Democracy or Socialism, 1st ed. 2021
The Fateful Question for America in 2024

Author:

Language: English

116.04 €

In Print (Delivery period: 15 days).

Add to cartAdd to cart
Democracy or Socialism
Publication date:
191 p. · 14.8x21 cm · Paperback

116.04 €

In Print (Delivery period: 15 days).

Add to cartAdd to cart
Democracy or Socialism
Publication date:
191 p. · 14.8x21 cm · Hardback

This book discusses socialism and democracy. It approaches socialism not as a label but as an ideology. Based on a careful examination of what socialism is, traced back to Karl Marx, this book explains the tense relationship between socialism and democracy and how it has influenced political thought and practice in both Europe and America. This book carefully avoids conventional wisdom, seeking instead to originate its definition and analysis of socialism in its political theory and practice. Building on the relationship between socialism and democracy, the book explores how this uneasy roommate agreement may affect America?s future.

1. Defining Socialism
Why the definition matters
Communism and intrinsic tyranny
Unavoidable economic demise 

2. Economics of Socialism 1: Prices vs. Labor Value
Marx and socialism in practice
Prices vs. labor-value theory
The status nature of Marxist theory
The iron law of wages
Labor value of central planning
Central planning and human nature

3. Economics of Socialism 2: Planning vs. The Market
Capitalist decline: a false notion
The welfare state: socialism without central planning?
An unsustainable blend
The inevitable conflict 

4. From Strife to Spring
History is perfect hindsight
Russia 1917: from chaos to Lenin
Prague 1968: modest reforms
Passing the point of no return
Solzhenitsyn's challenge
A note on Charta 77
Democratic socialism gets a boost
A penultimate moment in Sweden
An ideological lesson

5. The American Welfare State Today
Ideological metamorphosis 
Welfare-state entrenchment
Welfare-state consensus 
Neoconservative endorsement
Capitalism, nihilism and socialism

6. The American Welfare State Tomorrow
Expansion is inevitable
A note on government size and economic growth
Equality or solidarity
Bipartisanship and welfare-state unity
Monetized socialism
Hyperinflation: lighting the torch
U.S. hyperinflation 

Sven R. Larson is a Ph.D. political economist and author. He has worked for free-market think tanks and been an advisor to elected officials and political campaigns. His scholarship and policy research are focused on the dynamics between the welfare state and economic freedom. Among his previous books are Industrial Poverty, which analyzes the welfare state’s role in causing economic stagnation in Europe; The Rise of Big Government: How Egalitarianism Conquered America, an examination of the ideological similarities between the American and Swedish welfare states; and Faith and Freedom: The Moral Case for America, exploring the moral foundations of the American constitutional republic.

Explains where democratic socialism comes from, and how it has played out in Europe

Uses the European socialist experience to draw a line into America’s future

Answers the seminal question: when is government big enough, and what does that look like?