Socialist society: essence, foundations, ideas, principles, stages of development, tasks and goals

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:41

The formation of the Soviet Union was initially based on a gradual transition to a communist society, but for all the years of its existence it was not possible to achieve this goal. But we can safely say that in the USSR they built a socialist society that meets almost all the basic principles laid down in the concept. Initially, this type of society was considered only a small step leading to a bright communist future, but over time it became a completely separate concept.

The birth of socialism

In order to understand what the socialist system of society is, the first thing to do is to reject it as a concept that appeared exclusively in the 20th century. History draws our attention to at least the existence of two states, which at their core had echoes of socialism.

1. Ancient Mesopotamia, which became one of the first states that arose on Earth. It was based on the power of temples, around which ordinary people gathered. Full-flowing rivers gave impetus to the active development of agriculture, and howAs a result, the territory was divided into several small states at once. However, numerous cuneiform tablets have survived to our time, allowing you to find out the economic side: all grown products were sent to a warehouse, from where they were distributed to each worker, and at that time they could not own the land.
2. The Inca Empire before the period of conquest also resembled a socialist society: practically none of the inhabitants of this state owned property, and the concept of private property or money as such did not exist. Trade was not considered a significant occupation. Everything was controlled by the king, so that the entire territory was considered state property and was given out for use.

Deepening into history, you can find a huge number of similar examples both in the Middle Ages and in the New Age.

The essence of socialist society

There are many concepts that scientists invest in the concept of socialism. However, the base is the political and economic system of government, the basis of which is the predominance of society over everything. All production and distribution of income falls on the shoulders not of individual leaders, but of ordinary people in their mass.

It is believed that in a developed socialist society, instead of private property prevailing in capitalism, it is public property that plays the main role, and the individual and the state itself fade into the background. It is the team that becomes the cornerstone.

Fundamentals of politicalmodels

Over the centuries, the idea of a socialist society has gradually changed. As a result, the following theoretical foundations of this type of state were obtained:

• complete abolition of private property and transfer of control over the individual to a collective bureaucratic power;
• destroying not only property, but also the very institutions of marriage, religion and family (for a long time even the exchange of wives and children was the main concept).

Such a model was proposed only in theory, and in practice was never implemented even in the early centuries. There are huge differences between the theoretical and practical model of socialism.

Ideas rooted in socialism

It is now generally accepted to consider socialist society a phenomenon of the 20th century, which appeared in opposition to capitalism in the West or arose on the basis of the behavior of the inhabitants of Arab or African countries.

However, based on history, one can understand the basic idea that scientists have laid in socialism. They believe that a person is initially predisposed to collective work, therefore, for the work done, he can safely receive a share of the benefits received by the whole society. But at the same time, able-bodied citizens must also provide for sections of the population, such as the disabled or pensioners who cannot take care of themselves, through an even distribution.

The very idea of such a society, where all people are completely equal, and class inequality does not exist in principle, seems incredibly attractive to many. All the needs of ordinarycitizens are satisfied completely free of charge: education, medicine, recreation, culture. It is assumed that the individual is completely satisfied with what he gets and does not want to achieve more or fulfill himself.

Principles

The principles of universal justice and equality between any members of society, regardless of the tasks they perform, are always the basis of a socialist state. The main positions are as follows:

• the priority of society over the individual: any person is completely dependent on the team and all his actions are aimed at his benefit;
• complete elimination of any class inequality;
• collectivism: all people in society are bound together by close bonds of brotherhood;
• replacing private property with public property;
• planned economy - the entire economy is fully regulated by the state itself.

In this case, it must be taken into account that there are different types of socialist society: utopian, peasant, Marxist and others. Each of them can raise a number of other features to priority, however, the ones listed above are the basis for any.

Utopian socialism

All the ideas of a socialist society were built precisely on the basis of utopia. Thomas More, in his work on the ideal state, did not lay the laws of social development as the basis for the transformation of society. Therefore, utopian socialism sharply criticizedcapitalist society and dreamed of destroying it, but at the same time did not offer a real way out of the situation.

This type of socialism was based on the equality and brotherhood of people, which was preached by the early Christians, sharp criticism of the bourgeoisie and recognition of state power as the main stimulus for the development of the socialist system of society. More proposed to build a social system of an absolutely perfect kind - complete freedom, equality and fraternity for any person.

Marxist socialism

For the first time, Marx and Engels began to turn the theoretical utopian model of socialism into a science that can be put into practice at least a little. They believed that in the course of normal historical development after the class struggle of the proletariat, which called all working people to itself, a socialist society can be built.

In Marxist theory, socialism was considered just one of the steps by which a capitalist state can become communist. That is, he was assigned only an auxiliary role. Both economists recognized that this type of society must have some features of capitalism, and therefore all the results of labor had to be distributed according to the contribution made by the individual worker. The principle of equivalence was put at the basis of this type of socialism, but at the same time, nothing can be in personal property except individual consumer goods. And private enterprise should be criminalized.

Stages of development

In modern literature, there is enough conflicting information about how the construction of a socialist society should take place. However, two main stages can still be distinguished:

• dictatorship of the proletariat;
• general society.

It is not customary to single out a special stage, during which the restructuring of society into a nationwide one takes place directly. This is still the reason for numerous disputes between scientists. For some of them highlight the third stage - outgrowing.

Building a developed socialist society in the USSR

In practice, in the Soviet Union for a long time they tried to build a socialist state, but it was not initially possible to do this. The writing of the phrase "USSR is a developed socialist society" in the Constitution does not at all make the country such. The goals set by socialism are unnecessarily utopian. Governance of the state is impossible with a huge mass of people - a leader is definitely needed. In Russia, they were Stalin, Khrushchev and many others who led the team.

At the moment, it is generally accepted that despite the construction of a model of socialism based on all its dogmas, in practice, such a state simply could not exist, and therefore the collapse occurred. However, it is worth paying attention to: socialism in the country was at an early stage and underwent many deformations.

As a result, it cannot be said that it has become the most disgusting of the existing social systems. Howeverit can be argued that socialism in the USSR had many shortcomings, so it really could not be considered as such.