In a discussion, I recently made the following statement:

“Giving the government a superior interest over the individual is the Socialist view of the relationship between individuals and society.

Basically it says the individual is inferior to the collective.”

I was lambasted for saying this, and criticized for not recognizing the distinction between Socialism and Authoritarianism.

But I would stand by my statement, if not for a rigorous analysis, then for its practical eventuality.

Although in political and economic theory, in the purest sense, there may be a distinction, in practice socialism acts almost identically to authoritarianism.

Socialism seeks to empower man and mankind, by making us all equal under the law and in society; equal socially, economically, intellectually, and aspirationally.

By making us all equal, no one can claim a racial, sexual or intellectual superiority, or abuse a higher level of wealth or influence, to prejudice others.

Being equal also guarantees equal treatment and affirmative rights under the law, such as the rights to receive the modern needs of living, food, clothing, shelter, health care, transportation, and education.

Being equal also of course obversely demands that by law every person has an equal responsibilty and obligation to contribute their equal share of effort to everyone else. In modern societies, this translates into contributing most, if not all, of one's cash earnings to society.

Thus Socialism has the ideal of equality on all levels. Non-discretionary equality. That is – enforced equality, enforced available care, and enforced complete taxation.

That is the ideal of socialism: to each it is to provide all his needs, from each it takes from him all his abilities to produce. Variations on these absolutes, are simply variations from actual Socialism.

In theory, it almost sounds doable. If doable, it would even be an enviable existence for a large portion of the world's population, who would be happy to trade all their work product for the guaranteed necessities of life.

However, in practice, Socialism suffers from several pernicious problems, directly resultant from the fact that human beings are not eusocial animals, to wit:

Not Everyone is Equal;

People endeavor in relation to their perceived return;

People sometimes want more than they need;

Not Everyone values equal social services equally;

Not Everyone cares to be regimented, despite guaranteed services.

As ants, or wasps, Socialism would suit us perfectly, we would (most all) be equal, work as hard as we could, be treated equally, and be provided with everything we need to survive.

But we are not ants or wasps. We are people, and people although leaning strongly social for companionship and support, are equally (or more so) independent creatures as well, who wither when forced to formfit into a social class. The will to break out of an imposed caste is endemic, and does not cease until that freedom is achieved.

As an economically driven social political system, Socialism frays about from within due to the nature of human beings, and their innate vexation against uniformity.

But another level, Socialism suffers from another instability, not related to the nature of the governed, but rather the nature of the governers.

And it is in that, that the practice of Socialism devolves rapidly into Authoritarianism, the very thing its promoters seek to avoid – the stratification of individual inequality.

In Authoritarianism we find entrenched social classes, some classes afforded a legal status of superiority and privilege above others.

We therein find the right to legally impose onerous obligations upon one class to the benefit of another class of people. And the right of another class to make those decisions unilaterally of the governed.

So although Socialism truly is not Authoritarianism in the academic sense, what historically happens is, a citizenry that has willingly accepted Socialist principles for their government, finds that those in charge of the adminstration of those ideals are legally empowered to interpret them any way they want, as long as they superficially justify their actions as in furtherence of the Socialist cause.

The preemptive right of the government to enforce Socialist mandates by edict as interpreted by its leaders, entropically evolves inevitably into Authoritarianism.

The distinctions between Socialism and Communism notwithstanding, this eventuality is exemplified by the Soviet & Maoist communist regimes (and others), who always gave lip service to the idealistic political theory that was ostensibly the basis for their governments, yet in both cases they acted like dictatorships.

Much as in religion, the priest or shaman acts a proxy for God, and speaks for him, and in his name, in Socialist systems the Government acts as a proxy for the ideals of Socialism and makes sweeping policy, legal and social/moral decisions in its name.

In both cases, political power is not found flowing from the pure and noble origins that gives it its moral authority, but rather political power is concentrated in its stand-in, a changling who is not so pure and noble.

And much like God, who cannot speak for himself, Socialism likewise cannot speak for itself. Again in both cases, human leaders, acting as proxies for the ideal, inevitably corrupt the administration of the theoretically correct.

The old chestnut applies, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Governmental power will alway become corrupted unless and until that power is truly distributed among the people.

Socialism seeks to do this by making all contribute equally and sharing equally, by edict from above.

By contrast, Libertarianism seeks to do this by empowering the people individually directly, giving them the same rights and discretions over themselves as government traditionally monopolized for itself.

Whenever power is centralized, as in a socialist society, that power gets usurped by its administrators, and it quickly becomes indistinguishable from authoritarianism.

In both cases, Socialism and Authoritarianism, the Government purports to speak for the people, and reserves for itself the superior privilege to decide what shall be right for any individual in particular, in the People's name, and in People's governmental interest. And makes the fundamental moral decision that the collective is superior to the individual.

In the process, Socialism in trying to equalize everyone by freeing the people from themselves and self-interests, coalesces a privileged class, effective high priests who claim to know what is best for everyone else.

And by that authority impose their own superiority via an entrenched oligarchy. Socialism in practice always devolves to Statism, which is nothing more than thinly disguised Authoritiarianism.