Alternate *Socialisms*

Socialism in its many forms has had a deep influence in world history. While Socialism as an ideology arose in the 19th century and took time to become a political force, the ideas of social onwership, equality and wealth redistribution could have arisen (and indeed, did) many times and in many places in human history.

So, in this thread we can explore alternate forms of socialist-like ideals, both before and after the conception of the idea. A world without revolutionary Communism, for example is interesting, but I'm also interested in similar ideas previous to the Industrial Revolution

It doesn't need to be called socialism or have red flags, or even share all of its tenets. But an ATL *revolutionary* ideology that expouses common ownership of property and social equality fits the purpose of this thread.
 
Actually, there is an alternate history I have heard of in which a communist revolution occurs in the Confederacy. However, "common ownership of the means of production" is interpreted rather differently, with the means of production being slaves. Thus, a society based on the common ownership of slaves and the "equality of all freemen."
 
Some agrarian communitarism may become mainstream from time to time, and even may take over some countries, but will fall again because it will be destroyed regularly by any industrial power. I think that this fits your idea, because OTL socialism grows when popular and decays when expropiated capital is fully squeezed.
 
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It doesn't need to be called socialism or have red flags, or even share all of its tenets. But an ATL *revolutionary* ideology that expouses common ownership of property and social equality fits the purpose of this thread.

Lots of that going on around the Reformation, was there not? Just give it a more theoretical basis.
 
Actually, there is an alternate history I have heard of in which a communist revolution occurs in the Confederacy. However, "common ownership of the means of production" is interpreted rather differently, with the means of production being slaves. Thus, a society based on the common ownership of slaves and the "equality of all freemen."
That's pretty similar to the political system of Sparta. The helots were peasants owned by the state but distributed to the farms of the landowning citizens. Of course there were still Spartans without land and the perioeci but the state owning the slaves is nothing new.
 
If it had caught on in religious circles first, it would have been more successful; I can easily imagine a Catholic Communist State encompassing Spain, France, and Italy, forming in the Twenties or Thirties after a War, based on the writings of a priest in the mid-C19th. There is nothing intrinsic about socialism that requires it to be anti-religious, certainly nothing anti-spiritual, and nothing that requires it to be pro-atheist, it doesn't even have to be secular.
 
Lots of that going on around the Reformation, was there not? Just give it a more theoretical basis.

If it had caught on in religious circles first, it would have been more successful; I can easily imagine a Catholic Communist State encompassing Spain, France, and Italy, forming in the Twenties or Thirties after a War, based on the writings of a priest in the mid-C19th. There is nothing intrinsic about socialism that requires it to be anti-religious, certainly nothing anti-spiritual, and nothing that requires it to be pro-atheist, it doesn't even have to be secular.

Indeed. Religious *socialism is worth exploring, and it's in fact one of the reasons I made this thread. In fact I wonder... the Catholic Church was for a long time the largest social and cultural institution in the Western world. Could it take the mantle of a Socialist *state* across Europe? Biblical support is not hard to come by, but political and economic changes would be needed.

And while repugnant, a slavocracy could take some similar ideas from socialism. But it would be, in theory, print and practice*, a state made for supporting ownership of power and production by a small ruling class. So I don't think it would fit.

*I know many self-proclaimed socialist states like North Korea and others fit that definition but they at least pretended a measure of equality in print. A slave state would not have that excuse.
 

In so far as left and right make sense before the modern era, I would say that the Church represented the left-wing during the Middle Ages. When you count up the feast days, at least in places where the Church was supposed to provide the feast, it looks a lot like providing free food to the people. I'm not saying they didn't skim some from the top, but the operation was far more than that.

Political and social change were abound in Europe following the War. It could have taken on a more explicitly Catholic tone, and if the ideas of socialism were first made popular by a priest of good standing, rather than by the atheist son of a rabbi (if I remember correctly), the people may embrace it as they did reactionary politics in our world, as the best alternatives to the status quo.

Even if a Catholic Communist State were to allow religious freedom among Christians, and I think it would, it would likely not allow so much freedom to non-Christians, so it would continue to proselytize. It would have built in justifications for the continuation of the imperial holdings of it's constituent states (the French, Spanish, and Italian Empires would not be dissolved if they formed this state), they would be no more likely to let them go than the Soviet Union would have released the Ukraine in the Twenties. Depending how the War went, this could mean state backed efforts to convert locals in some colonies, which could be as good or bad as we can imagine, or horse trading for Christian protectorates with a still secular/Anglican Britain. This could be interesting, if the Ottomans ended up on the wrong side of the War, a Catholic Communist State could be extremely interested in gaining the Lebanon and parts of the Holy Land, but may not want to take territory with too many Muslims, leaving Jordan, Syria, Iraq, and parts of the Holy Land in British hands. I'm not certain about how such a state would treat their Jewish citizens, like with the colonies, it could go either way, as bad or as good as we can imagine.

A hypothetical Catholic Communist State in Europe would be quite different from North Korea. It would be actively engaged with the world, it would likely have an empire and therefore solid overseas commitments, it would not have hereditary leadership (at least not on a national level), it would be highly federated, it could not be nationalistic in the way North Korea is, and it wouldn't be so absurdly outmatched by it's neighbors. It may even gain voluntary members from South America, if the system proves itself in Europe, even if it doesn't, it would at least be exported there, locals would attempt it.
 
And while repugnant, a slavocracy could take some similar ideas from socialism. But it would be, in theory, print and practice, a state made for supporting ownership of power and production by a small ruling class. So I don't think it would fit.
Well, the idea in the alternate history is that there IS complete social equality... for the freemen.
 
I think some form of socialism is pretty much inevitable as long as society has moved beyond a hunter-gatherer state, hence why you see "proto-socialism" all over the world, like Jesus in the New Testament for instance.

One thing I find interesting is the idea of medieval peasant revolts turned into an ideology. Something like the German Peasants' War and such. Of course, it was condemned by both the Catholic Church as well as Martin Luther himself. I think the fact that religious authorities tended to be cautious about such things, as well as the fact that just as how you can read socialism into religion you can read anti-socialism/capitalism into it, means that tying religion and socialism is difficult at best. That's probably why you had to wait until the Enlightenment to see socialism emerge in the form of the immediate forerunners to Marx and Engels. That's part of the reason why the French Revolution was so different from the English Civil War, to the point where the main point of similarity is "they both executed their king" despite said king being divinely appointed (as per Biblical passages about God having set up Earthly authority).
 
So far several people have mentioned the Catholic Church as being a patron of or example for *socialist ideas, but my first thought regarding this topic was with the various Utopian social experiments and planned religious communities of early 19th century America. Perhaps one of these communities manages to somehow thrive and provide an example for others, and some sort of agrarian pious socialism becomes mainstream prior to Marx (add free love, millenarianism, polygamy, etc. to taste). Obviously, industrialization and urbanization are going to throw a wrench into the spread of any system that idealizes a rural agrarian community with only limited cottage industry, but that's not to say that a future thinker can't take the ideal of a 'New Harmony'-type town and try to apply it to a whole society and work from there.
 
The main problem with religious *socialism is the fact that the Church is an established worldly authority which has made an accommodation with the princes and kings of Christendom, and thus have a vested interest in the status quo. Dissenters before the Protestant Reformation are thus called heretics, and thus was the Peasants' War crushed underfoot.
 
So far several people have mentioned the Catholic Church as being a patron of or example for *socialist ideas, but my first thought regarding this topic was with the various Utopian social experiments and planned religious communities of early 19th century America. Perhaps one of these communities manages to somehow thrive and provide an example for others, and some sort of agrarian pious socialism becomes mainstream prior to Marx (add free love, millenarianism, polygamy, etc. to taste). Obviously, industrialization and urbanization are going to throw a wrench into the spread of any system that idealizes a rural agrarian community with only limited cottage industry, but that's not to say that a future thinker can't take the ideal of a 'New Harmony'-type town and try to apply it to a whole society and work from there.

Just as an off-thread thing -- I grew up near New Harmony, and visited there often as a kid. It was a bit surreal walking around the streets, and seeing how tourism (capitalist version) was making hay of an old utopian socialist experiment. My first lesson in Good Intentions versus Unintended Consequences.
 
There's also the Diggers and Levellers during the English Revolution- get a more charismatic leader among them, displace (somehow) Cromwell, and have the bulk of the New Model Army side wth the radicals.
 
The main problem with a Catholic Socialist movement is that the Popes and the lower church authorities have generally been strongly opposed to revolutionary movements. The nascent Christian Democratic movement in France was ordered to close up shop because the Pope feared that it might undermine the authority of the Church. Had the Pope not ordered it to end, or the leaders of the movement ignored the Pope, then it was likely to turn into something of a Christian Social Democratic movement (French political Christianity tended to be more left-wing than German political Christianity at this point).

Another possible alternative to Socialism in the 20th Century is Technocracy Movement of the US and Canada.

I suppose there is no reason why either political movement couldn't get started during the 19th Century.

fasquardon
 
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