What is a Socialist Society?
Socialist Society — The Pinnacle of Democracy
In a Socialist society the economy is democratically controlled by the people as a whole. Any large scale property and infrastructure used for economic activity belongs to the people as a whole and not to individuals or small groups of wealthy shareholders.
All of the economic decisions pursued by this minority — the Capitalist minority — are aimed solely at increasing their share of the national wealth in one way or another. Using every means available to them as exclusive owners of every important aspect of the economy, they work only to increase profit. In doing so the Capitalist minority diverts the wealth of society as a whole from being applied toward the fulfillment of the basic needs, the possibilities and the aspirations of society as a whole.
In a Socialist society the people as a whole will decide directly on the economic political course most beneficial to society through the most involved and deeply developed democracy. This will not be democracy, in the present sense, of voicelessness and empty ritual. Casting ballots every two to six years to approve this or that Capitalist politician. Democracy will for the first time, and in the full sense of the word, be realized as a practical and everyday way of life.
By instituting a rational, democratically planned Socialist society, the people as a whole will be able to choose the way of life which will satisfy the needs and aspirations of every member of society. Such a society will base itself on the direct input of society in every field of life and there will cease to be inequality and exploitation of the majority by a privileged minority.
Socialist Society — An Economy That Puts Humans First
In the present the worker has only his ability to work and the worker depends on this completely to provide the means for the worker’s survival. The Capitalist owns the resources and real estate of business and makes a profit out of the added value of labor which the workers contribute.
The worker earns occasionally more and often less than the worker and the worker’s family needs to survive. The value of the labor of many workers producing goods or providing services is far more valuable than the wages that are given out by the Capitalist employers. The remainder of the income of the business is kept as a surplus of wealth — profit — which goes directly to the Capitalist class and constitutes no less than 90% of the wealth of the entire world. This is what Socialists term exploitation of labor.
In a Socialist society no one will be permitted to privately own any of the wealth used in economic production or to exploit labor for personal gain. Work under Socialism will for the first time allow workers to have access to the exact social value of the time they put into work as a social whole.
Workers will decide on the balance of social wealth, all of which will go directly to improving the workers standards of living. The Socialist economy will for the first time put all people in a position to decide directly on the expansion of production for consumption, what technologies and initiatives are useful to invest in, and what products and services are useful or desirous to society and the individual.
All of the national wealth will be available to pursue these aspirations and no portion of it will be set aside as private property of any one individual.
The aim of Socialism is to transfer the economic and political power from the Capitalist class to the workers. For this to happen, workers must carry out a social revolution.
Socialist Society — A Plan for Common Prosperity, Instead of Individual Greed and Profit
The Capitalist class are a privileged few who own the decisive stake in the economy and reap the reward of these titles in the form of fabulous wealth and power. The lion’s share of the world’s wealth and the entire total of wealth that can be invested into new economic development lies in the hands of Capitalists. This minority consists of no more than 0.1 percent of the population of the world. The top 8 richest individuals — out of the 7 billion individuals on this earth —amazingly — hold more money in their personal portfolios than the combined wealth of half of the world’s population, three and a half billion people. This concentration of wealth and ownership of every aspect of the industrial and financial economy means that every single significant institution of society under Capitalism is expressive, by default, of the will and interests of the Capitalist class.
A Socialist society, by contrast, will be accomplished when the wealth available for economic production is owned in common, pooled together and managed according to a rational plan, through mass democracy. There will be no question of economic exploitation because there will be no special economic leverage in such a society which a minority could make use of against the population of the world.
Such economic leverage is represented today by the holdings of the Capitalist class. This results in present day inequality and exploitation of the people, as well as economic anarchy, nationalism, wars and destruction of the environment — all for the sake of maximizing the profits of the capitalist minority.
It is obvious then, that society must cease to recognize the exclusive ownership of the means of economic production by Capitalists.
Workers must organize themselves to take hold of the economic and political institutions which presently reinforce the Capitalist mode of production and serve to defend the interests of the Capitalist class.
What Way Forward? 