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1744712022-01-10T15:48:43Z2022-01-10T15:48:43ZHistorian offers comprehensive and up-to-date take on South Africa’s Communist Party<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439822/original/file-20220107-33062-bo50di.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African President Cyril Ramaphosa addresses a meeting of the SACP in 2015. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS: Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Communist Party of South Africa was formed in July 1921. To mark its centenary last year, renowned South African historian Tom Lodge <a href="https://www.loot.co.za/product/tom-lodge-red-road-to-freedom/jssb-7247-ga90?referrer=googlemerchant&gclid=CjwKCAiA5t-OBhByEiwAhR-hm6OaW-KlOjRMByLvjvPZIQ1L1hYLP6oNj2xHlUqMgskisxFlC9cR5RoCBkUQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds">published</a> Red Road to Freedom: A history of the South African Communist Party, 1921-2021.</p>
<p>It’s a welcome addition to the literature on the oldest communist party in Africa.</p>
<p>Most of the existing literature on the Party is about its early history until 1950. Some of the books were written by party members such as <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/archive/eddie-roux-time-longer-rope-review">Eddie Roux</a>, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/archive/class-and-colour-south-africa-1850-1950-h-j-and-r-e-simons">Jack and Ray Simons</a>, and <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/bunting-brian/kotane/index.htm">Brian Bunting</a>. </p>
<p>In the last two decades, a number of publications on the Party or leading members appeared. <a href="https://jacana.co.za/author-2/eddy-maloka/">Eddy Maloka</a> wrote two publications, <a href="https://monthlyreview.org/press/alan-wieder-morning-talk/">Alan Wieder</a> concentrated on Joe Slovo and Ruth First, while <a href="http://ukznpress.bookslive.co.za/blog/2015/02/16/steven-friedman-explains-why-the-contribution-of-harold-wolpe-is-still-relevant-today-video/">Steven Friedman</a> concentrated on Harold Wolpe. Some (auto)biographical publications or memoirs also appeared in this period on <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1200391.Slovo">Joe Slovo</a>, Govan Mbeki, Chris Hani, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347815776_The_Fabric_of_Dissent_Public_Intellectuals_in_South_Africa">Mzala</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/anc-spy-bible-a-real-life-south-african-thriller-but-too-much-left-unsaid-134803">Moe Shaik</a> and <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Bram_Fischer.html?id=V4oFAQAAIAAJ&redir_esc=y">Bram Fisher</a>.</p>
<p>Most of the publications are chronologically organised and few take a thematic approach. Policy analysis and exegesis are in most instances largely absent. A good example is what the party meant by its notion of <a href="https://www.politicsweb.co.za/opinion/colonialism-of-a-special-type-lives-on">“colonialism of a special type”</a>. First formulated in 1950 and included in the party’s 1962 party programme, it remains a major ideological pillar of the party. </p>
<p>But its ideological and strategic implications aren’t explored. This includes explaining how the approach enabled a merger between socialism and liberatory nationalism, how it underscored the two-stage revolutionary strategy of a national democratic revolution followed by a socialist revolution, and for justifying the Tripartite Alliance between the party, the African National Congress and the trade union federation (first Sactu and later Cosatu).</p>
<p>Also largely absent is a history of the more recent developments, as well as a political analysis of the party’s role between 1960-1990 and as part of government since 1994. </p>
<p>Lodge’s book fills some of these gaps. It is therefore academically and historically very important. Eddy Maloka, also an author on the party’s history, assessed its value as follows (on the book cover):</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Tom Lodge takes us on a century-long tour of the history of the South African Communist Party, through the fractal coastline of this party’s ideological evolution, to the hinterland of its organisational dynamics and relations with other actors. </p>
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<h2>The Cold War</h2>
<p>The Communist Party of South Africa was <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/suppression-communism-act-no-44-1950-approved-parliament">banned in 1950</a> by the new National Party (NP) government, which believed that the Soviet Union’s support for it would exploit South Africa’s domestic politics for its own purposes. After the party reestablished itself underground as the South African Communist Party (SACP) in 1953, and after its ally, the African National Congress (ANC) was also banned by the apartheid regime in 1960, a close alliance between them developed. </p>
<p>After the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">Sharpeville massacre</a> in 1960, followed by the banning of the ANC and other liberation organisations, and when the NP government refused to convene a national convention in 1961, leaders in the party and a number of prominent ANC leaders (but not the ANC’s President Albert Luthuli) decided to establish an armed wing, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/umkhonto-wesizwe-mk">Umkhonto we Sizwe</a>. Its first sabotage acts were launched on 16 December 1961. </p>
<p>The resort to armed struggle and the party’s involvement in the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe, brought the two movements much closer together during their time in exile.</p>
<p>The members of Umkhonto we Sizwe’s High Command were arrested in 1962 in Rivonia, a Johannesburg suburb. They were busy with Operation Mayibuye as a blueprint to stage a revolutionary insurrection in South Africa. They included Party members such as Govan Mbeki, Raymond Mhlaba, Ahmed Kathrada and ANC leaders like Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu. They were charged with sabotage (and not treason) and therefore did not receive the death penalty but very long prison sentences.</p>
<p>If one looks at the Umkhonto we Sizwe accused in the Rivonia trial in 1963, most of them were also members of the Party.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two men field questions at a press conference while seated with their backs to Communist Party posters" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/440001/original/file-20220110-25-1lfyd7o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Former South African Communist Party leaders Joe Slovo, left, and Chris Hani in Soweto in 1991.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Walter Dhladhla /AFP via Getty Images</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>During most of the Cold War, the South African Communist Party’s close alignment to the Soviet Union and to the ANC, pulled the liberation struggle in South Africa into the global ideological camps of the Cold War, in the same way as the movements in Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and other liberation wars. In this respect, the South African Communist Party was often regarded as the power behind the ANC’s throne.</p>
<p>The 30 years in exile were divided between establishing bases in African countries, training Umkhonto we Sizwe mainly in Angola and establishing international relations with many continents. The Party’s main base was in London but with close relations especially in the Eastern bloc. Peace processes in Southwestern Africa and the demise of the Soviet Union as its main sponsor, created new opportunities for dialogue and radical political changes.</p>
<p>After its unbanning in 1990 together with the ANC, the relationship continued but its nature changed dramatically. The liberatory strategy changed from targeting the National Party government, to being the government itself. Party leaders became members of that government.</p>
<h2>What’s covered, and what’s not</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/tom-lodge-1256885">Tom Lodge</a> is a trained historian. Most of his early publications were good historiographies. He joined the University of the Witwatersrand’s Department of Political Studies and in the 1980s, and testified for the defence in several ANC trials. He published extensively on the ANC’s politics, and later also on elections.</p>
<p>This book is a return to his earlier works. In the more than 500 pages (excluding the end notes, index and bibliography) and in nine chapters, he presents the most extensive history of the South African Communist Party.</p>
<p>The first six chapters are focused on the period until 1950, and the last three chapters cover the last 70 years.</p>
<p>There are some areas and issues that could have done with more attention. For example, deeper political analysis of the latest 30 years after the Party was unbanned and decided to become a “mass party” as opposed to membership on invitation, as well as its role in the ANC governments. This would provide more insight into the party’s political approach.</p>
<p>In addition, the Party’s ideological evolution deserves special attention. For example, its 1962 party programme, “The Road to South African Freedom”, can be linked to the ANC’s Morogoro programme (1969), “The Strategy and Tactics of the South African Revolution”. The two documents created a common approach to their revolutionary strategy, which is very important for understanding their longstanding alliance. But Lodge only briefly discusses this on pages 354-355. </p>
<p>Another omission in my view, concerns Joe Slovo’s paper “Has Socialism Failed?” (1990). It is mentioned on page 457 but its implications for the party’s reassessment of its ideological position after the fall of the Berlin Wall were not considered. More recently, the Party has revised “The South African Road to Socialism” (2007, 2012) as its programme. It receives more attention than the other programmes on page 479 but it does not explain how a communist party in a multiparty democratic dispensation sets out a vision for itself.</p>
<p>Chapter 9 distinguishes itself from the others and presents a political analysis of the party dynamics, such as its choice to participate independently in elections. It includes brief references to the party’s milestones but a more in-depth discussion could have addressed the shortcomings of the older publications.</p>
<p>For readers who want a comprehensive, up-to-date and accessible publication on the South African Communist Party, this is without any doubt the best one. As a Wits academic, Lodge, who now is associated with Limerick University in Ireland, had many personal experiences with people and events discussed in this book. It was therefore not merely a research or academic exercise for him.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174471/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dirk Kotze does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The resort to armed struggle brought the Communist Party and the African National Congress much closer together during their time in exile.Dirk Kotze, Professor in Political Science, University of South AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1684822021-11-22T19:08:50Z2021-11-22T19:08:50ZLittle red children and ‘Grandpa Xi’: China’s school textbooks reflect the rise of Xi Jinping’s personality cult<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432329/original/file-20211117-17-8jltky.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/group-asian-elementary-school-children-one-591940196">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When students in China returned to classrooms in September 2021, they were provided with a <a href="https://mobile.twitter.com/lingli_vienna/status/1413865821319860224">new series of textbooks</a> outlining China’s president Xi Jinping, or “Grandpa Xi’s”, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/9/1/chinas-pupils-get-schooled-in-xi-jinping-thought">political philosophy</a>. </p>
<p>Each textbook on “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era”, as Xi’s political philosophy is officially called, is tailored to students at primary, secondary, and tertiary levels.</p>
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<p>“Xi Jinping Thought” was enshrined into the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) <a href="http://www.xinhuanet.com//english/2017-10/29/c_136713559.htm">Constitution</a> in 2017. Although the main stated aims are to remain committed to reform and build a “moderately prosperous society”, the <a href="https://journals.openedition.org/chinaperspectives/7872#bodyftn4">realities</a> of this political philosophy has been a tightening of party discipline and curtailing of social freedom. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/chinas-sixth-plenum-will-consolidate-xi-jinpings-power-and-chart-the-countrys-ambitions-for-the-next-5-years-171395">China's sixth plenum will consolidate Xi Jinping's power and chart the country's ambitions for the next 5 years</a>
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<p>While prior textbooks were focused on the CCP, the new versions centre on China’s paramount leader. In this way they reflect the growing personality cult of Xi Jinping, eerily reminiscent of the days of China’s founding father Mao Zedong.</p>
<h2>The rise of the personality cult</h2>
<p>According to China’s <a href="https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202108/25/WS61259859a310efa1bd66aea6.html">National Textbook Committee</a>, the </p>
<blockquote>
<p>textbooks reflect the will of the Communist Party of China and the nation and directly impact the direction and quality of talent cultivation.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In particular, the <a href="https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202108/25/WS61259859a310efa1bd66aea6.html">Committee</a> stated:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Primary schools should foster love and right understanding for the Party, country and socialism in students.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The <a href="https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/19thcpcnationalcongress/2017-10/12/content_33160115.htm">core socialist values</a> highlighted in the textbooks include prosperity, patriotism and friendship. </p>
<p>Targeted at children, the moniker of “Grandpa Xi” is part of the ongoing strategy towards creating a personality cult in China. Authoritarian regimes like the Soviet Union also used the grandfather figure (“Grandpa Lenin”) as part of propaganda aimed at children. This enhanced Lenin’s <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9780230518216_6">personality cult</a> across the Soviet nations. </p>
<p>Political scientist <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1q1crzp.7?seq=5#metadata_info_tab_contents">Pao-min Chang</a> defines the personality cult as</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The artificial elevation of the status and authority of one man […] through the deliberate creation, projection and propagation of a godlike image.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Like Lenin, a personality cult around Mao Zedong emerged during China’s Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). Although later leaders Deng Xiaoping, the architect of China’s economic reform, and Wen Jiabao, who was Premier between 2003 and 2013, are popularly known as “Grandpa Deng” and “Grandpa Wen,” they did not overtly push for this image. </p>
<p>Xi returns to Mao in his efforts to build a <a href="https://utsynergyjournal.org/2019/03/16/the-cult-of-xi-chinas-return-to-a-maoist-personality-cult/">personality cult</a> around himself. Since coming to power, he has cultivated the image of being “a man of the people” in a bid to make his authoritarianism more palpable to the masses. </p>
<h2>Little red children and Grandpa Xi</h2>
<p>The new primary school textbooks emphasise Xi’s wisdom, friendliness and care for the children. Early signs of this strategy can be seen in government propaganda video, Grandpa Xi is Our Big Friend, that circulated online in 2015. </p>
<p>The video was <a href="https://www.dwnews.com/%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD/59660857/%E5%BB%B6%E5%AE%89%E5%AD%A6%E7%AB%A5%E6%AD%8C%E9%A2%82%E4%B9%A0%E7%88%B7%E7%88%B7%E7%BD%91%E5%8F%8B%E8%B5%9E%E4%BA%BA%E6%89%8D">recorded</a> at Yan'an Yucai Primary School in Shaanxi. The location is significant because the school was founded by Mao Zedong in 1937. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/xi-jinping-puts-his-stamp-on-communist-party-history-but-is-his-support-as-strong-as-his-predecessors-170874">Xi Jinping puts his stamp on Communist Party history, but is his support as strong as his predecessors?</a>
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<p>In the video, Xi Jinping is not presented as a distant authority figure. Instead, Grandpa Xi is a caring “big friend.” The children sing that his “warm smile” is “brighter than the sun.” Images of children waving sunflowers and lyrics that describe Xi’s visit as “better than the warmth of a spring day” serve to accentuate his friendly disposition. </p>
<p>Most importantly, the children sing about the need to “study diligently” to “achieve the Chinese Dream”. This dream is Xi Jinping’s vision for China to become a prosperous society.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Statue of Mao Zedong" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433031/original/file-20211122-13-1wujt62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A personality cult around Mao Zedong was a large part of the propaganda during China’s Cultural Revolution.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/lijiang-china-march-8-2012-statue-531870715">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The children wear red scarves and red stars in the video. These <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/220558">symbols</a> represent the national flag. The colour red alludes to the blood of revolutionary <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2011.587293">martyrs</a>. They remind children of their connection to the nation and the Party. </p>
<p>Xi wears a red scarf in the video. In one scene, he places a red scarf over the shoulders of a child. This accessory and gesture are depicted in the 2021 primary school textbooks as well. The act of placing a scarf on a child signifies children taking on the mantle of happily fulfilling Grandpa Xi’s vision. </p>
<h2>The CCP’s Young Pioneers</h2>
<p>The textbook for lower primary students contain photos of Xi planting trees with children and meeting them at school. </p>
<p>The books include statements such as: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Grandpa Xi Jinping is very busy with work, but no matter how busy he is, he still joins our activities and cares about our growth.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Xi shares his memories of being emotional when joining the Young Pioneers of China (the CCP’s youth organisation) in 1960. He then invites readers to describe their own feelings about becoming a part of the Young Pioneers, thus encouraging young people to join.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=693&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=693&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=693&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=871&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=871&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422845/original/file-20210923-1932-oof5br.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=871&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Xi Jinping tying a red scarf around a child at a Beijing primary school.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">'Page from Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics For the New Era' textbook for lower primary.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The textbooks use illustrations with speech bubbles to make the ideological content more interesting. Some illustrations are of students sitting around a table teaching each other Grandpa Xi’s expectations to become a person of “good moral character” and who is “diligent and thrifty”. </p>
<p>The books also emphasise acquiring knowledge about “science and technology,” as well as being “creative and innovative”. </p>
<p>The children must cultivate these markers of good citizenship to become what the books refer to as “qualified builders and successors of socialism”. This rhetoric of children as the <a href="https://cup.cuhk.edu.hk/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=394">hope of the nation</a> has been in use since the late nineteenth century. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/academic-chongyi-feng-profits-freedom-and-chinas-soft-power-in-australia-78751">Academic Chongyi Feng: profits, freedom and China’s 'soft power' in Australia</a>
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<p>The emphasis on being “qualified” suggests children must live up to the expectations set out by Xi. The textbooks imply this is only possible because of Grandpa Xi’s continued care for them. </p>
<p>This image of Grandpa Xi as a “big friend” is a gentler form of propaganda than that seen during Mao’s Cultural Revolution. Propaganda aimed at children during the Cultural Revolution positioned the Party as the surrogate parent. It also highlighted <a href="https://books.google.co.nz/books/about/Picturing_Power_in_the_People_s_Republic.html?id=I3S6mlTj1K4C&redir_esc=y">children’s violence</a> as they fought for the socialist cause. Young Red Guards sang patriotic songs and read the Little Red Book. These rituals fostered Mao’s cult of personality. </p>
<p>It remains to be seen whether the new school curriculum is a harbinger of future deification of Xi Jinping.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/168482/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New school textbooks in China focus less on the Chinese Communist Party and more on its figurehead Xi Jinping. The growing cultivation of a personality cult is reminiscent of the days of Mao Zedong.Shih-Wen Sue Chen, Senior Lecturer in Writing and Literature, Deakin UniversitySin Wen Lau, Senior Lecturer in China Studies, University of OtagoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1669762021-09-07T14:57:21Z2021-09-07T14:57:21ZRace and capitalism: no easy answers, but posturing will get South Africa nowhere<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/419301/original/file-20210903-21-18havdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Looters make off with supplies during the unrest that hit parts of two provinces in South Africa in July. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Stringer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It is likely that historians will conclude that there was no one reason why the <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/investigations/anatomy-of-a-violent-july-data-mapping-shows-unrest-was-part-of-tactical-plan-to-shut-down-sa-20210806">recent riots and looting</a> of supermarkets, shops and warehouses in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, South Africa’s <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/publications/P0441/GDP%202020%20Q4%20(Media%20presentation).pdf#page=47">two most economically important provinces</a>, caught up so many generally law-abiding citizens in their slipstream. There were seemingly <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-lies-behind-social-unrest-in-south-africa-and-what-might-be-done-about-it-166130">numerous dynamics at play</a>, from <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/29614">the sheer poverty</a> of numerous black citizens through to the <a href="https://www.sanews.gov.za/south-africa/six-suspected-instigators-violent-unrest-arrested">manipulations of social media</a> by supporters of former President Jacob Zuma, angered by his arrest.</p>
<p>However, one explanation which has been touted in various quarters has been that the upheaval was the outcome of <a href="https://mg.co.za/opinion/2021-08-28-racial-capitalism-destroys-ubuntu/">‘the racial capitalism’</a> to which South Africa has been subjected <a href="https://mg.co.za/opinion/2021-08-28-racial-capitalism-destroys-ubuntu/">over the centuries</a>. Such an explanation hearkens back to the racialised policies of the past, and how they twinned the <a href="https://witspress.co.za/catalogue/prisoners-of-the-past/">political ideologies of segregation and apartheid</a> promoted by South Africa’s white governments before democratic transition in 1994.</p>
<p>This view holds that the inequalities of the present, which continue to have a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-corruption-in-south-africa-isnt-simply-about-zuma-and-the-guptas-113056">strong racial dimension</a>, along with the brutal treatment handed out to poor black people – for instance, by the police at <a href="https://theconversation.com/marikana-tragedy-must-be-understood-against-the-backdrop-of-structural-violence-in-south-africa-43868">Marikana in 2012</a>, in the North West Province, when police shot dead 35 protesting miners – are a product of the history of racial capitalism in South Africa.</p>
<p>It is difficult to disagree with the major thrust of much of the analysis which is put forward in this vein. It is widely accepted that the democratic transition in 1994 was the result of an ‘elite pact’ which transformed the country’s politics but did little to undermine the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africa-should-undo-mandelas-economic-deals-52767">foundations of white economic power</a>. </p>
<p>It is continuity as much as change which characterises the <a href="https://borgenproject.org/poverty-in-south-africa/">post-apartheid political economy</a>. Nonetheless, South Africans need to take care in ascribing all the present crises to ‘racial capitalism’. Blaming racial capitalism for all the country’s ills can easily become a way of deflecting responsibility away from the country’s present politicians – and from South Africans themselves.</p>
<h2>The past as present</h2>
<p>Colonial conquest happened in tandem with the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40404472">development of capitalism</a>. Both projects requiring non-white people, notably Africans, to become instruments for the purposes of others. Africans were stripped of their land and their possessions and became the tools of their oppressors. This process was not stopped by the arrival of democracy.</p>
<p>When miners of Lonmin in Marikana, in the platinum-rich North West Province demanded a <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/2014-south-african-platinum-strike-longest-wage-strike-south-africa">reasonable increase in their wages</a>, the state colluded with foreign capital to crush their dissent. <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/southafrica/overview">Inequality</a> nurtures this objectification of humans, leading to greater exploitation of the poor, who are overwhelmingly black.</p>
<p>The problem with the solution that is often provided – that the entire system of ‘racial capitalism’ should be overthrown – is that it is so remarkably bland. So, it is worth attempting to deconstruct it.</p>
<h2>So, what is to be done?</h2>
<p>Is the implication that racism and capitalism are inseparable? If that is so, is the further implication that capitalism itself should be overthrown? Which is perhaps a very nice idea, but first, is this practical and likely? Who is to do the overthrowing? At what human and other cost (as its unlikely that capital and the state would give up without a fight)? And what would be put in capitalism’s place? Is this to be a new socialist order, and if so, will South Africa be following historical examples (which, on the whole, have not been very successful) or will it be charting its own way forward?</p>
<p>Or is the implication that capitalism can be deracialised? This is very much what, in theory, the African National Congress (ANC), which has governed the country since 1994, has set out to do through <a href="http://www.labour.gov.za/DocumentCenter/Acts/Employment%20Equity/Act%20-%20Employment%20Equity%201998.pdf">equity employment</a> and <a href="https://www.gov.za/faq/finance-business/where-do-i-find-information-broad-based-black-economic-empowerment-bee">black economic empowerment</a> legislation. Although the corporate profile, in terms of ownership and management personnel has registered not insignificant change, most would agree that the achievements of ANC policies have been <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/employment-and-labur-20th-commission-employment-equity-cee-annual-report-2019%E2%80%9320-19-aug">remarkably modest</a>.</p>
<p>However, it remains a matter of considerable debate whether this is because of corporate resistance, social factors (such as inadequate supplies of suitably trained black personnel) and or the incompetence of the state. </p>
<p>Leaving aside the entire question of whether a de-racialised capitalism would be less exploitative than a racialised one, and whether it would be less patriarchal, the more fundamental issue is how can South Africa achieve it if current strategies – which most would agree are well intentioned – are proving inadequate in realising their goals.</p>
<p>Should equity employment and black economic empowerment be ratcheted up, when the prevailing cry from the business establishment is that more regulation serves as <a href="https://www.biznews.com/sa-investing/2021/07/27/bee-sa-poverty">major barrier</a> to the inflow of much needed foreign investment? Will this increase or deter a rise in much needed employment? Or is it that current strategies should be re-engineered?</p>
<p>Often left out of such analysis is the question of what sort of state will be required to bring about the transformation to the more humane society South Africans are looking for. Present <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-1994-miracle-whats-left-159495">disillusion</a> with the post-1994 order highlights the limits of South Africa’s democracy, and the ways in which ANC dominance has eroded it.</p>
<p>Much attention lately has been focused on the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321223498_The_African_National_Congress_ANC_and_the_Cadre_Deployment_Policy_in_the_Postapartheid_South_Africa_A_Product_of_Democratic_Centralisation_or_a_Recipe_for_a_Constitutional_Crisis">ANC’s strategy of deployment</a>, how this has led to the substitution of political loyalty to the party for the capacity to do the job, how deployment has <a href="https://www.da.org.za/2021/05/its-da-versus-anc-over-cadre-deployment">led to corruption</a>, how it has <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/fm/opinion/home-and-abroad/2021-08-04-justice-malala-how-the-ancs-cadre-deployment-ruined-sa/">destroyed state-owned corporations </a>, how it has undermined the efficiency of government, and how it has <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329309747_Cadre_Deployment_Policy_and_its_Effects_on_Performance_Management_in_South_African_Local_Government_A_Critical_Review">collapsed local government</a>.</p>
<p>The answer that is usually given is that it is necessary to <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/fm/opinion/home-and-abroad/2021-08-04-justice-malala-how-the-ancs-cadre-deployment-ruined-sa/">undo the merger of party and state</a> and entrench the independence of the state to allow for expertise to flourish, and to ensure the <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/news/latest-news/opinion/2020/2020-01/build-a-capable-state-dont-just-talk-about-it.html">rise of meritocracy</a>. But then we are left with the conundrum whether the ANC is capable of bringing such a transformation about, or whether the ANC itself needs to be removed from power. </p>
<p>That, in turn, demands not only that it must lose an election, but that it will gracefully concede its loss if it did so. Perhaps both dimensions of that last sentence are unlikely.</p>
<h2>No easy answers</h2>
<p>So where does all this lead South Africa? Quite frankly, I don’t know. But I do know that the answers to South Africa’s numerous problems are far from easy. This does not mean that South Africans cannot work their way to finding the solutions, and unless they are just going to give up, they have to believe that they can. But, it is going to be extremely hard work. South Africans will have to talk to, listen to, and bargain hard with each other to find their way.</p>
<p>But one thing South Africans must draw from such complexity is that any realistic and workable answers will not be arrived at by posturing. Alas, there are no easy answers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/166976/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall has previously received funding from the National Research Foundation</span></em></p>The democratic transition in 1994 was the result of an ‘elite pact’ that changed the country’s politics, but did little to undermine the foundations of white economic power.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1607232021-05-13T07:25:47Z2021-05-13T07:25:47ZFormer minister’s memoir is a candid critique of South Africa’s political economy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400062/original/file-20210511-18-qztxk7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Rob Davies, former South African trade and industry minister.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A new book by <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/robert-haydn-davies/">Rob Davies</a>, a former South African Trade and Industry Minister, provides a candid and detailed insider’s account of the evolution of the country’s post-apartheid political economy.</p>
<p>He makes it clear from the outset that this is a memoir and not an autobiography. But, as one reads on, it becomes obvious that it is impossible to separate his personal experiences from the momentous events that have shaped democratic South Africa.</p>
<p>The book’s fourteen chapters cover topics as varied as the apartheid context, the southern African region, Mozambican socialism plus economic policy in the transition to democracy and in the first democratic administration led by <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/nelson-mandela-presidency-1994-1999">President Nelson Mandela</a>. It also covers the importance of the governing African National Congress’s (ANC’s) eventful <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/52nd-anc-national-conference-polokwane-2007">52nd national conference</a> in 2007. It looks at trade policy challenges, too, as well as politics and economics in the era of President Cyril Ramaphosa.</p>
<h2>The early years and ideology</h2>
<p>Early in the book the reader is introduced to the intellectual ideas that moulded Davies’s ideological worldview. His doctoral thesis at the University of Sussex, Britain, examined the relationship between capital, the state and white labour in South Africa.</p>
<p>Under the tutelage of exiled South African Marxist scholar <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/harold-wolpe">Harold Wolpe</a>, he became a member of a coterie of theorists and scholars. Mostly of Marxist orientation, they were concerned with analysing the relationship between capitalism and apartheid.</p>
<p>Davies’s 11 years in exile in Mozambique, where he worked as a researcher alongside <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/ruth-heloise-first">Ruth First</a>, an anti-apartheid activist and academic, at <a href="https://www.uem.mz/">Eduardo Mondlane University</a>, gave him direct exposure to Mozambique’s history and socialist model. It also deepened his understanding of the southern African region. He writes frankly about the failures of Mozambican socialism, while highlighting its achievements. </p>
<h2>Critiquing the post-apartheid economy</h2>
<p>The book focuses mostly on economic issues. This is not surprising, given the <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/robert-haydn-davies/">author’s long history</a> of dealing with economic matters. He recounts in detail the political and social changes that took place in South Africa following the 1994 elections that <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/04597239308460952?journalCode=tssu20">ended apartheid</a>.</p>
<p>He is critical of economic policy during the first ANC administration. He reserves particular criticism for its macroeconomic policy framework introduced in 1996, the Growth, Employment and Redistribution Strategy (<a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201409/gear0.pdf">GEAR</a>).</p>
<p>It was developed “without prior consultation” with any of the ANC’s alliance partners – the <a href="https://www.sacp.org.za/">South African Communist Party</a> and labour federation <a href="http://www.cosatu.org.za/">Cosatu</a>. Davies bemoans that GEAR led to the controversial scrapping of the <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/governmentgazetteid16085.pdf">Reconstruction and Development Programme</a>. The radical economic programme was designed to redistribute income, wealth and economic power and, at the same time, stimulate rapid economic growth.</p>
<p>These are valid concerns. Others include the point that GEAR failed to meet its job creation targets. It did not yield desired levels of foreign investment either. But his analysis lacks a nuanced appreciation of the national context. This includes the fact that when GEAR was unveiled, the country was mired in a debilitating <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/41660748_Reflections_on_the_South_African_rand_crisis_of_1996_and_policy_consequences_Centre_for_the_Study_of_African_Economies_Working_Paper_Series_No_97">currency crisis</a>, amid dwindling international confidence. And he doesn’t say whether the policy accomplished anything.</p>
<p>Davies thinks that the debate that pitted the supporters of GEAR against its detractors could be described as “macroeconomic fundamentalism”. The proponents emphasised the need for macroeconomic discipline. Critics argued in favour of an <a href="https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/KeynesianEconomics.html">expansionist neo-Keynesian economic approach</a>. </p>
<p>What was missing from the debate was </p>
<blockquote>
<p>any profound engagement with the constraints being imposed by the structural characteristics of the productive economy, the changes that were taking place in it and the kind of transformations that were therefore necessary at this level to move to a qualitatively different new growth path capable of addressing the triple challenges of unemployment, poverty and inequality.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>An opportunity lost</h2>
<p>Davies argues that the ANC’s 52nd conference, and the subsequent ascent of Jacob Zuma to <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/press-statements/achievements-and-milestones-during-tenure-president-jacob-zuma">the highest political office</a>, represented an opportunity for the radical transformation of the economy. </p>
<p>The focus was on active trade and industrial policies. These included the adoption of strategies for beneficiation (adding value to mineral resources) and localisation (designating that a certain portion of goods be bought locally for government’s infrastructure programmes). The policies were touted as being central to the structural transformation in the productive base of the economy. They were to be joined by an effective land reform programme. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1086&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1086&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400026/original/file-20210511-18-y2zs2h.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1086&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A “developmental trade policy”, set out in several iterations of the <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201805/industrial-policy-action-plan.pdf">Industrial Policy Action Plan</a>, would alter the structure of the economy, enabling a shift to higher value-added production. It is not evident whether these economic objectives were achieved. </p>
<p>Davies outlines some policy successes. These include significant investments in the automotive, pharmaceutical and agro-processing sectors. Others include retention of thousands of jobs in clothing and textiles. There were also notable advances in metals fabrication industries. </p>
<p>Even so, it is questionable whether these industrial policies succeeded substantially <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-07-09-de-industrialisation-acceleration-sa-manufacturing-output-almost-halved-in-april-2020/">to stem the tide of deindustrialisation</a> that has hobbled the post-apartheid economy.</p>
<p>Davies seems to concede this reality when he states that</p>
<blockquote>
<p>we had not yet remotely reached the stage of having sufficient impact decisively to create conditions for a new, productive, sector-driven inclusive growth path.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Trade diplomat</h2>
<p>As a public servant he was not only hardworking but had an impressive command of policy and technical detail. This is laid bare when he discusses trade policy challenges. His good understanding of the global political economy, coupled with his mastery of policy detail, made him an effective trade diplomat.</p>
<p>His vast knowledge, sharp insights and extensive experience stood him in good stead. He led South Africa’s charge in dealing with intractable problems within the <a href="https://www.wto.org/">World Trade Organisation</a> and renegotiating the <a href="https://agoa.info/about-agoa.html">Africa Growth and Opportunity Act</a> with the US. He also led in negotiating <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/countries-and-regions/development/economic-partnerships/">Economic Partnership Agreements</a> with the EU and engaged with counterparts in the <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/brics.asp">Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS)</a> grouping.</p>
<p>His concerns about what stalled progress within the <a href="https://www.sacu.int/">Southern African Customs Union</a> between South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Eswatini deserve serious attention.</p>
<p>Like his colleagues within the <a href="https://www.sacp.org.za/">South African Communist Party</a> and <a href="http://www.cosatu.org.za/">Cosatu</a>, Davies was initially hopeful that the Zuma administration (<a href="http://www.presidency.gov.za/profiles/president-jacob-zuma-0">May 2009 to February 2018</a>) would usher in a new era of economic and social progress. He is disappointed with what it turned out to be.</p>
<p>He points out that in spite of some advances, including those in the area of HIV/AIDS policy, the</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Zuma presidency ended up being an extremely destructive demobilisation of state capacity through rampant looting.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Davies cannot delink himself from the historical events in which he took part. As his earlier <a href="https://www.biznews.com/interviews/2016/05/06/how-world-sees-sa-bbc-hardtalk-rips-into-zuma-loyalist-ti-min-rob-davies">cringeworthy interview</a> with the BBC’s Stephen Sackur showed, he missed a chance to speak out more forcefully against economic mismanagement and <a href="https://pari.org.za/betrayal-promise-report/">state capture</a>.</p>
<h2>Book’s significance</h2>
<p>Overall, this is a thoughtful, well-researched and informative book. It is a substantive, and in some respects original, contribution to the post-apartheid political economy literature. </p>
<p>The writing style is somewhat turgid but this is eased by the fascinating anecdotes. The book will serve as a valuable resource to everyone who is interested in South Africa’s contemporary political economy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160723/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mills Soko does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Rob Davies is critical of economic policy, starting with the Mandela administration. He reserves particular criticism for its macroeconomic policy framework introduced in 1996.Mills Soko, Professor: International Business & Strategy, Wits Business School, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1584022021-05-11T12:50:34Z2021-05-11T12:50:34ZRobert Owen, born 250 years ago, tried to use his wealth to perfect humanity in a radically equal society<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/399309/original/file-20210506-13-2n89pb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=138%2C116%2C2746%2C1833&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The utopian community modeled on the industrialist's principles lasted only two years.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/sketch-of-a-city-plan-for-a-new-community-at-harmony-news-photo/615293152">Corbis Historical/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Do you have a work schedule that leaves you with enough time off the clock to rest up and handle your other responsibilities?</p>
<p>If so, you might owe something to <a href="https://www.assignmentpoint.com/arts/biography/biography-of-robert-owen.html">Robert Owen</a>, a wealthy industrialist who was born in Wales on May 14, 1771.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Portrait of a wealthy, well-dressed man with well-coifed hair in the 19th century" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=865&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1087&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1087&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398988/original/file-20210505-15-1gr8roq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1087&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Welsh social reformer Robert Owen, portrayed about a decade after his experimental community in Indiana collapsed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://hdl.handle.net/10107/4674544">National Library of Wales</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Owen is widely credited with being the first person to advocate for a universal “eight hours labor, eight hours recreation, eight hours rest” approach to work-life balance. He experimented with this concept at his own factories and urged employers everywhere to adopt this management ethos as part of the <a href="https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofWales/Robert-Owen-Father-British-Socialsm/">socialist ideology he embraced</a> decades before Karl Marx.</p>
<p>In the early 19th century, many U.S. and European factory workers worked up to <a href="http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/05/why-a-typical-work-day-is-eight-hours-long">18 hours a day, six days a week</a>.</p>
<p>Once a year, <a href="https://iupress.org/9780253200297/we-make-a-life-by-what-we-give/">I travel</a> with 15 <a href="https://tobiascenter.iu.edu/tobias-fellows/about-the-program.html">fellows enrolled in a leadership program</a> to <a href="https://newharmony-in.gov/">New Harmony</a>. It’s the site of <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/life-of-robert-owen-written-by-himself/oclc/1073483640">Owen’s greatest experiment</a>, a “<a href="https://www.wcml.org.uk/our-collections/working-lives/the-cooperative-movement/">cooperative community</a>” he founded in southern Indiana on the banks of the Wabash River. Far more radical than limiting labor to eight-hour workdays, the utopia Owen envisioned ran up against human nature.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1388431964076744704"}"></div></p>
<h2>Early success and a socialist vision</h2>
<p>Owen, born into a working-class family, had virtually no formal education. By the age of 21, he was managing a textile mill, and at 28 he married the daughter of a Scottish mill owner, whose business he soon purchased. Owen rejected long hours and <a href="http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/factmine/owenfact.htm">took steps to make child labor less exploitative</a>. Although he paid higher wages than his competitors, the mill’s profits made him a wealthy man.</p>
<p>Owen believed in lifelong education, establishing an <a href="https://www.newlanark.org/about-new-lanark/buildings/170-institute-for-the-formation-of-character">Institute for the Formation of Character and School for Children</a> that focused less on job skills than on becoming a better person. This innovation attracted considerable attention, and many dignitaries – including the future czar of Russia – visited to see it for themselves.</p>
<p>But Owen’s ambitions went far beyond the well-being of his workforce.</p>
<p>He conceived of <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/robert-owen-a-biography/oclc/3724196">socialist communities of people</a> who would live together, as well as collectively prepare and eat their meals. Children would remain with their families until age 3, at which point the community would take over raising and educating them. Men and women would have equal rights. </p>
<p>At the core of Owen’s philosophy was an <a href="https://www.routledgehistoricalresources.com/economic-thought/sets/the-selected-works-of-robert-owen/volumes/the-book-of-the-new-moral-world">earnest question</a>: Why shouldn’t people who work together enjoy the fruits of their labor communally, promoting “the well-being and happiness of every man, woman, and child, without regard to class, sect, party, country, or colour?” </p>
<p>There’s a <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2020-06200-001">long-running debate</a> over whether nature or nurture is the biggest factor shaping human character. Owen firmly sided with nurture. He believed in a concept then called “<a href="https://www.athabascau.ca/syllabi/ltst/ltst639.php">human perfectibility</a>.” In his view, all that was necessary to create better human beings was to raise, educate and employ them in better circumstances.</p>
<h2>Creating New Harmony</h2>
<p>Owen sought to demonstrate the viability of his ideals by establishing a new community in the United States that would adhere to them. His <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Two-Hundred-Years-of-American-Communes/Oved/p/book/9781560006473">aspirations belonged</a> to a <a href="https://apnews.com/article/66dd5282a2d74f1b95d510aa0c875a17">broader utopian movement</a> that included the <a href="https://thetrustees.org/place/fruitlands-museum/">Fruitlands agrarian commune</a> in Massachusetts and the <a href="http://www.nyhistory.com/central/oneida.htm">Oneida community</a> in New York state.</p>
<p>Other Europeans had attempted their own real-life experiments. In fact, a <a href="https://www.archives.gov/nhprc/projects/catalog/harmony-society">German religious sect</a> that emphasized a communal way of life was selling its southern Indiana town of Harmony, and its residents were <a href="http://oldeconomyvillage.org/learn/history/harmonist-history/">relocating to Pennsylvania</a>.</p>
<p>Owen purchased it in 1825 for US$150,000 (the equivalent of about $4 million today) and renamed it <a href="https://www.usi.edu/outreach/historic-new-harmony/about/history/">New Harmony</a>. He invited “any and all” to come join his “community of equality” located halfway between St. Louis, Missouri, and Louisville, Kentucky. </p>
<p>New Harmony attracted about 1,000 newcomers, including <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/americas-communal-utopias/oclc/34320548">scientists, naturalists, educators and artists</a>, all eager to build what Owen called a “union and cooperation of all for the benefit of each.”</p>
<p>Trouble soon began to brew.</p>
<p>For one thing, Owen himself seems to have taken a greater interest in <a href="https://www.robertowenmuseum.co.uk/tag/new-harmony/">traveling and promoting his ideas</a> than in securing the success of the new venture.</p>
<p>A second problem was who moved there. Some residents sincerely believed in Owen’s ideas, while others had been lured by the <a href="https://heritage.humanists.uk/robert-owen/">promise of an easy life</a> and did little to promote the community.</p>
<p>Finally, his reforms proved to be at odds with human nature. Few families wanted their children to be shielded from what he called the “<a href="http://brbl-archive.library.yale.edu/exhibitions/utopia/uc07.html">negative influence</a>” of their parents, and people who worked hard resented those who contributed little. </p>
<h2>Ahead of his time</h2>
<p>Despite considerable investments that depleted Owen’s fortune, the community failed economically after just two years. Perhaps he had overestimated the malleability of human nature. Owen personally believed that <a href="https://www.biographyonline.net/business/robert-owen.html">humanity wasn’t yet ready</a> for his radical new ideas. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A row of colorful buildings" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/399019/original/file-20210505-13-xq1iio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The small town of New Harmony, Ind., today is a picturesque and historic destination.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Downtown_new_harmony_indiana.jpg">Timothy K Hamilton/Creativity+Photography</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>He returned to Europe, where he continued to promote publicly funded education, better working conditions and his vision of an enlightened society. He died in Wales in 1858. His four sons and <a href="https://www.in.gov/governorhistory/mitchdaniels/2568.htm">one of his daughters</a> remained in New Harmony, <a href="https://usi.edu/owen250">leading notable lives</a> of their own.</p>
<p>Owen’s legacy doesn’t just live on in the <a href="https://bestlifeonline.com/9-to-5/">nine-to-five schedules that became the norm</a> starting in the early 20th century. It’s also in the broad notion of social welfare behind everything from public schools to paid sick leave – including the <a href="https://theconversation.com/biden-gives-congress-his-vision-to-win-the-21st-century-scholars-react-159979">expansion of government benefits</a> the Biden administration is proposing.</p>
<p>Visitors to New Harmony, where <a href="https://datacommons.org/place/geoId/1852974">about 750 people reside</a> today, can wander around its <a href="https://www.indianamuseum.org/historic-sites/new-harmony/">many historical sites</a> and learn about its one-time owner and most famous resident, who devoted his fortune and his life to improving the human condition.</p>
<p>[<em>Insight, in your inbox each day.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=insight">You can get it with The Conversation’s email newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158402/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Gunderman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The wealthy textile manufacturer harbored ambitions that went far beyond the well-being of his own workforce and depleted his fortune.Richard Gunderman, Chancellor's Professor of Medicine, Liberal Arts, and Philanthropy, Indiana UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1565722021-05-05T12:10:54Z2021-05-05T12:10:54ZHow ‘socialism’ stopped being a dirty word for some voters – and started winning elections across America<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398138/original/file-20210430-13-1l7yxhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C0%2C2977%2C2056&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders are both members of the Democratic Socialists of America.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/rep-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-and-democratic-presidential-news-photo/1205412883?adppopup=true">Joe Raedle/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The leftist Democratic Socialists of America, which <a href="https://www.dsausa.org/democratic-left/aoc/">helped congressional star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez get elected</a> in 2018, looks to be a big political player again in New York City’s 2021 municipal elections. </p>
<p>The group has not yet endorsed anyone for mayor – the top prize in New York’s <a href="https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2021/02/10/yang-tops-latest-poll-in-mayors-race-1362601">June 22 Democratic primaries</a>. But all 51 city council seats are up for grabs this year, and the DSA has <a href="https://inthesetimes.com/article/dsa-new-york-city-council-aoc-democratic-socialism">members running for six of them</a> – including Queens public defender <a href="https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-tiffany-caban-city-council-astoria-queens-20200910-6x5lb7e5gfaijkdtx23dkunpsy-story.html">Tiffany Cabán</a> and Brooklyn tenant activist <a href="https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/michael-hollingsworth-city-council-nyc">Michael Hollingsworth</a>.</p>
<p>With two state senators and five representatives out of 213 lawmakers, the New York State Legislature already has the country’s largest <a href="https://www.timesunion.com/news/article/New-York-Legislature-leans-further-left-with-15705078.php">DSA legislative caucus</a>. These Democrats share a leftist platform that includes guaranteeing <a href="https://www.socialists.nyc/platform-preamble">housing as a human right and ending mass incarceration</a></p>
<p>The DSA has <a href="https://litci.org/en/the-dsas-dirty-break-strategy-a-balance/">upended local politics in this Democratic stronghold</a>, and its wins extend well beyond New York – into Virginia, Nevada and beyond. How did socialism jump from the fringes of American politics into its very center?</p>
<h2>American socialist history</h2>
<p>The DSA’s roots trace back to the Socialist Party of America, which was formed in New York in 1901 to promote such issues as establishing an eight-hour workday and public ownership of utilities like water and electricity. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black-and-white image of a man speaking from a train to a crowd of men in top hats" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398141/original/file-20210430-18-kxvgey.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Union leader and Socialist Party presidential candidate Eugene Debs campaigning in 1900.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/eugene-victor-debs-american-union-leader-addressing-a-crowd-news-photo/804460368?adppopup=true">Historica Graphica Collection/Heritage Images/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Writer <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/sinclair-succeeded-through-failure-180958247/">Upton Sinclair</a>, Christian theologian <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1971/06/02/archives/reinhold-niebuhr-is-dead-protestant-theologian-78-reinhold-niebuhr.html">Reinhold Niebuhr</a> and Planned Parenthood founder <a href="https://www.nyu.edu/projects/sanger/aboutms/">Margaret Sanger</a> were prominent early members. But many early American socialists were Jews and Eastern European immigrants – groups <a href="https://theundefeated.com/features/white-immigrants-werent-always-considered-white-and-acceptable/">that were considered well outside mainstream “white” society</a> at the time.</p>
<p>My <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=I4RHLDQAAAAJ">research as a historian</a> of American socialists finds that early 20th-century socialists found electoral success by running candidates who represented the economic and racial diversity of their communities and championed the issues that mattered to working-class, immigrant constituencies.</p>
<p>In 1918 – the heyday of New York’s socialist caucus, when socialists held 10 of 121 seats in the State House – socialist politicians were teachers, settlement house lawyers and union leaders. They proposed New York’s <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1917/01/25/issue.html">first birth control bill</a>, allowing advocates to give women educational pamphlets about contraception, and put forward programs to create old-age insurance and rent control.</p>
<p>The Socialist Party began <a href="https://jacobinmag.com/2019/10/highlander-folk-school-socialist-party-new-deal">losing members to the growing Communist Party</a> in the 1930s. By the mid-20th century, it had responded to Americans’ growing anticommunism with a rightward turn. In 1972, party leaders actually <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1972/12/31/archives/socialist-party-now-the-social-democrats-usa.html">renamed the party the Social Democrats, USA</a> because so many people associated the word “socialist” with America’s great antagonist, the Soviet Union. </p>
<h2>The DSA, past and present</h2>
<p>Disillusioned, the activist and Marxist professor Michael Harrington left the organization and in 1973 formed the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, which later merged with another leftist group, <a href="http://dlib.nyu.edu/findingaids/html/tamwag/tam_051/">the New American Movement</a>, to <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1989/08/02/309189.html?pageNumber=95">form the Democratic Socialists of America</a>.</p>
<p>Unlike the Socialist Party of America, which was a registered political party and ran candidates on its own ticket, the DSA is a political group. Harrington wanted to create the “<a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/00/05/28/reviews/000528.28navaskt.html">left wing of the possible</a>” within the Democratic Party. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black and white image of Harrington, seated in a suit and tie, speaking." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398147/original/file-20210430-14-1y3lass.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">DSA founder Michael Harrington, who died in 1989.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.wnyc.org/i/1500/1004/h/80/1/514413087.jpg">Photo by Barbara Alper/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For four decades, DSA members have mostly run in Democratic primaries, attempting to push the party leftward – on <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/progressives-obama/">the Iraq War and NAFTA, for example</a> – while endorsing Democratic presidential nominees from Walter Mondale to Barack Obama. </p>
<p>It had some early local successes. From the 1980s to the early 2000s, DSA members were elected to <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/socialist-wins-seattle/">city councils</a> nationwide and won mayoral races in liberal college towns like <a href="https://www.newspapers.com/image/609123492/?terms=gus%20newport&match=1">Berkeley, California</a>; <a href="https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2007/11/professor-emeritus-ben-nichols-dies-87">Ithaca, New York</a>; and Burlington, Vermont, where <a href="https://jacobinmag.com/2021/03/bernie-sanders-burlington-vermont-mayoral-election-open-socialist/">the openly socialist politician Bernie Sanders</a> was mayor from 1981 to 1989.</p>
<p>In 2016, Sanders ran for president. His campaign, coupled with Donald Trump’s subsequent victory, created a <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/5/15930786/dsa-socialists-convention-national">surge in DSA membership</a> among young voters. The group’s median age dropped from 68 in 2013 <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/in-the-year-since-trumps-victory-democratic-socialists-of-america-has-become-a-budding-political-force/">to 33 by 2017</a>. The DSA now <a href="https://www.dsausa.org/news/npc-newsletter-nov2020/">claims</a> over 90,000 dues-paying members, up from <a href="https://inthesetimes.com/features/dsa_democratic_socialists_of_america_growth_alexandria-ocasio-cortez-bernie-sanders.html">6,000</a> in 2015.</p>
<p>The DSA’s electoral strategies also changed after 2016, partly due to the influx of new members and partly in frustration with mainstream Democratic candidates. </p>
<p>In Democratic primaries across the country, DSA candidates ran to replace older, centrist, white incumbents with young leftists who promised to fight for “Medicare for all” and to “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/17/nyregion/jamaal-bowman-eliot-engel.html">hold elected officials accountable</a>.” </p>
<p><a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/145727/socialist-beat-one-virginias-powerful-republicans">It was a winning strategy for the Trump era</a>. Since 2016, DSA-backed candidates have won district attorney races from <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/larry-krasner-philadelphia-district-attorney_n_5a026984e4b04e96f0c6433a">Philadelphia</a> to <a href="https://www.texasobserver.org/jose-garza-redefines-progressive-prosecutor/">Travis County, Texas</a>, and hold <a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/number-democratic-socialists-congress-soon-double-down-ballot-movement-scored-biggest-victories">four seats in Congress</a>. Forty DSA members sit in 21 state legislatures. DSA members <a href="https://chicago.suntimes.com/2019/4/3/18412913/democratic-socialists-now-control-one-tenth-of-the-chicago-city-council">hold five of Chicago’s 50 city council seats</a>. </p>
<p>The professional backgrounds of today’s DSA legislators resemble those of their forebears. New York State Sen. <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/teacher-jabari-brisport-set-be-n-y-s-first-black-n1240963">Jabari Brisport</a>, elected in 2020, was a teacher and <a href="https://brooklyneagle.com/articles/2017/11/02/arrest-of-city-council-candidate-at-bedford-union-armory-protest-draws-criticism/">tenant organizer</a>. New York State Rep. <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/25/meet-the-31-year-old-nurse-who-is-now-a-member-of-the-new-york-state-assembly.html">Phara Souffrant Forrest</a> was previously a tenant organizer and nurse.</p>
<p>The DSA’s legislative proposals – <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/02/zohran-mamdani-new-york-state-assembly-queens">rent control</a>, <a href="https://www.nycitynewsservice.com/2020/11/jessica-gonzalez-rojas-first-latina-assembly-member-for-district-34-queens/">free college</a> and <a href="https://www.bkreader.com/2019/01/24/ny-senate-passes-historic-reproductive-health-act-to-protect-roe-v-wade/">reproductive rights</a> – are classic socialist issues, updated for the 21st century. The Democratic Party has now <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/549405-sanders-jayapal-introduce-bill-to-make-college-tuition-free-for-many">embraced many of these proposals</a>, but moderates like <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-joe-manchin-is-so-willing-and-able-to-block-his-partys-goals/">West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin</a> have not. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Young crowd of young people holding red 'DSA' banners on a New York street" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/398139/original/file-20210430-15-jzzrjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">DSA activists in New York march for immigrant rights, May 1, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/members-of-the-democratic-socialists-of-america-gather-news-photo/1146329853?adppopup=true">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As in the past, the DSA tends to back candidates from <a href="https://prospect.org/politics/how-new-york-city-democratic-socialists-swept-the-competition/">marginalized groups</a> – whether African American, Caribbean, South American or South Asian – who reflect the racial makeup of the neighborhoods they represent.</p>
<h2>Angry Dems and DSA infighting</h2>
<p>The DSA’s growing political profile has caused tensions within the Democratic Party. </p>
<p>Shortly after DSA-backed candidates in March 2021 <a href="https://theintercept.com/2021/03/08/nevada-democratic-party-dsa/">swept all five leadership positions in the Nevada Democratic Party</a>, many longtime party staffers quit rather than work under the new leftist leadership. But first, according to <a href="https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/say-goodbye-to-the-most-effective-democratic-party-in-the-country">the Nevada Independent</a> and other local newspapers, the Democratic staffers <a href="https://www.rgj.com/story/news/politics/2021/03/10/nevada-democratic-party-staffers-resign-after-sanders-backers-take-over-leadership/6949152002/">transferred US$450,000</a> from the DSA-controlled Nevada Democratic Party coffers into the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which is controlled by the National Democratic Party.</p>
<p>Some DSA policies that diverge sharply from the Democratic party line – such as its <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-the-dsa-went-from-supporting-israel-to-boycotting-the-jewish-ethnostate?ref=scroll">support for the movement to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel</a> for its militarized occupation of the Palestinian territories – <a href="https://queenseagle.com/all/opinion-shame-on-nyc-council-candidates-seeking-dsa-endorsement?rq=DSA">draw fierce criticism from other Democrats</a>.</p>
<p>The DSA has also been accused of having a “<a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/152789/americas-socialists-race-problem">race problem</a>.” Despite running primarily candidates of color, the organization’s leadership is largely white and male. Some DSA members say the group silences the concerns and voices of people of color. </p>
<p>After <a href="https://dsabuild.org/">new groups arose within the DSA</a> to <a href="https://www.socialistmajority.com/theagitator/embracing-black-leadership">recruit more Black leaders</a>, the <a href="https://www.dsausa.org/statements/national-priorities-prioridades-nacionales/">DSA’s national committee announced</a> in February 2021 that it would start an initiative to better attract, mentor and retain people of color.</p>
<p>In the 20th century, American socialism cracked under the weight of infighting and social change. Can the modern DSA survive its 21st-century challenges? </p>
<p>Its next test is in New York City on June 22.</p>
<p><em>This story has been corrected to accurately reflect Bernie Sanders’ political identification. Sanders is a self-described “democratic socialist” and is endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, but is not a member of the group.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156572/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joshua Kluever does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The leftist Democratic Socialists of America was tiny before the 2016 election. Now, with 90,000 dues-paying members and four seats in Congress, the DSA is upending Democratic politics nationwide.Joshua Kluever, Ph.D. Candidate of 20th Century American History, Binghamton University, State University of New YorkLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1580742021-03-29T17:32:24Z2021-03-29T17:32:24ZBook excerpt: ‘Misconceptions about Vietnam’<p><em>The recent 13th Congress of the Vietnamese Communist Party gave the ruling party the opportunity to congratulate itself on the country’s economic growth and its <a href="https://theconversation.com/vietnams-prudent-low-cost-approach-to-combating-covid-19-136332">management of the Covid-19 pandemic</a>. In “Misconceptions about Vietnam” (<a href="http://www.lecavalierbleu.com/livre/idees-recues-viet-nam/">“Idées reçues sur le Viêt Nam”</a>, available in French), Hiên Do Benoit looks at Vietnam’s society, culture and political and economic history, and provides us with the keys to understanding this state unlike any other. We present here the chapter that deals with the preconceived idea that the country is still fully communist today.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>It is often claimed that with the collapse of the Soviet Union, Vietnam remains – alongside China, North Korea, Laos and Cuba – the last remaining case of a communist country in which communist discourse and practice can be observed.</p>
<p>First, communism per se should not be confused with the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP), effectively the only party in power in Vietnam, with a membership of some 5.2 million people in 2019, or around 5% of the population. In theory, communism is a social doctrine based on the abolition of individual private property – and the pooling of all means of production – seeking to replace a capitalist society with one based on equality and fraternity. In practice, within Vietnam’s one-party political system, communism as both doctrine and political behaviour is undergoing a complex reformulation. Today, not only is there is no longer any question of a class struggle but, rather, a “market economy with a socialist orientation” has officially replaced the centrally planned economy. Moreover, private property has never been so highly valued as today as a driving force in the process of national development. So, what is left of a communist heritage and how deeply entrenched is Vietnamese communism?</p>
<p>The Sixth Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam (VCP) in 1986 acknowledged the need for “reforms” both to redress a bankrupt economy and, also, to find for the country a way out of a hostile international environment. The latter was due to the conflict in Cambodia. The choice of Vietnam was astute, at least for that period. The desire to maintain the balance of power, to strengthen the political legitimacy of the regime, converged with the priority of promoting economic development. A regime cannot generally be politically legitimate without a healthy economic situation, but at the same time, any effort to promote economic development would prove futile if it was not accompanied by a stable political environment.</p>
<p>Thus, since the Sixth Congress, the Communist Party has been ready, not to really to question its control of the country, but, rather, to correct its mistakes in building socialism. This is precisely what its prime minister at the time, Vo Van Kiet, declared at the World Economic Forum in Davos in February 1990:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Renovation does not mean a clean sweep of the past, nor does it mean abandoning socialism, but seeking to conceive more clearly a humane, perfected socialism.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In practice this has meant encouraging political mobilisation around campaigns of criticism and self-criticism without tolerating pluralism. Reforms of all kinds remained strictly controlled by the Party. Vietnam’s <em>doi moi</em> (renewal) model is closer to Chinese practice than to that of Russian perestroika. For the VCP the essentials remained intact: Marxist-Leninism, democratic centralism, and a monolithic political system. The name “Socialist Republic” was retained, even though it was accepted that Soviet-style socialism had run its course and that the term socialism, itself, had to be redefined.</p>
<p>Thus, in Vietnam, being a “reformer” meant one was no less loyal to the Party, even if it was a Party that had to be renewed, modernised and democratised. It should be noted that, already in 1987, Nguyên Van Linh, then General Secretary of the VCP, had questioned the economic strategy of “jumping from the capitalist stage”, which was in his eyes “unrealistic and harmful”. There were already historical antecedents, namely the <em>Luân cuong chinh tri</em> (political theses) presented in October 1930 in Hong Kong by Trân Phu, the first general secretary of the Indochinese Communist Party. Doctrinal changes were also reinforced by the experience of a war economy. </p>
<p>After Vietnam’s reunification, the Fourth Plan in 1977 codified these changes and legitimised the conceptual foundations of Vietnamese socialist development. With the initial political theses, the party had given itself an economic orientation based on the Soviet model of linear “development by stages”. As the ethnohistorian Pierre-Richard Féray has argued, this model proposed, among other things, to “skip the stage of capitalist development” and to move without a transition from a “feudal” and “colonial” mode of production to a “socialist” mode of production. Furthermore, there was also a key idea established as a dogma in Asia by Mao Zedong: to make ideological considerations central in controlling the economy. The reforms since 1986 have attempted to reverse this trend.</p>
<p>Vietnamese international relations thinking, based on a vision of the world conceptualised through the sole ideological lens of opposing socialism and capitalism had long been sufficient to enable Vietnam’s leaders to obtain international aid in the form of support from “fraternal countries”. The collapse of the Soviet bloc in the late 1980s showed the need, not only for new partners, but also a reexamination of the criteria promulgated to obtain external support. In order to ensure, not only the development of Vietnam, but also the sustainability of the power they represented, the veterans of yesterday’s liberation wars, however, did not abandon the imperatives of “security and independence” of the country. They simply tried to take into account the new context in order to benefit from “favourable international conditions”. While there was general agreement that pragmatism was necessary, some leaders seemed to believe also that the failure of socialism was not due to a crisis of Marxist-Leninist doctrine, but, rather, to errors in “theoretical perceptions” and in the “application” of the doctrinal code.</p>
<p>The strategy chosen was formulated at the 10th Congress of the Communist Party (April 2006) in apparently clear terms: to continue and strengthen “reforms”, to perfect “the market economy along socialist lines” and to achieve “international economic integration”, since this global strategy is being implemented through a twofold action, both internally and externally. Nevertheless, this strategy is somewhat ambiguous and problematical, for it specifies as a primary condition for success inculcating a strong sense of national unity and a stable and secure political environment.</p>
<p>There are two major questions for the Communist Party of Vietnam in order to sustain its one-party rule. How should it manage its opening up to modernity and development opportunities, while preserving national sovereignty and identity? How can it take advantage of the “positive points” of capitalism in the pursuit of socialist construction? While reiterating Vietnam’s firm resolve not to see its sovereignty be diluted by globalisation, General Vo Nguyen Giap could not hide, in a conversation with former US secretary of defense Robert McNamara on November 9, 1995, in Hanoi, the perilous reality test Vietnam faced:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Today, Vietnam is conducting its multilateral foreign policy. It has its own cultural and philosophical identities, but its level of technology and economic management still leaves much to be desired. We intend to benefit from the valuable knowledge and experience of all countries without jeopardising our culture, our spirit of independence and autonomy, and our Vietnamese character traits.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In tracing the different stages of what he calls the “intercultural dialogue between Vietnam and the West”, the intellectual Huu Ngoc revealed in even more glaring terms what is at stake for the Vietnamese:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“In the cultural dialogue that we are conducting with the West, we are not in an equal position because of our level of economic development […], it is by no means easy for us to preserve our national identity.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While socialism has not been called avoiding a into question, and remains an objective repeatedly confirmed in important documents of the CP (11th and 12th Congresses of the CP, in 2011 and 2016, respectively), a kind of economic pragmatism has been proposed. In rhetorical terms it seeks to make the current ideology more coherent, by injecting a strong dose of nationalism. It is indeed in relation to the outside world that Vietnamese nationalism today finds new impetus and new sources of inspiration. “A prosperous people”, a slogan that echoes the famous formula “get rich to enrich the country”, axiom proposed in Beijing by Deng Xiaoping in January 1992, has become a quasi-neologism for expressing patriotism in the country today.</p>
<p>The symbolic watershed can be found in the decisions taken at the 10th Congress of the Communist Party, which ratified the results of a heated debate that had been going on for years about the ability and right of every Party member, as a citizen, to be “prosperous”. At this congress is was decided that individual prosperity would contribute to collective prosperity, meaning that “capitalism,” which is contrary to the Party’s ethics and even its ideal had found respectability. In any case, members of the Communist Party can now – directly and officially – “undertake private business”, while preserving “the quality of Party membership and the essence of the Party”.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1030&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1030&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1030&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1294&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1294&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/384703/original/file-20210217-21-1xnoo5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1294&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This text is from <em>Idées reçues sur le Viêt Nam</em>, which has just been published by Le Cavalier Bleu.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Éditions Le Cavalier Bleu</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today a comprehensive concept of security centred on this economic pivot, national unity, a collectivist sense of the nation, abetted by a reinforced role for the State and the Party, remain the key means for blocking what the political elite calls “hostile forces” from endangering socialism. In February 2007, quoting Ho Chi Minh’s words on the anniversary of the founding of the CP, General Secretary Nông Duc Manh did not hesitate to condemn individualism, which, by causing the loss of national unity, was indeed “harmful to the interests of the revolution and the people”.</p>
<p>According to Huu Ngoc, in Vietnam, the community spirit, which is contrary to Western individualism, is “understood in the sense of a national spirit, of love of the fatherland”. For the strategist Vo Nguyên Giap:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Solidarity, the great spirit of unity, characteristic of Vietnamese culture, has given the Nation all its intense vitality.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, in this country where economic results are attributed to so-called Asian values – such as diligence, a sense of community, family stability, etc – some Western values are recognised as both universal and also considered necessary. During an international seminar on “Asian values and Vietnamese development in a comparative perspective”, held in March 1999 in Ha Noi, Vietnam’s blended approach was particularly praised for its ability to maintain a certain stability in the face of “international and national economic and social upheavals”. It was claimed that this was due, not only “to the partial maintenance of traditional values”, but also “to adopting certain Western values [such as] well-understood individual rights, democracy, gender equality, etc.”.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Translated from the original French by David Camroux.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158074/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hien Do Benoit ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>In a new book, Hiên Do Benoit looks at Vietnam’s society, culture and political and economic history, and provides us with the keys to understanding this state unlike any other..Hien Do Benoit, Enseignante-chercheure, Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (CNAM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1135072020-12-01T19:48:20Z2020-12-01T19:48:20ZSocialism is a trigger word on social media – but real discussion is going on amid the screaming<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/371807/original/file-20201128-13-1u67y0y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Tug-of-words' posts debating the merits of socialism versus capitalism are all over social media platforms.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pxfuel.com/en/free-photo-xssmf">pxfuel</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The word “socialism” has become a trigger word in U.S. politics, with both <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2019/10/07/in-their-own-words-behind-americans-views-of-socialism-and-capitalism/">positive and negative perceptions of it</a> split along party lines. </p>
<p>But what does socialism actually mean to Americans? Although surveys can ask individuals for responses to questions, they don’t reveal what people are saying when they talk among themselves. </p>
<p>As a social media scholar, I study conversations “in the wild” in order to find out what people are actually saying to one another. The method I developed is called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netnography">netnography</a> and it treats online posts as discourse – a continuing dialogue between real people – rather than as quantifiable data. </p>
<p>As part of <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0148296319300219">an ongoing study on technology and utopia</a>, I read through more than 14,000 social media comments posted on Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and YouTube in 2018 and 2019. They came from 9,155 uniquely named posters.</p>
<p>What I found was both shocking and heartening.</p>
<h2>Loyalty and fear</h2>
<p>Both support for socialism and attacks on it appear to be on the rise. </p>
<p>Socialism can <a href="https://news.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/243362/meaning-socialism-americans-today.aspx">mean different things to people</a>. Some see it as a system that institutionalizes fairness and citizen rights, bringing higher levels of social solidarity; others focus on heavy-handed government control of free markets that work more effectively when left alone. U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, emphasized the right to quality health care, education, a good job with a living wage, affordable housing and a clean environment <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/17/opinion/bernie-sanders-socialism.html">in a 2019 speech</a>.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/268295/support-government-inches-not-socialism.aspx">2019 Gallup Poll</a> found that 39% of Americans have a favorable opinion of socialism – up from about <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/socialism-rising-plurality-of-democrats-think-it-would-be-good-for-us-to-move-toward-socialism-according-to-fox-news-poll">20% in 2010</a>; 57% view it negatively. </p>
<p>Prominent elected “<a href="https://www.dsausa.org/about-us/what-is-democratic-socialism/">democratic socialist</a>” officials include six <a href="http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/September-2019/How-Socialism-Permeated-City-Council/">Chicago City Council members</a>, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/world/2020/03/bernie-sanders-socialist-or-social-democrat">Sanders</a>. </p>
<p>These and other advocates <a href="https://theweek.com/articles/783700/democratic-socialism-bad-why-norway-great">point to</a> a version of socialism called the “Nordic model,” seen in countries like Denmark, which provide <a href="https://www.vox.com/2015/10/16/9544007/denmark-nordic-model">high-quality social services</a> such as health care and education while fostering a strong economy. </p>
<p>Critics call socialism anti-American and charge that it undermines free enterprise and leads to disaster, often using <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/venezuelas-collapse-exposes-the-fake-socialism-debated-in-u-s-11549465200">the unrealistically extreme example of Venezuela</a>.</p>
<p>President Trump has portrayed socialists as radical, lazy, America-hating communists. His son, Donald Trump Jr., has posted <a href="https://twitter.com/donaldjtrumpjr/status/925495970032443392?lang=en">tweets ridiculing socialism</a>.</p>
<p>During the 2020 election season, Republican Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell advised that his party could win by being a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/04/12/mitch-mcconnells-strategy-is-run-against-socialism-it-wont-be-enough/?utm_term=.6c9d5393693f">firewall against socialism</a>. He was on point: Fear of socialism may have been a <a href="https://reason.com/2020/11/06/socialism-2020-trump-biden-rebuke-left/">reason</a> why the Republicans gained seats in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2020. </p>
<h2>A ‘tug of words’</h2>
<p>Although I wasn’t initially looking for posts on socialism or capitalism, I found plenty of them in my online investigation. Many were what I call a “tug of words” in which people asserted which system was better. People from opposite ends of the political spectrum made pithy observations, posted one-liners or launched strong, emotionally worded broadsides. There was often little dialogue – those who posted were shouting at each other as if using a <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jcr/article-abstract/40/1/136/1792230">megaphone</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/371389/original/file-20201125-15-31vgbu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=307&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A YouTube commenter uses a megaphone-like approach to preach about the perils of socialism.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Screen shot by Robert Kozinets</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I also found a large number of short, nonconversational, megaphone-like posts on visual social media like Instagram and Pinterest.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370936/original/file-20201124-17-2rbbm5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Some commentary on socialism on Pinterest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Screen shot by Robert Kozinets</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But some people were more circumspect. While they were often reactive or one-sided, they raised questions. For example, people questioned whether business bailouts, grants, lobbying or special tax treatment showed that capitalism’s “free markets” weren’t actually all that free. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/372172/original/file-20201201-13-1421u0d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Making a historical economic argument against socialism and its slippery slope to totalitarianism.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robert Kozinets' data collection</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>And some considered what “socialism” actually means to people, linking that meaning to race, nationality and class.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370935/original/file-20201124-15-imys5h.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The meaning of socialism discussed on Twitter.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Screen shot by Robert Kozinets</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Overcoming primitive ‘isms’</h2>
<p>Amid all the sound and fury of people shouting from their virtual soapboxes, there were also the calmer voices of those engaging in deeper discussions. These people debated socialism, capitalism and free markets in relation to health care, child care, minimum wage and other issues that affected their lives. </p>
<p>One YouTube discussion explored the notion that we should stop viewing everything “through the primitive lens of the nonsensical ‘isms’ – capitalism, socialism, communism – which have no relevance in a sustainable or socially just and peaceful world.” </p>
<p>Other discussions united both left and right by asserting that the real problem was corruption in the system, not the system itself. Some used social media to try to overcome the ideological blinders of partisan politics. For example, they argued that raising the minimum wage or improving education might be sensible management strategies that could help the economy and working Americans at the same time.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/370938/original/file-20201124-17-pw4wwg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This Reddit post explores the benefits of changes that some might label as socialist.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Screen shot by Robert Kozinets.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>New forum for discussions</h2>
<p>As America’s divisions fester, my work gives me reason for hope. It shows that some Americans – still a small minority, mind you – are thoughtfully using popular social media platforms to have meaningful discussions. What I have provided here is just a small sample of the many thoughtful conversations I encountered.</p>
<p>My analysis of social media doesn’t deny that many people are angry and polarized over social systems. But it has revealed that a significant number of people recognize that labels like socialism, free markets and capitalism have become emotional triggers, used by some journalists and politicians to manipulate, incite and divide.</p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>To unify and move forward together, we may need to better understand the sites and discussion formats that facilitate this kind of thoughtful discourse. If partisans retreat to echo chamber platforms like <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/11/technology/parler-rumble-newsmax.html">Parler and Rumble</a>, will these kinds of intelligent conversations between people with diverse viewpoints cease?</p>
<p>As Americans confront the financial challenges of a pandemic, automation, precarious employment and globalization, providing forums where we can discuss divergent ideas in an open-minded rather than an ideological way may make a critical difference to the solutions we choose. Many Americans are already using digital platforms to discuss options, rather than being frightened away by – or attacking – the tired old socialist bogeyman.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/113507/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Kozinets does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>An analysis of social media commentary about socialism versus capitalism shows that people are talking past each other, but some are engaging in more nuanced discussions as well.Robert Kozinets, Jayne and Hans Hufschmid Chair in Strategic Public Relations and Business Communication, USC Annenberg School for Communication and JournalismLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1383652020-09-04T18:18:11Z2020-09-04T18:18:11Z‘From each according to ability; to each according to need’ – tracing the biblical roots of socialism’s enduring slogan<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/356431/original/file-20200903-16-gi34dn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C0%2C2316%2C1192&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Marx, Madison or God? Who said it first...or at all?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Bettmann/Corbis/ Lucas Schifres via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“From each according to ability; To each according to need,” is a phrase derived from where?</p>
<p>A) The works of Karl Marx</p>
<p>B) The Bible</p>
<p>C) The Constitution of the United States</p>
<p>If you answered “A,” you are kinda right. But if you answered “B,” you’re not exactly wrong either.</p>
<p>“C,” on the other hand, would get you zero points. But you would not be alone in getting it wrong. In a 1987 survey, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1987/02/15/constitution-confuses-most-americans/47e6691c-e42b-4276-8adb-ec1b24539954/">nearly half of Americans surveyed</a> believed the phrase “From each according to ability; To each according to need” came from the U.S. Constitution.</p>
<p>The phrase was, in fact, popularized by Marx in his 1875 Critique of the Gotha Program. But its origins are in France. </p>
<h2>From Paris to Moscow</h2>
<p>It occurs in the 1848 speeches of <a href="https://www.hetwebsite.net/het/profiles/blanc.htm">the socialist politician Louis Blanc</a> and can be traced further back to the cover of the 1845 edition of philosopher Étienne Cabet’s utopian novel <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/utopian/cabet/icarus.htm">“Voyage en Icarie”</a>: “First right: To Live – To each according to his needs – First duty: To Work – From each according to his ability.”</p>
<p>But a decade and a half before Cabet, the followers of the French <a href="http://www.hetwebsite.net/het/profiles/saintsimon.htm">political theorist Henri de Saint-Simon</a> coined a similar phrase, “To each according to ability; To each according to works” as an epigraph of their journal L’Organisateur in 1829. </p>
<p>There is a constitution that contains a mix of both phrases, but it isn’t the U.S.’s. Rather it is <a href="https://www.departments.bucknell.edu/russian/const/1936toc.html">the Constitution of the USSR</a>. Joseph Stalin paired “From each according to ability” with “To each according to work” in <a href="https://www.departments.bucknell.edu/russian/const/36cons01.html">the 1936 Soviet Constitution</a>.</p>
<h2>Communal living</h2>
<p>So where does the Bible come in? Well, Saint-Simon, Cabet and Blanc – all committed Christians whose social programs were inspired by their faith – borrowed each of these phrases from French Bible translations of the time, and defended them on scriptural grounds. History of economics scholar <a href="https://adrienlutz.wordpress.com/">Adrien Lutz</a> and <a href="https://philosophy.unc.edu/people/luc-bovens/">I</a> <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article/51/2/237/137098/From-Each-according-to-Ability-To-Each-according">traced these phrases</a> back to <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article/51/2/237/137098/From-Each-according-to-Ability-To-Each-according">these French biblical passages</a>.</p>
<p>“To each according to needs” comes from the Book of Acts documenting the practices of early Christian communities in Jerusalem. In the Book of Acts, believers “<a href="https://biblehub.com/acts/2-44.htm">were together and had all things in common</a>” and sold their possessions and distributed the proceeds within the community “<a href="https://biblehub.com/acts/2-45.htm">as any had needs</a>.” </p>
<p>In “Voyage en Icarie,” Cabet tells of a fictional community who practice similar communal living arrangements. He later went to the U.S. and founded a number of “<a href="https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=11182&context=annals-of-iowa#:%7E:text=%5ESpecifically%20the%20Icarian%20communities%20were,%2C%20California%2C%201881%2D1886.">Icarian communities</a>” in the second half of the 19th century, that practiced communal ownership of goods and were governed by egalitarian ideals. </p>
<p>“From each according to ability,” is likewise found in the Book of Acts: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/acts/11-29.htm">So the disciples determined, everyone according to his ability, to send relief to the brothers living in Judea</a>.” Cabet and Blanc both construed this phrase as a call for Christian servitude. They believed society to be a cooperative venture in which people of means should contribute more.</p>
<h2>Investing in talent</h2>
<p>“To each according to ability” is in the Gospel of Matthew. In the Parable of the Talents, a master gives his servants different amounts of money – or “talents” – and goes away on a journey: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/matthew/25-15.htm">To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability</a>.” Upon his return, he praises the servants who have invested and increased their allotment but condemns the one who buried the money and simply returned it.</p>
<p>For Saint-Simon, the phrase meant putting jobs and resources in the hands of the most qualified and entrepreneurial people and taking them away from nobility. This would lead to greater productivity, benefiting everyone, and in particular, the most disadvantaged socioeconomic groups in society.</p>
<h2>Wages of virtue</h2>
<p>“To each according to works” occurs at many junctions in the Bible. For example, St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans states: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/romans/2-6.htm">[God] will render to each according to his works: To those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life.</a>”</p>
<p>The phrase is also found it in First Corinthians: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/1_corinthians/3-8.htm">He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.</a>” Whereas St. Paul’s letter makes rewards contingent on one’s achievements as a single individual, in Corinthians it measures the effort that one brings to a collective endeavor.</p>
<p>The same article in the Soviet Constitution that employs this phrase also contains a quote from a Bible passage found in the Second Letter to the Thessalonians: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/2_thessalonians/3-10.htm">If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.</a>”</p>
<p>The message is the same, but the background of this quote is interesting. St. Paul, the Christian apostle, believed that he and his co-workers did have a right to be maintained by the Church – presumably because their ministry was a sufficient contribution to the common good.</p>
<p>But they were facing an incentive problem: There were idle and disruptive elements in the Christian community who were trying to free-ride on the communal living arrangements. For this reason, even though they were doing ministry, St. Paul urges his followers to do manual labor to set a model and distance themselves from the free riders.</p>
<h2>Nothing new</h2>
<p>The sentiments behind these slogans are not confined to the ash heaps of history. Rather, many of the policies from the political left today fit under these simple slogans. </p>
<p>“To each according to need” can be applied to the debate over health care. The aim is to take the provision of health care away from market forces and to make it freely accessible to all who need it. “From each according to ability” is what underlies a concern for the common good and a conception of society as a cooperative venture, with mandatory public service as a matching policy proposal. </p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>“To each according to ability” is at the core of equal opportunity – an ideal that underlies affirmative action legislation and various policies to increase the accessibility of college. “To each according to work” maps onto the ideal of equal pay for equal work and the push for minimal wage policies, mainly benefiting manual labor jobs. </p>
<p>Two millennia in the making, these phrases illustrate what is said in the book of Ecclesiastes: “<a href="https://biblehub.com/ecclesiastes/1-9.htm">There is nothing new under the sun.</a>”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138365/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luc Bovens does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>At the height of Reaganism, close to half of Americans believed a phrase popularized by Karl Marx actually derived from the US Constitution. It doesn’t, but scholars have traced it to the Bible.Luc Bovens, Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel HillLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1383782020-05-19T14:28:53Z2020-05-19T14:28:53ZEconomic policy remains hotly contested in South Africa: this detailed history shows why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334659/original/file-20200513-156625-1r5p84n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Persistent rampant povery has been blamed on the compromises made by the African National Congress during negotiations to end apartheid. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Economic inequality in post-apartheid South Africa <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/media/wits-university/faculties-and-schools/commerce-law-and-management/research-entities/scis/documents/Estimating%20the%20Distribution%20of%20Household%20Wealth%20in%20South%20Africa.pdf">has deepened</a>. This is not what was expected. Firstly, the African National Congress (ANC) won an overwhelming victory in the 1994 elections and promised to significantly reduce inequality in the world’s most unequal country. Secondly, the country’s constitution, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/drafting-and-acceptance-constitution">adopted in May 1996</a>, foregrounds the promotion of social and economic rights. </p>
<p>This paradoxical outcome has led to a ferocious political-economic debate on the nature of South Africa’s transition to democracy.</p>
<p>On the one hand, there are those who argue that in the 1994 settlement the leaders of the liberation movement sold out their <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/archive-files/patrick_bond_the_elite_transition_from_apartheibookos.org_.pdf">socialist commitments</a> to the white minority, in particular, <a href="https://www.loot.co.za/product/sampie-terreblanche-lost-in-transformation/rgfm-2362-g810">international and local capital</a>. This conserved the pillars of the apartheid economy, the <a href="https://www.ee.co.za/wp-content/uploads/legacy/Sharife-Bond-MEC-in-New-SA-Review-2.pdf">minerals-energy complex</a>. </p>
<p>On the other hand, there are those who argue that the ANC had no alternative to the Washington consensus approach to the economy in the 1990s. They say it was always a party of a mixed economy, the right to trade freely and the growth of a black business class. </p>
<p>Among the exponents of this view are <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/thabo-mbeki-the-dream-deferred/oclc/180845990">Thabo Mbeki</a>, the key figure in shaping ANC economic policy as deputy president from 1994 to 1999, and <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Choice_Not_Fate_The_Life_and_Times_of_Tr.html?id=xWu5CO_vXB8C&redir_esc=y">Trevor Manuel</a>, finance minister at the time. </p>
<p>Simply put, the Mbeki camp maintains that a fundamental continuity exists in the economic and social policies developed after 1994. Critics say there has been a policy reversal in post-apartheid South Africa. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former South African President Thabo Mbeki.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AMISOM Photo / Ilyas Ahmed</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A new book, <a href="https://witspress.co.za/catalogue/shadow-of-liberation/">Shadow of Liberation</a>, by Vishnu Padayachee and Robert Van Niekerk, respectively Distinguished Professor of Development Economics and Professor of Public Governance at the University of the Witwatersrand, challenges both approaches. It revisits how economic and social policies were made from the late 1980s to the mid-1990s. The authors draw on 35 in-depth interviews with participants in the policy process. This pool of original data is complemented by a rich archive of primary and secondary sources. Together, these data sets reveal a fascinating story about who shaped these policies and how. </p>
<p>The book is the first attempt to comprehensively document and interpret the origins and evolution of the ANC’s economic and social polices. </p>
<h2>Evolution of ANC economic policy</h2>
<p>The authors argue that the ANC lacked economic expertise – and spurned what little it had. In particular, it rejected the evidence-based analysis and recommendations of the MacroEconomic Research Group, which it had commissioned. They argue that it was less a case of the ANC “selling out” and more one of being outmanoeuvred. Policy makers were, Padayachee and Van Niekerk conclude (p. 135),</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Intellectually seduced in comfortable surroundings and eventually outmanoeuvred by the well-resourced apartheid state and by international and local pro-market friendly actors.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The story of the evolution of the ANC’s economic policy is a complex one. The authors take us on a long journey that begins in the 1940s. The rest of the journey is spread over nine chapters. Chapter 2 shows how the party’s economic and social roots lie in social democratic policies. These ideals can be found in the bill of rights in <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/anc/1943/claims.htm">African Claims</a>, developed in 1943.</p>
<p>African Claims was a document with a recognisably social democratic impetus. It argued for state intervention to secure social rights to health, education and welfare for all. This was to be based on universal political and social citizenship. These aspirations can also be traced to what the authors call the
“Keynesian, social democratic welfare state, based on the social rights of citizenship” in the <a href="http://scnc.ukzn.ac.za/doc/HIST/freedomchart/freedomch.html">Freedom Charter</a> adopted in 1955 (p. 22). </p>
<p>The next chapter connects the past to the dawn of democracy and the formation of the ANC’s economic planning department. The authors argue this consisted of a small group – Trevor Manuel, Alec Erwin, Maria Ramos, Neil Morrison, Moss Ngoasheng, Leslie Maasdorp – who came to believe that there</p>
<blockquote>
<p>was no alternative to neo-liberal globalisation (p. 67). </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The pace quickens in chapters 4, 5 and 6 – the empirical heart of the book. The authors show how the ANC distanced itself from the post-Keynesian MacroEconomic Research Group in December 1993, and then abruptly dropped the popular “growth through redistribution” <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/governmentgazetteid16085.pdf">Reconstruction and Development Programme</a> in April 1996.</p>
<p>At the centre of the book is a powerful critique, not only of the policy outcomes, but also of the way in which the policies were made. Yet the critiques sometimes feel incomplete. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is a substantial body of literature on the “politics of economic reform” that could have been drawn on to deepen Padayachee and Van Niekerk’s argument that widespread consultation and negotiation is vital for successful economic reform. In fairness, the refusal to negotiate the <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/growth-employment-and-redistribution-macroeconomic-strategy-south-africa-gear">Growth, Employment and Redistribution</a> macroeconomic strategy for South Africa in the <a href="http://nedlac.org.za/aboutus/">National Economic Development and Labour Council</a> is rightly criticised and the authors show admirable awareness of the issue. </p>
<p>The late post-Keynesian American economist Hyman Minsky’s famous observation, made over 30 years ago and rightly quoted by the authors, makes the point:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Economic issues must become a serious public matter and the subject of debate if new directions are to be undertaken. Meaningful reforms cannot be put over by an advisory and administrative elite that is itself the architect of the existing situation (quoted on p. xi of the book under review). </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Tragically, it is precisely what unfolded in South Africa in the 1990s.</p>
<h2>Speaking to the present</h2>
<p>Although the book examines events nearly three decades ago, it speaks to the present where the demand for <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-odd-meaning-of-radical-economic-transformation-in-south-africa-73003">rapid economic reform</a> has become widespread. </p>
<p>The lesson I draw from the book is that economic reform cannot be undertaken by a small group of people. Instead, policies must be formulated and implemented through negotiation and consultation of a social compact beyond the state and parliament to include unions, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/sustainable-democracy/B90F11ECCF2A20383ACAA887D20AFCFD">employers and other interest groups</a>. </p>
<p>What I argued <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02589009808729620">in 1998</a> remains true today: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Labour retains the power to block the imposition of economic reform – both at the national and workplace level. Any attempt to impose neo-liberal solutions unilaterally is likely to take the country down the path of ungovernability and civil war – it will ensure rather than avert chaos. If, at the same time, socialist solutions seem unfeasible, this conclusion points towards a class compromise between capital and the labouring poor: a Southern version of social democracy. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The insights in Shadow of Liberation complement this claim, while developing new interpretations based on evidence from face-to-face interviews with the key actors as well as new archival material. It is a necessary read for a new generation of policymakers as they confront the challenge of economic reform. Above all, this book is a major contribution to the growing body of literature on the appropriate policies required to reduce inequality in the global South. </p>
<p><em>This is an edited version of a longer article published in the June issue of the <a href="https://www.african-review.com/">African Review of Economics and Finance</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138378/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies is funded by the Ford Foundation. I also receive funding from the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
</span></em></p>Book sheds new light on the evolution of the economic policy of the African National Congress, South Africa’s governing party.Edward Webster, Distinguished Reserach Professor, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1344292020-03-26T10:26:52Z2020-03-26T10:26:52ZBy sending doctors to Italy, Cuba continues its long campaign of medical diplomacy<p>As Italy continues its battle against the global coronavirus pandemic, Cuba has sent <a href="https://www.repubblica.it/esteri/2020/03/21/news/coronavirus_cuba_in_soccorso_dell_italia_52_medici_e_infermieri_in_arrivo_a_crema-251931147/">52 doctors and nurses</a> to the country to help. The excellent training of Cuban doctors as well as the fact that they are used to working in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/20/opinion/cubas-impressive-role-on-ebola.html">precarious and high-risk situations</a> will provide invaluable support for the Italian people. </p>
<p>For nearly 60 years, Cuba has been sending healthcare professionals around the world. It does this in solidarity with those in need, but also as part of a concerted campaign of medical diplomacy and to make money to help the country survive an ongoing US embargo. </p>
<p>Since the very early years of the Cuban revolution, its former leader, Fidel Castro, made clear that universal healthcare and internationalism would be key to the country’s strategy. Based on the socialist concept that everyone should have the same opportunities in life, Cuba believed these ideals should be applicable at the global level. The Cuban programme was born out of an interest to export its revolutionary socialist ideals, first to Africa, and later to South America and the rest of the world. </p>
<p>Cuba sent its first long-term mission of Cuban doctors to Algeria in 1963, a country facing a territorial conflict with Morocco. Since then, Cuba has sent more than 400,000 healthcare professionals to work in 164 countries, according to <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2020-03-23/cubasalva-practica-humanista-de-la-revolucion-23-03-2020-01-03-38">statistics published</a> by the state media.</p>
<p>They have helped both in disaster relief, as well as to provide access to healthcare for those living in remote areas, for example in Venezuela and Brazil. These interventions are born out of trade cooperation agreements between the receiving country and Cuba, for which the Cuban government <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/12bd92f8-1bae-11d9-8af6-00000e2511c8">gets paid either in cash or in goods</a>. </p>
<p>In 2019, more than <a href="https://elpais.com/sociedad/2020-03-22/cuba-envia-a-italia-y-america-latina-brigadas-medicas-para-enfrentar-el-coronavirus.html">28,000 Cuban healthcare professionals</a> were working abroad. And before the outbreak of the coronavirus, 59 countries were benefiting from Cuba’s medical internationalism. The Cuban government recently <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2020-03-23/cubasalva-practica-humanista-de-la-revolucion-23-03-2020-01-03-38">confirmed</a> that its medical missions will be maintained and that, where needed, the services provided by their doctors would focus on combating the virus.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1241675000794558466"}"></div></p>
<p>The national press never misses an opportunity to present Cuba’s <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2019-05-22/los-medicos-son-los-heroes-22-05-2019-21-05-15">internationalist doctors as heroes</a>, responsible for giving hope to people all over the world who are in desperate situations. Pedro*, one of the doctors I interviewed as part of my <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/26382599?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">research</a> on the life stories of Cuban healthcare workers, explained the uniqueness of the Cuban doctors’ position:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The doctor can be Cuban, or from another country, but not every doctor will sacrifice their life and put themselves in danger to save lives, and this without any kind of financial compensation. This is something we Cubans only do. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Critics and fugitives</h2>
<p>Despite the admirable aspects of the programme, it has also received criticism. Some suggest the <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/5531/d06ec4e99076859a725a397f7b6c83752a2c.pdf">real interests</a> of the programme are economic and diplomatic and that it allows Cuba to shift scrutiny away from its own <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/cuba">poor human rights record</a>. </p>
<p>Others have <a href="https://www.ascecuba.org/asce_proceedings/cubas-business-of-humanitarianism-the-medical-mission-in-haiti/">criticised</a> what they see as the “selective humanitarianism” of the programme, calling attention to the lower numbers of doctors available to the Cuban population due to the high numbers of doctors working abroad. In my research in Cuba, I’ve witnessed long waiting times in medical centres and several of the people I interviewed spoke of a lack of continuity in doctor-patient care.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-the-cuban-healthcare-system-really-as-great-as-people-claim-69526">Is the Cuban healthcare system really as great as people claim?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>As for the doctors and nurses who take part, their participation is not always driven by solidarity but in <a href="https://theconversation.com/castros-legacy-cuban-doctors-still-go-abroad-but-its-no-longer-driven-by-international-solidarity-65181">some cases by the opportunities</a> these missions represent for them and their families. In many cases, working on a mission will improve their standard of living when they return to the island. Many are also able to send goods such as fridges or other household appliances to their families while they are away. </p>
<p>Many doctors have also used the mission as a way to escape a country that is still governed by an authoritarian regime and between 2006 and 2016, more than 7,000 Cuban doctors <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/cuba-usa-doctors-idUSL1N14S1LY20160108">defected to the US</a>. Several have even <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/world/americas/brazil-cuban-doctors-revolt.html">accused the Cuban government</a> of using them as modern slaves. </p>
<h2>A moment for global cooperation</h2>
<p>Cuba always offers its medical help, but Italy is the first developed European country which has decided to accept it. </p>
<p>Many global leaders have been wary of doing so, because of Cuba’s poor human rights record. The case of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 is illustrative here. Castro offered to send 1,500 doctors to the US to help with the relief effort. A special group of healthcare professionals was formed for the task called the Henry Reeve medical brigade, <a href="http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/2005/esp/f040905e.html">named after</a> an American who supported the Cuban independence forces in 1868 and died in combat for the cause. But US president George W Bush <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/americas/09/05/katrina.cuba/index.html">never got back to Castro</a> and the doctors and nurses were redeployed elsewhere. It’s this same brigade which has now gone to Italy. </p>
<p>In 2005, while waiting for Bush’s response, Castro <a href="http://www.fidelcastro.cu/it/node/1257">made clear</a> what should be at the centre of decisions in times of crisis:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This is not a war between human beings, it is a war for the life of human beings, it is a war against diseases, against repeating calamities, and one of the first things this world should learn especially now, with the changes that are taking place and the phenomena of this type, is to cooperate.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While everyone may not agree with Castro’s revolution, perhaps this is a moment for the world to put ideological disagreements aside and focus on the global war against coronavirus by all working together. </p>
<p><em>* Names have been changed to protect the anonymity of interviewees.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/134429/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stéphanie Panichelli-Batalla has received funding related to this research from the British Council.</span></em></p>Cuba stresses its programme to send doctors abroad is based in solidarity. But there are diplomatic and economic reasons too.Stéphanie Panichelli-Batalla, Associate Professor in Global Sustainable Development, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1323352020-02-27T14:57:02Z2020-02-27T14:57:02ZHow socialism became un-American through the Ad Council’s propaganda campaigns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317193/original/file-20200225-24672-1w17i64.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bernie Sanders was asked at a CNN-sponsored town hall about socialism.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2019/04/23/bernie-sanders-town-hall-failures-of-socialism-question-soviet-russia-sot-vpx.cnn">CNN screenshot</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><strong>This article was published in 2020</strong>
Bernie Sanders has emerged as the Democratic <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/campaign-chronicles/on-the-eve-of-the-iowa-caucuses-bernie-sanders-is-the-democratic-front-runner">front-runner</a> in the race for the presidential nomination. </p>
<p>Yet even some left-leaning pundits and publications <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/12/opinion/bernie-sanders-2020.html?fbclid=IwAR2Rba8I0OTMyry_KDG_qB6uWTiZOI4e44u9fDoaqrYfI6cYiN2tuQGwZjM">are concerned about</a> what they see as Sanders’ potential lack of electability. </p>
<p>Sanders is a Democratic Socialist. And the label “socialist” is a political liability in American culture. According to a Gallup <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/285563/socialism-atheism-political-liabilities.aspx">poll</a> released on Feb. 11, 2020, only 45% of Americans would vote for a socialist.</p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://muohio.academia.edu/OanaGodeanuKenworthy">scholar of American culture</a> with an interest in the relationship between political ideologies and popular culture. In my research, I have found that this antipathy toward socialism may not be an accident: American identity today is strongly tied to an image of capitalism crafted and advertised by the Ad Council and American corporate interests over decades, often with the support of the U.S. government. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317163/original/file-20200225-24655-1ffoszf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A screenshot from one of the corporate Cold War-era cartoons linking the Bill of Rights to free-enterprise ideology.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://archive.org/details/ItsEvery1954">Internet Archive, Prelinger Collection</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Business and government solidarity</h2>
<p>In 1942, a group of advertising and industry executives created the <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/12/141207-world-war-advertising-consumption-anniversary-people-photography-culture/">War Advertising Council</a>, to promote the war effort. The government compensated the companies that created or donated ads by allowing them to deduct some of their costs from their taxable incomes. </p>
<p>Renamed the Ad Council in 1943, the organization applied the same wartime persuasive techniques of advertising and psychological manipulation during the Cold War years, the post-war period when the geopolitical rivalry between the U.S., the USSR and their respective allies raged. One of their goals: promoting the virtues of capitalism and free enterprise in America while simultaneously demonizing the alternative – socialism – which was often conflated with communism. </p>
<p>Government propaganda at home portrayed the communist USSR as <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-history-of-communism/cold-war-anticommunism-and-the-impact-of-communism-on-the-west/FBF5BE47137C1284F8D7AB073CE0EDBF/core-reader">godless, tyrannical and antithetical to individual freedoms</a>. As a counterpoint, America became everything the Soviet Union was not. </p>
<p>This link between capitalism and American national identity was advertised through a sophisticated, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/enterprise-and-society/article/fun-and-facts-about-american-business-economic-education-and-business-propaganda-in-an-early-cold-war-cartoon-series/664FAB7E513C39EA17E860627C0393AD">corporate effort</a> as efficient and ubiquitous as state-driven propaganda behind the Iron Curtain. </p>
<p>The campaigns used the ideological divisions of the Cold War to emphasize the relevance of their message. In a 1948 report, the Ad Council <a href="https://news.hrvh.org/veridian/?a=d&d=scarsdaleinquire19490909.2.72">explained</a> its goal to the public: “The world today is engaged in a colossal struggle to determine whether freedom or statism will dominate.” </p>
<h2>Extolling capitalism’s virtues</h2>
<p>The campaigns started as a public-private partnership. At the end of World War II, the government worried about the <a href="https://depts.washington.edu/moves/CP_map-members.shtml">spread of communism</a> at home. Business interests worried about government regulations and about <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/3400/longterm-gallup-poll-trends-portrait-american-public-opinion.aspx">the rising popularity of unions</a>. The Cold War provided both parties with a shared enemy.</p>
<p>In 1947, President Truman asked the Ad Council to organize the <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/remembering-the-freedom-train">Freedom Train Campaign</a>, focusing on the history of America’s political freedoms. Paramount Pictures, U.S. Steel, DuPont, General Electric and Standard Oil provided financial support. For two years the train crisscrossed the nation, carrying original documents that included the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=28%2C0%2C221%2C101&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=274&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=274&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=274&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317170/original/file-20200225-24685-1wv4n16.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">One of the Ad Council’s messages about capitalism in America.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://repository.duke.edu/dc/outdooradvertising/AAA5813">Outdoor Advertising Association of America Archives, Duke University Libraries</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The following year, the Ad Council launched a business-led campaign, called <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/business-history-review/article/selling-of-america-the-advertising-council-and-american-politics-19421960/FD882140447065C31D46F1118A486C7A">“The Miracle of America,”</a> intended to foster support for the American model of capitalism, as distinct from its Western European version, which was more friendly to government intervention. It urged increased productivity by U.S. workers, linked economic and political freedom and, paradoxically, asserted capitalism’s <a href="https://ballouonvisualcomms.wordpress.com/2016/06/15/ad-council-economic-education-ads/#jp-carousel-1192">collaborative</a> nature. </p>
<p>“Sure, America is going ahead if we all pull together,” read a brochure. Another flyer, “<a href="https://ballouonvisualcomms.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/1949_comes_the_revolution.jpg">Comes the Revolution!</a>,” cast its support of American capitalism in the language of global struggle: “If we continue to make that system work…then other nations will follow us. If we don’t, then they’ll probably go communist or fascist.”</p>
<p>In its first two years, the Miracle of America message reached American audiences via <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/little-cold-warriors-9780190675684?cc=us&lang=en&">250 radio and television stations and 7,000 outdoor billboards</a>. Newspapers printed <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3114050?Search=yes&resultItemClick=true&searchText=selling&searchText=of&searchText=america&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dselling%2Bof%2Bamerica%26amp%3Bfilter%3D&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_SYC-4946%2Fcontrol&refreqid=search%3A4461685f10fcf36b78d4b85743875e92&seq=1">13 million lines</a> of free advertising. The Ad Council boasted that the campaign made over <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9780230116948#aboutBook">1 billion “radio listener impressions.”</a></p>
<p>American factory workers received about half of the 1.84 million copies of the free pamphlet “The Miracle of America.” One-quarter were distributed free of charge to schools, and <a href="https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190675684.001.0001/oso-9780190675684">76 universities</a> ordered the booklet.</p>
<p>This pro-business propaganda, expressed in the language of Cold War patriotism, had <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Free-Market-Missionaries-The-Corporate-Manipulation-of-Community-Values/Beder/p/book/9781844073344">reached roughly 70%</a> of the American population by the end of the campaign.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/G4FmHsniTGg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">How Ad Council campaigns after WWII helped make socialism un-American.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Cartoon capitalism</h2>
<p>The efforts produced more than just print and billboard messages.</p>
<p>In 1946, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, founded by the former head of General Motors, paid the evangelical <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01956051.2011.653419?journalCode=vjpf20">Harding College</a> to produce “<a href="https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Sutherland+%28John%29+Productions%2C+Inc.%22">Fun and Facts about American Business</a>,” a series of educational cartoon videos about capitalism, produced by a former Disney employee. </p>
<p>Between 1949 and 1952, Metro Goldwyn Mayer distributed them in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/enterprise-and-society/article/fun-and-facts-about-american-business-economic-education-and-business-propaganda-in-an-early-cold-war-cartoon-series/664FAB7E513C39EA17E860627C0393AD">theaters, schools, colleges, churches</a> and workplaces. </p>
<p>The films promoted the same messages as the Ad Council campaigns, although they were not part of the project. They continued a decade-long effort by the Sloan Foundation to start, in the words of its executive director, “<a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/593466">a bombardment of the American mind with elementary economic principles</a> through partnering with educational institutions.” </p>
<p>To both Sloan and the movement’s backers, business interests were synonymous with the national interest. The free-enterprise system was a shorthand for freedom, democracy and patriotism. Unlike in Europe, the videos suggested, class struggle – of the kind that required unions – did not exist in the U.S. </p>
<p>In the cartoon “Meet the King,” Joe, the archetypal American worker, realizes he is not an exploited proletarian. Instead, he’s a <a href="https://archive.org/details/MeetKing1949">king</a>, “because he can buy more with his wages than any other worker on the globe.”</p>
<p>Conversely, government regulations of, or interventions in, the economy were described in the cartoons as socialist tendencies, bound to lead to communism and tyranny.</p>
<p>“<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVh75ylAUXY">Make Mine Freedom</a>,” and “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHDyE954l4U">It’s Everybody’s Business</a>” presented the state as a perpetual threat. <a href="https://archive.org/details/ItsEvery1954">A money-sucking tax monster</a>, the government reduces everyone’s profits, crushes private enterprise and takes away individual freedoms: “<a href="https://archive.org/details/make_mine_freedom_ipod">No more private property, no more you</a>.”</p>
<p>According to an estimate from Fortune magazine, by 1952, American businesses spent US$100 million each year, independent from any Ad Council campaigns, promoting free enterprise.</p>
<h2>‘Peanuts’ pushes freedom</h2>
<p>In the early 1970s, business responded to rising negativity about corporate power with a new campaign coordinated by the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1975/08/01/archives/advertising-simplifying-the-dismal-science.html">Ad Council</a>. </p>
<p>“The American Economic System … and Your Part in It” was launched alongside the bicentennial national celebrations. It was <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/375958?seq=1">the largest centralized pro-business public relations project</a> thus far, but only one of many <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1976/09/19/archives/the-babel-of-economic-advertising.html">independently run by corporations</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317192/original/file-20200225-24659-s8egp4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Part of a page from the 1970s booklet that used Charles Schultz’s ‘Peanuts’ comic strips to explain the benefits of America’s economic system.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.amazon.com/American-Economic-System-Charles-Schulz/dp/B077NRNH28">Amazon</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The media industry donated $40 million in free space and air time in the first year of the campaign. The Department of Commerce and the Department of Labor contributed about half a million dollars toward the production costs for a 20-page <a href="https://www.amazon.com/American-Economic-System-Charles-Schulz/dp/B077NRNH28">booklet</a>. </p>
<p>That <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED177057.pdf">booklet</a> used data provided by the departments of Commerce and Labor and Charles Schulz’s ‘Peanuts’ comic strips to explain the benefits of America’s economic system. The system was again presented as a foundational freedom protected by a Constitution whose goal was to “maintain a climate in which people could work, invest, and prosper.”</p>
<p>By 1979, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Free-Market-Missionaries-Corporate-Manipulation-ebook/dp/B008FZ10QK/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=free+market+missionaries&qid=1582606871&sr=8-1">13 million</a> copies had been distributed to schools, universities, libraries, civic organizations and workplaces. </p>
<h2>Echoes now?</h2>
<p>For four decades, the Cold War provided a simple good-vs.-evil axis that consolidated the association between freedom, American-ness and free-enterprise capitalism. </p>
<p>The business community, independently and through the Ad Council, funded massive top-down economic education programs which shaped American perceptions of <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/3400/longterm-gallup-poll-trends-portrait-american-public-opinion.aspx">business and government</a> and of capitalism and socialism. </p>
<p>The Cold War ended 30 years ago, but its cultural structures and divisions endure – perhaps, even, in the responses of some Americans to Bernie Sanders’ socialism.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: The Conversation has received grant funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/132335/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Oana Godeanu-Kenworthy received funding from the Fulbright Commission and The Library of Congress. </span></em></p>Bernie Sanders is a Democratic Socialist, a potential problem for the presidential candidate. A Cold War campaign to link American-ness and capitalism helped create popular distrust of socialism.Oana Godeanu-Kenworthy, Teaching Professor of American Studies, Miami UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1226892020-02-06T13:45:22Z2020-02-06T13:45:22ZSanders called JPMorgan’s CEO America’s ‘biggest corporate socialist’ – here’s why he has a point<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313566/original/file-20200204-41527-4gqvoh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=27%2C109%2C4525%2C3017&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">JPMorgan's Dimon, center, recently criticized socialism.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Sen. Bernie Sanders called JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon the “<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-26/sanders-goes-after-jp-morgan-ceo-jamie-dimon-in-new-ad">biggest corporate socialist in America today</a>” in a recent ad. </p>
<p>He may have a point – beyond what he intended. </p>
<p>With his Dimon ad, Sanders is referring specifically to the <a href="https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2008/03/18/jpmorgans-12-billion-bailout/">bailouts JPMorgan</a> and other banks took from the government during the 2008 financial crisis. But accepting government bailouts and corporate welfare is not the only way I believe American companies behave like closet socialists despite their professed love of free markets. </p>
<p>In reality, <a href="http://anon-ftp.iza.org/dp6635.pdf">most big U.S. companies operate</a> internally in ways Karl Marx would applaud as remarkably close to socialist-style central planning. Not only that, corporate America has arguably become a laboratory of innovation in socialist governance, as I show in <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-99-percent-economy-9780190931889?cc=us&lang=en">my own research</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313842/original/file-20200205-149762-1xrgxxy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Karl Marx might feel right at home in a typical U.S. corporation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Roger Viollet via Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Closet socialists</h2>
<p>In public, CEOs like <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/22/jp-morgan-ceo-jamie-dimon-takes-on-socialism-says-it-will-lead-to-an-eroding-society.html">Dimon</a> attack socialist planning while defending free markets.</p>
<p>But inside JPMorgan and most other big corporations, market competition is subordinated to planning. These big companies often contain dozens of business units and sometimes thousands. Instead of letting these units compete among themselves, CEOs typically direct a <a href="https://hbr.org/1975/01/strategic-planning-in-diversified-companies">strategic planning process</a> to ensure they cooperate to achieve the best outcomes for the corporation <a href="https://store.hbr.org/product/demise-of-cost-and-profit-centers/b0701a?sku=B0701A-PDF-ENG">as a whole</a>.</p>
<p>This is just how a socialist economy is intended to operate. The government would conduct economy-wide planning and set goals for each industry and enterprise, aiming to achieve the best outcome for society as a whole. </p>
<p>And just as companies rely internally on planned cooperation to meet goals and overcome challenges, the U.S. economy could use this harmony to overcome the existential crisis of our age – climate change. It’s a challenge so massive and urgent that it will require <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/09/beyond-business-as-usual-addressing-the-climate-change-crisis/">every part of the economy</a> to work together with government in order to address it.</p>
<h2>Overcoming socialism’s past problems</h2>
<p>But, of course, socialism doesn’t have a good track record. </p>
<p>One of the reasons socialist planning failed in the old Soviet Union, for example, was that it was so <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/socialist-planning/80A1C337AD2ACF7BF4365BA2A1090363">top-down</a> that it lacked the kind of popular legitimacy that democracy grants a government. As a result, bureaucrats overseeing the planning process could not get reliable information about the real opportunities and challenges experienced by enterprises or citizens. </p>
<p>Moreover, enterprises had little incentive to strive to meet their assigned objectives, especially when they had so little involvement in formulating them. </p>
<p>A second reason the USSR didn’t survive was that its authoritarian system <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/40870502.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A74af1ee78ac916638927d4342e598b9e">failed to motivate</a> either workers or entrepreneurs. As a result, even though the government funded basic science generously, Soviet industry was a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/USSR-Crisis-Failure-Economic-System/dp/039395336X">laggard in innovation</a>.</p>
<p>Ironically, corporations – those singular products of capitalism – are showing how these and other problems of socialist planning can be surmounted.</p>
<p>Take the problem of democratic legitimacy. Some companies, such as <a href="https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Rise-and-Fall-or-Transformation-The-Evolution-of-at-Ocasio-Joseph/99debd9035e7884e202a6a72fd028d46aead342e">General Electric</a>, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1553725011370699">Kaiser Permanente</a> and <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2782632?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">General Motors</a>, have developed innovative ways to avoid the dysfunctions of autocratic planning by using <a href="https://hbr.org/1976/09/how-to-design-a-strategic-planning-system">techniques</a> that enable lower-level personnel to participate actively in the strategy process.</p>
<p>Although profit pressures often force top managers to short-circuit the promised participation, when successfully integrated it not only provides top management with more <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mar.2015.06.002">reliable bottom-up input</a> for strategic planning but also makes all employees more <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4131439?seq=1">reliable partners</a> in carrying it out.</p>
<p>So here we have centralization – not in the more familiar, autocratic model, but rather in a form I call “participative centralization.” In a socialist system, this approach could be adopted, adapted and scaled up to support economy-wide planning, ensuring that it was both democratic and effective.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313844/original/file-20200205-149778-g0noou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The USSR was good at collectivism but bad at innovation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Central Press/Getty Images)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As for motivating innovation, America’s big businesses face a challenge similar to that of socialism. They need employees to be collectivist, so they willingly comply with policies and procedures. But they need them to be simultaneously individualistic, to fuel divergent thinking and creativity.</p>
<p>One common solution in much of corporate America, as in the old Soviet Union, is to <a href="https://hbr.org/1970/05/beyond-theory-y">specialize those roles</a>, with most people relegated to routine tasks while the privileged few work on innovation tasks. That approach, however, overlooks the creative capacities of the vast majority and <a href="https://www.gallup.com/workplace/238085/state-american-workplace-report-2017.aspx">leads to</a> widespread employee disengagement and sub-par business performance. </p>
<p>Smarter businesses have found ways to overcome this dilemma by creating cultures and reward systems that support a synthesis of individualism and collectivism that I call “interdependent individualism.” In my research, I have found this kind of motivation in settings as diverse as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1070.0293">Kaiser Permanent physicians</a>, <a href="https://hbr.org/1993/01/time-and-motion-regained">assembly-line workers at Toyota’s NUMMI plant</a> and <a href="https://aisel.aisnet.org/misqe/vol4/iss1/3/">software developers at Computer Sciences Corp</a>. These companies do this, in part, by rewarding both individual contributions to the organization’s goals as well as collaboration in achieving them. </p>
<p>While <a href="https://thesocialist.org.au/everyone-paid-the-same/">socialists have often recoiled</a> against the idea individual performance-based rewards, these more sophisticated policies could be scaled up to the entire economy to help meet socialism’s innovation and motivation challenge.</p>
<h2>Big problems require big government</h2>
<p>The idea of such a socialist transformation in the U.S. may seem remote today. </p>
<p>But this can change, particularly as more Americans, especially young ones, <a href="https://www.axios.com/exclusive-poll-young-americans-embracing-socialism-b051907a-87a8-4f61-9e6e-0db75f7edc4a.html">embrace socialism</a>. One reason they are doing so is because the current capitalist system has so manifestly failed to deal with climate change. </p>
<p>Looking inside these companies suggests a better way forward – and hope for society’s ability to avert catastrophe. </p>
<p>[ <em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122689/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Adler does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In some ways, many of America’s CEOs are like closet socialists whose corporations offer a working model for what a socialist United States could look like.Paul Adler, Professor of Management and Organization, Sociology and Environmental Studies, University of Southern CaliforniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1304272020-01-22T17:14:27Z2020-01-22T17:14:27ZCan capitalism solve capitalism’s problems?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311432/original/file-20200122-117907-966dsh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=68%2C73%2C3718%2C2015&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A session at Davos highlighted the consequences of capitalism. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Capitalism is in trouble – at least judging by recent polls. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/26/a-majority-of-millennials-now-reject-capitalism-poll-shows/">majority of American millennials reject</a> the economic system, while 55% of women age 18 to 54 <a href="https://www.axios.com/axios-hbo-poll-55-percent-women-prefer-socialism-f70bf87e-34fd-4b63-b1f6-2f2b6900f634.html">say they prefer socialism</a>. More Democrats now <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/25/stark-partisan-divisions-in-americans-views-of-socialism-capitalism/">have a positive view of socialism</a> than capitalism. And globally, 56% of respondents to a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-davos-meeting-trust/capitalism-seen-doing-more-harm-than-good-in-global-survey-idUSKBN1ZJ0CW">new survey agree</a> “capitalism as it exists today does more harm than good in the world.”</p>
<p>One problem interpreting numbers like these is that there are many definitions of capitalism and socialism. More to the point, people seem to be thinking of a specific form of capitalism that deems the sole purpose of companies is to increase stock prices and enrich investors. Known as shareholder capitalism, it’s been the <a href="https://prospect.org/article/when-shareholder-capitalism-came-town">guiding light of American business</a> for more than four decades. That’s what the survey meant by “as it exists today.”</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://www.umass.edu/spp/people/faculty/elizabeth-schmidt">scholar of socially responsible companies</a>, however, I cannot help but notice a <a href="https://ssrn.com/abstract=3406867">shift in corporate behavior in recent years</a>. A new kind of capitalism seems to be emerging, one in which companies value communities, the environment and workers just as much as profits. </p>
<p>The latest evidence: Companies as diverse as alcohol maker <a href="https://www.beveragedaily.com/Article/2020/01/09/AB-InBev-to-brew-all-beers-with-renewable-electricity-in-Europe">AB InBev</a>, airline <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200106005549/en/JetBlue-Prepares-Business-New-Climate-Reality">JetBlue</a> and money manager <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/blackrock-joins-worlds-largest-investor-group-on-climate-change-11578594349">BlackRock</a> have all in recent weeks made new commitments to pursue more sustainable business practices. </p>
<h2>The purpose of business</h2>
<p>Nearly 50 years ago, the economist <a href="https://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/business/miltonfriedman1970.pdf">Milton Friedman</a> proclaimed that the sole purpose of a business is “to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits.”</p>
<p>Within a decade, Friedman’s claim <a href="http://rooseveltinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/The-Shareholder-Myth.pdf">became accepted wisdom</a> in corporate boardrooms. The era of “shareholder primacy capitalism” had begun.</p>
<p>One result has been <a href="https://forecast-chart.com/historical-sp-500.html">remarkable growth in the stock market</a>. But critics argue companies and the “shareholder value theory” <a href="https://hbr.org/2017/05/managing-for-the-long-term#the-error-at-the-heart-of-corporate-leadership">are also complicit</a> in exacerbating many <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2019/02/25/race-shareholder-profits-has-left-workers-dust-according-new-research/">economic</a>, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/04/how-investing-turns-nice-people-into-psychopaths/255426/">social</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change">environmental</a> problems, such as <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/03/02/perspective-on-the-stock-market-rally-80-of-stock-value-held-by-top-10/">income inequality</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change">climate change</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=804&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=804&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=804&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285409/original/file-20190723-110187-1ag0vc1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Milton Friedman won prizes for his research on consumption analysis and monetary history.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Friedman#/media/File:Milton_Friedman_1976.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>They also note that putting profits first actually <a href="https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=http%253A%252F%252Fwww.bing.com%252Fsearch%253Fq%253Dlynn%2520stout%2520toxic&amp=&go=Search&amp=&qs=n&amp=&form=QBRE&amp=&sp=-1&amp=&pq=lynn+stout+toxic&amp=&sc=1-16&amp=&sk=&amp=&cvid=79A92B3E536049C493D0683540E953E5&amp=&httpsredir=1&amp=&article=1031&amp=&context=penn_law_review&amp=&sei-redir=1#search=%22lynn%20stout%20toxic%22">harms shareholders</a> in the long run by encouraging managers to take actions that may eventually reduce earnings.</p>
<h2>The rebellion</h2>
<p>Many consumers, workers and socially conscious investors have also noticed these shortcomings and increased pressure on corporations to change.</p>
<p>For starters, more Americans no longer find it acceptable for companies to exclusively seek profits. A <a href="http://www.conecomm.com/research-blog/2017-csr-study">2017 poll</a> found that 78% of U.S. consumers want businesses to pursue social justice issues, while 76% said they would refuse to buy a product if the business supported an issue contrary to their beliefs. Almost half the respondents said they had already boycotted a product for that reason.</p>
<p>Workers increasingly expect their employers to share their values. A <a href="https://sustainablebrands.com/read/organizational-change/3-4-of-millennials-would-take-a-pay-cut-to-work-for-a-socially-responsible-company">2016 study</a> found that most Americans – particularly millennials – consider a company’s social and environmental commitments when deciding where to work. Most would also be willing to take a pay cut in order to work for a “responsible” company – and are demanding their current employers behave that way.</p>
<p>For example, workers at online furniture company Wayfair <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rakeenmabud/2019/07/12/two-lessons-from-the-wayfair-walkout/#71c1ddc33a88">recently walked out</a> when they learned it had sent beds to detention centers at the U.S.-Mexico border. More than 8,100 Amazon employees signed an open letter supporting a <a href="https://medium.com/@amazonemployeesclimatejustice/public-letter-to-jeff-bezos-and-the-amazon-board-of-directors-82a8405f5e38">shareholder resolution</a> urging the retailer to do more to address climate change. </p>
<p>Finally, investors are <a href="https://hbr.org/2019/05/the-investor-revolution">becoming more socially aware</a> and putting more of their money behind businesses that behave in sustainable and responsive ways. At the beginning of 2018, portfolio managers <a href="https://www.ussif.org/files/Trends/Trends%202018%20executive%20summary%20FINAL.pdf">held US$11.6 trillion</a> in U.S. assets using environmental, social and governance criteria to guide their investments, up from <a href="https://www.ussif.org/files/Publications/10_Trends_Exec_Summary.pdf">$2.5 trillion in 2010</a>. </p>
<p>Laurence Fink, founder and CEO of BlackRock, the <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-13/blackrock-looks-to-five-megatrends-to-expand-etf-business">world’s largest asset manager</a>, <a href="https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/investor-relations/2018-larry-fink-ceo-letter">summed up the growing sentiment</a> when he said in 2018, “To prosper over time, every company must not only deliver financial performance, but also show how it makes a positive contribution to society.”</p>
<h2>The corporate response</h2>
<p>Presumably realizing how important these constituencies are to their bottom lines, businesses are paying attention. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2020/01/21/stakeholder-capitalism-arrives-at-davos/">Stakeholder capitalism</a> is this year’s theme at Davos, the global gathering of the world’s elite in the Alps. And last year, the leaders at some of the world’s largest companies said that <a href="https://www.businessroundtable.org/business-roundtable-redefines-the-purpose-of-a-corporation-to-promote-an-economy-that-serves-all-americans">they are ditching</a> shareholder-first capitalism and instead embracing a corporate purpose that seeks to serve all constituents. The sentiment is hardly isolated. </p>
<p>Dick’s Sporting Goods, Kroger, Walmart and L.L. Bean, for example, responded to growing concerns over mass shootings by <a href="https://www.triplepundit.com/story/2019/parkland-year-2-gun-safety-and-business-response-gun-violence/82451/">restricting the sale of guns</a>. Procter and Gamble, a major sponsor for U.S. Soccer, expressed support for the quest of the <a href="https://www.tmz.com/2019/07/14/procter-and-gamble-donate-us-womens-national-soccer-team-equal-pay/">women’s team</a> for equal pay and donated $500,000 to help narrow the pay gap with men. </p>
<p>Airlines including American, United and Frontier <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/airlines-transport-immigrant-children.html">refused to knowingly fly children</a> separated from their parents at the border following outrage over the Trump administration’s policy. And even though Amazon shareholders rejected the worker-supported shareholder resolution described above, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/amazon-climate-change-resolution-2637862790.html?rebelltitem=3#rebelltitem3">Amazon set stronger goals</a> for reducing its carbon footprint after the resolution was introduced.</p>
<p>These actions have sometimes hurt the bottom line. The decision to restrict gun sales cost Dick’s Sporting Goods <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-29/dick-s-dks-ceo-ed-stack-says-gun-shift-cut-sales-by-150m">$150 million</a>. Delta <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/georgia-lawmakers-kill-jet-fuel-tax-break-after-delta-drops-nra-discount-2018-03-01">lost a $50 million tax break</a> in Georgia after severing ties with the NRA. </p>
<p>But these and <a href="https://www.dailysignal.com/2018/08/30/how-louisiana-stood-up-to-the-anti-gun-corporate-elite/">other companies</a> didn’t back down. The CEO of Dick’s Sporting Goods <a href="https://tennesseestar.com/2019/03/30/dicks-sporting-goods-lost-millions-over-anti-gun-policies/">explained</a> that when something is “to the detriment of the public, you have to stand up.”</p>
<p>Companies are also setting tougher social and environmental goals for themselves and then reporting their successes and failures. Tesla, Unilever, Nike and Whole Foods are among nine companies with annual revenues of at least $1 billion that “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2016/jan/02/billion-dollar-companies-sustainability-green-giants-tesla-chipotle-ikea-nike-toyota-whole-foods">have sustainability or social good at their core</a>.” </p>
<p>In 2018, <a href="https://www.ga-institute.com/press-releases/article/flash-report-86-of-sp-500-indexR-companies-publish-sustainability-responsibility-reports-in-20.html">86% of Standard & Poor’s 500 companies</a> reported on their environmental, social and governance performance and achievements, up from less than 20% in 2011. </p>
<p>And companies have found that putting more emphasis on social justice can pay off. Unilever, for example, said in 2017 that its “<a href="https://www.marketingweek.com/unilever-sustainable-brands-growth/">sustainable living” brands</a>, such as Ben & Jerry’s, Dove and Hellmann’s, are growing much faster than its other brands. Companies with the best scores on their sustainability reports <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/terrywaghorn/2017/12/04/sustainable-reporting-lessons-from-the-fortune-500/#7a4d9f756564">generally perform better financially</a> than those with lower scores. </p>
<h2>The end of shareholder capitalism?</h2>
<p>Skeptics can be forgiven for believing these corporate “changes” are not real or are simply public relations stunts designed to appeal to a new generation.</p>
<p>Businesses can, of course, say they will be responsible citizens while doing the opposite. Few sustainability reports in the United States are <a href="https://www.cpajournal.com/2017/07/26/current-state-assurance-sustainability-reports/">externally audited</a>, and the companies are asking us to take them at their word.</p>
<p>Even if they are well-meaning, intentions are not enough to create systemic change. A 2017 study showed that many companies with climate change goals actually <a href="https://hbr.org/2017/11/how-bold-corporate-climate-change-goals-deteriorate-over-time">scaled back their ambitions over time</a> as the reality clashed with their lofty goals.</p>
<p>But businesses can’t afford to ignore their customers’ wishes. Nor can they ignore their workers in a tight labor market. And if they disregard socially responsible investors, they risk both <a href="https://hbr.org/2019/05/the-investor-revolution">losing out on important investments</a> and facing <a href="https://www.porticobenefits.org/Overview/ReponsibleInvesting/InvestingForSocialImpact/ClimateChangeResolutions">shareholder resolutions</a> that force change.</p>
<p>The shareholder value doctrine is not dead, but we are beginning to see major cracks in its armor. And as long as investors, customers and employees continue to push for more responsible behavior, you should expect to see those cracks grow. </p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/investors-consumers-and-workers-are-changing-capitalism-for-the-better-by-demanding-companies-behave-more-responsibly-119281">article originally published</a> on July 24, 2019.</em></p>
<p>[ <em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130427/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Schmidt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As capitalism’s image crumbles, many of the world’s biggest companies are trying to give it new life by showing it can mean more than just making money.Elizabeth Schmidt, Professor of Practice, Nonprofit Organizations; Social & Environmental Enterprises, UMass AmherstLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.