It is on this point that I think John Rawls’ taxonomy of political economic systems can help to clarify what democratic socialism is about. In his book Justice as Fairness, Rawls discusses five political economic systems. They are as follows:
- Laissez-faire capitalism. This is what we might think of as libertarianism. It makes no effort to hold down inequality in wealth or income and, as such, makes no provision for genuinely equal electoral systems (in Rawls’ view).
- Welfare-state capitalism. This system has potentially quite generous welfare systems that “guarantee a decent social minimum covering the basic needs” but nevertheless “permits very large inequalities in the ownership of real property (productive assets and natural resources).”
- State socialism. This is your typical “command economy” system with an authoritarian one-party regime.
- Property-owning democracy. This system features private ownership of production, but that private ownership is very dispersed. I read this as being basically similar to distributism and mutualism. One could also read this as being kind of in the spirit of what people who are really into antitrust are in favor of (whether they actually could achieve it is another matter).
- Liberal or democratic socialism. In this system, the means of production are owned by society, but planning is done in a more dispersed way by the multitude of socialist firms. This system respects basic liberal rights and features democratic elections. Rawls himself has in mind a market socialist order, but you might be able to imagine non-market socialist forms that fit this general category as well.
Rawls believed only property-owning democracy and liberal/democratic socialism satisfy his particular egalitarian philosophy.
No comments:
Post a Comment