“But real socialism has never been tried!”
Just in time for the holidays, a quick – but not too quick – primer on socialism in three democratic countries where it was tried, failed, and democratically rejected.
For my money, they could have added Sweden and Denmark.
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Add Ireland to that list. I spent the summer of 78′ walking though the west country and believe me, it was strictly third world. Pitiful Tinker children begged on every other street corner in Galway, kneeling on the cobblestone barelegged in the cold rain. The power went out two and three times a day due to strikes. You had to wait in line at the post office to make a long distance call.
I could go on endlessly.
When I returned in 1999, the Tinker kids were replaced by BMW’s and the shops and bars were bursting with activity.
Socialism and capitalism, night and day.
For my money, they could have added Sweden and Denmark.
I don’t think this is correct. There never was, that I can recall, a nationalization of industries. Private property, commercial and private, has always existed.
One could argue that the almost complete takeover of government by the Social Democrats for some 70 years is proof of socialism’s presence, but due to the parliamentary mechanisms, the expected “dictatorship of the proletariat” never came to be. There was, thus, nothing to reject.
Not all of us like socialism.. But way too many do admittedly.
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