Social Welfare, Liberalism, and Progressivism are NOT Socialist

 

As a political historian, which is the core of my academics, I cringe when I hear Right wing pundits decry social welfare as socialism. It may indeed be liberal and progressive, but welfare is NOT socialism, even where it is social. I also hate when capitalism is demonized.

Socialism is an economic system whereby property is owned holistically by a community, citizenry, or representative government. Communism is the extreme of socialism. Whereas socialism is compatible with democracy, communism enforces public ownership of property through authoritarianism. Social welfare, on the other hand, is not the public ownership of property and industry. Rather, it is a means to ensure classically liberal ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness through an attempt at leveling the playing field so that everyone has an equal starting place -- not finishing. 

Welfare is 1) about fair opportunity, and 2) about civic responsibility. A nation and its economy succeed when equal opportunity creates more capitalistic competition. Welfare is a check on the imbalance of monopolies and economic disparities that squelch opportunity. By disparities, I do not mean that CEOs and business owners need to make a parallel wage to the worker, but rather the vast wage gaps that essentially makes workers into indentured slaves for corporations. I think of Japan, which employs a closer wage ratio between executives and labor as a check. Japanese big business CEOs typically make 1/6 or less that of American CEOs, who in turn often make in excess of 300x that of the average American worker. This extreme in America keeps opportunity low, people in poverty, and reduces competition, which is necessary for healthy capitalist nations.

Welfare is about a hand-up first, and not merely a handout. Although, conservatism is correct in its wariness of some welfare programs as self-defeating. It is possible for hand-ups to become handouts if caps and limitations aren't placed on them. That doesn't mean welfare is unnecessary, because we are responsible for one another as a civil society. Checks and balances are needed in both directions. 

So what is progressivism? 

Progressives are those who seek to address and redress societal ills through legislative measures. They are positivists and seek to legislate certain rights. Progressives have historically ranged between liberal and conservative bases, based on specific socio-political aims. Some of the earliest progressives were what we would call conservative Christians today. They were concerned with social problems like alcoholism, gambling, and so forth. Their legislative efforts led to things like prohibition, which sought to conserve the moral fabric of society. This did not work, because progressive action was compulsory. 

Other progressives were what we think of today as liberals, who desired an equal playing field for the marginalized of society (women, blacks, Natives, etc.), which is consistent with the liberalism of our founding. Yet, late nineteenth and early twentieth-century society was still dominated by white propertied men, who pushed back. "Liberal," in time, became a pejorative and synonym for Left oriented progressiveness, which was certainly more communitarian and social than the Right's conservatism, which centered around property ownership. The question is whether the rights to property (a classically liberal stance) trumped a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which demanded an equal starting place or opportunity (also classically liberal). 

Read that last sentence again. Both the property-minded Right and the equal-opportunity oriented Left are expressions of classical liberalism. Both perspectives are necessary for making a holistic liberty-loving society. In short, Right wing and Left wing are wings of the same bird and the bird cannot fly without either wing. And disagreements between the two can push for civil compromise, so having differences can be healthy. What we have today is pure grandstanding by both parties to the detriment of holism. We are always divided by our differences, but like spoiled children, we often retreat to our respective corners to pout and nothing gets done.

In the end, we ought not fear welfare, liberalism, progressivism, capitalism, or conservatism, as these are all cogs within our system. None of these are socialism or communism. Rather, these things can be checks and compliments to one another. We need to move beyond the name calling and tribalism.