http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/14-things-bernie-sanders-has-said-about-socialism-120265
In the link above, a brief history is given of 2016 Democratic Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders' statements on his form of democratic socialism. Some critiques have made connections to Sanders having classical communist views, as described in our discussion of Karl Marx.
Sanders has stated in the past that he believes government should be accountable for the following: health care, free college education, and wealth equality. I believe that Sanders shares a great deal of ideas with Marx and I think the two would agree certain property destroys equality in the vast majority of instances. After reading the above Bernie Sanders quotes, what do you think? Are there significant similarities between Sanders and Marx? or do they follow different ideologies?
James,
ReplyDeleteDoes Sanders call for government control over the means of production (i.e. government owned businesses)? How significant is this?
Professor,
DeleteAs far as I know he has not called for the full nationalizing of any of the private sector although his monetary policy contains heavy amounts of financial regulation which may prove to slow economic growth if implemented.
This is highly significant because I believe fiscal issues to be the most important our country faces today. Not to say there are not a plethora of important obstacles in modern America that need to be sufficiently dealt with, but the economy is my main concern.
I agree with you that they share a great deal of commonalities. Sanders is too closely aligned with Marx for me to ever be comfortable with him being president of the United States.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your insight, I feel the same way about Sanders' approach to fiscal issues.
DeleteThe reason why Sanders has stayed away from calling himself a socialist is because people have been brainwashed into thinking socialism as slave-labor camps, dictatorship and no freedom of speaking and publishing. And I agree with you that Sender shares a lot of similarities with Marx.
ReplyDeleteI would not say people are brainwashed into believing socialism to be a violent autocratic regime, but there are negative aspects of the philosophy people associate with it that Sanders does try to shy away from. Indeed, they are similar on issues.
DeleteI agree that there are some similarities between Marx and Sanders, but I would not categorize him as being a firm believer in communism. Sanders views might overlap with the ideas of classical communism, but Sanders knows that if her were to ever directly say that he believed in socialism, that his entire campaign would be ruined. We might never know what exactly Sanders does believe because of how quick people are to judge candidates these days, but I do believe that Sanders views do overlap somewhat with Marx.
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