(6 of 13)
The legitimate achievements of Third World socialist states in building economies often suffer by comparison with what has been done by nonsocialist countries once in similar circumstances. Kenya is a case in point. Although it lacks significant natural resources, it has one of black Africa's most successful economies. Its secret: limiting the government's role in the marketplace, encouraging the development of a black middle class and welcoming foreign investment. Poverty exists, to be sure, as does corruption, but Kenyans live better than their neighbors in Tanzania (see chart).
LIBERTY AND FREEDOMS
Wage slavery. Exploitation. Alienation. These are some of the indictments that socialists have routinely hurled at capitalism. Promising to end these and other forms of repression, socialists have long claimed that their ideology is synonymous with true freedom. Excepting social democracy, the historical record argues the opposite. Instead of greater liberty, Marxism-Leninism and Third World socialism invariably lead to authoritarian one-party and even one-man rule.
Explains California Political Scientist Chalmers Johnson: "Socialist regimes produce welfare, economic wealth, but are underdeveloped politically. Most of them eliminate any concept of citizenship. In America, we assume that every adult has a political life. Under socialism, there is a monopoly of politics." The authoritarian socialist might retort that politics means little to a hungry, unemployed worker. But even for members of the American underclass, seemingly mired in perpetual poverty, political rights offer a potential way for making their grievances heard and eventually, perhaps, redressed. While it is true that capitalism's corporations and other interest groups exercise great power over the individual, they are far less potent than the tiny cliques that monopolize power in the Marxist-Leninist and Third World socialist states.
To be sure, the social-democratic governments of Western Europe and elsewhere have consistently demonstrated their respect for gradualism, the parliamentary process and human rights. Says a leading Italian Socialist Senator, Aldo Ajello: "Oh sure, our future ideals are the usual ones: a classless society, worker control of the means of production, overcoming capitalism. But these ideals have to be realized with human liberty. This comes before anything else."
Even so, social democracy presents some potentially worrisome threats to liberties. Ambitious economic and social programs have created burgeoning bureaucracies that threaten to mushroom, becoming much larger than those in non-socialist states. Arbitrary bureaucratic decisions can and do restrict individual freedoms and initiatives. Most West German M.D.s on hospital staffs are not permitted private practices, while Norwegians wishing to build cabins in the mountains usually have to spend a year untangling red tape.
These infringements on freedom are minor compared with those imposed by Marxist-Leninist regimes.